How to Save the Photography Industry

If you spend any time chatting with photographers or milling around in the photography forums on LinkedIn you'll get a pretty desperate view of our professional industry.  Everywhere you look photographers are complaining that clients have smaller budgets, other photographers are stealing their business by shooting for free, moms with cameras are taking over!  The truth is - photographers need to learn how to evolve!

The photography profession is rooted in tradition.  It's a craft that is both art and science - both creative and technical.  As such, there is no right way to do it.  Just as there are numerous ways to take a photo, there are numerous paths to pursuing it as a career.  You can go to school, you can assist another professional, you can read books to educate yourself on the technical aspects of photography but the hardest thing to learn is the business of photography.  Because there is such a lack of information on how to run a successful photography business we tend to copy or learn from those who have been successful in the past.  We look to other working photographers as a model on how to run our own business.  We send mailers, we run email campaigns, we network.  This is how the industry perpetuates itself.  Each new generation learning from those who have blazed a path before us.  Unfortunately, this is exactly why our industry has grown stale!

One thing I've learned from working in the SF Bay Area is just how quickly an entire industry can move. Silicon Valley is THE birthplace of today's computer technology and I've seen it grow, evolve, boom, bust and transform in the 20+ years I've lived here. I'm not sure why the entrepreneurial spirit here is so high - maybe it's the weather, or maybe it's because we have more venture capital firms than anywhere else in the country.  One thing is certain, the Valley never quits.  There is always some new idea, some new technology, some new college graduate thinking they have the next Facebook!  You very rarely hear people complain about the competition, or blame their customers for the lack of business, or whine about technology moving too fast.  When business starts to slump they look internally, not externally, and will change their business strategies on a dime!

If the photography industry is to survive, we need to adopt these types of business practices.  We need to stop clinging to business models that were created in the days of film.  We need to stop thinking that we are "owed" a successful business just because we know how to use a camera. We need to stop comparing ourselves today to the photographers of yesterday.  Yes, the industry has changed. Yes, technology moves fast.  Yes, everybody can take great pictures now.  So look internally and ask yourself "What else can I bring to the table?"

If your clients aren't paying you what you think you deserve it's because they don't value what you offer.  Commercial photography is a service industry and you can either be a $20 table massage or a $200 spa treatment, the choice is up to you.

How To Capture Action

Capturing fast-moving action is essential for sports photography and there are a few things to know before taking on this challenge.

The first thing you need to decide when capturing fast-moving objects is how you want them to appear in your photograph.  In the shot of the bike racer above we wanted to enhance the feeling of speed by blurring the background but there may be cases where you want to freeze the action so that everything is in focus.  The trick to this creative style is choosing your shutter speed appropriately.  The faster your shutter speed, the more you can stop motion - the slower your shutter speed, the more blur you create.

To achieve the shot above, we set our camera to Tv (Shutter Priority) so that we could adjust our shutter speed and let the camera set the aperture automatically.  Normally we would meter the scene with an ambient light meter and shoot in Manual mode but this day was partially overcast and the light values were changing constantly due to the cloudy conditions so we wanted to let the in-camera meter do some of the heavy lifting. We chose to shoot at ISO 200 so that we could reach higher shutter speeds without introducing too much noise. To get the right amount of blur we used trial and error (also knows as "chimping") until we settled on 1/50th. Finding the right speed is a but tricky because if you go too low, it becomes impossible to hold the camera still enough to capture anything sharp. You'll have to experiment a bit to get the right setting.  The camera adjusted the aperture to f13.

Another challenge when shooting fast-moving subjects is focus.  This is where a high-end, professional camera really pays for itself.  Our Canon EOS 1d Mark III is known as a "sports shooter" and has a newly redesigned auto focus system with 45 auto-focus points, 19 of which are "cross-type" points which can focus on horizontal and vertical lines of contrast.  To get this shot, we set our auto-focus to AI Servo mode which can intelligently track moving objects to predict correct focus.  Proper focus, however, isn't magic and doesn't always require such sophisticated technology.  Road criterium racing is a great way to get started with sports shooting because the riders complete a lap roughly every 2 minutes so it gives you plenty of opportunity to setup a shot.  To get this shot without a sophisticated auto-focus system you could simply set your lens to manual focus and pre-focus your lens to the spot you want to shoot.  We always have a "zone" in which we want the shot to take place.  To establish our zone we study the background/foreground elements, lighting, and path the riders take in the road and determine what will make the best composition.  Once you have a zone picked out it's pretty simple to pre-focus on something in that zone.  This is another area where "chimping" is perfectly acceptable - while determining the right focus for your zone, just use trial and error until you get it right. That's one of the beauties of digital photography!

The last thing you'll need to capture action is a good technique.  All good sports shooters have a natural instinct for being able to anticipate the "right" moment that comes with years of experience and an in-depth knowledge of the sport.  There are some things you can do however to improve your chances.  Set your camera to Continuous shooting mode.  In this mode your camera will take a photo as fast as it can for as long as you hold the button down.  When shooting in Continuous mode, you can start shooting a slight second before the moment and continue shooting slightly after the moment to ensure you captured just the right shot.  Another technique that we used for the shot above is "panning".  If the camera was held completely still at 1/50th, the rider would pass right through the frame before the shutter closed, rendering him completely blurry and the background completely in focus - the exact opposite of what we wanted.  So to properly pan this shot, we begin pointing the camera at a location slightly down the street and as the rider rides by we move the camera to the right, following him at exactly the same speed he is moving.  This takes practice and patients but when you get it right, it's magical.

Accept Credit Cards with Square

Looking for a way to accept credit card payment quickly and easily with your iOS or Android device.  Look no further than Square.  We've been using this small business solution for a few months now and have fallen in love with the technology.  You simply sign up for an account, link a bank account for your deposits, and after you receive your free card reader in the mail, you're ready to start taking credit card payments.  There's no yearly fee, no activation fee, no hidden fees at all really...just a 2.75% transaction fee.  Give it a try!

Case Study: Caletti Cycles Brand Campaign

Over the course of the next four weeks we'll be shooting a brand campaign for a local, independent bike builder in Santa Cruz.  I thought it might be interesting for ya'll to see what goes into shooting a project like this and get a glimpse into the creative process - from concept to completion.

THURSDAY, APRIL 29, 2011 - INITIAL CLIENT MEETING

We had our first client meeting with John Caletti of Caletti Cycles in Santa Cruz, CA.  John has been hand-building bicycles since 2003 and over that time has made an impressive career building custom bicycles for his unique clients.  We reached out to John to help expand their brand using photography.  The purpose of the initial meeting is to gather the information that will help us define the creative direction for the project.  We talk about things like brand messaging, and target audience and we kick around keywords that help define the emotional connection we want to create.  John built his business with the principals of a unique craftsmanship, a responsibility to the environment and the Santa Cruz community, and an authentic passion for all things cycling – and with his brand he wants to cater to authentic people who are healthy, unique and passionate about the ride in whatever form it takes.

SATURDAY, MAY 7, 2011 - CLIENT CREATIVE MEETING
Today we met with John to discuss the creative direction for the campaign.  At this point, it's important that John and I are on the same page about the concept and that we both walk away from this meeting knowing exactly what we want to communicate and how we will show it visually.  The concept that I wanted to present had to do with creating 3-4 mini success stories from his customers in a visual style.  John really works closely with his clients to create a bike that is just as unique as they are so I wanted to highlight some of the customers that have benefitted the most from his process.

Creative Concept = Showcase each facet of Caletti Cycles culture by focusing on individual riders/clients and their personal stories.

The campaign will highlight one rider from three different genre's of cycling - road, cyclocross and mountain biking.  Because one of the core values of the Caletti brand is "authenticity" we want to shoot real customers in their real environments on their real bikes and showcase the real culture that surrounds each genre.  Once finished, the campaign will live as an image slideshow on www.caletticycles.com which shows each rider doing what they do best, on their bikes, with a testimonial quote about John and unique elements about their bikes.

Now that we know what the driving concept will be, we can dive into pre-production.  We know that we'll be featuring 3 riders of various cycling genre's so John will begin to touch base with his clients to see who's interested in being featured.  We also know that we'll be shooting a road rider, cyclocross rider and a mountain biker so we can start to plan for locations.  Ideally we'll look for a location that can support both road and trail bikes within a close distance to each other to minimize travel time in between.  At this point I'm also starting to get an idea of what kind of images I want to shoot and how I want to shoot them.  I have an idea to mount our Canon G10 to the bike frames using a Manfrotto Magic Arm and trigger it remotely with our Paul Buff Cyber Commander unit while the riders are on their bikes.

Now it's time to book the crew and start scouting for locations.

Check back with us over the course of the project and watch the events unfold!