photography work

[paulbrogden10]

Hello guys

I am here asking for some business advise from you fantastic pros. Here is little back ground info I left college coming away with a part time certificate in photography a 2 year diploma in photography a national higher diploma in graphic design photography and video and spend a year doing television production at uni but never finished it as its so expensive although as I here it you Americans have it far worse than us brits do when it comes to college costs.

Any way back to the subject Clearly I know alot but not put what I know into practice apart from the odd job done for friends and family. After leaving college I fell in the trap of doing engineering training slave labour training courses then fell into the call centre boredom jobs. Working for mobile phone company’s and banks.

This is not what I am into as making videos and taking pictures is my passion. Any way why am I writing this you might ask well I was wondering how I can get a job in photography and actually do a job I want to do for a change. Do I need a website is it needed in this day and age?  

I wanted to ask about Istock and smut mug do you think I can make a living from stock photography or will I need to mix it up? Yes I learned how to manually focus when I was at college. It taught me more than the colleges of today in the digital world do.

Any way wanted to say you guys are fantastic and I appreciate your time answering my questions many thanks Paul.

[Waddizzle]

I would have no idea, but I have known several folks who have been professional photograpers.  Most were photographers at professional sporting events, but one was in the network news busienss.  He was the personal camera  man for a major network news anchor.  Whenever he was on TV, this guy was behind the camera.  Who knew they had such a thing.

I mention this only to bring up the fact that all of these people had a couple of common traits.  All of them were talkiers, or what is sometimes referred as a "people person."  They all loved to interact with friends and strangers alike.  That love affair for personal interaction showed up in their photos.  They would want to get to know the people they were photographing as much as possible, which explains why a network news anchor would have a personal camera man.

[ebiggs1]

One thing right off the bat is if you love photography you don't want to become a photographer!  You spend 10% of your time shooting pictures and the rest of the time running your business.  If you truly love to do photography stay a hobbyists. Believe me way more fun.

OK, I am sure that didn't sway you one tiny bit.  So next you must offer people something they can not do for themselves. Something crazy uncle Bob can't do with his Rebel.  You need to have something people will give you money for.  Make sense yet?

You need advertising. You need to let people know you are in business.  Facebook, website, flyers, etc. You may have to do some freebies at the start to showcase your work.  Possibly you can find a mentor.  An older photographer that may be close to retirement that would be willing to sell his customer base.

"I wanted to ask about Istock and smut mug do you think I can make a living from stock photography ..."

No, not in any world or lifetime.  You need to work at it and I mean work for it.

You need to become one with Photoshop and Lightroom.  Are you?  If not make it so first.

[RobertTheFat]

You might consider looking for a job as an assistant to a professional event photographer. It probably won't pay very much, but you'd learn a lot and get practical experience that should serve you well as you try to move to the next level or go into business for yourself.