Where is the money in photography

[Tyson]

What are the money makers, stock, portrits, special assignments, photojournelisum ?

[TPF Sponsor]

[hyp0rbyte]

Selling Cameras/lenses/memory sticks/filters/bags/tripods/
books/batteries/hoods/straps/

Isn't that what you spend your money on?

[Big Mike]

I think there are several books called 'How to make money with photography'...or something like that. Check out Amazon.com

Although, it's probably easier to make money by writing a book about how to make money...

[castrol]

Selling Cameras/lenses/memory sticks/filters/bags/tripods/
books/batteries/hoods/straps/

Isn't that what you spend your money on?

HAHAHAHAHA... best response ever.

It seems to take a really long time to get things going. I have been taking photos
for quite a little while now and so far, I have made a grand total of $350.00.

I, however, am not really trying to make money doing this though...

[elsaspet]

Commercial, Editorial, Portraits, and weddings.
Forget Photojournalism. :-( You can sell craploads and still not have enough moolah to pay the rent.

[mysteryscribe]

you can shoot enough stock shots to fill a boat and sell zero... you have to have the exact shot the customer wants, because even a small variation was made by someone else. thanks to the net the buyer can see many many thousands of shots. the odds are against you.

Play the odds. My brother who is a dynamite salesman says see what the successful guys are doing and do it. I would narrow it to, see what the successful guys are doing locally.

If you live in new york you might want to shoot small clothing houses cateloques... but if you live in rural NC you are probably going to want to shoot weddings and portraits.. Oh hell you get to shoot the occassional double wide for the local realty company as well.

....What you DONT want to do is go retro....I only answered this to add that part...

[neea]

....What you DONT want to do is go retro....I only answered this to add that part...

cute.
I like your work mysteryscribe.
I also like your new avatar btw.

And like.. BigMike said I think, selling books about photography would probably make you more money then actual photography. The fun part being that you need to know about photography in order to do this.
Perhaps everyone on TPF should make a collaberation of tips.
And we could all be rich.... ahh to dream.

[craig]

The money is in being a good photographer. The work is out there. Getting it takes dedication and a lot of experience and perseverance.

Also depends on your style of shooting. What are your strong areas of photography? Weddings? still life?... Pick a strong suit and go with it.

[Iron Flatline]

High-end fashion photography, candid celebrity (paparazzi) work.

[uberben]

I make money doing wedding photography. Not a lot...I net about 1,500 per wedding normally. This was after doing a bunch of free weddings though and dropping a lot of coin on gear. I probably just broke even after my last wedding. I wont even touch Stock photography, not worth my time.

[DocFrankenstein]

Commercial and editorial. Good luck getting in.

[JIP]

I think so far you have gotten every aspect of photograpy as a response and one thing that shoud tell you is that the money in photography is where you make it. Photography is almost 100% marketing yourself some people get rich shooting $10,000 weddings some people toil away shooting for someone else for a few hundred bucks a pop. Some people make lot sof money working for sports illustrated as a photographer some people make a few bucks every weekend as a stringer for their local paper. The bottom line is that if you can sell yourself you can make it it is very rare for you to look in the want ads and see "wanted 9-5 photographer".

[mysteryscribe]

I wish I had a dollar for every time I've said, "I'm a great photographer and a lousy businessman."

I wish I had a dime for everytime I've heard others say it.

The half a million a year photographer is the one who is both. More businessman than photographer I expect.

That is absolutely not an insult it is pure jealousy. If I had been better at it, at this point in my life I would be on a yaught not the internet.

Oh yeah, if it hadn't been for fast women and slow horses, I might have at least had a bass boat.

[RMThompson]

As a writer, there is an old saying by someone much wiser than me said this of writing:

"If there was such a thing as a writer who was a smart businessman, he would know better than to be a writer."

And to some extent, the same thing applies here. If you love taking pictures, really love it, you'll find a way to make money at it. I've actually found it MUCH easier to make money at photography than at writing.

My 2006 totals for writing: $120 dollars.
My 2006 totals for photography: $550 dollars. Since October.

However I make my money TAKING pictures, not selling them, so it's different. I've found out that people are willing to spend money on someone they can trust to take their picture, (especially since a lot of what I do is semi-nude), and its worth it to them to pay for it.

I don't charge anywhere NEAR the amount of cash as the big pros in my area. They charge about $250.00 for one hour of studio time, while I charge about 50 bucks for 3 hours in my homemade studio... because I am using inferior equipment, and the customers understand I am more amatuer than anything.

However, I honestly have had to turn DOWN work this week because I didn't think I would have time, or my equipment could handle it! It's amazing what word of mouth can do!

Good luck making money, as I wish you much success in doing what you love for a living.

I, however, have a day job I like too!

[Karimala]

A lot of people are earning a pretty decent income through microstock...myself included. There's a lot of controversy and debate about the micro-payment model and image quality on the microstock sites, but it's working quite well for me as a fairly new photographer. I'm earning enough to where I recently quit my full-time job and can now work part-time or as a temp...whichever I choose and whenever I choose. Within the next year, I fully expect to be earning a comfortable living from my microstock income alone.

My highest earnings come from Shutterstock and IStock (which is now owned by Getty), with StockXPert (owned by Jupiter) and Dreamstime both a close second. Bigstock Photo and Fotolia round out the remaining top six agencies. There are also a lot of start-ups going around to choose from, but they don't provide a lot of earnings. Unless you believe in a particular agency and are willing to support it during the start-up phase (for me, Lucky Oliver falls into that catagory), they are mostly a waste of time. But the others can and do provide a solid income and are worth checking into.

If you'd like to learn more from photographers in the microstock business, both amateurs and professionals, the TalkMicro message board is a great place to visit.

Good luck!!!