--- In selling_stock_photography@yahoogroups.com, "Pete Jenkins" <petej@...> wrote:
> snip<
> Since then, (1986), I have seen, (for example), many traditional, very competent, and very successful picture agencies go to the wall because they refused to embrace digital imaging in time, or refused to embrace it at all.> snip<
I don't think the digital issue is as black and white as it is sometimes made to be. For example if you were an early adopter of digital cameras the photos you made in 1999 with a several thousand dollar camera wouldn't even be considered for stock on technical grounds now. And your camera would be handed over to your 7 year old daughter to play with (as I did with my $1000 Nikon 990 of the day.) However if you were shooting 4x5 chromes back in 1999 you would have commercially viable image quality now(even with a camera made in the 1970's.) That's assuming your subject matter was still relevant. I also had a 4x5 kit with a 210mm and a 90mm that cost less than that crappy Nikon, and I really don't like looking at those photos...ouch! But the 4x5s are great! And we see fully digitized stock agencies dropping like flies now.
Perhaps photography is at a crossroads? There will always be professional photographers, but how many and doing what? In general there is a huge over supply of photography and "photographers" (in quotations because anybody can call him or herself a photographer, with no education or skill.) There of course will always be farmers too, but the first world used to employ (just guessing here) 20% in agriculture and now I think it's in the very low single digits. Or take textiles, porcelain, etc, etc. There are successful niches in all of the above mentioned professions: local organic agriculture, small run specialized textiles, the local "artiste" clay pot person etc. Is that where we're heading?
Seems perhaps:
*Many of us will see dwindling photographic incomes
*A select few of us will get lucky
*Some of us will find successful stock niches
*Some of us will find other non-stock, non outsourceable to the cheapest bidder (or country) work like weddings, events, bat and bar mitzvahs etc.
--
Michael Halberstadt
1070 Marina Village Pkwy
Suite 204, Alameda, CA
telephone 415.742.1201
siliconvalleystock.photoshelter.com
halberst.zenfolio.com
siliconvalleystock.com
halberst@gmail.com
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