Practicing Business...

Music | Charles Mingus Interviewed By Nesuhi Ertegun

I've always followed basic business principles when it came to my commercial photography. I think because of that, I lost a lot of business when I was more specifically "into" it. My futile attempts at breaking into the market for years was constantly and abruptly pushed into the ground. At the level I was working towards, no one wanted to hear about creative fees and usage fees. Often they worked with "photographers" that charged a single rate and gave up all rights to the image. This is a sure course to doom for the industry.

But thru out it all, I kept plugging away trying to get my rates, according to this supposed industry wide standard. Eventually, I was forced to stop pursuing commercial photography here in Portland and move on to other means.

One thing I never gave up on however was to not sell a photograph outright. I am always the owner of each and every image I took and will take. Because of that, I have the ability to license out a usage contract to my images.

Check off a point for me today! I photographed a portrait of 2 business men at their facility for a magazine about 3 or 4 years ago. It was actually the very last editorial image I took. I got an email from them today asking for permission to use the photo for some advertising they would like to do. So long as they agree to my fee, they can license the image for a stated usage for a period of time with limited distribution rights. The beauty of this of course is that this is an existing image I all ready photographed. I will be getting paid for merely licensing out the image. Besides that, they want to commission me to shoot another photograph for them! Good Karma!