You have the talent, you have the training, you have the equipment, you are ready to be a professional photographer – now what? I am a strong believer that the education we pursue to become a photographer is often missing one of the most important elements; strategies on business, and how to sell yourself and your craft.

I am absolutely terrible at self-promotion. I hate it when people ask me “how much do you charge?” It has taken me a lot of years to try and find my self-worth, especially when it come to putting a price tag on something I have created. And don’t let me fool you, I still haven’t totally found it. So, take it from me, learn the skills when you are young. It is so very important!

  • Take Business Classes – If you are in college, no matter what your major is, if you ever think you want to own your own business, take some business courses. If you aren’t in college, you can go back or find some courses you can take online. Places like CreativeLive.com have some wonderful courses. Do it early so you have the mindset from the very beginning.
  • You are in Business to Make Money – As a creative person you put all your energy into creating. You aren’t thinking about down the road when you want to be able to make a living doing your craft. When that time comes you have to change your approach and remember you are in business to make money.
  • Don’t Assume – Don’t ever think the clients will find you. Don’t get me wrong, some will. At first, usually by word of mouth, you will find yourself with work. But as you work through your personal network things can dry up. You have to self-promote. You have to get out there and make yourself a household name. Get involved with your community, join your local Chamber, get people to notice you, and most important know your name.
Sitting at an event – they couldn’t remember my last name. It is now Photographer – could be worse
  • Keep at IT! – Keep learning, don’t get too comfortable. There will always be new equipment, new processes, new trends. Not just in photography, but business as well. Remember you have to keep up with the times and stay current with the trends. Most importantly – Educate Yourself!
Great Smoky Mountain National Park

One person’s idea of beautiful can be totally different from another. We all get that. But how can someone not see how bad they are? They have a camera in hand, they take pictures, family and friends say how wonderful they are even if they aren’t. They need to find someone who will be honest with them because they will not be honest with them-self.

One of the things I see a lot is the request for Constructive Criticism (CC). There are YouTube channels that focus on this regularly, Facebook groups that are there to help you grow, but do you listen? I belong/have belonged to a few photography Facebook groups. They run the whole gamut from very comfortable to downright mean. Some people will ask for CC, but they don’t really want it. They want validation that their work is good. When they don’t get it, they get nasty. People fight, say things they shouldn’t. Then leave the group and learn nothing.

I saw one recently where a young girl posted some photos very proud of what she had taken. They were pretty good but did have issues. Mostly technical things that a few people pointed out to her. That is all fine and good, but no one pointed out any of the good things. She had great composition, but her depth of field was off. One was a beautiful shot, but the sky was blown out. The CC was all about the blown-out part, no comment on how great the rest of the photo was.

Here is my suggestion to those offering CC. Find something encouraging to say. Tell them what they did right, not just what they did wrong. Then they will be more open to listening to what you have to say, and what you say will hold more credibility.

To the person receiving the CC, take it. By that I mean listen, process, learn, and move on. As I said at the beginning, everyone has a different idea of what they like. Personally, some of the best photographs I have seen aren’t ‘technically’ perfect. Photographers are the worst critics because they will see the technical flaws. The best critic is the one who sees what you were seeing when you took the picture. But also remember that the best photographers never took their art for granted. You have to continue to grow; if you become stagnant you will wither away. Most important, do not get full of yourself. These days there is always another photographer to pick up where you left off.

Iceland’s Independence Day 2015

I was having a discussion with a few fellow photographers the other day about not being given credit for your work. One of them had photographed an event for free, with the only stipulation that credit was given. They didn’t. Now I have had similar things happen; I am sure most photographers have. There are so many people out there who don’t get it. They think if you have a nice camera anyone can take the picture, so why the big deal?

There is also a trap you can fall into. You can end up being known as the one who will do it for free. I worked for a non-profit for a number of years. Your mindset is to help provide things for those in need. So when events come up for something dear to my heart, I want to document it. I have no problem shooting it for free, but why is it so hard to get the credit? If you ask, you become the one that only does it for the publicity. Is there something wrong with that? Isn’t it human nature to desire acknowledgement for a job well done. Whether it be a check, or a simple thank you.

There comes a point when you just have to say ‘no’, and boy is that hard! In my case I had a medical issue, my foot – what this blog began from. Bit-by-bit I pulled away from free jobs, and I just simply won’t go back. But there are a few I will constantly stick around for. One big reason is because they make me feel appreciated, and we all need that once in a while.

My favorite non-profit to work with, American Red Cross

I have wanted a more lightweight camera for quite a while. There are so many different cameras out there, it makes it hard to choose. As a life-long Canon shooter, I have no real bias. I started with Canon, so grew with it. If my first real camera had been a Nikon, I am sure I would feel the same way about them. Both brands have great cameras.

The problem I was having was deciding on which one. It is an investment, and you don’t want to spend $1,000’s to find you don’t like it. Recently I was able to make a $500 investment into a LUMIX GX85 kit that I felt comfortable with. But here is the kicker – when you have shot with one system for 30+ years, it is really hard to change. So, let’s walk through a few things.

Right out of the box – there is no charger. The battery charges in the camera. This has its pros and cons. Handy to be able to plug into your car when you are traveling. Not so handy when you need to get multiple batteries charged before shooting. Solution – you can buy a charger for it separately.

When you pick up a camera brand you have shot with for many years, you will instinctively know what to do. Even as models change, certain aspects of the camera stay the same. So as you upgrade through that brand, you ease into the changes and upgrades. But when you change brands, something that before you would find fairly easy, becomes a new challenge.

After charging the battery I picked up the camera ready to shoot. Ok, maybe not so ready . . . Firstly I am dealing with a touch screen. One thing I heard was that people were having issues with hitting the screen with their nose when attempting to use the viewfinder. I don’t get that. As soon as you go anywhere near the viewfinder it has a sensor and turns off the screen. I have more of an issue with the screen turning off if you come at it with you left hand and activate the sensor.

I set the camera on P (program mode) and took some pictures. To be totally honest, they were bad. The focus was so off I was puzzled. I went online to try and find some solutions. From all I read this is what I got. Canon’s P mode accounts for stabilization as in won’t go lower than handheld quality. The LUMIX expects you to adjust for that yourself. But the reason I didn’t key off on that was because if the ISO is set on Auto you don’t see the number on the screen.

Now this isn’t to say that either camera doesn’t have a true auto mode. Cannon has the A+, but until today I had never used it. The LUMIX has iA and iA+, so I will experiment more . . .

Shot with the GX85 at 32mm, f/5.6, 1/60sec., ISO-800 – with the pop-up flash

The bottom line here is that I did take some great pictures, so I know the camera can. It is me that needs the training. So check back as we work through this learning curve together.

Last week’s tip was to scout locations wherever you go. This brought up another point. I can’t tell you how many times I have heard a photographer comment about how they wish they had checked out the location before the shoot. I hope I am not out of line here, but why wouldn’t you?! I mean there will always be times when it isn’t possible to physically check out a location. But if nothing else I get online and look it up, find it on a map, see what the weather is like, etc.

Here is a perfect example. A while back I was asked to do a shoot at a local event location. I was told it was on the main floor and had lots of windows. The event was mid-day, so I should have a lot of natural light. My instinct was to plan for the light and to keep my back to the windows as much as possible.

This is the first test shot I took, jpg straight out of the camera (I shoot both jpg and raw). As you can see, the windows are all covered with curtains with colored lighting coming up from the floor. The ceiling is painted black, and all the chairs, tablecloths etc. are also black. The floor is reflective – in other words a white balance nightmare. Now, 15 minutes later I had the lighting worked out. I knew what to expect, what I would need to bring, and where the best places were to shoot from, and towards.

For a number of years, I would shoot family portraits at the Kinship Family Fair. Often this was the only portrait the family would get, so it was important to me to get it right. One year the venue was changed so I went to check it out. There was nowhere inside to set up. I ended up at a wonderful location outside, but this meant a totally different equipment setup. Instead of softboxes and backgrounds, I needed reflectors and sandbags to weigh down my tripods!

In other words – Always check out your venue before the shoot!