Make a living with photography
klgan
I'm quiet new to photography. It is very interesting and i'm stuck with
it. If I can make a living with, it will be great.
What are the many way a photographer can make a living? I can only think
of one, wedding photography. Im looking for suggestion and idea from
this group or a list of all the source of income a photographer can try.
Thank you
klgan
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Before you buy.
radi...@means.net
> Hi,
>
> I'm quiet new to photography. It is very interesting and i'm stuck with
> it. If I can make a living with, it will be great.
>
> What are the many way a photographer can make a living? I can only think
> of one, wedding photography. Im looking for suggestion and idea from
> this group or a list of all the source of income a photographer can try.
>
> Thank you
>
> klgan
FIRST, make sure you know how to run a business, as in billing, collections,
planning purchases, keeping records, etc. NOT doing that sinks more
photographers than their talent or lack thereof.
John
Rroberts549
I agree with John.. + either gain some marketing and sales experience or take
some basic courses.. As to the many ways to earn income.. their are lots of
ways but you still need the basic non photographic skills.
Ron
Jim Coe
--jim coe
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Like creative photography?
http://www.everydaymagic.com
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"klgan" <kl...@my-deja.com> wrote in message
news:8dmous$4iu$1...@nnrp1.deja.com...
> Hi,
>
> I'm quiet new to photography. It is very interesting and i'm stuck with
> it. If I can make a living with, it will be great.
>
> What are the many way a photographer can make a living? I can only think
> of one, wedding photography. Im looking for suggestion and idea from
> this group or a list of all the source of income a photographer can try.
>
> Thank you
>
> klgan
>
>
zeitgeist
>
> I'm quiet new to photography. It is very interesting and i'm stuck with
> it. If I can make a living with, it will be great.
>
> What are the many way a photographer can make a living? I can only think
> of one, wedding photography. Im looking for suggestion and idea from
> this group or a list of all the source of income a photographer can try.
>
First, think about the things you LIKE to do, and persue
it.
There are a lot of parallels you can make comparing
photography with other professions, one cynical observation
is to compare with muscians, for every guy making gold
records or sitting in the first chair at the symphony, there
are hundreds doing weddings...
The one used in many professional seminars uses the
restaurant business as an analogy, as there are a lot
marketing similarities. You can purchase a fast food
hamburger for a buck, a 'slowfood' burger for $5 bucks or
steak hashe for $20. I would assume that the costs of
materials are similar, the major differences are the
marketing and packaging. The folks who make the least
mark up and the least profit are the folks in the middle,
and that is echoed in photo studios. The guys making the
most money are the Kmart/sears and other high volume
operations, who make perhaps a buck each on 20 million
orders a year, and the very high end portrait artist.
for low end work, there are
sports, team and candid.
the latter requires a long lens and lots of film and cheap
photofinishing, show the prints and sell them for a few
bucks each. Team shoots requires some strong flash and
perhaps a crew with cameras and flash for doing the teams
and individuals, there is lots of competition for these
gigs. there are lots of teams though, the usual little
leagues, but there are corporate teams, school teams,
churches, and lots of sports.
weddings, the lowest end is to shoot and hand the clients
the film for a couple hundred, do two or three weddings a
weekend. I new a guy who left his hassleblads at home and
started doing this, charged $600 and gave the clients twin
sets from a local one hour lab, no albums, little client
schmoozing and he was making more than when he was doing the
proof book shuffle. Typically this is traditional style of
the most hackish sort, though there are some exceptions.
The high end has two distinct models, portrait and photo
journalistic. the portrait stylist usually takes a select
few carefully posed and completely studio lighted images,
all fully retouched and mounted in a handmade leather album
and average four/five K a wedding. PJ'rs shoot hundreds to
over a thousand images, capturing completely candid images
in a variety formats and the good ones (and in many cases in
both examples, good is often a marketing perception, though
one does have to have something going for them) also average
in the multi K's.
model portfolios, there is an even bigger chasm between low
end and high end model shooters, most clients are unemployed
teenagers and/or adults with self esteem issues and you
shoot rolls of film and the clients either never pay for
them or buy one and copy it someplace else. however, model
shoots can be fun, can be a learning experience, and if you
actually learn something, the experience can help in the
future, you discover that "normal" people like to be
photographed in similar styles only they buy several copies
for family, large prints for the wall and hand you a card to
pay for it. Lots of folks move into the highschool senior
market this way too. The high end is getting paid
corporate commercial rates for your considerable skills.
kids/family/pets the dominate paradyme is the stripmall
studio with some guy behind a counter, his wife in the
office doing retouching and packaging, and a coule
umbrella's in the studio. However, this has gone the way
of Dagwood Bumstead's lunchcounter burger. It is hard to
compete with a kmart/sears studio that sells their packages
for about what your lab would charge to print them. there
are those who do so, having a warm huggy personality helps.
doing things that the volume studio's can't, won't or are
behind the times with. but having a slightly superior
product doesn't cut much with the 'public' after all the
great cliche isn't great lighting, good pose, excellent
exposure, it's "expression, expression, expression." Some
folks do well pursuing the senior portrait market, there is
enough demand for creative work beyond the smiling in the
camera jr MBA cap and gown look that the school contract
photogs give, (even though most who skim the cream of the
senior market will tell you that those are still the
dominate sellers.) Then they get the mature families back
for portraits.
the upscale market seems to work via marketing position and,
I don't know how else to put it but a friendly sense of
conceit and arrogance, you act like you are an artist worth
thousands and can carry yourself as such, with enough
artistic skill and a style that appeals to those who can
afford it and people will desire it. Most that carry this
off do not emulate the mom and pop studio, their places look
more like art galleries, if they have a studio, it is mostly
show room and typically the camera room, if there is a
separate one seems more like an afterthought coverted store
room. They don't advertise specials, only $9.95 for your
first 8x10. They work on special projects photographing the
important business people in the community at the request of
the chamber for a gallery showing and fund raiser. and it
seems that if the mayor, the hospital director, the head of
local charity drive, the minister of the big church are all
shown at the $100 a plate banquet then lots of other folks
want to 'commission' a portrait too.
This nonsense is copied to the z-prophoto mailing list at
egroups.com where there are lots of other rambling essays in
the archives and even some original discussions about
photography without the disruptions of disturbed
personalities.
Pat Jerina
(magazine spreads), coporate (annual reports, brochures), catalog, and
advertising work. This type of photography is the kind that brings in big
money (if you can break into it). But, it also requies much more technical
know how and money to keep a float. Clients are usually ad agencies and
designer. They have a greater understanding of photography (to a point) and
composition.
pat jerina photography
214.893.0458 phone
214.696.1758 fax
http://www.patjerina.com
=David--M=
>
> > Hi,
> >
> > I'm quiet new to photography. It is very interesting and i'm stuck with
> > it. If I can make a living with, it will be great.
> >
> > What are the many way a photographer can make a living? I can only think
> > of one, wedding photography. Im looking for suggestion and idea from
> > this group or a list of all the source of income a photographer can try.
> >
> >
> > klgan
>
> FIRST, make sure you know how to run a business, as in billing, collections,
> planning purchases, keeping records, etc. NOT doing that sinks more
> photographers than their talent or lack thereof.
>
>
No point in even starting a business if you cannot do that.
radi...@means.net
I think we have and and/both situation here, not an and/or. You canb be the
greatest photog in the world and you will fail if you do not attent to
business. In fact, a mediocre photog will likely make more money than a
great one if the mediocre one attends to business.
This included organized presentation, aggressive marketing, etc.
If, OTOH, a photog with real talent ALSO does the hard work, he/she can
REALLY make some money. Sadly, a lot of photogs with great vision tend to
think of them self as artists, and cannot be bothered with the other stuff,
as it is very boring to them. Kind of a left brain, right brain thing.
But both components are needed, especially if you are a one person business.
Perhaps hiring a manager would be a good idea?
John
- Michael Leenheer -
Don't come up with a product and then try to push it. Find out what the
need is in your area and then meet it.
For example, with a little research you may find that there are boatloads of
wedding photogs in your area and almost nobody doing studio commercial work.
Guess where you'll be more profitable?
--
Michael Leenheer
Home Page: http://connect.ab.ca/~mleenheer
===
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===
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klgan <kl...@my-deja.com> wrote in message
news:8dmous$4iu$1...@nnrp1.deja.com...
> Hi,
>
> I'm quiet new to photography. It is very interesting and i'm stuck with
> it. If I can make a living with, it will be great.
>
> What are the many way a photographer can make a living? I can only think
> of one, wedding photography. Im looking for suggestion and idea from
> this group or a list of all the source of income a photographer can try.
>
> Thank you
>
> klgan
>
>
Alan Tutt
portraits, youth sport portraits, event portraiture (proms, dances,
Christmas parties, etc.), and other volume portraiture.
I stumbled onto this when I ran into a tough time with my own business
and became a part-time photographer with Lifetouch, a company that does
this kind of photography. I saw many times when 1 photographer could
pull over $5,000 (gross) from one school in a single day. Of course,
production costs need to be well under control to make a significant
profit from this, but it is a solid market in virtually any area.
I now market myself in this line, both to schools and to adult markets.
I am getting a growing response to it. Considering that I never was a
good salesperson, I think I'm doing fantastic with it.
One book that describes many markets for photography that I highly
recommend, is Roger Hick's book "How you can make $25,000 a year with
your camera". Many good ideas in there.
-Alan Tutt
kqualls
camera (no matter where you live)" but it is by Larry Cribb. Is that
the same book you are referring to or is there a seperate book by
essentially the same title but by a different author?
I did a search on Amazon.com and the only one they list is the one by
Larry Cribb. They do have a lot of photography books by Roger Hicks
but none by that title.
Thanks
Kevin Q
kqu...@chartertn.net
On Thu, 27 Apr 2000 19:47:28 -0400, Alan Tutt <al...@ionline.com>
wrote:
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>title:Photographer
>note;quoted-printable:My mission is to create Art that evokes feelings of peace, beauty, =0D=0Aand wonder.=0D=0A=0D=0AAny portrait, wedding or promotional photography I do comes with=0D=0Aa 100% satisfaction guarantee.=0D=0A=0D=0A=0D=0AWill travel anywhere in a 100 mile radius.
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>--------------5D34CA552F05C3D71D4073AE--
>
John Halliwell
<al...@ionline.com> writes
>One of the most profitable areas of photography seems to be school
>portraits, youth sport portraits, event portraiture (proms, dances,
>Christmas parties, etc.), and other volume portraiture.
I would only 'go pro' if I could get enjoyment out of it. Using a
production line approach wouldn't interest me (neither would weddings or
general family portraits).
Of course, for those looking for a job in photography, it might be a
lucrative market and may be worth checking out.
--
John
Preston, Lancs, UK.