Tag: Professional photography

Are Camera Phones Ruining Photography?

Posted on May 8, 2016 by Marie Gardiner

Everyone’s a Photographer

With most people having access to a camera phone these days, it seems like everyone has suddenly become a photographer. Antonio Olmos told The Guardian,

‘There have never been so many photographs taken, but photography is dying’.

A strong statement for sure, but is it really accurate?

Death of Enjoyment

The last gig I went to was a few years ago and I remember the majority of the audience filming and photographing the gig with their smartphones. Even though (and perhaps because) I’m a photographer, I was very conscious of wanting to watch the performers rather than peering through a lens or phone. I understand the mindset of wanting to capture some memories to look back on later, but if you spend the entire event doing that, did you really make any memories?

After a large event, the internet and media are saturated with pictures, both from the press and from the public. Newspapers these days can be far more keen to use snaps that have been taken by the public than to pay a photographer to license their image.

Professionals vs Public with Phones

wedding — Weddings require careful negotiations with guests.

One of the major things I’ve had to factor in as a working photographer is people getting in the way with their phones! This is when a camera phone can really impact your job. When I was shooting weddings or events, I had to build in a part for guests taking pictures too. In the past this would have been a small handful of people with a compact camera, today it’s almost everyone in the party, jostling for a phone snap. In my opinion, we can’t fight this and so part of my ‘direction’ would be to tell guests that I’d be setting up the bride and groom for a few pictures but then when I was done, they would remain while everyone else got a picture. To not do this meant trying to shoot while fighting elbows, trying not to get edges of phones in a shot and people shouting to get the couple to look at them.

Another concern is ruining the day for the person or people involved. If you’re getting married then chances are, you’d want to share pictures of your big day yourself, for friends and family who couldn’t be there. Imagine your disappointment if you logged on to Facebook the next day to find there were already tons of images posted and some weren’t so flattering.

A professional photographer’s job is to make you look the best you can; that’s why a client will never be presented with photographs where the subject has their eyes half closed or is pulling a strange face. That’s not something that can be guaranteed when a dozen camera phones are snapping away. In fact, many wedding photographers are now pleading with couples to have a technology free day; something I think we’re inevitably hurtling towards being the norm.

Quality Control

Many argue that the quality of a phone camera can never surpass the quality of a professional DSLR, but technology is forever changing and improving. We’re already at the stage where many journalists are now using iPhones to take pictures, record audio, and record video, so clearly they are good enough.

For me, the devil is in the detail. I can take a perfectly nice picture with my smartphone. What I can’t do though is an edit that in the same way, I would a DSLR picture on my computer. I also wouldn’t have the same control or flexibility that I have when shooting manually with my Nikon.

Aside from technology, as photographers we practice and hone our skills constantly, there’s a reason we do things a certain way and we tend to know what we’re doing. I once had a client who’d bought an expensive DSLR and asked me why it was taking rubbish pictures. I had another who asked me if I could teach them how to take and edit pictures properly so they could do it themselves. As exasperating as this can be, it gives me confidence that the people who cry out that anyone can be a photographer these days most likely have all the gear and no idea!

Conclusion

Camera Phone — It’s hard not to spot someone pointing a camera phone in a crowd.

The evolution and subsequent decrease in the price of cameras have opened up photography to just about everyone, it’s made it far more accessible than it ever has been before. That’s a great thing, no hobby or profession should ever be exclusive due to lack of funds. While many worry that this means the ruination of photography, I disagree. Being ‘good’ just because nobody else can afford to have a go is worthless. Now, we have to try harder, keep up with the changing technology and adapt our methods. Olmos went on to say,

‘Photographers are getting destroyed by the rise of iPhones. The photographers who used to make £1,000 for a weekend taking wedding pictures are the ones facing the squeeze. Increasingly we don’t need photographers – we can do just as well ourselves.’

If someone wants to shoot a wedding for £200 because they bought a cheap DSLR and want some pocket money then the person who hires them wasn’t your client anyway. I don’t doubt that many companies, couples, events managers, will try and ‘do it themselves’ because it’s cheaper, but that’s something we just can’t fight. It just means we have to demonstrate in what we do every day why we are justified in calling ourselves photographers, rather than just being another person with access to a camera.

Much the same way that there was an outcry over eBooks heralding the death of the book, there will always be those who worry that a shift in the norm is the end of all that they know. The truth is, there is a place for both and probably always will be. We still have film photographers despite the overwhelming preference for digital, vinyl has risen in popularity again, despite easy downloads; after an initial interest and peak, things always settle down and find their place and camera phones are no different, we just have to keep doing what we do and striving to perfect our craft.

Some Recommended Reading

If you’re new to wedding photography, you may enjoy our Comprehensive Guide to Shooting Weddings.

Knowing what you need to shoot a wedding can be overwhelming. We’ll help you out with Wedding Photography: A Look Inside Your Gear Bag.

Discovering that there’s more to photography than a camera is everyone’s first step. Check out 5 Things a Photographer Should Learn from Arts.

Become a More Creative Photographer Through Restrictive Projects

Posted on April 1, 2016 by Nathaniel Eames

There are many ways to become an excellent photographer. Though some begin their practice through formal education, such as high school or college classes, many modern photographers are completely self-taught. Ultimately, how you acquire your photography knowledge is of little importance compared to the results you achieve. However, through my own experience and education, I have learned that there’s one technique that is guaranteed to improve your creativity as a photographer: restrictive projects.

While most photography classes wisely make heavy use of restrictive projects, this learning method is not necessarily the most intuitive nor the easiest for self-taught photographers. The basic idea is to impose strong constraints on a key element or variable within photography, then take loads and loads of photographs within those constraints. When first starting out, restrictive projects often focus on technical elements, like only using f/2.8, setting all exposures to over one second, or the eternal first assignment: manual focus and exposure only. While these are excellent ways to get to know the ins and outs of your camera, the same principals can be applied to creative thinking to bring your photography to the next level.

My absolute favorite restrictive project, one that I inevitably return to when I feel my creativity slipping, is location restrictions. As you can probably guess, this just means deciding to spend a large chunk of time only shooting in one area. It’s important to choose an area that’s the right size, has enough visual material to work with, and is different from your usual locations. The size and challenge of your area should be chosen depending on your own aesthetic, skill, and experience, but it’s best to keep the area size to something you can see all at once, not an entire town or the like. It’s also important not to intermingle a restrictive project with your regular work, but to focus all of your creative energy on this singular location for as long as you can.

Recently, I took it upon myself to only shoot on one small, industrial block in Brooklyn for a weekend. I was shooting film (both color and black and white) with an Olympus XA, a very simple, compact rangefinder that further limits my freedom and forces me to think laterally. The photos throughout this article are all from that weekend project.

You probably won’t like all of the images you shoot during your restrictive projects, and you may not like any of them. However, that’s just a sign that you really are challenging yourself. That challenge is what makes restrictive projects so effective. With this type of exercise, you aren’t after fantastic results, you’re going for self-improvement and growth. Professional photographers often get bogged down by their work from taking the same sort of images over and over because clients expect a certain aesthetic from them. While a long-time wedding photographer is likely very good at taking outdoor group portraits thanks to years of practice, that type of repetition can also stymie the creative flow and ultimately cap one’s potential. Usually, the reaction to a creative rut is to free yourself from any limitations and go take photos of whatever you fancy when you get the chance. While this kind of exploration is also important, developing the ability to see subject matter in multiple ways can free any practice from monotony.

Creating limitations for yourself isn’t always the easiest thing to do, so below are some ideas for potential restrictive projects that you may find helpful, organized thematically. If one of them sounds easy, don’t do it. If one of them sounds extremely boring, don’t do it. The best restrictive projects are the ones that are intriguing and intimidating at the same time.

Example Restrictive Project Assignments:

Locations:
- Only shoot on one city block
- Only shoot within reaching distance of your own house
- Only shoot facing towards the sun
Subjects:
- Only shoot objects smaller than your shoe
- Only shoot the ground
- Only shoot photos with the sun in them
- Only shoot manmade objects that are green
- Only shoot people without photographing their faces
Camera settings:
- Only shoot with the aperture wide open
- Only shoot with something in the foreground out of focus
- Only shoot at the minimum focusing distance for any lens
- Only shoot a telephoto lens while indoors
- Only shoot vertical panoramas
Physical techniques:
- Only shoot without looking through the viewfinder/screen
- Only shoot crouched down
- Only shoot from the hip

Hopefully, one of the above “assignments” will trigger your intrigue while still feeling difficult to accomplish. Regardless of what restriction you choose, the most important part of this practice is determination. It’s not enough to take photos of one city block until you can’t think of any more good shots to take. In fact, that’s precisely when the project begins. The goal is to take photos past the point of creative exhaustion; when you can’t possibly think of anything else to take that wouldn’t be either repetitive or terrible, keep shooting. Eventually, you will always get a second wind and find new perspectives or personal aesthetics that you never thought existed, and that is when you truly grow as a photographer.

Professional Photography: How Much Should You Charge?

Posted on February 27, 2016 by Sabina Sister

Its really hard to ask yourself how much you should charge. It seems like a really loose question without many guidelines but below are a few helpful tips.

A good thing for all professional photographers to know: once you enter the world of professionalism, part of your job will include doing things that are not exactly related to your job title such as figuring out your rates! Although boring, its a very important decision to make. Because of this, its good to have some small understanding of the duties of a professional photographer.

Firstly, you should always expect reimbursement when performing a service. Professional photography is a service that people seek out and request. Respect yourself as an artist and professionl in knowing and acknowledging your worth. Therefore, your work, your service, and your time is worth getting paid for.

Establishing monetary compensation says that you are good enough to get paid. While we certainly do not always agree that this is the case for everyone, make sure you keep that in mind when brainstorming ideas for yourself! Stay realistic and know that everyone has to start somewhere.

However, being a good photographer means you are constantly willing to evolve and learn, so most likely the very first paid shoot you do will not resemble the 89th shoot. As your skill level goes up, so should your rates.

But now comes the question of how high do I go? That is certainly a difficult question and varies for everyone. Personally, I want to charge enough to sustain myself but also maintain accessibility so a wide range of people can hire me. Because as your price range goes up, your clientele changes.

If you know anyone in the business, consult them! You can learn from their experience/

For example; weddings. A low budget wedding versus a higher budget wedding will be different in the areas of venue, dress,flowers, etc. and we all have our preferences of what styles we like best.

Be mindful of this as higher rates cater to those who can afford you which does impact who you work with and where.

Get to know the other photographers in your area as their rates determine the range you should be in. With this in mind, you want to start low but enough so that you could still enter the market and create competition. Careful not to price too low as that can make you seem cheap and turn you off from clients.

Our association with low cost and inexpensive services are not very good. Often time we think of cheap services synonymous with inexperienced or not good. When it comes to photography, your rates reflect your level almost.

Now comes the waiting part. This is the part where you wait until you reach a level of consistency and satisfaction that raising your rates seems like the logical next step. This can take months or maybe a year or two. Do this by assigning a percentage that you would like to see your income rise by every year!

I say this as someone who used this techniques which is by no means the only way or even right way. Shooting primarily weddings, I decided to start rising their increasing my wedding rates by 15% each year.

If you feel like the process is becoming arduous or that you’re just not getting it, consult a business adviser. They’ll be able to answer your questions and help you come up with strategies.

Its hard to start a business. Do not get discouraged. Remember how many people around you probably had to do the same thing and take comfort in it! There is zero shame in asking for help

Hope this helps. Happy shooting, y’all!