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Mr. Stock Smarty Pants discusses stock photography in the winter season
As the song says: Baaay-beeee, it’s c-o-l-d outside.
However, I’m sure you’ll be pleased to know that’s it’s a cozy 75 degrees inside Mr. Stock Smarty Pants’ Aspen retreat, with a roaring fire blazing just a few feet away while I recline in my La-Z-Boy and sort through the latest pleas for help from readers of About The Image. I’m tempted to knock back my third toddy of the evening but realize that I need to keep at least a somewhat clear head in order to provide the thoroughly professional level of expertise that’s required for this sort of work. Plus, I really detest getting on the ski lift in the morning and then flying down a double-diamond run with a throbbing head, so let’s just get right to it, shall we?
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Dear Mr. Stock Smarty Pants:
I’m a photographer who lives out on the frozen tundra of the Midwestern US. As I write this it’s not even officially winter yet, and yet we’ve already been hit by several major snowstorms as well as extremely chilly temperatures in my neck of the woods. I’m thinking that I need to just mothball my cameras and forego my stock photography activities until things thaw out in the spring. What do you think?
Sincerely yours,
Sunless in St. Paul
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Dear Sunless:
Just because you’re “sunless” doesn’t give you an excuse for also being clueless. I regret to inform you that “frozen tundra” is redundant, and if you had attended the same high-priced boarding schools as me you’d know that. However, despite whatever educational advantages you may have been deprived of in your sad little corner of the world, there’s nothing preventing you from using a dictionary and thus avoiding a grammatical faux pas such as this one. Or, perhaps it’s not your lack of forced vocabulary drills in 7th grade that’s holding you back: you’re apparently residing in St, Paul, which is dangerously close to Green Bay, Wisconsin where the natives also insist on referring to the “frozen tundra” at Lambeau Field, home of the hapless Green Bay Packers. So, since it’s holiday time, I’ll be charitable and ascribe your lack of geological knowledge to an unfortunate proximity to, and thus unwitting influence from, that unruly band of cheeseheads that insists on sitting outdoors to witness yet another football fiasco in frigid December.
As for your “plan” to mothball your stock photo activities until spring, I’ll paraphrase a quote from comedian Dave Chappelle: IS YOU CRAZY?
Stock photography is not a part-time endeavor if you hope to achieve any significant degree of success (and that may be a leap in your case, but work with me, OK?). You don’t do a little stock photography here, a little there, or decide to take an entire calendar season “off” from stock if you want to make the big bucks. And, if you do NOT want to make the big bucks, why are you even involved in it?
So, as a service to you, as well as all of the other snow-challenged stock photographers out there, here is MSSP’s not-entirely-comprehensive guide to suggested winter activities (I’ve left a few of my own personal favored winter activities out because the editors of this website claim it has to remain suitable for a “family” type of audience, so going into details about the benefits of combining a hot tub, strippers and cordless appliances is frowned upon):
1) TAKE PICTURES! Wow, what a concept, eh? Yeah, that’s right, head over to REI or Dick’s Sporting Goods, buy some high-quality winter boots, long underwear and a polarfleece jacket, and get on out into the elements and take pictures. What can you shoot? Just about anything you’d shoot in the warmer seasons, but with beautiful white snow for a backdrop instead of green grass. No, you won’t do a whole lot of shooting at the beach, but so what? You can still capture skylines, lifestyles, traffic (and traffic accidents on slippery roads!), sports and action (skiing, boarding, skating, etc.), families (building snowmen, sledding, putting up holiday lights, etc.) and on and on. Your ability to capture wintry images is limited only by your own imagination. And, here’s the good news: many other photographers are thinking just like you…they act like girly-men and put away their cameras until it turns tropical again. That means your winter pictures won’t be competing with the plethora of images made by fair-weather photographers in sunnier climes.
2) SCAN THOSE ANALOG IMAGES. You’ve dreaded it…you’ve put it off…and now you have no excuse not to do it. I know you’re one of those older folks who used to shoot film (I know this because younger people don’t care about the cold weather or snow, unlike whiney old guys like you whose bones creak every time they lift a snow shovel) and now you’re sitting with boxes and boxes of transparencies that aren’t making a dime for you. So, step one is to sort through them as quickly as possible and select for scanning ONLY the images with serious sales potential (forget about any that contain dated clothes or hairstyles, stiff poses or skylines lacking the latest skyscrapers). Step 2 is to throw some logs on the fire, curl up with your scanner and convert those analog images into digital files. Step three is to do all the regular steps to prep the digital files for the marketplace (adjust color, clean up obvious dust, add keywords, etc.) and step 4 is to get them out the door. There: you wanted an excuse to stay inside all winter, I’ve just given it to you, and you can thank me the next time our paths cross at a suitable watering hole.
3) PLAN YOUR WARM-WEATHER PRODUCTION. An active fantasy life is good for your mental health, especially when you live in a godforsaken place like Minnesota. So, dig out that visual reference file you’ve been compiling (you HAVE been doing this, right?), call up your file of “Key Stock Photo Concepts,” and start planning your image production for when the Midwest finally thaws out (I think that’s around the 4th of July). By doing this you’ll accomplish two things: 1) when the relatively balmy weather finally hits your region, you won’t be fumbling around asking yourself, “What should I shoot?”, you’ll already know and have it detailed: WHERE you want to shoot, WHAT concept(s) you intend to illustrate, WHO you’re going to shoot (How many models? What ages? What gender? What ethnicity?), HOW you’re going to do it (What props do I need? What kind of lighting? Do I need a hair, makeup or set stylist? Do I need to get a location permit?); and 2) by thinking of shooting in warmer weather, you’ll be creatively visualizing something other than the 7-foot snowdrifts outside your window, and thus re-focusing your thoughts from the bleak scene outdoors to one that’s more joyous.
4) SHOOT THOSE TABLETOPS (OR OTHER INTERIORS). Not every best-selling stock shot is a family standing in front of a house, two people shaking hands or a panda wearing a clown suit and riding a Harley Davidson motorcycle (actually, I’m not sure if that last one exists, but it probably WOULD be a best seller if it does). Again, I’m trying to humor you, Sunless, and since your goal seems to be to hibernate like a bear, here’s yet another excuse for staying in the great indoors. Many stock shooters seem to ignore tabletops, but they require very little production space, there are no model fees and they don’t cost much to create. As always with stock, you need to illustrate a strong concept, but doing so by using inanimate objects can result in some very successful images.
5) LEARN SOMETHING! You know mastering Lightroom would be beneficial. Or Portfolio. Or Aperture. Or Excel. Or Quickbooks. Or any number of other software programs that are commonly employed by stock picture entrepreneurs. So, if all you want to do is relax in front of a monitor in your office with a cup of hot cocoa, don’t fritter away your time Googling Britney Spears or surfing for the latest Nikon doo-dad, sit down and actually read the manual or tutorials for the program(s) that are going to be most useful to you as a photographer and businessperson. Get help if you need it: the “Dummies” series is pretty good, if a bit condescending (like “Photoshop for Dummies”), but there are many others out there. By mastering the full capabilities of your software you’ll discover many useful tools that you didn’t even know existed.
So, Sunless, these are just a few ideas to get you through the coming months. Personally, if I lived where you do I’d devote my time to nailing up a “For Sale” sign outside my house and scoping out the internet ads for beach property in Costa Rica, but hey, that’s just me.
Mr. Stock Smarty Pants, an internationally known figure in the global professional picture industry and part-time waterboarding consultant to the CIA, answers your questions about the business side of stock photography on sporadic Mondays, or whenever the mood strikes him, on About The Image. Although MSSP travels the globe incessantly due to his need to use up frequent flyer miles before they expire, your question regarding anything about the stock photo business will be forwarded to him and, so long as Mr. Stock Smarty Pants is reasonably sober and within reach of an Internet café, he will consider responding to you in an upcoming edition of About The Image. E-mail your questions to: . Oh, and MSSP categorically denies any affiliation whatsoever with the company called Stock Answers LLC ®.
Posted in: Features, Mr. Stock Smarty Pants, Photographers, Stock Photo Companies
Comments(1)
post a comment »Frozen to death, December 23, 2008 [#]
It seems like you enjoy Minnesota winter as much as I do. Seriously. That is exactly my plan for this time of year except that instead of scanning films (which I do not have) I go through the pile of RAW files done over the summer.