The State of Professional Photographers

[rolando]

I just wanted to share my thoughts after coming back from WPPI about the State of Professional Photographers. Please read my blog article here and share you thoughts. Wishing everyone the best, thanks, rg sends!

[studiocygnet]

I noticed that there have not been any replies yet. So I figured I would just say that I read the blog, and there's not much to disagree with. Not much to say but Yep, that's the way it is these days.

[CaptainTom]

Ditto

[SpeedRacerSlots]

I will add this reply to your blog, but thought I would do it here as well.

I would say you hit the nail right on the head.

While I am not a corp. exec., I do like shooting nicer gear than a P&S for my own personal preferences.
While I do shoot for fun, I don't pretend to be any form of a professional photographer, nor do I sell goods/services as a photographer.

Now then for a perfect example of this that I will relate to you something that most people here may not understand, but can relate to...

I grew up helping my parents out at their business.

• They owned (and still do to this day) a company that specializes in A/V duplication. They have had it for a little over 30yrs now.
• Started off doing mass production and duplication for studios of the 8-tracks, reel to reels and cassettes. Along with video on 2", U-Max (3/4"), VHS and Beta.
• The media world changed. 8-tracks gave way to cassettes, Reels died off, Betamax died off.
• THen enter the world of CD's. OK they could still do replication and purchased large scale equipment that actually creates the physical disc from pellets, burns the image off the glass master and cranks them out.
• THen comes the CD Burner, then the computer with WAV files and some software to convert the format.
• I know... you dont need a history of portable audio, but suffice it to say that the home based CD Burner, the less than $500 8-drive DVD duplication towers, MP3/MP4 players, tune sharing sites, etc...

It has killed many businesses that have been lucrative for many years because the advancement of technology and the mind sets that go along with them have changed many people's lives forever.

There's not one of you that wouldnt think twice of cranking some of your photos through a tool (Photodex ProShow as a robust bot fairly cheap example) to create a slide display video. That capability 20yrs ago, you would have to take the prints to a video editor to get a VHS made for a trade show... Now people just crank them out on their desktops. Dont like that version, make a change and crank again.

If we take another angle to that one, what about the people that because they know some simple tools like MS Word, PageMaker, MS Publisher, Photoshop, Illustrator, etc. How many of you crank out your own designs, forms, cards, logos, etc and zip the off to a printer. Once again, a little over 20yrs ago, you would have to take that to a print shop for them to layout, typeset, crank a proof out on a Lino printer, then make the plates and print your final product. About 20yrs ago is when Pagemaker surfaced from the Xerox labs in CA on the MAI Basic Four computers and desktop publsihing rocked the world. Now we dont think twice about altering a layout of anything on our computers. No one stops to think of all the graphics shops that were put out of business because someone did it on a home PC.

Its a convergence of media and advancement of technologies, and photography and its professionals are being sucked into the vortex along with its predecessors from other industries.

DONT GET ME WRONG HERE.... I do NOT in any way belittle your profession! I applaud it! I am a person that appreciates all that goes on behind the scenes and all the pain, effort, money, energy, etc that goes into visualizing and creating the artistic works that you do. I wish I had a fraction of the artistic flair that the professionals that I have seen in gallery showings, coffee table books (Ansel for example), online forums and galleries. KUDOS to you! You guys ROCK!

The convergence of media, the technology advancements, the internet, even IP Telephony... its all changing the world around us in many professions, industries and businesses.

At the end of the day, its what we are able to do with what we have to work with, in order to carve out a niche in the market, fill that niche and make a name for ourselves.

[toverman]

Thanks for the link to your blog post, Rolando. And Greg, I appreciate your detailed and informative response. Definitely, things are changing and we've got to change with it, somehow without sacrificing ourselves and our visions, to keep going.

Times are tougher than they've ever been in most of our lifetimes. The technology won't go away, but all I can do is believe that our economy will rebound at some point. When it does, let's hope those with talent, experience and dedication will once again be valued for the quality of their work. From desktop publishing to photography, we know it's not the tools but the graphic artist and the photographer. Here's to hoping that talent will matter again very soon.