7 Ways To Make Money as a Photographer in 2021

If the global pandemic has impacted your photography business, you might be pondering other ways of creating an income while still producing images. Check out this list of seven ways to make money from your photographs.

Experienced photographer Zdenka Daulra runs you through her ideas for creating some passive income, especially for those who are relatively new to photography. Be warned: none of these are quick and easy schemes for making money and they all assume that you have some time on your hands and are prepared to work hard. You may also need to take on work that you’d normally never consider.

If you decide to start uploading to stock libraries, keep in mind that this will take far longer than you anticipate, especially when you’re starting out. Tagging all of your images is a mind-numbing process, particularly if you’ve not done it before. I strongly recommend sorting out all of your keywords in Lightroom before you upload your images as the image management systems used by stock library websites, though often decent, are nowhere near as quick and easy to use.

What would you add to the list? Let us know in the comments below.

Andy Day's picture

Andy Day is a British photographer and writer living in France. He began photographing parkour in 2003 and has been doing weird things in the city and elsewhere ever since. He's addicted to climbing and owns a fairly useless dog. He has an MA in Sociology & Photography which often makes him ponder what all of this really means.

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3 Comments

Way to make money #1 - Take a lot of pictures and sell a bunch of them.

Way to make money #2 - See "Way to make money #1."

Number 1: Selling stock photos.

End of the video for me.

I believe, the pandemic made us all get more creative in order to make at least some money. I've started doing smartshow 3d slides with photos and photo calendars on request, one of my friends started a photography course, even though she doesn't enjoy teaching, etc. there is always a chance to make more, if you are willing to.