Digital raising the bar?

[JG_Coleman]

Since we are talking photographers, I am amazed at how many people on this forum have a camera for a few months and want to be a paid photographer. I am also amazed that they get hired.

Well, hey... I am also amazed that you can see ten-year-old musicians on YouTube that are already better than some lead guitarists or drummers that have been in a half-dozen different bands over two decades.

True... how good you are is most often proportional to your experience... but, as much as some "seasoned pros" hate to admit it, some people just have a knack for it. The mere fact that a person only has 6 months to a year of experience doesn't necessarily mean they aren't skilled and worth being paid for their work. Oftentimes it does... but sometimes you get that rare individual that is just good at it. The photo-buyers decide who those people are.

 

[KmH]

But, like you said, "that rare individual that is just good at it" is indeed rare.

I also wanted to add. Many retail/professional developing labs that are/were doing prints from film, post process(d) images, without the customers knowledge.

 

[Vinny]

I agree that there are some talented individuals who can excel in a short period of time unfortunately I'm not one of them!

Since we are talking photographers, I am amazed at how many people on this forum have a camera for a few months and want to be a paid photographer. I am also amazed that they get hired.

Well, hey... I am also amazed that you can see ten-year-old musicians on YouTube that are already better than some lead guitarists or drummers that have been in a half-dozen different bands over two decades.

True... how good you are is most often proportional to your experience... but, as much as some "seasoned pros" hate to admit it, some people just have a knack for it. The mere fact that a person only has 6 months to a year of experience doesn't necessarily mean they aren't skilled and worth being paid for their work. Oftentimes it does... but sometimes you get that rare individual that is just good at it. The photo-buyers decide who those people are.

 

[Flash Harry]

Since we are talking photographers, I am amazed at how many people on this forum have a camera for a few months and want to be a paid photographer. I am also amazed that they get hired.

Well, hey... I am also amazed that you can see ten-year-old musicians on YouTube that are already better than some lead guitarists or drummers that have been in a half-dozen different bands over two decades.

True... how good you are is most often proportional to your experience... but, as much as some "seasoned pros" hate to admit it, some people just have a knack for it. The mere fact that a person only has 6 months to a year of experience doesn't necessarily mean they aren't skilled and worth being paid for their work. Oftentimes it does... but sometimes you get that rare individual that is just good at it. The photo-buyers decide who those people are.

Yeah, till you start charging money then have a tricky situation which you have no idea how to deal with, the difference between a pro and a new starter is the pro should be able to guarantee, through technical ability/understanding, the client gets what they want and pay for, where someone without the knowledge but a good eye can guarantee jack $hit. H

 

[jake337]

most people buying digital slr camera are not looking to go pro, they just want better equipment to take photographs of family, friends, and whatever else they want. I believe most pelople who dive deeper into photography than a, P & S, would pay more for a photographer with the understanding "you get what you pay for".

I would spend 4 grand for a photographer if I could afford it. I would spend 10 grand for one if I could afford it. I can't afford it though. What to do? I guess find a less experienced cheaper photographer for the job.

And as far as digital lowering the bar, well I guess that depends on your knowledge of computers and the world of digital.

Also when there was no digital photography around there wasn't a market for a cheap wedding photographer. I'll assume plenty of people from those days who could not afford one had no pictures at all or just some pics from a family members camera.

Being a photography may be someones dream in life. Is the fact that they're making money doing it early in their possibe career a bad thing?

"you know... in general, is the goal to make photos that impress other photographers, or to make photos that impress ordinary people that will buy them?"

I thought the goal was just to take better photographs and improve your skill for yourself. Photography is art afterall, right?

 

[kkamin]

I'm not a seasoned pro, but I did start photography 10 years ago when film was still the standard.

I think there were a lot of mediocre film photographers who simply existed because the technical barriers to photography at the time were high (shooting film "blindly", scanning film or darkroom work, f/stops, etc...)--there was a mystic surrounding photography and normal people were slightly scared of it. Now a lot of these mediocre photographers are scraping by, in large part because their work is...well, mediocre. If the art director can take a picture with a DSLR that is mediocre too and have the company's graphic designer jazz it up in post, they just saved a couple thousand dollars in production and licensing.

So I feel the bar is being raised. Before a photographer didn't have to be very good because photography was a seemingly more complicated process and normal people couldn't do it. Now the professional needs to provide something that is markedly higher quality than what an amateur can produce. A lot of professionals work that I see is not much higher than an amateurs work and I'm sure they don't fair very well in the market. A lot of professionals work I see in simply stunning and could be hung in a museum. They will always have work, despite economic factors and smarter cameras. They are selling profound and refined visions.

 

[newimage]

I'm not going to say that the bar has been lowered or raised. However, I strongly believe that the value and respect of the artform has been lowered dramatically. I'm not going to blame it entirely on the DSLR though. When I'm shooting I do nothing different than I did 20 yrs ago. The media is irrelevant. If I need to shoot at 250/f2.8 that's what I need to do .. film or digital. DSLRs didn't change anything .. 5000K is still 5000K .. a softbox functions just the same .. so on and so on. People use the excuse "digital cameras are cheaper to get into now" ... not so much. In the last 20 yrs the prices haven't really changed with the exception of the newbie consumer level setups. They actually doubled in comparison to other body levels.

The problem isn't the photo industry. It's the rest of the world. Back in the day when a shooter sucked or had no business sense to get anywhere .. nobody knew them. Nobody really saw the crap images they put out. What they saw was the shooters who knew what they were doing .. had the gear .. had the skill .. had the business knowledge that made it professional. Those were the photographers who basically set the standard of "this is what pro work looks like." Naturally there were exceptions but they didn't have much effect. Now we have the internet. For a couple bucks a month any idiot can setup a website or blog with their crap shots and they are telling the consumers "this is what professional photography looks like." Naturally a pro can look at the site and say .. wow that's crap. But the consumer is looking with untrained eyes. You get a million people and convince them a turd is better than gold guess what .. the value of crap goes up and gold goes down.

 

[kkamin]

Now we have the internet. For a couple bucks a month any idiot can setup a website or blog with their crap shots and they are telling the consumers "this is what professional photography looks like."

I think people can tell what is good, bad or mediocre. People are being flooded with more images than ever before, on a daily basis, and becoming more visually literate. Also, every phone now has a camera on it, and naturally when one starts to participate in an art form (taking camera phone pictures all the time) they start to develop an appreciation and literacy in the art form.

I think people hire "crap" retail photographers, not because they don't know any better, but because the "crap" photographers are usually low balling the market and in this economic climate people would rather have some photography instead of no photography.

 

[newimage]

Now we have the internet. For a couple bucks a month any idiot can setup a website or blog with their crap shots and they are telling the consumers "this is what professional photography looks like."

I think people can tell what is good, bad or mediocre. People are being flooded with more images than ever before, on a daily basis, and becoming more visually literate. Also, every phone now has a camera on it, and naturally when one starts to participate in an art form (taking camera phone pictures all the time) they start to develop an appreciation and literacy in the art form.

I think people hire "crap" retail photographers, not because they don't know any better, but because the "crap" photographers are usually low balling the market and in this economic climate people would rather have some photography instead of no photography.

I can't count how many times a client has popped back in or messaged us on facebook and said something along the lines of .. they placed our portraits on the wall next to a siblings taken by another photographer the year before and they noticed that side by side it made the others skin look gray or blue like they were dead .. yup it's because the other photographer didn't know how to calibrate the WB or they went overboard with some lame photoshopping .. more often it's both. It's always the same response .. I never even noticed it. I thought they looked awesome before but side by side the other photos really suck.

I wouldn't say that just because every phone has a camera on it people are going to develop an appreciation for the art of photography. If anything it encourages the notion that photography is nothing more than a novelty.

 

[kkamin]

I wouldn't say that just because every phone has a camera on it people are going to develop an appreciation for the art of photography. If anything it encourages the notion that photography is nothing more than a novelty.

It can be a novelty. Imo it is now the professionals job to create images that blows the client's hair back and instill in the client that they could never take a shot like that in a million years. The mediocre, professional photographer is unfortunately closer to an amateur, than to a talent like Chase Jarvis or Joel Grimes.

I think if you want to win, you need to find a way to make your images unique, polished, and look completely out of the realm amateur photography and mediocre, uninspired professional photography.

 

[newimage]

yeah I flipped through the Chase Jarvis iPhone portfolio and was so unimpressed it wasn't even funny ... major novelty points there LOL

 

[kkamin]

I think Chase Jarvis is a borderline douche, he self-markets himself in a non-stop, faux sincere way, but aside from that he is at the top of his field and has a lot of interesting ideas, is getting people excited about the art of photography, and is living a photographer's dream right now. He is shooting projects that are 100x more interesting that what you or I am doing. He is going to 100x more interesting world locations. And he is making a million times more money than what we are making, doing something he loves.

You sound very frustrated with the industry and overly protective of your views.

 

[Petraio Prime]

Ya gotta put 10,000 hours in before you get really good at anything. This is why so many photographers who learned on film are so good with digital; they already put in the time. Those who are just beginning with digital are never going to catch up. They have no need to spend the time to do it. They will always be so-so at best until they spend that 10,000 hours.

Yes, it has definitely lowered the bar.

 

[JG_Coleman]

I can't count how many times a client has popped back in or messaged us on facebook and said something along the lines of .. they placed our portraits on the wall next to a siblings taken by another photographer the year before and they noticed that side by side it made the others skin look gray or blue like they were dead .. yup it's because the other photographer didn't know how to calibrate the WB or they went overboard with some lame photoshopping .. more often it's both. It's always the same response .. I never even noticed it. I thought they looked awesome before but side by side the other photos really suck.

Just a quick side-note here that links this issue with one that has come up before in other threads. I really can't resist pointing this out after seeing a trend in the posts here.

The customer is NOT always right. They generally know next to nothing about what they are buying and, in reality, they aren't qualified to make intelligent decisions about... well... almost anything having to do with any type of specialized skill.

I just want to throw that out there, because sooooo many people are fond of saying that the "customer is always right"... yet, so many of the complaints about modern photography here revolve around how crappy photographers are kept in business by stupid customers that don't know any better. Who's really committing the crime, eh? The photographers that are trying to make a living doing what they can, or the customers that enable them to?

So... the next time you find yourself tempted to say," Well, the customer is always right!"... just remember, that's not true... and this thread is proof of that. If anything, the customer tends to be wrong...

And yes, we all play the role of the stupid customer from time-to-time...

 

[newimage]

I can't count how many times a client has popped back in or messaged us on facebook and said something along the lines of .. they placed our portraits on the wall next to a siblings taken by another photographer the year before and they noticed that side by side it made the others skin look gray or blue like they were dead .. yup it's because the other photographer didn't know how to calibrate the WB or they went overboard with some lame photoshopping .. more often it's both. It's always the same response .. I never even noticed it. I thought they looked awesome before but side by side the other photos really suck.

Just a quick side-note here that links this issue with one that has come up before in other threads. I really can't resist pointing this out after seeing a trend in the posts here.

The customer is NOT always right. They generally know next to nothing about what they are buying and, in reality, they aren't qualified to make intelligent decisions about... well... almost anything having to do with any type of specialized skill.

I just want to throw that out there, because sooooo many people are fond of saying that the "customer is always right"... yet, so many of the complaints about modern photography here revolve around how crappy photographers are kept in business by stupid customers that don't know any better. Who's really committing the crime, eh? The photographers that are trying to make a living doing what they can, or the customers that enable them to?

So... the next time you find yourself tempted to say," Well, the customer is always right!"... just remember, that's not true... and this thread is proof of that. If anything, the customer tends to be wrong...

And yes, we all play the role of the stupid customer from time-to-time...

Thats exactly right !!!! and deep down the consumer knows it. I've noticed that in general newer photographers who are still learning but trying to run a business get WAY excited when they photograph somebodies kids and the parents drop $200-300 on prints. Put me in the room with the same parents and on average they will spend at least $600-800 and upwards to a couple grand. Sure you have to offer them awesome images but you got to hold there hand too because they dont know anything and they appreciate it when you do. Your reward is making a huge sale. It's like me hiring somebody to remodel my kitchen .. I don't know how to do it and if somebody comes in and holds my hand and shows me all this stuff Im gonna cut them a big check to make me happy.