I know that there are many of us around who may not yet have the confidence to say, "Hey, I should be getting paid for this, because I'm awesome!" Jay P. Morgan from the Slanted Lens gives you the kick up the backside that you need and provides you with 8 ways to get yourself ready to start making money in photography... Now.
We are so excited to announce that the staff writers and contributors from Fstoppers have teamed up with TogTools to give you a new series with an in-depth look behind each of our businesses. If you aren't familiar with TogTools, it is an awesome resource for new and emerging photographers to obtain industry information from some of the best pros in the industry.
The largest ring light I've ever seen consists of 27 bulbs and is four feet in diameter. Six months ago, I built it. With so many questions left unanswered, I put together a short film that explains how I built it, why it was built, and why it's the most amazing light I've ever used to date.
When teaching workshops and talking to other photographers, I’m constantly asked how I market myself to gain more exposure and business. While there are no surefire ways to insure your success when it comes to marketing, I have found four really unconventional ways to better market myself.
Widely known among photographers for his role as founder and publisher of The Luminous Landscape, Michael Reichmann has been heading “LuLa” since 1999. After a decade and a half of writing, running workshops, and creating premium video content for photographers worldwide, Mr. Reichmann admits, “LuLa has grown up.
With the announcement of Aperture's retirement, many of Apple's software users are seeking a new home for their image libraries. One of the most obvious choices is Adobe's Photoshop Lightroom. But moving those images from Aperture to Lightroom can be a little tricky. A new app has made it out of Beta and hit the app store that may provide an easier solution.
Having recently moved from a DSLR into medium format digital, I can affirm the transition isn't a cheap one. Besides shelling out tens-of-thousands of dollars for a body and digital back, you've also got to buy a new set of lenses which average around $4k each. Add tether cables, tripod mounts, additional batteries, and filters, you're in the hole for the equivelent of a home mortgage.
Over the years I have been able to organically build a base of over 26,500+ people that follow my work on Facebook. In addition, while many complain that Facebook is only sharing their posts with less than 10% of their fan base, I am averaging around 40% of my fans that are seeing my posts. So what's the secret?
Flickr surprised us all (pleasantly) when they gave us an unheard-of free 1TB block of photo storage. Today, their platform is becoming even more powerful with "Curated Connections," a program that Flickr will start to help its users license their work.
We all have our own motivation for the images we choose to make. Every photographer has that little voice, that driving force pushing you toward the goal, or that feeling in your gut when you really nailed it.
Maybe that works to your advantage now, but at some point, it’s likely to break loose and run wild…for better or for worse.
As your photography archive grows, so does the need to handle and protect that data. What happens if your computer doesn’t boot, or an image file won’t open? What if your home or studio gets robbed, or worse, catches fire? What if your backup drive fails, or your laptop gets stolen? These are all questions I ask myself when planning my backup strategy.
I have only been shooting photography for a little over 3 years now. Things have progressed so quickly during that period of time that I haven't really had the chance to look back at the evolution of my photography. I had to think thing long and hard about the investments I have made over the 3 years and the things that really changed the game for me.
Early on, I faced some bullying from older photographers that viewed me as competition and tried to convince me to quit my budding photo career. Ever since, I have been particularly aware and sensitive to how photographers treat and/or handle each other.
Most of us approach our pricing with some apprehension and anxiety. It is a topic of much discussion and debate among creative professionals, but with a little ingenuity, you can break away from boring pricing and use it in a way that will excite your client and build a brand identity!
Prepping for the off season is something we rarely do, as we barely have time to keep our heads above water during the busy season. Even though we may break goals and surpass expectations at certian times, there are always a few months out of the year where we feel like we are starving for work.
At first when I saw the title of the document in question "The Photographers Guide to Instagram," I was hesitant and almost blew it off as yet another cliché, small list of tips and tricks that have been passed around for the past 4 years since the inception of the popular photo sharing app.
Photographer Lukas Renlund recently traveled to Cape Town, South Africa where he had his "Steal My Photograph!" photo exhibition. This is the forth show/exhibition of its kind, in which he asked random people who passed by to try and steal his work. He decided to create value (or at least perception of value) for his art by making it worthy of stealing.
On June 25th, the action/sports camera GoPro went public and their stock grew 50% in value overnight. Their 2013 earnings were almost 1 billion dollars and their small, tough, and waterproof camera has become the world's highest selling camera. Can this company's growth continue?
As a wedding photographer I am always looking for tools that make my job easier and the experience for my clients better. For years one of my least favorite parts of my job was getting feedback and approvals on wedding albums I designed for my clients. Fortunately all that has changed since I have started to use AlbumDraft.
In December of 2013, Amazon teased the world with the thought of delivering (small) packages to your doorstep using drones, as first reported here. It got a lot of people talking. But since that initial announcement from Amazon, there hasn't been any indication that it was real. Was it purely a publicity stunt? If it was, it was a good one.
Over the past years Fstoppers.com has grown into something much more massive than I ever could have imagined. Patrick and I built this website from absolutely nothing and all of our success can be attributied to trial and error. We decided over a year ago that the new website would block NSFW content and today I will explain to you why we made that decision.
Back in 2004 I was given the Nikon D100 digital camera for Christmas and I started making money with the camera within a few months. I fell into wedding photography and within 2 years I was making almost 100% of my income shooting them. In the last 10 years I never learned how to process a RAW file (effectively) or use Lightroom until last week.
If you’re anything like me, you’ve got hard drives full of footage from personal or other non-commercial projects, that don’t serve much use once the project they were shot for is completed. I’ve considered trying to license it as stock footage, but never really taken the time to do it.
Regret is the worst feeling in the world but as humans, we feel it.
All this week at the PRO EDU studio in St. Louis, Michael Woloszynowicz has been hard at work showing off his techniques for an upcoming tutorial series on creating fashion and editorial photography.
Last year Mercedes-Benz USA (@MBUSA) ran a very successful social media campaign using Instagram and some of its top influencers to spread the word about the new CLA which you can read about here. Now, they are at it again with a new approach on the much anticipated Mercedes GLA.
I recommend watching this very interesting (and brief) interview of Ramit Sethi on how to charge more for your work. Whether that work is photography, videography, graphic design or anything else, he has some interesting things to say including why charging what others in your territory are charging is a bad idea. Ramit is a motivational speaker/bus
Presenting your work to potential clients has been made extremely effortless and efficient with the rising popularity of social media platforms and template-based portfolio websites. It has never been simpler to upload your photos to the internet and reach out to employers with a hyperlink.
For my inaugural post on Fstoppers, I want to run down of a few of the apps that my studio manager and I use almost daily to help manage the studio and keep things running smoothly. Many of these you’ve probably heard of, others may be new to you. The list is actually endless, but I’ve narrowed it down to these nine to get us started:
David Jay, founder of Shoot And Share a platform for photographers to share high resolution images with their clients, made a rather interesting comment on social media the other day. He proposes you ditch the rights to your work in celebration of freedom and claims it will make you a happier photographer and the world a better place!
Yesterday, Canon and Microsoft agreed to terms on a cross-licensing agreement on each of their highly valued patent portfolios. This now means that Canon and Microsoft are able to use each others patents easily, allowing innovation and new products between the two of them to be released much quicker than before, but what does this mean for the photography community?
You don’t need another image of the bride’s shoes, the groom’s bow tie, or some other “detail” photo to repost all over your Pinterest album. Really, you don’t. That’s not the photo that will make you the hero of the wedding day, or even keep you in the conversation for the rest of the evening.
A month ago I flew to North Carolina and was the Director of a 5 person crew for a week-long video shoot at a multi-million dollar corporate facility. Then just last week, I spent 4 days in Albuquerque as a Production Assistant, shooting behind the scenes images and getting lunch for the crew. My ego almost stopped me from taking that gig, but I’m glad it didn't. Here’s why.
Awhile ago, fellow writer Peter talked a little bit about barter, and how to use it when a client has no budget, as well as a few other tricks. We always think money makes the world go round, but if you're working with an individual, stand alone businesses, there's a lot more than money to work with.
"For the last four years this has been true: the top three search terms that clients are using on Getty Images are woman, family and business in that order." - Pamela Grossman, Director of Visual Trends at Getty Images. This is very powerful information for strategic business marketing, but it means even more on a societal level.
If you have been reading Fstoppers for the last year, you may have noticed our post about Wave Accounting for desktop use and how it offers free invoicing, receipt creation, accounting, and more. Now, Wave has just announced their release of an official iPhone app so you can create invoices and more on the go.
Adobe was very clear that the 2014 updates were mainly focused on what they have seen to be a rapidly evolving market: Mobile. Adobe is seeing a rapid pace of change, explosion of mobile, and a world that is continually and incredibly connected. But their software, for real-work at least, is still tethered to a desk.
Many people in the editorial and commercial industry still send out promotional mailers. But the truth is, if you are just sending out a flyer with a few photos, you are flat out wasting your money.
Last week, Adobe teased one of the many new features they will be unveiling this week during their launch event in New York (and online).
I've been shooting professionally for just over four years now – “professional” as in starting a legitimate business where I charge money to take photographs of my clients.
If you aren't growing you are dying. Maybe it is pessimistic view or a harsh reality for our industry. If you and your business isn't growing and adapting with the fast pace of an ever changing market and technology, you will become irrelevant.
The music business is a brutal, cutthroat, dog-eat-dog world and I lived it for nearly 10 years. Since the age of 16, I struggled as a touring musician, surviving off nothing but cold Spaghettios and sleeping in a decade-old 8-passenger van. I was fortunate enough to explore the nation and see things that most will never see, but by the time I left the business I was completely burnt out.
I've had some pretty amazing experiences in my life. Fstoppers.com has given me incredible opportunities like meeting Bon Jovi, or riding in the first Lamborghini Aventador in America. Our international workshop last week took a year of planning and insane amounts of stress. On top of it all, I had the flu during the entire week.
We get stuck, we fall into these positions where we call ourselves photographers and think that's all we'll ever be. That's not a bad thing, but the truth is there are so many different outlets we can flow into being photographers. For some of us, that means using our knowledge and abilities to help others. Thats exactly what Jose Rosado did with his new company, Zēro.
Do you want agency grade models in your portfolio but can't quite cut through the competition vying to test with the same talent? Do you want agency grade models in your portfolio but can't afford the agency rates?
So many talented photographers who dream of being full time professional photographers are too afraid to make the jump and quit their 'safe' full time job with steady income in order to do so. Too many people will settle for something they don't love doing just because they're afraid they'll fail doing what they really love.
Earlier this year Lukas Renlund, a 30-year old professional photographer from Scandinavia, sat down and tried to imagine what the photography industry might look like in 5 or 10 years. That imagination-session lead him to quickly start a new photography/media company named 'Not So Fast | Media'.
A number of years ago, I read on a photography/marketing blog that there are reasons why we, as photographers, should think about working for free.
As a photographer, your average day most likely includes at least one blog, social media, or image post.
A year ago today the Chicago Sun-Times laid off their entire photography department, replacing veteran photographers with freelancers and reporters armed with iPhones. This move left 28 people without jobs, including pulitzer prize winning photographer John H.