February, 2010

for Everyone — No Comments
27
Feb 10

What’s in a category?

For income tax purposes, the Canadian federal government uses a set of Industry Codes to categorize all jobs.

Not sure if this means anything, but the government puts Photography in the same category as Janitorial Services and Miscellaneous Building or Dwelling Services.

Apparently, Photography is not considered a profession like the “profession” of Online Advice; not a “business service” like that of Chimney Cleaner; and not even similar to the jobs of Authors or Artists.

However, it’s nice to see that the government is keeping up with the times. It has a new industry code for the jobs of Online Escorts and Online Psychic.

for Everyone — No Comments
24
Feb 10

Take my job, please

Fresh off the press (okay, from a computer) is the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2010-11 Edition. The electronic version was released in December 2009 and the print version should be released within a few weeks.

Although it’s been described as “up-to-date and reliable”, it seems rather simplistic and behind-the-times in its descriptions. The handbook may be intended only for students, but one might wonder how many teens will ever go to a government web site for anything. Besides, who selects a career from a catalog?

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for Photographers — No Comments
20
Feb 10

Beginner’s guide to negotiating

Another long post. This one’s about negotiating photography fees.

“Money can’t buy happiness, but it can buy a better quality of misery.”
- anonymous

Three important points to remember when pricing photography:

(1) Never give a price over the phone. When someone calls and asks, “How much to shoot … ?”, never give a price over the phone. A photographer needs time to get more information, figure out all the details, and then determine the proper price.

No job is ever as easy or as quick as the client says it will be. If the wrong price is quoted over the phone, it will be difficult to increase it later, if necessary. Verbal quotes are often misunderstood by the client.

Being in a hurry and pulling a price out of thin air is always a mistake, which leads to point #2:

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for Clients — No Comments
14
Feb 10

Annual reports for small business

Just the phrase alone, Annual Report, sounds impressive and big league.

Most corporations are required by law to publish an annual report, and many are available online. But what about a small business that doesn’t have any investors or shareholders, and isn’t required to do a yearly summary?

Annual reports are not just for the big corporations anymore.

It makes perfect marketing sense for the smaller business to get into the game.

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for Photographers — No Comments
12
Feb 10

Pyramid Power

Many things can affect the “performance” of a business, such as: the quality of its products or services, the abilities of its employees, its marketing, its public and media relations, how it reacts to change and, sure, a bit of luck doesn’t hurt either.

The late Peter Drucker, author, political economist and management consultant, is credited with pioneering the most important social and management theories of the 20th century. A quick web search will turn up many of his famous quotes, including:

There are only two things in a business that make money: innovation and marketing. Everything else is cost.

The purpose of a business is to create a customer.

The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well, the product or service fits him and sells itself.

Suppliers and especially manufacturers have market power because they have information about a product or a service that the customer does not and cannot have, and does not need if he can trust the brand. This explains the profitability of brands.

In most types of business, there are dozens, maybe even hundreds, of brand choices for the consumer. Why would, or should, a customer choose your business? (For extra credit: does a customer choose a business or does a business choose its customers?)

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for Everyone — No Comments
12
Feb 10

Best romantic photography lines

Very off-topic but just for Valentine’s Day:

Although these will make little sense to non-photographers, here are the best photography pick-up lines.

Let me focus only on you.

Picture us together.

I’ve got you in my viewfinder.

Will you be my long-term story?

I Leica you.

Do you do it RAW?

Will you be my laptop?

My love for you is full-frame.

True love can never be photoshopped.

Let’s get together for a horizontal composition.

Let’s converge our verticals.

I’d sync with you at any speed.

So, what’s your focal length?

How big is your aperture?

You are the catchlight of my eyes.

When you flash your smile, my heart lights up.

That’s not a zoom lens in my pocket. I’m happy to see you.

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for Clients — No Comments
5
Feb 10

Photo Surgery

Not sure if this is an indication of anything, but last month I received three similar photo requests. The catch was, I wasn’t asked to shoot any photos but rather, the customers wanted me to fix some pictures they had shot themselves.

• One client asked me to fix a group photo. The company employees in the picture are back in their hometowns, so there’s no chance of a reshoot. The picture was under-exposed, slightly out-of-focus, had red-eye, and was poorly composed with some bad shadows. Photoshop can only do so much, but the client was happy with the results of the emergency retouch surgery. The picture will have a happy life in a company newsletter.

• Second request was another self-shot image. But unfortunately, this one was inoperable. I diagnosed a terminal case of the blurs. A picture may look good on the camera’s LCD screen, but when used at a higher resolution, any and all imperfections become very obvious. I suspect the company already knew this, but just wanted a second opinion.

• Third request from another customer was to pull a nice headshot from a group photo. This image was rushed into the operating room for some complicated surgery. It was touch-and-go, and sadly, an arm had to be amputated in the process. But the photo is now recovering and will be strong enough to appear in a series of Powerpoint presentations.

Everyone loves to take pictures, and for personal pictures, this is great. But if your company decides to take its own business photos, here are three suggestions:

(i) Don’t.

(ii) Take lots of pictures and hope one hits the target.

(iii) Know where the closest photo emergency room is located.

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Also last month, I got a request to go to Iqaluit. Who doesn’t want to go up to the Arctic in the middle of winter? Unfortunately, it turned out that the expenses involved were far too high in relation to the job itself.