Young Photographer looking for work

[Ashley]

December 7, 2009 at 12:35 am

joeyvw wrote:

Im not looking to make an easy 40k a year, what im looking for is a career which I am passionate about but can also provide a steady income aswell to make a living out of.

Hi Joseph
Well if you want to make 40k+ profit, then you need to be looking to turnover about 3 or 4 times that amount.
So 150,000 should be your target figure (approximately 12,500 per month and / or 3,000 per week).

With that figure in mind, you next need to look and study the various markets.
It’s a buyers market – and you are simply producing & providing images for those markets to use.

So putting the horse in front of the cart – you first need to look & study the various markets – to see who is buying, what all are they buying, where is the work being done and how much are they paying.

You will find most markets are already well covered, so you need to look for gaps in those markets, that you feel you can full-fill… or bring more to the table than the other guys. (Note: charging less is not bring more to the table.)
Plus, if you want a steady income, then it needs to be a huge market, so even in bad times, there will still be a steady flow of work.

Most photographers start out dreaming of doing some type of glamorous stuff, like high end fashion or shooting exotic cars or working on ads in beautiful locations. However, the reality is, most of those fields are hugely competitive and the standards & demands are very, very high.
Plus what you have to remember, is a client who is about to spend hundreds of thousands of pounds on Media, isn’t going to want to gamble on getting it wrong at the photography end – which is often the starting point. So until you have some sort of good track record or great portfolio, the top end stuff, that will provide you with the income you are after, is probably 10 years down the road… at best.

Anyway, you mentioned your parents are worried and they feel you should go back to college to study another subject.

All I will say is, they have a right to be worried and you should probably consider studying another subject… because it’s very tough to make it as a photographer these days and there are easier ways to make 40k a year.
However, if you really want to be a photographer, then forget college.
Study the markets – and start producing & providing images, that those markets will want to use.