Advice required.

[DrJon]

Re: Advice required.

Paul - do those three services add up to much money over the year?

[Paulstw]

Re: Advice required.

Paul - do those three services add up to much money over the year?

Nope absolutely none. Crowdsourcing via twitter, fb and the like has taken over. Big news agencies like Getty, Reuters and SNS Group (locally) storm in, take over and have the clout to get their work out there.

The wee guys at the bottom like me, who get to locations earlier than these guys end up with some pics, that I fire up to Demotix, but it's always under a tenner for each pic. I've made £31 from the 19 news stories I've created. Of course the agencies take their cut and you never see what the image sold for in the first place.

The problem with selling pics, is that there's always someone else who will give them away for free buying into the whole "I'm famous for being in the paper" ideal. A lot of folk get into photography thinking they are going to be raking it in and they'll have a 1Dx within months of going live, but it's so far from the truth that it's enough to crumble you.

Unless you have a really niche market, or hit that story no one can cover quickly enough, then you're battling against the big boys or the iphoneographers who are at the scene.

[Columbarius]

Re: Advice required.

Nat,
Instead of getting involved with tax & insurance & the rest as a "professional", have you considered asking buyers to make a donation to the Cathedral or the choir that you support? You should perhaps also charge for quantifiable direct expenses such as the cost of printing or travel. And of course always retain your copyright of the image.

[Nathaniel]

Re: Advice required.

Thanks folk for all your good advice. No! I am not going to be a professional photographer as it takes away from my enjoying photography as a nice hobby. I will only take pics if and when I am requested to do so and depending on the client, I might ask for a payment of say £25-£50 for say 50 pics ,at the most ,put on a disc. Having said that I was talking to a recently married lady who said that the wedding photographer at her wedding charged £1000 for 4 discs of 175 pictures on each disc- 175 in colour,175 in B&W,175 in sepia, & 175 in something else (I think she said monochrome!).

[Ems]

Re: Advice required.

Have a look at the NUJ site for an idea of what to charge.

http://www.londonfreelance.org/feesguide/index.php?language=en&country=UK&section=Photography

I'm still living in hope!

[S_J_P]

Re: Advice required.

Have a look at the NUJ site for an idea of what to charge.

http://www.londonfreelance.org/feesguide/index.php?language=en&country=UK§ion=Photography

I'm still living in hope!

Excellent link Ems!

[Nathaniel]

Re: Advice required.

Agree with Steve above. Excellent link Ems and thank you.

[Paulstw]

Re: Advice required.

Maybe I need to stop submitting to agencies if this is what the papers are paying. I smell a rat.

[Nathaniel]

Re: Advice required.

Hope the rat smells of £'s signs for you Paul.

[wayne2418]

Re: Advice required.

Hope the rat smells of £'s signs for you Paul.

[Ems]

Re: Advice required.

I don't really trust agencies although I have had some photos published using them. My best payday was for three photos in the Sun for which they paid £900. If I'd gone through an agency they'd have taken 50%. A couple of other dailies were going to run the story the following day but the tsunami in Thailand happened. The pictures were of a postman being attacked by a pheasant.

[Bhuna]

Re: Advice required.

Do you still have the pet pheasant :)

[Ems]

Advice required.

No. I ate it several years ago.

[Nathaniel]

Re: Advice required.

No. I ate it several years ago.

Roasted,curried,boiled or raw?? However it was cooked did it taste good?

[Ems]

Re: Advice required.

I'm trying to resist making pheasant plucker jokes. Actually it turned up on queue. As soon as the postman arrived the bird landed on the road alongside the van then followed it along the road. It attacked the postman when he tried to get the mail from the postbox. Apparently it used to do it everyday.