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Advice
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Hi to the photography community out there.
I’m looking for advice from ye all out there any comments would be much appreciated. I have just completed a 2year photography course in Cork and I’m now at a loose end. I’ve been looking for experience with other photographers and I’ve been finding it difficult as many photographers aren’t interested in employing an assistant. I was hoping that someone out there might know of someone who needs an assistant of some sort or of anyone who can advise me on where to go next with my career.
Delighted to have found this site because there’s loads of interesting information. best forum I’ve found. hope to hear some replys soon.Hi Danielle,
try the http://www.photoassistant.net
I had one guy from Galway looking for assistant job. I recomended the above site and it helped him.Firstly, welcome to the forum. Good to see yet another Cork man here (I’ll just ignore the fact that you also put down Kerry as a location in your profile – not a lot we can if your schizophrenic :lol: )
Was that the course run by St. Johns college? A friend of my wife also finished that this year; not sure how she got on though, or what she plans to do with it.
I think the opportunities for assisting here are rather limited, if they even exist at all. You may have a better chance in Dublin, but I doubt it. I don’t think there’s any easy path into this industry here, or anywhere else. Don’t forget there’s a bunch of other people that finished the same course you just did and while not all of them will be interested in a career in photography, you are going to have some competition.
Perhaps you could let us know more about the type of work you want to get in to as there are various suggestions that you could try out depending on what route you’d like to take.
Welcome to the site Danielle, i am presuming you are looking into making a career out of photography – so at
this stage you want to start making a name for yourself as a professional photographer and should start
marketing yourself. Do you have a website? Do you have business cards? Do you have a portfolio in place?
Even if you are not self employed these will always come in handy. I would even suggest having these in place
before you approach prospective employers.Hi Danielle and welcome to the forum.
You’ll have to forgive me for talking through my “proverbial” here because this is all supposition and guess work as I’ve never tried to look for work in the industry.
The first thing you need is a portfolio. I’m sure you’ve already developed one through your course but continue to work on that, daily if needs be. Only keep your strongest images and have high quality prints of each of them mounted in some sort of album or portfolio book. Next thing to get is a website (if you don’t have one already). Personally I’d recommend one with your own domain name rather than the flickr’s or pbase sites, which in themselves are excellent but won’t make you stand out from the crowd. Then other suggestions are as Ali mentioned like business card etc. These in themselves won’t be enough, but if they are high quality, then when you talk to prospective employers they’ll immediately give them a guage on the quality of your work as well as helping you stand out from the crowd and the rest of the competition.
Shoot every single day. Thankfully I have no aspirations to be a professional photographer, but the more I shoot the more I improve. The more I improve, the more I actually get requests from people (friends as well as strangers) to do some work for them. I’m sure the same would happen in your case and you could also try and sell a little of your stuff through stock libraries and your website. Anything to get your name out there!
One thing to take into account here too is th quality of the “average professional” photographer in Ireland. While a lot of them are very good at running small businesses from looking at their work, their skill is in the business and marketing aspect and not the photographic aspect. So it maybe worth considering starting out on your own. Right now you’re in the perfect position where as you’ve nothing to lose if you try to start out on your own. Put adds up in supermarkets with links to your website and advertise services like graduations, christenings, weddings (if you’re brave enough)
Anyway enough “advice” from me. Best of luck with it all.
Welcome Danielle,
I think making a living from photography is more about marketing than skill. Same as any line of work I suspect. If you wake up in the morning and need to hold your camera and push the button a few times. If you get a buzz out of giving someone the portrait of all portraits or the best wedding shots you’ve ever done. Then you’ll have fun, probably scrabble for a living, but a good life. WIth everyone having easy access to camera equipment and retouching software, there isn’t as much corporate work now. I started to do weddings this year, glad I did, I love them, high-energy, quick thinking, use all your skills. If you love photography, then you have no choice. Shoot a lot, advertise in the local paper or walk the streets shooting people, hone your skills, understand your equipment and light. Get your work seen (do as I say, not as I do, I’m crap at this). Be realistic with pricing, aim to make a living, not a killing.
Good luck
Si
Welcome Danielle, best of luck… and if you need business cards, a website or any other design work to help you on your way, give me a shout I’d be happy to help :-)
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