Are Amateurs destroying Photography

Ricardo222 wrote in post #15206059
Damn, and I bought an Android! Is there no hope for me Mike?

I wouldn't sweat the body...just get some really good glass for your Android. Have you tried using an EOS-to-Android adapter to attach it to your 600mm?

yes they are destroying photography. Just contacted a very large event management company for some up coming artist tours. The guy I spoke to clearly said to me that they wont pay for my time or photos, but they are happy to comp me a ticket to the concert in exchange for all the photos on the card. He said they have heaps of amateurs doing it for free to get into the concert for nothing.

Farking amateurs are destroying photography. Anyone who says they aren't is fully up themselves.

God help you if you goto an amateur doctor. Will it be different then? or will you still agree amateurs are ok?

Other forum members have in the past made the comment that they have no issue with them or that if your good enough an amateur wont get chosen. True if your in a cozy position with your client and in an area where there aren't many amateurs. The issue is that in smaller zoned locations, amateurs are selling their souls for free which in turn takes away from a photographer trying to earn to support their familiy.

I have made the effort to contact a few photographers and they can confirm that amateurs have taken work off them. We sit here and slave over the perfect image, with sharpness and colour and magical post processing. The average consumer who wants photos for an event or whatever doesnt see the hard work we focus on in our images, they look at how light their wallet is after. I said it before and say it again, its happening in many other trades where amateurs are selling their half baked skills for next to nothing. This creates a price normality where the consumer believes that the cheap price of an amateur is supposed to be the going rate for a photographer. I have a friend who is a computer tech. He is losing work because amateurs are selling themselves half price and they dont even have insurance to cover their actions. He can't regain clients as they have told him he is now to expensive!!!!

He hasn't changed his rates in 7 years and the rates are a standard rate for any professional I.T. business.

Why do people goto craigslist, ebay, and cheap department stores.......because they want cheaper, not quality or sales assurance. Most, not all people today are more worried about saving money then spending. Make note that I am not referring to saving $100 on an apple iphone between two stores. i am referring to knockoff iphones being sold cheaper where the customer doesnt care about the research and design of a proper iphone, they just wanna save money and so will pay for the cheap, poor qaulity amaateur knockoff.


How can this be fixed????????????


Amateur photographers, if leaping out in the real world want to work, must charge like any existing professional. Then the difference between pro and amateur will surface as many consumers realise they spent $$$$$ on hiring somebody without the skillset to give them a final product. I agree that there a some amateurs out there that are very talented. Respectfully, they should be selling their services at a proper price level.

Most of you on this forum aren't people that rely on photography as your day to day money source. Imagine if you lost your normal 9-5 job because your boss let you go because he hired someone who would work for half the pay and they didnt even commit to years of study for the position nor did they have qualifications as did you. All they did was offer to work for half the pay that you get.

Ya gunna feel warm and fuzzy now?.....well are you?

I gather you wont sit back and accept it. You are going to wanna club the SOAB and take your job back. How many Americans lose their jobs due to work being handed over to overseas labour where its half qualified, dodgy and poor quality. Without mentioning names there is a major airline in Australia that for years handed over its servicing of its jets to an overseas asian outfit. The amount of dodgy and poor quality workmanship was all over the news. Not because they were asian, but that the engineers and mechanics werent qualified enough to complete the repairs.

This is because they were thinking about their $$$ and not the quality of service.

lensfreak wrote in post #15219213
Farking amateurs are destroying photography. Anyone who says they aren't is fully up themselves.

God help you if you goto an amateur doctor. Will it be different then? or will you still agree amateurs are ok?

I wouldn't go to an amateur doctor. I might go to an amateur photographer, if I liked their work. The risk/reward considerations are quite different between the two.

Or, as someone once said, anyone who makes doctor/photographer analogies is fully up themselves.

David Arbogast wrote in post #15218645
I wouldn't sweat the body...just get some really good glass for your Android. Have you tried using an EOS-to-Android adapter to attach it to your 600mm?

I'm working on it David....expect to see something really tragic in the near future!:p

moose10101 wrote in post #15219240
I wouldn't go to an amateur doctor. I might go to an amateur photographer, if I liked their work. The risk/reward considerations are quite different between the two.

Or, as someone once said, anyone who makes doctor/photographer analogies is fully up themselves.

Well substitute an alternate occupation plumber or painter instead of doctor.

The point is that there are people out there who have worked and educated themselves to a point where they are very good at what they do and charge accordingly. The issue is that cheap under qualified people are taking jobs away from more educated people on price and not experience or qualifications.

Consumers dont want to pay normal prices anymore. They want cheap cheap cheap. Yes the likes of marie claire and may other magazines are going to hire professionals but I am referring to .....example. A local hardware store in you city is having a open day for a new building. There are two photographers in your city, you and little Johnny who just purchased a cheap slr from walmart and has been watching youtube videos on how to take photos LIKE A PRO!

You apply for the job as the photographer to cover the event and they reply that they have gotten a photographer already. You enquire further and it turns out to be Little Johnny. You explain to the client that you have been working for many years, shot countless weddings and commercial events and you can certainly deliver quality images for them to use on the web or brochure or whatever to promote the opening. They decide to go with Johnny.....because Johnny has a digital camera and he will shoot the whole day for $50 or a voucher from the store. The client weeks later gets the photos and they love them....my god Johnny is a great photographer.....you check out the photos and to your expectations they are poorly composed, over and underexposed and blurry in most shots. It doesnt matter what you say, the client is too blind to see the difference, its too late now, Johnny got his $50, the client got 1000 photos, and you got a kick in the teeth. This has happened to me and many other photographers I know.

yes but that is in nearly every type of job, its the sign of the times,i dont disagree that amateurs may be taking a slice of your work market,but its prob a very small slice,and as said all the new i phones etc that has in built cameras are getting used more and more ,and its only on the rare times that they will go to a pro for photos to be taken,the rest of the times its a fast snap and strait on to facebook twitter etc, the times are a changing

I agree, great point. Times are changing, soon the so called professional will not exist and the world will be saturated in half baked, uneducated people thinking they have what it takes.

lensfreak wrote in post #15219213
yes they are destroying photography. Just contacted a very large event management company for some up coming artist tours. The guy I spoke to clearly said to me that they wont pay for my time or photos, but they are happy to comp me a ticket to the concert in exchange for all the photos on the card. He said they have heaps of amateurs doing it for free to get into the concert for nothing.

Farking amateurs are destroying photography. Anyone who says they aren't is fully up themselves.

God help you if you goto an amateur doctor. Will it be different then? or will you still agree amateurs are ok?

Other forum members have in the past made the comment that they have no issue with them or that if your good enough an amateur wont get chosen. True if your in a cozy position with your client and in an area where there aren't many amateurs. The issue is that in smaller zoned locations, amateurs are selling their souls for free which in turn takes away from a photographer trying to earn to support their familiy.

I have made the effort to contact a few photographers and they can confirm that amateurs have taken work off them. We sit here and slave over the perfect image, with sharpness and colour and magical post processing. The average consumer who wants photos for an event or whatever doesnt see the hard work we focus on in our images, they look at how light their wallet is after. I said it before and say it again, its happening in many other trades where amateurs are selling their half baked skills for next to nothing. This creates a price normality where the consumer believes that the cheap price of an amateur is supposed to be the going rate for a photographer. I have a friend who is a computer tech. He is losing work because amateurs are selling themselves half price and they dont even have insurance to cover their actions. He can't regain clients as they have told him he is now to expensive!!!!

He hasn't changed his rates in 7 years and the rates are a standard rate for any professional I.T. business.

Why do people goto craigslist, ebay, and cheap department stores.......because they want cheaper, not quality or sales assurance. Most, not all people today are more worried about saving money then spending. Make note that I am not referring to saving $100 on an apple iphone between two stores. i am referring to knockoff iphones being sold cheaper where the customer doesnt care about the research and design of a proper iphone, they just wanna save money and so will pay for the cheap, poor qaulity amaateur knockoff.


How can this be fixed????????????


Amateur photographers, if leaping out in the real world want to work, must charge like any existing professional. Then the difference between pro and amateur will surface as many consumers realise they spent $$$$$ on hiring somebody without the skillset to give them a final product. I agree that there a some amateurs out there that are very talented. Respectfully, they should be selling their services at a proper price level.

Most of you on this forum aren't people that rely on photography as your day to day money source. Imagine if you lost your normal 9-5 job because your boss let you go because he hired someone who would work for half the pay and they didnt even commit to years of study for the position nor did they have qualifications as did you. Ya gunna feel warm and fuzzy now?.....well are you?

Trying to compete with crowdsourcing event photography will be an exercise in frustration.

I see your point about losing your livelihood with respect to photography being your main source of income. Businesses refocus and change markets (3M going from mining to abrasives to adhesives to media). Workers find new fields. Technology has always driven these changes. Before photographers, coopers, woodworkers, and countless others were displaced.

You either have to find another profession, or another market. The technology combined with complacency on quality are reducing the market you're currently pursuing.

lensfreak wrote in post #15219471
I agree, great point. Times are changing, soon the so called professional will not exist and the world will be saturated in half baked, uneducated people thinking they have what it takes.

Sad but true. Lots and lots of uneducated comments on last night's election as evidence. They're all experts on fixing this mess.

lensfreak wrote in post #15219471
I agree, great point. Times are changing, soon the so called professional will not exist and the world will be saturated in half baked, uneducated people thinking they have what it takes.

How will we know if you are wrong?

That is, if professionals do continue to exist, at what date in the future (SOON!) will we be able to say that your prediction is totally, unequivocally, in error?

lensfreak wrote in post #15219408
Well substitute an alternate occupation plumber or painter instead of doctor.

The point is that there are people out there who have worked and educated themselves to a point where they are very good at what they do and charge accordingly. The issue is that cheap under qualified people are taking jobs away from more educated people on price and not experience or qualifications.

The difference is that with photography, as compared to most other fields, it really isn't that hard to learn and become decent at. If all a customer wants are fairly basic photos, then it doesn't take someone with an advanced degree in art and a decade of experience to produce it with a modern camera. It is a fairly simple field to be decent in.

There will always be demand from some for higher quality, and photos that are simply better. Either step up and move in with the smaller crowd, or step out.

What happens when you hire a bad but expensive photographer for an event? You don't get photos of the event. What happens when you hire a dozen super cheap photographers, and two of them turn out to be decent? You get the photos of the event you wanted.

What happens when you hire a cheap plumber who doesn't really know his trade? You get tens of thousands of dollars in damages.

Where it actually matters, there will be professionals. Where it doesn't matter, there will be ever cheaper and lower skilled people looking to do it for whatever reason.

If you have never cried for the plight of the blacksmith as a well paying trade (A good swords smith was one of the wealthiest professions at one point), then you have little room to excuse yourself to cry for the lower end photographer.

lensfreak wrote in post #15219471
I agree, great point. Times are changing, soon the so called professional will not exist and the world will be saturated in half baked, uneducated people thinking they have what it takes.

Any time change occurs, opportunity exists.

What most people do not understand, is opportunity does not come knocking on the door, one has to step outside and discover it.

pbelarge wrote in post #15220175
Any time change occurs, opportunity exists.

What most people do not understand, is opportunity does not come knocking on the door, one has to step outside and discover it.

I couldn't agree more. The pro photographers won't find a new paradigm of photography by pining on the old times on this forum (I for one am glad they are gone and welcome the digital era); they'll have to find new solutions for themselves.

The problem is simple the solution is tough
Photography isn't licensed or regulated .
With Doctors and lawyers you know what their training or education should be.
There is no amateur doctor or lawyer.
Take Electricians and plumbers, they are licensed, apprentice, journeyman, masters. Different qualifications and proven time working to get each.
Painters, at least in Texas are unlicensed, anyone with white clothes and a brush can be called a professional painter.
Unless photographers can organize and establish a license or rating, which requires an apprenticeship and training or some level of testing, then this field will always suffer in this way.
But even then you still have competition, Electricians compete against the unlicensed handyman.
Some lawyers charge $100 p/hour, some $3000.
There will always be someone cheaper or less skilled than you.
Just like all the above occupations, Photogs have their work and reputation to prove their competence.

pbelarge wrote in post #15220175
Any time change occurs, opportunity exists.

What most people do not understand, is opportunity does not come knocking on the door, one has to step outside and discover it.

Apricane wrote in post #15220186
I couldn't agree more. The pro photographers won't find a new paradigm of photography by pining on the old times on this forum (I for one am glad they are gone and welcome the digital era); they'll have to find new solutions for themselves.

Well said guys...I'm glad there is still some reality out there!

Fester wrote in post #15220282
The problem is simple the solution is tough
Photography isn't licensed or regulated .
With Doctors and lawyers you know what their training or education should be.
There is no amateur doctor or lawyer.
Take Electricians and plumbers, they are licensed, apprentice, journeyman, masters. Different qualifications and proven time working to get each.
Painters, at least in Texas are unlicensed, anyone with white clothes and a brush can be called a professional painter.
Unless photographers can organize and establish a license or rating, which requires an apprenticeship and training or some level of testing, then this field will always suffer in this way.

it would be tough to establish and enforce photography licensing standards, it's like painting - anyone can do it, good or bad