Even though it’s important to keep practicing photography right now, it’s also worth taking a break from it. Taking some time away from photography is great for inspiring different types of creativity. We have so much time on our hands right now, that you can make the most out of it by learning a new skill or taking up new hobbies. Is there a language you always wanted to learn? Or a recipe you want to perfect? Think of a time when you’ve said, "If only I had more time, I would do ___” and start doing it.
In this time, I reviewed and practiced some new tips and tricks at home and on the surrounding. Some are good and some are need to be developed. But it is true that, this COVID destroyed our ongoing career just in a moment.
The quarantined lock-down really has put a lot of things into context. I enjoyed reading this lovely slideshow article of yours. The author talks about fortifying your equipment, portfolio, and that is what I've been doing currently. Additionally, there has been an influx of wildlife on my balcony, which were never seen before ever. Now I've started developing a calm sense of composure for clicking wildlife shots as well. ~Sanjeev Nanda
Consider Uber to supplement income... My cousin is making $1000 a week doing Uber eats... I'm sure Amazon and other home delivery services also need more employees...
A day after coming home from the hospital with my newborn daughter the lockdown was announced here in Spain. My 22 months old son is ripping the flat apart.
I have just bought really literally everything for professional product photography and was on to go but I have less time than ever now even being home all day long. Impossible to make a studio to peactice and then take everything away by the time they wake up.
Travel back in time in DPreview and read articles and discussions from the past. It's like reading a journal to see how far we've come. You'll laugh at people as they bragged about the image quality they get from their 4mp camera...
All good suggestions. I would add: Register your copyright with the Copyright office or develop a system to do that. In theory pros are doing that but IRL many are not.
Prioritizing your income and especially backing up should be part of your regular routine anyway, lock-down or not. Maybe if you have several backup drives sitting around, you can consolidate them into one larger drive or something or if you've been thinking about doing cloud backup, now might be a good time too.
Another good activity is to do a deep cull of through photos. I just did one and got rid of about 25% of what I had left over from my prior culling (sometimes I'll save multiple copies of an image until I'm sure I have a good backup of one or two of them), or sometimes I'll go back through later and delete multiple shots from a burst. So going through your photos (and organizing them if they're a bit unorganized) is a good task to do, especially if you can't book any clients during this time. While it won't generate any cash flows right now, it will free up time later that you could use for doing money-making things,
SELL UNUSED GEAR: I shot my manual Canon FD lenses and sold them on Ebay as well as my older camera 5N & EVF.
BUY NEW STUFF: I then ordered a Sigma 16/1.4 from the return.
SCAN OLD SHOTS: I also bought a cheap Canon Lide 400 and was smashed by the quality of scanned photos and already scanned an entire album from the 80s. Will continue with kids photos where the negatives were destroyed due to fungus.
REPAIR YOUR GEAR: Also, I replaced the 4way controller on my A6000 and made a youtube video how to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CCY94lHUjrs Only cost 27 Euros including shipping :-)
I then cleaned the internals & sensor of my Sony P150 2005 camera just for fun and got a jolt from the flash capacitor, yikes!
IMPROVE YOUR GEAR: Now I ordered f-stop and noname backpack inserts for camera stuff and will try out which fits better to my Osprey light-weight backpack (seems I can't find a photo backpack to my liking :-).
Since cooking is my second favorite hobby, I started a channel on YouTube when I knew I was going to have to stay home for a while. I know I suck right now as far as a content creator but I don't care. It's a way to keep my Z6 off the shelf and using battery.
Haha, a bunch of Nikon kit lenses, a D600, D610, maybe a D800, couple of D7100s, a D5300, a 7RM2 with aftermarket battery grip & Commlite smart adapter for Nikon F-mount lenses, and dumb adapters for M42 (not MFT/M43), a Fuji X-T20 with a couple lenses, and a ton of other stuff mainly Nikkors i don't use anymore...
Things to do: #1: Send a9M2 back to Sony to replace shutter that just got mangled because i enabled the shutter to act as the sensor's protection. #2: Remember to tell Sony on that work order to fix the sensor that got scratched by the broken shutter. #3: Call mom.
For number 10, they should have considered adding a different important thing to try.
If you do not need to do any serious work at the moment, why not take this time to improve your overclocks. Given your current overclock, is it the best you can get given your current cooling and motherboard VRMs?
If near the max overclock, have you experimented with lowering voltages and then experimenting with different LLC values to see if you can maintain your overclock with a lower average voltage but less Vdroop?
Have you double checked your videocard overclocks?
Have you been putting off overclocking your RAM and tightening subtimings because of how time consuming it is? Why not use this time to also overclock your RAM?
Overclocking now will provide you better performance in any subsequent work you do. You will also get better gaming performance.
The truth is that I have always had photography there as a possible escape from my bland work. I have come up with proposals that I have always rejected, I thought, maybe one day I will do it, I invest a few hundred on a good website and start making those orders that I always reject. But now that mental escape is dead. I don't want to be pessimistic, but the economic recession that this situation brings is going to be really hard and depends on the duration or the possible second waves, perhaps it will significantly change our way of life and consumption. We will see where the professional photography of weddings, graduations and "low level" events is.
I fear that even if your contract stipulates that the deposit is non-refundable (based upon whatever could happen including acts of God), you will not be able to hold onto that money and the customer at the same time. It might ensure that you'll keep the assignment once most things revert to previous plans, however don't be surprised if a lot of jobs will be cancelled or, at least, renegotiated. Suzi hit it on the nose when she said that it doesn't hurt to have some flexibility.
Not so sure about that. I run a small wildlife photography tour company, and consider a deposit to be a financial commitment by a buyer.
If the buyer then cancels, he/she loses the money - otherwise I'd have to increase the cost to the remaining participants, which would be unfair on them, and risk me losing multiple customers. When a customers pays a deposit they know and accept that it is non-refundable.
I agree that it does pay to be flexible though - I'd refund a deposit if e.g. they were forced to cancel due to something serious like personal illness or bereavement, but certainly not if it was just a case of they'd changed their mind. You have to judge each case on its merit.
I think it will actually stay about the same. Yeah, some of the high-end cameras might have price cuts (like your A7R IV, Canon R5 (whenever that's released), and others that break the $3000 marker as people might flock to used cameras or cheaper cameras especially if the global recession is predicted to last more than a year. If anything, I expect there to be huge demand on the used market.
I don't foresee (and wouldn't count on) any heavy discounting because while businesses will need the money, they'll also want to recoup as much as they can, so I don't think prices will change too much from what they are now, and If companies start moving production out of China (which it sounds like it will be the case for some, as some companies are making plans already to do so) that will probably mean prices will remain pretty constant to the consumer as the cost will probably go up for the mfr a little.
Learn about marketing. That should be #1, #2, #3. I have no affiliation to any of the companies I mention, btw.
1. Learn how to make your own website on WordPress. It's actually pretty easy. Wordpress themes like Divi make it a simple drag and drop. Learn how to make your website load quickly - I use Linode, which can run a Wordpress website with your own dedicated IPv4 and resources for $5. $20 gets you a VPS that will fly even with thousands of visitors. You can set up the linode using one of their scripts. A little bit of coding gets you a free SSL from Let's Encrypt. If you ever run into issues, there are thousands of people on Fiverr who can fix it for you. By setting up your won website you simultaneously learn how to be a basic web developer designer, save money, and gain better control of your SEO.
2. Learn SEO. This isn't just keywords anymore. They are still important so you should figure out how to optimize your site for them. Ubersuggest is a good free tool to figure out which keywords you should be looking at in your area. You'll probably also want to start blogging on topics that are helpful to your customers as a way of building a brand, giving Google a reason to recrawl your website and giving you a platform to target additional keywords. It will be difficult to get on the first page of the search results for competitive keywords so you'll want to make sure that you have a profile on all of the aggregator sites like Wedding Wire and The Knot. Also make sure your Google Maps, Yelp and Apple Maps listings are updated regularly. That is an effective way to get to the top of the search results.
3. Step up your social. I know so many photographers who don't care about Instagram. This is especially shocking now. You may not like it, but it is the #1 way to get clients right now. I run a couple of 150k+ accounts for brands and they are seeing about 250% increase in growth vs. pre-Covid and about 5x the number of website visits. People are stuck in their homes with nothing to do so they are spending huge amounts of time on social media. If you previously gave up on growing your following because it was a lot of work for little reward, I suggest you try again. Just have a look at how successful photographers do it. You basically just need good professional content that you post regularly (have a separate account for family photos), you need to interact with people who comment on your posts, also like and comment on other accounts. Run contents for free shoots, free prints, create how to's, ask questions in your posts to increase the number of responses, maybe even live stream.
4. Prepare for the new normal. If you shoot weddings then you should be thinking about what you can do for those people that had to cancel their arrangements. Maybe make special offers for people to help them afford a good photographer for when they rearrange their date. You could do something like offer to shoot a wedding for free for someone who has had their date canceled. If you are any good then you'll probably have a lot of people apply and you can offer a reduced rate to the ones you don't pick and get good press from the one you do. You can even do something like offer to create a free wedding website for people using your new WordPress skills. Everything is going to be weird for a while so the photographers who think outside the box and are adaptable are going to be the ones who survive. Even if you are technically unemployed because you can't get any work, you aren't really unemployed. You are investing your own labor in your future business.
I agree with #3 and #4, especially #3 if you've been slacking on uploading photos to social media. Will help keep your account active with new content. I've gone back through and started posting some old stuff from a few years ago on mine, also gives me a chance to go back through my library and find some images I had forgotten about.
I would also add that perhaps people should consider updating their portfolio and make sure it's of good quality--get rid of the "fat" (either stuff that no longer resembles what you do or that isn't your best work--I've seen some people put their second and third best work up in their portfolios, and IMO, that probably hurts them. So going through your portfolio should have also be a priority too (you should actually always do this, but now is a great time to really go through it and put up new stuff and get rid of the old stuff).
Ah, yes... they could also wash their socks (remember poisinous gas protection gear), clean the kitchen sink, repair the foot path or even, God forbid, do the dishes... etc.
Guys (and lassies)... please collect yourself. This lock-down-madness-syndrom is taking things too far.
The Sony a7CR is a high-resolution addition to the company's compact full-frame a7C series. So what did we make of it and where does it leave the a7 IV that it sits just above?
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The Sony a7CR is a high-resolution addition to the company's compact full-frame a7C series. So what did we make of it and where does it leave the a7 IV that it sits just above?
Lomography's LomoChrome '92 is designed to mimic the look of classic drugstore film that used to fill family photo albums. As we discovered, to shoot with it is to embrace the unexpected, from strange color shifts to odd textures and oversized grain.
Sony's gridline update adds up to four customizable grids to which users can add color codes and apply transparency masks. It also raises questions about the future of cameras and what it means for feature updates.
At last, people who don’t want to pay a premium for Apple’s Pro models can capture high-resolution 24MP and 48MP photos using the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Plus. Is the lack of a dedicated telephoto lens or the ability to capture Raw images worth the savings for photographers?
Kodak's Super 8 Camera is a hybrid of old and new: it shoots movies using Super 8 motion picture film but incorporates digital elements like a flip-out LCD screen and audio capture. Eight years after we first saw the camera at CES 2016, Kodak is finally bringing it to market.
In this supplement to his recently completed 10-part series on landscape photography, photographer Erez Marom explores how the compositional skills developed for capturing landscapes can be extended to other areas of photography.
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Sony, the Associated Press and 'Photo Mechanic' maker Camera Bits have run a month-long field-test to evaluate capture authentication and a subsequent workflow.
A color-accurate monitor is an essential piece of the digital creator's toolkit. In this guide, we'll go over everything you need to know about how color calibration actually works so you can understand the process and improve your workflow.
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It's that time of year again: When people get up way too early to rush out to big box stores and climb over each other to buy $99 TVs. We've saved you the trip, highlighting the best photo-related deals that can be ordered from the comfort of your own home.
The LowePro PhotoSport Outdoor is a camera pack for photographers who also need a well-designed daypack for hiking and other outdoor use. If that sounds like you, the PhotoSport Outdoor may be a great choice, but as with any hybrid product, there are a few tradeoffs.
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DJI's Air 3 and Mini 4 Pro are two of the most popular drones on the market, but there are important differences between the two. In this article, we'll help figure out which of these two popular drones is right for you.
The Sony a7C II refreshes the compact full-frame with a 33MP sensor, the addition of a front control dial, a dedicated 'AI' processor, 10-bit 4K/60p video and more. It's a definite improvement, but it helps if you value its compact form.
Above $2500 cameras tend to become increasingly specialized, making it difficult to select a 'best' option. We case our eye over the options costing more than $2500 but less than $4000, to find the best all-rounder.
The iPhone 15 Pro allows users to capture 48MP photos in HEIF or JPEG format in addition to Raw files, while new lens coatings claim to cut down lens flare. How do the cameras in Apple's latest flagship look in everyday circumstances? Check out our gallery to find out.
Global shutters, that can read all their pixels at exactly the same moment have been the valued by videographers for some time, but this approach has benefits for photographers, too.
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The Sony a9 III is a ground-breaking full-frame mirrorless camera that brings global shutter to deliver unforeseen high-speed capture, flash sync and capabilities not seen before. We delve a little further into the a9III to find out what makes it tick.
The "Big Four" Fashion Weeks – New York, London, Milan and Paris - have wrapped for 2023 but it's never too early to start planning for next season. If shooting Fashion Week is on your bucket list, read on. We'll tell you what opportunities are available for photographers and provide some tips to get you started.
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