Photography: hellobo

Waiting to become a successful photographer can be pretty frustrating. You want to make the sales that prove you’re creating powerful images. You want the attention and respect of other photographers. You want to be a leader in the world of photography. And it’s not happening quite yet. But for those photographers who have already achieved success, life isn’t always easy either. Even Annie Leibovitz has run into more than her fair share of trouble, putting up her entire photography collection as collateral on a multi-million dollar loan. That sort of debt might not be something you ever run into, but there are a bunch of other dangers you might well find yourself coming up against as your name becomes known and your images become popular.

The biggest risk is that your photographs will be copied and used without your permission. To some extent that’s almost inevitable. Bloggers are renowned for their lax attitude towards copyright issues. But because few blogs make money, few photographers pay much attention. For those who are bothered, it’s usually enough to point out that an image is copyrighted to persuade a photographer to take it down and swap it for another image.

Printing Company Stole Thousands

A bigger problem is when companies use those images for their own commercial benefit without permission and without paying royalties. Each sale made by the firm is a sale lost to the photographer. In effect, it’s a theft of earnings, and sometimes those earnings can be meaningful. In 2007, Flickr icon Rebekka Gudsleifdottir famously discovered that several of her pictures had been used by UK printing company, Only Dreemin. Tracking customer feedback on the site, Rebekka was able to estimate that the company had managed to generate about $4,840 in sales from her images. In response to a letter from Rebekka’s lawyer, the company claimed that they had bought the images in good faith from a third party which had now disappeared. The images were removed from sale but Rebekka never saw her royalties.

There are now services available that can reduce the risk of image theft. Products like Attributor and PicScout can search the Web for your photos and inform you of copyright infringement. They may even contact the image thief and demand damages on your behalf, particularly if the usage was commercial. For big photography companies — and top photographers — it’s a cost of doing business.

It’s not just the images that can be stolen though. Other photographers have seen their entire business model plagiarized. Build a good, professional website, create effective copy and offer a working business model and you might well find that others rush in behind you and copy your work. They might not be stealing your images but in copying the way you find clients, they can weaken your brand and remove your advantage.

To some extent, copying will be inevitable. It’s part of being a leader rather than a follower. But there are limits. Grace Chon, Los Angeles’ leading pet photographer, has long battled against competitors who didn’t just try to copy her way into the marketplace but who lifted her marketing copy from her website word-for-word. Back in 2008, she was already challenging other photographers to be fresh and original, after spotting a copycat pet photographer plagiarizing her website. That wasn’t the last time though, and it wasn’t the worst time. Earlier this year, Grace complained to a copycat’s hosting company that one of their clients had broken copyright. In the following spat, her own site was temporarily taken down by her hosting company on the grounds that it was unable to assess which site was online first and which owned the rights to the site’s text.

Pointing out to a competitor that you’ve spotted them stealing your content may well be enough to force them to change, but it’s rarely a good idea to get into a full-scale fight about stealing marketing copy — however just the battle may be. A smarter position might be to assume that a competitor who needs to steal to reach the marketplace is never going to conquer it. Cheats don’t prosper because they’re cheats. They don’t prosper because they’re aren’t talented enough to do it for themselves.

Stock Pictures Look the Same for a Reason

Stealing marketing copy is surprisingly common. In response to Grace’s initial posting about the conflict on her Facebook page, a number of other businesses commented that the same thing had happened to them.

Even more common though is that when you create successful images, other photographers will copy your approach. They won’t copy the image itself, but they’ll try to figure out what made the picture successful, what buyers saw in it, how you shot it — and they’ll try to produce more of the same.

It’s particularly a problem for stock photographers. Microstock sites allow users to see which images have sold the most downloads, helping buyers to focus their searches on the photos that other users have considered the highest quality. That also alerts other photographers to the pictures that are currently the most popular among buyers, encouraging them to shoot their own versions of the same style.

There’s nothing wrong with that. Producers should move towards the market, and if you can’t learn from the success of others, who should you learn from? But it is a problem for photographers who have managed to build a name for themselves, who have created a brand for their photographs and who are trying to stand out from the crowd. It’s not easy to do when the crowd keep following you.

If all of those challenges, from thieves stealing your pictures to sell them, through copycats swiping your business model, to followers seeing you as the photographer to copy, sound daunting then it’s worth remembering that there are plenty of advantages to being successful too. Mimicry is the highest form of flattery, having followers means that you’re a leader, and being seen to be a leader marks you as the best in the market.

And the money is nice too.

Related posts:

1. What it Takes to Become a Successful Stock Photographer
2. Becoming a Successful Wedding Photographer
3. Carolyn Wright — Nature Photographer And The Photographer’s Lawyer
4. Entrepreneurial Photographers Become Successful Developers
5. Why Some People Will Never Be Successful at Selling Photos

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Photography: Gina Signore

The more artistic your photography becomes, the harder it’s likely to be to sell. Images shot for stock can have multiple uses and can please a wide range of buyers. But artworks have only one main use, they’ll only appeal to buyers with a similar sense of aesthetic, and not only are galleries the main retail outlet, they’re also very choosy. Without a track record, a list of prizes from juried art shows or an introduction from a trusted contact, art photographers are going to face a great deal of rejection and a lot of frustration. The ability to sell online though has changed the situation for some photographic artists. Zazzle offers products from leading brands alongside its user-made items, while Etsy has over 5.2 million members, and 400,000 art and craft sellers offering 6 million items. Revenues were $180 million in 2009 and by June 2010, they’d already reached $130 million. All of that money came from — and flowed to — artists who were earning from their creativity, including many photographers. It’s not easy and it requires that a number of conditions be met but photographers with the right products and the right strategies can make money shooting exactly the kind of artistic images that provide artists with the most satisfaction.

The right images though are clearly vital. Gina Signore describes herself as an artistic photographer. She has a bachelor’s degree in fine arts, majored in painting, minored in drawing, and took a number of photography classes. Her works combine photography with painting, turning her nature photographs into unique art works, decorated with acrylic paint, enhanced on Photoshop, and filled with color. They show flowers and fish, trees and birds photographed during hikes in Michigan, while strolling through her own gardens or while attending her koi ponds, but with an extra artistic touch that’s vitally important. The Internet is filled with well-taken artistic images but Gina’s handmade alterations enable her photographs to stand out in a competitive market. They’re attractive enough to be desirable but they’re also similar enough to have a signature style yet unique enough to have a rarity value. Buyers will buy her images not just because they’re beautiful but because they’re different.

A Sales Strategy for Photographic Artworks

The right product though is only the start. It’s also important to have a sales strategy that’s able to deliver those products to buyers. Gina has her own website where she introduces herself and shows off some of her work, but her sales take place primarily on Etsy and Zazzle. Etsy, a showcase for artists and crafters,  is used primarily for original art, while Zazzle functions as an outlet for reproductions where Gina can offer large numbers of relatively low-priced photographic products to customers who are either budget-conscious or looking attractive but practical objects.

The images are sold in a variety of forms that includes prints, postcards, business cards, posters and even postage stamps. Several times each year, Gina also issues limited editions of her work, numbering and signing each piece before it’s sold, in the same way that her image would be offered in a gallery. Her best sellers though are photo collages that have been cut and sewn in many layers.

“These images become one of a kind,” she says.

But if art works need to be unique in order to sell, that makes the pricing difficult. Without a competitor offering similar items, there’s little to which the artist can compare his or her products.

Gina Signore takes a practical approach when it comes to fixing a fee for her work on online stores. The price, she says, has to take into account the cost of the materials that went into creating it, as well as the amount of time the work took to produce. Size is a factor too, if only because larger works take her longer to produce when she’s adding hand-made alterations. Some of her pieces can  take as long as three months to create. Paintings are more expensive than photographs and because they’re one of a kind, tend to be priced higher too. Ultimately though, the height to which a price can rise is limited by the amount to which the market is willing to pay.

“Currently, price is important for some customers,” says Gina. “I sell many more items priced below $100 than $1,000.”

The result is that Gina’s prices vary widely, enabling her to reach a broad market. A unique, signed, 7.5 x 7.5 inch altered art photograph sells for $79 on Etsy while a 2.5 x 3.5 inch miniature costs just $14.95. Mass-produced printed products such as those sold on Zazzle do have direct competitors and are therefore easier to price. Her business cards, for example, are offered at $22.75 for a pack of 100. But one of Gina’s non-photographic acrylic collages can go for as much as $800.

The Right Sites, the Right Products, the Right Advertising

Putting the right images on the right sites will help to make them available. Both Zazzle and Etsy, Gina says, are great sources for getting your work recognized by both customers and other customers. But with so many stores on both those sites, it will take some effort to stand out even when your images are better than most. Gina also uses Facebook and Twitter to tell her market that she’s added a new image to Zazzle. She uploads new images and products weekly, and re-lists items on Etsy each day. Art.com and AllPosters.com list a few of her posters, and Gina also buys advertising on Etsy each week to bring customers to her store.

Her strategies clearly work and enable Gina to show her work around the world without knocking on gallery doors. Browse Zazzle for posters and Gina’s work turns up on the first page of the most popular designs. More importantly, she’s also making a living doing what she enjoys the most: creating artworks out of paint, photography and talent.

Related posts:

1. Curator Explains How Banks Buy Photographic Art
2. The Best Selling Photo Products
3. Tips for Selling Your Photo Products
4. Could You Become a Photographic Bounty Hunter?
5. How to Shine on Zazzle

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Photography: Nick Gregan

Photographers who find their passion a competitive field can always console themselves by remembering that at least they’re not actors. While everyone with a camera believes they could shoot a cover for Vogue, they aren’t all trying — and even those who don’t make it to the top can still make a living from their skills by focusing on markets smaller than the film industry. For actors, it’s Hollywood or bust and everyone is pushing for the same jobs.

But struggling actors are also an opportunity for photographers. To win parts, actors need headshots and to get those headshots they have to turn to photographers, creating a reliable stream of work at a price that ranges broadly around $225 for a two to three-hour shoot. It’s a realistically priced niche with plenty of opportunities.

Develop the Connection

Nick Gregan, for example, is a UK-based photographer who has been specializing in actors headshots for more than eighteen years. For fifteen of those, one client alone has been sending him more than 1,000 child actors to photograph every year. His typical rates are £225 ($352) for a two-hour shoot.

The shots themselves are relatively simple. At their most basic, headshots consist of a properly-lit, attractive head-and-shoulders shot. The challenge for the photographer is to develop the connection and understanding with the client that creates a similar connection between the image and the viewer.

“This is done by the eyes, they must have the wow factor, a depth of emotion, focused in the right place and finally a twinkle in them,” explains Nick.

That may be where the creativity in the shoot ends though. Headshots are fairly formulaic. They’re images shot for a purpose and provide little freedom to the photographer to play with poses. While US casting agents tend to be a little more flexible and are interested in seeing lifestyle shots that might include torso-length images of the actor laughing on a sofa or looking particularly stylish, the traditional shot is still just the head, the shoulders and nothing to interfere with the look. The photographer is free to choose the lighting, the location, the crop and the clothes but the biggest satisfaction is likely to be thrill of seeing the image open doors and create opportunities rather than turning an imaginative line into an original set of pictures. When you’re shooting an actor, Nick explains, it’s important to remember that the client is the star and the best way to get the most effective shot may well be to rein in your own creativity.

If that sounds a little frustrating at least the niche doesn’t have to be difficult to break into. Nick Gregan turned to photography at the age of 29 after working as a doorman at a luxury hotel. Initially, he shot disc jockeys and musicians but it was when he was asked to photograph an actor that his career really took off.

“His agent loved it and started sending me quite a lot of people,” said Nick. “I gradually found myself drifting into this field and enjoying it tremendously.”

More than three-quarters of Nick’s new now clients reach him through his website which he works hard to keep on Google’s first page of search results. But most of his clients come in through referrals and through a network of contacts that he’s created over the years that includes agents, colleges and casting directors. Actors also need to return for fresh photographs as the years pass, if they change their hairstyle or if they put on or lose weight. Child actors, in particular, may need new sessions as often as twice a year, giving a photographer a chance to build a relationship that lasts a lifetime.

“It’s important to many actors to feel comfortable with their photographer,” says Nick. “Once a relationship is established it’s much easier to keep in contact and check how their career is going and if my headshots are making a difference.”

From the Head Up

While launch may be slow then, a good headshot photographer should find that knowledge of his or her work spreads, bringing in new leads and new central referral points such as agencies and colleges which can send a regular and large supply of new actors to photograph.

And what then? If headshots are a little like interesting school portraits, creative photographers may want a little more from their profession. It’s a small jump from headshots to portraiture and family shots, a leap that many photographers are willing to make. Art can provide another higher risk outlet that allows the photographer to play with his or her camera while the actors pay the bills. (Nick Gregan has just completed his first exhibition of fine art nudes). But at least one other photographer has seen headshots as an opportunity that can allow him to build a reasonably large business.

Peter Hurley is a former Olympic sailor who came to photography while working as a model. The success of his own photography business led other photographers to ask about his process and marketing, and in 2007, he launched PH2 Headshot Photography. A network of associate photographers in eleven cities, including London and Rotterdam, as well as San Francisco and Washington DC, the project allows Peter to spread his brand beyond his own New York and Los Angeles bases.

Not all photographers are that entrepreneurial and not all are interested in building a business larger than their own studios. Nor are all photographers excited at the thought of spending a couple of hours creating a headshot in which the only goal is to make sure that the eyes connect through the lens. But it’s rare to find a field in which the clients are as competitive as the people they hire, the jobs are regular and the connections can pour a stream of new jobs into your studio.

“Whilst other markets are shrinking and budgets are being cut there will always be a market for actors headshots as there will always be actors entering the market,” says Nick Gregan.

Related posts:

1. 3 Ways To Kick-Start Your Photography Career
2. The Photographer on the Movie Set

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