Still here after reading the last post? Good. Hopefully you are a committed photographer who needs to know how to make a living doing what you love. Before I really get going with all of the handy-dandy little things that will help you on your journeys (hopefully), there are two things that I have to address - get ready, because you may not like them:

1) Look at your work and decide whether the quality is good enough to charge the money you need to make a living. If not, DON’T work yet. Go back to school..
2) Work for what you are worth.

That’s it. Well, not actually it - there’s some explaniation involved.

When starting out in photography, we all feel insecure about what our time and end product is worth. I am SO guilty of this problem myself and it is something I constantly battle with every day while negotiating with clients. More than a few times in the past I have ended up losing money (out of pocket, mind you) on shooting a project for someone who “hired” me.

I realize now that I was screwing professionals out of their livleyhood for a few measly bucks - basically working for a fraction (if not for FREE) of what a client should be paying for art.

You have to understand that there are literally thousands of working photographers who depend on jobs that pay enough to survive - be it make their mortgage payments, equipment costs, kids college tuition - whatever anybody else at any other job needs money for. By low-balling yourself, you not only undervalue the costs of photography in the eyes of clients overall but also make it harder for an established, working photographer to justify their prices when a client says to them, “Well, I could just get a student/beginner/amature to do it for much less than what you are quoting me.”

Believe me, everyone likes to see their pictures in print along with that little tag line that includes their name, or having their pictures shown off by a client who paid them for portraits. Eventually though, the novelty wears off.

Some people think that photographers aren’t worth the money they ask for. (And, truthfully, many aren’t - but these folk aren’t real, professional photographers. They are people that aren’t commited, that either dabble in it or are deluded into thinking they are pros because they get money from people in exchange for a few snapshots.) Photographers ARE worth the money because of the quality of the image, the professional way that they deal with clients and the fact that, like any other business, being a photographer isn’t about just some guy or gal with a camera that takes pictures. There are huge amounts of overhead - from the cost of equipment and computers, to vehicle maintainance and gasoline, insurance (both against theft and liability), rent on storefronts/studios - the list goes on and on.

Frankly, by not charging what the local market shows as fair, you are not only setting up yourself to fail in the long run, but others as well.

So, what do you do? How do you know what’s fair to charge without undercutting everyone else so drastically? Check out a program called FotoQuote (www.fotoquote.com). I’ll be getting into this awesome program later on in the month, but it is a great way to figure out how much others are making and what you should charge depending on who you are doing the work for.

Related Tags: Freelance, Photography, Rates, Fotoquote