RDKirk -- sounds like you have things pretty well established. I'm curious how I should go about doing this when I get started as I'm still learning the ropes, though?
Can someone point me to a good standard model release form, as I will definitely need to build my portfolio for consultations? At least 1 client from my other business wants to do a shoot of her kids for next weekend, and one of my employees wants a family shoot for the holidays, so that will get me more of a start.
So let's get to a different part of that initial consultation: the Portfolio or whatever examples you use to demonstrate what you offer and why you're the one they want to choose. Especially since I don't have my own studio currently and prefer doing location portraiture anyway (in their home, lakeside, wherever), although I do have 1 that I can rent for those who really want studio portraits.
Obviously you need enough examples and variety for them to visualize the possibilities, but you don't want to completely overwhelm them. What kind of portfolio might you suggest? An artist's type portfolio? What sizes -- 8x10, 14x20, or whatever your usual size would actually be? A laptop to pull up your website? Both?
Chip Payet wrote:
RDKirk -- sounds like you have things pretty well established. I'm curious how I should go about doing this when I get started as I'm still learning the ropes, though?
The honest truth is that you aren't going to be working at RDKirk's level, or at your $1,000-3,000 level, given your current amount of experience and portfolio. While I'm sure your dentistry practice has given a lot of business seasoning and general customer service experience, much of that doesn't translate to operating as a photographer. Even beyond the technical expertise and natural confidence that come with experience there's the "x-factor" that I think Brent was referencing early in the thread - the uniqueness of vision and the ability of your work to be, at a glance, YOUR work that will allow you to command those kind of rates. That's something you arrive at in time, not something you can just make up your mind to suddenly be. I think you'll find that anyone who is making that kind of money, with the exception of "It Boy" wunderkinds like a Ryan McGinley, took a long road of apprenticeship, assisting and working at a much lower level to get there.
Chip Payet wrote:
Can someone point me to a good standard model release form, as I will definitely need to build my portfolio for consultations? At least 1 client from my other business wants to do a shoot of her kids for next weekend, and one of my employees wants a family shoot for the holidays, so that will get me more of a start.
You don't need a model release for a commissioned portrait shoot. A model release is a document used to have the subject of a photo release commercial usage of their likeness to the photographer or another party. Look at it this way: the person signing the release (i.e., the photo subject) is generally the one getting paid, as their likeness is the commodity in question in that transaction. In the case of a portrait shoot, you're unlikely to be selling that portrait to people other than the ones who commissioned it, so the release doesn't do anything for you.
That said, the ASMP standard release is a good starting point. There's also a book called, I believe, "Business and Legal Forms for Photographers" that I think is a must-own.
I'm curious how I should go about doing this when I get started as I'm still learning the ropes, though?
I'm kind of in the same position in that I'm trying to break into an entirely new market--quinceañera portraits. The important point here is that a "qualified client" isn't so much a matter of absolute income level but the importance the client places on a quality portrait. The quinceañera market in my area isn't one of very high income levels, but they care very much about having good photographs done and will save up money specifically for this very important event in their daughters' lives. And I do care very much about them having good photographs done of an event that's very important to them. This isn't a market that is very well served at all in my community--it's a huge service hole.
But I'm starting at square one in getting there with this entirely different set of clients, so I have to go through all the basic steps of making myself known to them to the same degree that I'm known to others.
RDKirk wrote:
The important point here is that a "qualified client" isn't so much a matter of absolute income level but the importance the client places on a quality portrait.
This concept is applicable to ANY product or service, really. I often run into patients who are driving a Mercedes and wearing $1000 suits who don't want to pony up the $500 not covered by insurance for a crown on a tooth that's hurting........but patients with your average income will have worked and saved for a complete mouth fix-up because it's so important.
shatterkiss wrote:
The honest truth is that you aren't going to be working at RDKirk's level, or at your $1,000-3,000 level, given your current amount of experience and portfolio. While I'm sure your dentistry practice has given a lot of business seasoning and general customer service experience, much of that doesn't translate to operating as a photographer. Even beyond the technical expertise and natural confidence that come with experience there's the "x-factor" that I think Brent was referencing early in the thread - the uniqueness of vision and the ability of your work to be, at a glance, YOUR work that will allow you to command those kind of rates. That's something you arrive at in time, not something you can just make up your mind to suddenly be. I think you'll find that anyone who is making that kind of money, with the exception of "It Boy" wunderkinds like a Ryan McGinley, took a long road of apprenticeship, a shttps://www.fredmiranda.com/reviewssisting and working at a much lower level to get there....Show more →
Shatterkiss, please be assured I have no intent of going out after reading this thread and telling my next client that they'll be spending $2000 I completely understand that there will be time, a lot of hard work, etc. that will go into this process, and I'm perfectly fine with that.
I think you'd be remarkably surprised, too, at how my dental practice may have prepared me for this. You have to remember, I often do treatment for patients that total WAY more than the numbers we're discussing. The numbers involved in photography seem quite small to me in relation, but I understand that there is a matter of proportionality. It's all about the art of communication, of listening, of relating what the patient wants to what you provide.
My goal here was not to get myself ready to start charging those kinds of rates on Januray 1. What I do know, however, is that the person with a PLAN will generally reach the goalposts a lot faster and with less worry and stress than someone without a plan, so I want to develop my plan to get me there.
"A man who knows his destination will choose only the right road, but for a man who does not know where he's going, any road will get him there." (Paraphrased from someone a long time ago, can't remember whom offhand.)
A model release is needed for a commissioned portrait if the photographer intends to use it for any of his own public promotions, such as a website or mall display (but not for display within his own studio or in a portfolio).
This does not have to be the kind of comprehensive release a photographer needs for unlimited 3rd party commercial use. I ask my clients to sign a release that is strictly limited to my own use to promote myself as a photographer and my business of photography. It explicitly prohibits me from using it to promote any 3rd party product or service. It has language that relieves me (or any corporate entity representing me, or my heirs or my "assigns") of any vulnerability to adverse legal actions by the model (or any corporate entity representing him or his heirs or his "assigns") of any use of the photographs by me within the limitations of the release.
In my experience so far, very few people have not wanted me to use their photographs for my promotions. Most ask, "You're going to put this on your website, right?"
"A man who knows his destination will choose only the right road, but for a man who does not know where he's going, any road will get him there." (Paraphrased from someone a long time ago, can't remember whom offhand.)
I like Yogi Berra's, "If you don't know where you're going, you won't get there."
Get an 8x10 view camera. Mount your DSLR inside (make sure it has live-view). Disappear under the dark cloth, people think you're shooting on antiquated, extremely complicated equipment. Your mystique and the public's perception of you is raised. Raise your own rates commensurately.
As long as they don't realize you should be switching out plates after every shot, you're golden.
RDKirk wrote:
A model release is needed for a commissioned portrait if the photographer intends to use it for any of his own public promotions, such as a website or mall display (but not for display within his own studio or in a portfolio).
Jonathan H wrote:
Get an 8x10 view camera. Mount your DSLR inside (make sure it has live-view). Disappear under the dark cloth, people think you're shooting on antiquated, extremely complicated equipment. Your mystique and the public's perception of you is raised. Raise your own rates commensurately.
As long as they don't realize you should be switching out plates after every shot, you're golden.
One $3000 job is, in general, just as time consuming as 10 $300 ones. Plus the time it takes to get you to that point where you can actually charge $3000 for a job isn't really a short term deal. Chip Payet wrote:
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Gear is not the issue, nor is knowledge of PP, nor is creativity.
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Imho your kinda wrong on this, not judging your work, since I haven't seen it, but these are more the MAIN issues, PLUS a more than average sense of marking and business skills and no offense but if you have these qualities you wouldn't be posting this, 'cause you would already be there.
One $3000 job is, in general, just as time consuming as 10 $300 ones.
If you're saying that a $300 job will generally take only 10 percent of the time and effort of a $3000 job, I have to disagree rather strongly.
In general, a $300 job will take me nearly as much time and effort the $3000 job will take me, and the $300 client is likely to be a far greater pain in the okole. If a $3000 job takes me a total of 30 hours, the $300 job is going to take probably 20-24. I'm not going to deliver work below my professonal and creative standards...that would affect my ability to charge anyone $3000.
Much of the effort is fixed in the process. Going to 10 locations for those $300 jobs is certainly 10 times the effort of going to one location for the $3000 job. Most of the post processing, packaging, communications, billing, et cetera are also multiplied 10 times for those 10 $300 jobs, but performed only once for the $3000 job.
I will spend more time massaging the $3000 client...maybe. But with the $3000 client, I simply state, "You want my services. This is what I cost," and they write out the check. With the lower-end clients, I have to justify every nickel and dime.
There can be a wholly different product that I can produce more inexpensively. For instance, on a dollar-per-image basis, my professional portrait line (headshots, business portraits) is cheaper than my wall portraits. But the client options are fewer, the personal service is much less, they're done on more of a production basis, I can apply some volume pricing, and the product is a CD rather than a framed print.
blob loblaw wrote:
What if your website is your portfolio?
The issue there has been how states define "publication." So far, court cases have revolved around the hardcopy world and have defined "publication" as being an open presentation to the mass public in a massive manner. Where there have been court cases, they have declined to identify personal showings--such as showing a hardcopy portfolio to an art director--as "publication." New York state has specifically stated that a photographer showing his work in his own studio is not "publication."
There aren't any cases that I've heard of specific to the internet, but the opinions I've heard from a couple of Internet-savvy IP lawyers suggest that a fully public website might in the future be defined as "publication" but a website that required a password probably would not.
Several states (Florida and New York, for example) have very specifically identified "commercial use" of a photograph as promoting a product or service other than the photograph itself. Thus, if the website does not promote the photographer's services as a photographer, the use of the photographs on it is not commercial even if the photographs themselves are for sale. But if the purpose of the website is to gain further work for the photographer, then the use of the photographs is commercial.
Obviously, there are going to be cases in the gray (it's a lawyer's job to create gray where others see only black and white), and those will find their way to courts on a case-by-case basis.
I completely understand that there will be time, a lot of hard work, etc. that will go into this process, and I'm perfectly fine with that.
but if you have these qualities you wouldn't be posting this, 'cause you would already be there.