Photography

greed exists in every person

because people no longer value photography. It really died when the iPhone came out.

People will ask for anything… this will never stop. Prepare yourself with either a canned denial response, or a block & forget.

Slap your watermark as a pattern all over the photo like they do with school photos

In the late 1990's, I worked for a stock photography house doing Photoshop editing work. Average sale per licensed image = $800. This was before the age of Royalty Free images and Microstock. Yes, $800 was a premium amount of money to spend on an image, but the images were top notch, and everybody was happy including the buyers. A few things happened since then. Royalty free imagery (very cheap) came about. Film went away in favor of digital capture (more shots available, more photographers in the market). And the web became the primary vehicle. Cultural expectations (for cheap photography, or cheap anything) naturally followed.

You pay peanuts, you get monkeys, as they say.

It would be fun to troll them back.

"Thank you for your enquiry. As you intend to get married at a church, the weather (sunny, cloudy, rainy,) will determine the equipment to be used, as well as the use or not of off-camera flash; similarly, it may be necessary to use a high ISO, necessitating the correct use of noise reduction later. Depending on various other factors, a wide angle zoom lens may be suitable, or, for other shots, a moderate tele lens. However, as you just offered an insulting amount of money for this service, I suggest you get your phone out and do it yourself. Sincerely..."

Because so many people feel entitled to lots of things they didn't earn or pay for. It's not just photos.

“it’s just like a button press for you, just do it for me”

A lot of photographers suck. suck at everything. It is an oversaturated market. photography isn't viewed as a very professional or skilled profession by people like me, with disposable income and who have paid premiums, seen their friends pay premiums, and have coworkers and acquaintances pay premiums because it's basically a major roll of the dice if you'll get someone competent, someone available when you need them, and someone who is great but isn't leaving the field between now and the event.

As shallow as that all sounds, the reality at least for me and my circle is that the hobbiests in the group are way better. Period. By no measure or exception has a professional ever out done them. If you are thinking of a reason, I don't know what you're thinking because it's a period. This causes all of us to push people to never hire out and turn to people who are their social circle and basically trust and reward.

I now put 2 watermarks

1 that's slightly obvious in the corner and then another really faint across foliage or something so it can't easily be removed without screwing with the photo

in my opinion if i pay for photos, why should i have a watermark on them??

Because everyone has a phone, and people can't understand the difference between taking a phone picture and a professional picture. If phones could do simple plumbing, no one would want to pay plumbers for advanced work either.

They don’t understand what a professional photographer does. Everyone has the ability to take photos now.

"I have a smart phone. I take photos. No one pays me to take a photo. Why should I pay you just cause you have a fancy camera?"

That's basically why... everyone thinks they're a photographer and it's just the camera that makes the photo, all the photos they've ever taken have just required holding the camera and pressing the button... they don't know what goes into a good photo.

bruh never send high quality proofs. i send my selects at 25% quality. and put your watermark straight through the center of the image always. that way if they really want to remove it, they cant just crop it out. sure with AI now you can almost just remove it but the closer it is to the faces the harder it is for AI.

Because they think they can take just as good of photos with their phones.

With the advent of digital cameras.....photography became really accessible. With this, you have everyone trying it out and doing side hustles. The issue, then, is everyone undercutting everyone else.

I wouldn't care too much. If you feel confident in your skills, it'll sell. And if they decide to go the cheaper route and get bad photos from someone less experienced, their loss and lesson learned.

Considering that a camera phone is good enough for many photo situations, the marginal value of the photos from a photographer is less than what it used to be.

A camera phone photo might look “80%” as good as what a photographer can produce, so it’s hard to convince people that the extra quality is worth a large price.

I would de-emphasise the cameras themselves and focus on the added value of good lighting etc. that is something that is difficult for a layperson to reproduce

Because people don't know the difference between pressing the shutter button on phone and professional shooting

Because a lot of people have no taste & can’t distinguish professional photography from a crappy iPhone photo. In which case, they should just take their cellphone photos and leave us alone. If only.

I think it’s because people think we’re a simple service provider. I get phone calls for passport photos from Yellow Pages. I just asked them to remove my phone number lol.

Photography as much as writing (I do both) suffer from the same problem: Everyone thinks he could do it. But only because you are able to hold a pen you do not become a gifted author and because you can press a shutter release button you still aren't a photographer. That's the misunderstanding people fall victim of and which diminishes the appreciation of our work. It might be sickening but I fear it is something we will have to live with.

The age of the internet has made people feel entitled to free stuff.

Look how many photographers feel entitled to free features and accuse camera companies of “crippling” because they don’t make some cool new feature available in their entry level lines.

It’s pretty universal, trying to get something for nothing.

Because most people have absolutely no idea what it takes to be a photographer, hence the high amount of "your camera takes such great photos", "you only have to press a button, what's so hard" etc.

And let's not talk about editing

A lesson I learned a long time ago is you never focus on what the bottom 75% of a field is paying/doing/wanting. There's no margin and that's just a game of how hard can you run before you exhaust yourself.

The short answer is people feel entitled to lower prices for stuff they feel isn't difficult (but can't do themselves)

I am not a pro and could be wrong however my feeling is that paid photography is soon a thing of the past besides weddings, LinkedIn profile portrait and few other things. Better to have photography as a hobby than a way of making a living. That is limited to very few photographer. But again you might be a McCurry or Leibovitz.

Unfortunately I think it's just going to get worse as people can just use AI enhanced pics that add various clothes and backgrounds for profile pics, holiday cards, etc etc. Sure they aren't perfect yet but improving all the time. So against this competition, you'd really need to seek out a higher end segment than just talking shots of regular people. Need to focus instead on where the pics are used for higher value things like advertising, although even here there is competition coming from AI. But at least a bit more resistant market at the high end.

outside of just people being cheap, a lot of people dont understand that you aren't buying a photo, but paying someone with the skills to take a good photo and then edit that photo to make it look even better.

a photo is cheap, but a person's time of setting up equipment, time of taking photos, and editing aren't. but because there things are things that a buyer doesn't see, they don't fully understand that they are paying for that as well. they see 20 for a picture and think, thats a lot i can take one on my phone for free, even if its of lesser quality.

actually just had a similar discussion with someone about the cost of custom knives.

People genuinely think that exposure pays the bills. You get this with people that want to become models too just finding some creepy guy that will do TFP shoots of young girls instead of paying for an actual photographer that can help them create a portfolio.

"for the exposure!!!!!!!"

Photography is cheap. Everyone has a camera.

Photographers don't like to hear this -- and I say this as a photographer -- but most people are OK with reasonably shitty photos. They don't care if you want to spend an hour touching something up then charge them for it. They'd rather have something poorly framed and overexposed shot on a smartphone and get it free.

I'm lucky in that 99% of what I shoot is part of my day job, so I get paid regardless. But if people ask me for photos that I've taken at work or incidentally during a work shoot I just send them jpgs free. There are a lot of photographers like me who do that, too, which probably also hurts the market for people asking money for photos.

One recent example is I was shooting portraits for a marketing initiative at work and a passing student asked if I'd shoot his headshot for a resume or something. I had all the gear set up so I said sure. It took like 10 minutes later to edit and send him the photo, so it didn't matter much to me. But some people try to charge guys like $100 for that simple task, which is silly.

I think cell phones are definitely narrowing the market a bit, because honestly what you can do with a smart phone in many situations is pretty impressive and with the bonus that your technology can neatly store and display those photos. People place less value on low quantity, high quality photo shoots. The people who don't want to pay, or don't see the value, likely won't see the value after making the purchase either. You just have to be firm about your prices and not waste time trying to sell to leads that will never flip.

The same reason they feel entitled to free music - they get it for free all the time. So they think that's a default reality. Plus, in both cases, they look at the creation as something that must be soooooo much fun that you should be willing to do it just for the experience!

The intentionally ignore all the work and expense it takes to create art. This thinking also justifies the stealing of it.

Had people say they need me to photo a gig or film them performing, then they'll say, "i'll pay you", like they're doing me a favour.

It’s because they don’t understand that they are paying for your experience and expertise. They probably think anyone can snap a picture because they all have cameras in their smartphones. Probably think any idiot can take a photo. You have to explain that your time isn’t free.

Not only have I been a victim of someone editing out my watermark and not paying for the package

If you're feeling vindictive...

Send them an invoice for triple the original package price.

Removing a watermark is an automatic win if you have to take this in front of a judge (you won't) - as it constitutes what is to a judge a magical phrase: Willful Infringement.

It means the person cannot claim ignorance or "innocent" infringement, like they didn't know what they were doing was wrong. They knew it was wrong to do that, they did it anyway, automatic /gavel for you. (Edit: Oh, and you get to claim triple because it was willful)

So anywhoo - send them an invoice for triple the price, and if they don't pay it, file against them in small claims. If the treble amount is high enough, you can just sell the debt to a collection agency for 10 cents on the dollar. You earn a little money from that bad debt, and the collection agency gets to hound them for the next 7 years or so - and it shows up on their credit history.

The problem is competition.

Your phone's camera plus AI can produce decent photos now, so all the expensive equipment a photographer has plus their experience isn't worth as much as it used to be. We are just at the start of the AI revolution. People and society will have to adjust and it will be a difficult time for some.

aLl YoU hAvE tO dO iS pReSs A bUtToN is the mentality that plagues many. People just don’t have appreciation for the effort, experience, planning and knowledge that is put in to photography

Because they don’t value your work or your talent. Copyright everything. Join PPA and if someone, anyone, anytime infringes your copyright, contact PPA and sue for copyright violations and get court cost, and lawyer fees. It’s not about $20 bucks, it’s about stealing what it took you a lifetime to learn.