Newsletter February 2010 See Previous newsletters here.
Hiya All
As many of you know I'm a little behind at present due to a week in Copenhagen which I have to say was a great deal colder than I had been prepared for. Most days it was minus 3 or 4 and at night it was a lot lower than that. Someday's we found ourselves turning white as great flurries of snow covered us. It made taking pictures out of doors almost impossible as we are not talking blue skies and Sun like on the ski slopes, but that grey dead light.
However now I'm back and have organised the next workshop with the lovely Samantha who some of you will recognise as my make up artist. She models quite a lot for me, and is really looking forward to her first workshop. She is also one of the models who is accompanying us to Marbella for our glamour holiday in October. So for those of you thinking to come this will be an opportunity to meet one of the models. There are at the moment 7 places left on the workshop.
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Marbelle 2010
Places are now starting to be filled on the Marbella holiday and its all very
positive indeed so don't hang around and remember you can ring and ask me
anything. Holiday
Page.
As promised here is part 2 of turning pro and due the emails I received it
seems a great many of you are looking forward to the series. Part 1 can be
found in last updates news.
In the first part I talked about the usual ways of earning an income from
your photography through the high street and the general public. I will be
returning to these in more detail later in the series, but I know from my
feedback there is a lot of interest in how to break into the glamour photography
industry. I finished the last part with the thought if you want to earn an
income from photographing beautiful women and if you are talking about a real
income so it becomes your full time job, pays the mortgage the school fees
and the holidays then you will need to do these 3 things.
1) Get an agent.
2) Find an agency you can work with.
3) Be very self critical and be prepared to put yourself about!
Let me begin with 3 first. I see a lot of work which is very good, but is
it professional in quality and presentation? Look at your work seriously and
most importantly compare it with other work. Ideally professional pictures
that you see in magazines and photography books. Is your work as crisp and
technically good as what you see?
My experience places photographers into 4 groups. Those that think their work is the best thing ever when in fact it's a little less than average and sometimes not even in focus. Those that take excellent work and will never believe it is good enough for publication, those that have all it all under their belts technically, but offer nothing creatively, and finally those that walk the walk and sell their work.
Where do you fit in? The first thing you need to do is get your work critiqued by others and be prepared to listen to what they say. This really isn't easy to do as sadly on the main photographer model forums there are too many egos and you can never be sure that what you are hearing is real critisism, or a different agenda.
I'm sure many of you are used to the photographer and model sites where both place portfolios of themselves and this is combined with forums on many subjects including critiques. However if you are not a regular poster and ask for a critique is likely you will receive no feedback at all and if you are a regular poster you will have both fans and dislikers depending on your posts, so very unlikely you will get a real critique.
There are genuine photographer forums where there are only working photographers so no one needs to impress. It means spending several hours on google hunting them down. When you do find one you like the look of check out what the posters are saying and see if it's critisism, rather then simpering comment. If it is, is it constructive and helpful? I find these forums are usually USA based. Must be something to do with the American psyche.
Once satisfied you have found a forum that suits you pick a favourite picture and post it asking for critique. Then sit back and see what the results are. Remember you asked for critique so it is unlikely everyone will say how wonderful it is. If they do move on to number 1 now, or find a more 'realistic' forum. Don't argue with the critique if it's good listen to it, if you feel it's worthless try to understand what the poster is saying.
When you get to the point that you feel your work is good enough then put together a portfolio of 10 pictures Make sure they show your strongest abilities, are varied is style and look, and please ensure they are creative rather than girl in bikini, girl in corset! Think of this as your apprentice piece if you like. Your portfolio needs to be way above average because people will assume you have picked your very best work to portfolio. When a cabinet maker was finishing his apprenticeship he didn't make an average piece, it would have all the skills he had learnt put into it. So the best advice I can give you is take your portfolio pictures as just that. Don't skim through your work simply picking the best, be creative, invest time and money and make it exceptional.
It's now you can seriously think about finding an agent. I'll go into what an agent does later in the series. Again the internet makes things much easier in finding these people. You will show them your work and if he/she feels they can sell your talents they will take you on as a client. It means signing a contract and he/she will find you work, negotiate the fee and take a percentage. This for the less business minded is the ideal solution as you are self employed, yet working for the agent who deals with the client, payment, and organisation.
Naturally he/she will have a great many contacts and will be able to provide you with work a great deal of the time. Obviously he/she will only take you on if they feel they are able to sell your talents and your portfolio must be up to scratch before you approach him/her. I doubt very much if you make an approach and are turned down because your work is not good enough you will get a second chance. You may receive some useful advice which may give you a second chance, but there are more photographers than there is work so get it right first time.
Finally for this session there is the picture agency. Put simply an agency will look at your portfolio and if they accept you will ask you to provide between 500 to 5000 pictures for 1 to 5 years depending on the agency. Then they sell your pictures on your behalf and take a commission. How many pictures you have to provide depends on the agency. Remember they have sole right to the pictures they hold for the length of time in their contract. If they sell a picture to a client for exclusive use and you sell the same picture to a magazine you will get sued!
I will give you far more details of this in future updates. An agency is not to be confused with the websites where you can upload pictures in any number and if they get sold you get paid an amount.
So if you are going to start you need to take some creative beautifully lit
pictures of some stunning models and get them critiqued.
Part 3 in the next update and I'll be going into these points in more depth,
Until I see you here, or until next time
Paul
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