selling

greenspun.com : LUSENET : Nature Photography Image Critique : One Thread

How do you go about selling or showing photography? How do you know if your work is good enough?

-- Kimberly Lewelling (lewellig@iswt.com), June 13, 2001

Answers

Posting it for critique is one way to get advice from other photographers; you can do it here, on photo.net, or on photocritique.net, to name a few places. As for selling it, word of mouth is a start.

-- Christian Deichert (torgophile@aol.com), June 13, 2001.

The hard part is finding your market- the question is, who would use your photos? Assemble a portfolio according to a theme- mine's lighthouses and nautical, for instance. You won't have all of your good pictures in there, but you have to make sure that your target would be interested in each and every photo in there. Photos should be unique; something that they've never seen before. I managed to sell quite a few prints in Rhode Island, just going around to maritime tourist shops, and showing my portfolio. Make sure that you have a price that you will be asking don't ever ask anyone to make you an offer. In RI, matted 8x10's go for about $75 a print. If you just want to show them, see if a local coffee shop will display them. Most Starbucks won't, but others will. Get a copy of the "2001 Photographers Market" and they list all kinds of companies wanting to buy photos. You will know you are good enough when you believe you are. This is no business for a lack of self-confidence in your work; leave your humility at the door and believe in yourself, or just be content in doing photography for fun. (which is the best way to be, personally- I haven't tried selling anything for a couple years, because although you can make some real bucks, it takes a lot of the fun out of it.)

-- David LaHeist (nikonos@bellsouth.net), June 20, 2001.

You're photo looks a little dark to me, and blah blah crop differently blah blah rule of thirds...

Oh, wait! I thought this was the nature photography critique forum! Guess I'm in the photo.net general forum...

(Seriously - ask this question over there, too, but pick up Joihn Shaw's Business of Nature Photography. Be super-critical of your work, and market yourself like crazy. It's not all that difficult. Good luck.)

-- Scott (bliorg@yahoo.com), June 20, 2001.


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