Steven Johnson speaks about concepts in his book “Where Good Ideas Come From.” Here is his speaking to the TED conference. I learned from Steven that the coffee shop came along in Europe at a time when most folks drank wine or beer with everything. He joked about how the sobering up around the time of Benjamin Franklin helped as well as brought folks together for dialogue. Actually he said Sotherby’s was first a coffee shop that grew into a insurance company.
I just got to spend two days with some of the coolest experts on marketing. Here are some of the folks I met and links to their works.
Barry Schwartz, author of Practical Wisdom and The Paradox of Choice. He spoke to the group about how too many choices can be a bad thing and not enough choices is also bad.
After hearing a few of the speakers there were some conflicts, but the past couple of days was very mind stretching. These would not have been people I would normally sought out to listen to and this is one of the reasons I love what I do. People pay me to cover their events where I get the added bonus of hearing people outside my normal interests that stretch me.
Julie Ask is the VP and Principle Analyst for Forrester Research. Julie talked about the key consumer and mobile technology trends, highlighting the opportunities to engage our customers and explore an approach to developing and deploying a mobile strategy that supports business and marketing objectives and delivers value to our customers.
Julie Ask made the statement that mobile is quickly becoming a major player in the market. At this point only about 23% of phone users are using their smart phones for most of their computer needs. She sees this number growing.
Aiden Tracey is the CEO of Mosaic Sales Solutions, one of the fastest growing and leading privately held agencies in North America. He talked about how old rules of marketing get re-written by new technology and empowered consumers, it is critical for marketers to take a close look at their current go-to-market strategies to evaluate the approaches that truly deliver ROI.
Aiden Tracey showed where the technology introduction moments changed how we do marketing and business. This graph he used here shows when radio, TV, Cable and the web all were introduced and the resulting impact.
Tom Asker, Author and Brand Strategist, talked about unlocking the hearts and minds in today’s idea economy. At the core of his thesis is there are doors, invisible metaphysical doors, to people’s hearts and minds. And more importantly, there are specific keys and designs which will unlock these doors.
All the speakers were addressing the idea that we no longer live in a commodities market. We live in a experiential market. While some even talked about how the entire Walt Disney World is an experience and not so much a commodity they pointed to more and more things that today drive higher sales growth are linked directly to an experience the company provides. A good example of this is Starbucks. One presenter commented that he heard the CEO of Maxwell house just say how nothing knew had happened to coffee in the last 15 years. The CEO was still thinking about the commodity of the coffee itself and not the experience that Starbucks had done to the industry.
David Butler, VP Global Design, The Coca-Cola Company, talked about how design is used to create competitive advantage. He used the example of how kids need to brush their teeth for 2 minutes and they found a product that played a 2 minute song that his daughters would use to time their brushing. A creative solution that was a system that addressed an issue. Coke new 100 plus flavor fountains is something Coke has created to help create a system that offers variety for the customer.
Take what your company does that ends in ING and make a list of it. Things like roast-ing, or cook-ing and then think of new words that you have not even thought about your company and make up a new word with ING. I might write photographing, capturing and things related to taking pictures. Then I would create new words like “storying,” “vizwording,” and so on. This is how I see myself helping folks tell their stories by combining words and visuals.
Newell-RubbermaidYou can tell from the expressions of the attendees at the conference that this was an enjoyable experience.
If you want to be the next Starbucks, Google, or Facebook business success–study them and you will discover they are all creating experiences and not just a commodity. What kind of an experience are you creating for your customers?
Everyone was eager to collaborate and interact with each other.
Pam Goldsmith, world renowned violist [Nikon D4, 28-300mm, ISO 5600, ƒ/4.5, 1/125]
Looking for the light and how it naturally appears is a way photographers train their eyes.
An étude (a French word meaning study, French pronunciation: [eˈtyd], English pronunciation: / ˈeɪtjuːd /), is an instrumental musical composition, most commonly of considerable difficulty, usually designed to provide practice material for perfecting a particular technical skill. —Wikipedia
I grew up playing trumpet and after learning your scales I learned études. Each one worked on a particular skill and as they became more difficult I thought they were just a way to torture a musician, but they were like tongue twisters for the musician.
Every trumpet player will at some point acquire the famous Arban book. The Arban Method is a complete pedagogical method for students of trumpet, cornet, and other brass instruments. The original edition was published by Jean-Baptiste Arban in 1864 and it has never been out of print since. It contains hundreds of exercises, ranging enormously in difficulty. The method begins with fairly basic exercises and progresses to very advanced compositions, including the famous arrangement of Carnival of Venice.
For me certain light patterns and objects help create a mood. Reading the Sunday Paper with a cup of coffee sets a mood for me. Does it do something for you?
While professional musicians practice every day for 6 to 12 hours so too must professional photographers. They must learn to see. They may not use a camera all the time, but they must learn to see with an inquisitive eye.
A shaft of light was coming through an opening in the trees on our back porch. The branches created a pattern where the whole scene was not being lit up. When light is not so even it draws your attention to the highlights.
I love a cross light. It brings out texture and gives depth to a scene.
You need to practice seeing in order to be able to do like a musician does when they perform. They pull upon all their practices to play the music with such artistry that the nuances are there even tho they had never seen the music. But in reality they had in a way seen the music. All those scales and études along with other performances are being drawn upon. Their well is deep because of all the time they put into their practicing.
I love the back lit clouds at sunset.
Most all the movies and TV shows music isn’t practiced before it is recorded. That would just be too expensive to play through the music a few times with professional studio musicians. They know how to play the music as written and with their experience can bring it alive.
The professional photographer doesn’t practice a few times taking your portrait and then says OK this is for real. No they perform right away.
If you photos are not that great–have you considered you might not have practiced? I know my trumpet teacher would ask how much I practiced when they heard me play–it was a good sign I wasn’t doing it right if he asked me that question.
One of the concepts in the book is creating a tighter tribe and/or “transforming the shared interest into a passionate goal and desire for change” usually leads to much more impact than trying to make a tribe bigger. I now see this as more about niche markets are where people are going today rather than the mass market communications.
Just today I visited with a missionary couple who are raising their first support to go into missions full time. They had been on staff of a missionary organization that helped “missionaries” with their presentations to churches and their supporters when they came home on furlough every few years.
While these “missionaries” were not doing what we might term mass communications they were mainly using the older mass communication model of communications done at certain times. America would tune into the news on TV for a very long time at 6 pm and watch one of three networks before the Cable Networks came along. While CNN was the first to give us round the clock new cast it for the most part was more of the same network news rebroadcast throughout the day.
Since the 1995 when Mosaic popularized the World Wide Web and helped what started out to be the instantaneous news cycle. February 2004 Mark Zuckerberg launched Facebook and then we were all able to create our communities with our “friends.” We could talk with and follow our friends. We shared tips and what we were finding on the web.
Two years later July 2006 Jack Dorsey launched Twitter. The tipping point for Twitter’s popularity was the 2007 South by Southwest (SXSW) festival. During the event, Twitter usage increased from 20,000 tweets per day to 60,000. “The Twitter people cleverly placed two 60-inch plasma screens in the conference hallways, exclusively streaming Twitter messages,” remarked Newsweek’s Steven Levy. “Hundreds of conference-goers kept tabs on each other via constant twitters. Panelists and speakers mentioned the service, and the bloggers in attendance touted it.”
Today the ability of any person to reach out and create content that others with similar interest might be interested in has created a new communications platform for not just the professional communications expert, but anyone who wants to get on a soapbox.
What’s the big difference?
Today people want ongoing communications when they want it and where they are located. The mobile devices like smartphones and tablets are now creating more demand.
While the mass communication channels are still working the audience for them has shrunk considerable. Meanwhile more specialized magazines exist today than ever. Authors are self publishing because of e-Books. Bloggers are sitting in their bathrobes in their homes and connecting with the world.
Summary
If you are needing to communicate with a constituency, you need to be communicating more often. Blogging three times a week, putting out a newsletter, tweeting are not something of a fad–this is how your audience is getting their messages daily with things they are interested in. For those missionaries who used to come home every four years and give a slide show to their church and sending out quarterly newsletters they snail mailed are finding their support dwindling. Those who are connecting with their supporters on a regular basis are flourishing.
Business can do the same things as these missionaries I met with today–telling their stories to keep their customers.
The missionaries noticed something new they didn’t see years ago from their traditional communication–responses. Their supporters are responding immediately when they get an eNewsletter. They mention what they are doing and the people are excited and want to know when they are doing something so they can pray for them right then.
Businesses are also discovering a raving fan. Their customers are creating blogs about their products and trying to get the scoop on what the company is doing next.
The bottom line is mass communication which was one way communication is being replaced by a dialogue.
Sometimes photographers suffer from a “visual block.” It is very similar to the “writers block.”
What do you do to get some inspiration. This is one of many techniques I use.
Pick a macro lens or use your point and shoot on the macro (flower) setting.
Set the lens to the closest focus setting.
Set the f/stop on f/8 or greater. Very important if using a macro lens on DSLR
Get as close as you can without refocusing, but you getting the photo in focus by just getting closer or further back to keep the object in focus.
A screw in our deck
As you hunt for different things to photograph this close, you will notice you will often cast a shadow on the objects–be careful not to do that. If you want to make this more fun then use a small compact mirror (ladies have them in their purses) and bounce some light where you are casting a shadow. You can also just use a 3×5 white index card and that will work just as well.
Glaze finish on our kitchen cabinets
A photographer who needed to go back and get something and left his intern to watch the equipment at a photo shoot. They were in the middle of no where. Just a car there in the field. When the photographer returned he asked the intern what he got and he said nothing–there is nothing to shoot. The photographer then took the camera and shot about a dozen or so images in just a few moments and handed back to the intern.
They were all spectacular. Jay Maisel was that photographer. The intern got an incredible lesson that day, the images are all around you. The creative photographer will find them.
Water on our deck where you can see the reflection of the sky
When you create portraits that will run together you can create a “feel” for the portraits. One way is to use a traditional formal portrait where the backgrounds are identical. Another way is to use a similar style.
The last three photos are more traditional. But when used together they are not very good as a theme. What you need on a company website or organizations website is consistency of portraits. My recommendation is to find a theme and then have all the portraits done the same.
I love the low angle, use of flash off camera, and great expressions
Today is one of those days that you have got to get outside in Atlanta. Clear skies and most of the day in the 80s. During the morning, before it got warmer, I enjoyed capturing these moments at a local college.
Low angle to pick up on the blue sky and the architecture in the background
We didn’t have to go and find students and bring them outside for us to photograph them; no, they were everywhere today. Laptops were out in the sun, which isn’t easy to see in, to enjoy this weather.
Fill flash, and great expression makes the photo for me
I believe that the reason we were getting great shots is the weather brings out the best in folks. When it rains, I don’t see bright smiles but gloomy expressions. They match the weather to me. People bundle up and cover their faces with scarves when snow is on the ground.
Back-lit will help rim light the subject, and then using flash off the camera to the right of the issue enables you to see those wonderful expressive moments between friends.
Clothing can make or break a shot. The dental school students look great in their bright blue outfits with all the green landscaping around them.
Back-lit creates that excellent rim lighting and the flash off to the side helps again fill the shadows so you can see their expressions, enabling you to understand how these are good friends.
I cannot take the type of photos you see here without a photo assistant. I call them “voice-activated light stands.” They know where to point the lights and help them move along with the subjects, as in these photos of people walking toward me.
Every business uses signage to help in branding them. I like to tie their people to their brand, as I have done here.
Clayton State University found out this year that research shows they primarily compete with Georgia State University for their students. Georgia State University is an inner city school so Clayton State University will play up its beautiful green lush campus. When high school seniors look at those college brochures, they want them to see how they are different.
You don’t just take one photo; you take lots of pictures. Which image would you use, this one or the one above?
With cooler days of the fall starting to creep up on us, get outside on these days and take photos. Better yet, give me a call, and I will make them for you.
Compare these photos that use flash to the one below without the flash.
I put these two photos to show how when you don’t use a flash on a sunny day at about noon; you will make people become like a number rather than a person; because they are most often in shadows. Compare these two photos. Both are strong visually, but they say something different.
Here the person is a silhouette and becomes symbolic to me where the photo above the person is someone.
T J Fischer, Bravo Company Commander, talks with some of his staff during a light moment when Knobs are checking in at The Citadel on the first day.
From Wikipedia: Street photography is a type of documentary photography that features subjects in candid situations within public places such as streets, parks, beaches, malls, political conventions and other settings.
Street photography uses the techniques of straight photography in that it shows a pure vision of something, like holding up a mirror to society. Street photography often tends to be ironic and can be distanced from its subject matter, and often concentrates on a single human moment, caught at a decisive or poignant moment. On the other hand, much street photography takes the opposite approach and provides a very literal and extremely personal rendering of the subject matter, giving the audience a more visceral experience of walks of life they might only be passingly familiar with.
The “Red Sash” is what the Cadre wear at the Citadel. Cadre members are cadets who train the incoming fourth-class cadets and are considered to be in high standing academically and militarily.
I love “Street Photography” because you are just capturing those moments when people are so caught up in doing life they forget about you. The best photos I find is when people are with their closest friends and family.
One of the places I have enjoyed shooting the most has been The Citadel these past four years. Our son graduated in May, but we were vacationing nearby in Isle of Palms and went by for Matriculation Day. Dorie, my wife, enjoys volunteering.
Alpha parents wait with their Knobs things as they check in with the Cadre. The light blue shirt is for those Citadel parents who are volunteering. Their cadets have already been through their Knob year.
The volunteers are parents of current and former cadets at The Citadel. They remember so well dropping their sons and daughters off for that first time. The Knobs, what the call the freshmen at The Citadel, will go through right away what they call “Hell Week.” As compared to the other service academies The Citadel “fourth class system” is longer than all the others.
Sue Reigerix talks with her daughter Rachelle Reigerix, Athletic Cadre Commander, on Matriculation Day 2011 at The Citadel.
Now with a graduate I can see much better with my 20/20 hindsight. I believe that the higher the commitment of anything a person does, the more involved their friends and family become with them in their endeavor.
We are now into the next stage of being the family of a military officer. Already I am seeing how families all bond in ways that graduates that go into civilian life just don’t experience in the same way.
Knob is checking in for the first time. I love seeing the eyes look around. He will soon learn to do this using peripheral vision.
While street photography for me is fun the photos reveal more about folks than I ever thought possible. I think in these few photos you see a bit of life in just a few frames.
My favorite thing is also sharing these moments with those in the photos.
Remember to get these “Street Photography” images, you have to have your camera with you. The photo that got away is the time you don’t have your camera.
You need to understand what you need for each category over a year.
Knowing the costs of doing business is step two of learning how to quote a price to someone when they ask you, “How much do you charge?”
In step one, you should have devised an annual figure for your living expenses in step one. For example, if you live in a gated community and drive a premium vehicle, you can see that what you have to charge to pay your bills will impact your prices for your clients.
The other extreme I often encounter when teaching folks how to figure their prices is if they are in college or live at home. If they use their actual expenses for their annual salary, they will have to live with Mommy and Daddy for the rest of their lives. If you are one of these folks, then take some time and research what it would cost you to be alone. A few things will significantly change for those under 25 if they are alone and not with their parents.
Housing costs
Car Insurance
Health Insurance
These three items will be much more expensive if you do this alone.
I suggest going to the NPPA website and plugging in your figures. However, there is a better reason to go to the website than just using it as a calculator. Beside each item, there is an i-button. You have to be a member these days to access this calculator.
Telephone
Utilities
Internet Connection
Auto expenses
Computer
Adjust your home budget. You will need to revisit your “Annual Salary” and most likely realize you can now take home less for your home budget because some of this shifted to your “Business Expenses.” Revisiting your budget items will slightly affect the rates that you must charge.
A little guessing Determining the average job or assignment you will do with your business would be best. I found this difficult, but you can change this later if needed. It is the most challenging thing to approximate for several reasons. For example, I might do some photo shoots in a year.
Headshots
College Recruiting
Corporate events
NGO editorial coverage
Magazine features
News coverage for wire service
The prices for each of these are different for various reasons. First, they don’t all take the same amount of time. But, more importantly, I am an expert in some of these, and my competitors cannot compete head-to-head with me with all my clients.
The basic idea is that once you have figured out how many of these assignments you will do a year, you will guess what an average job entails. Next, take the same list and indicate how many you will do in a year. Besides that, how long does it take you, on average, to complete the work?
Headshots (100) x [2 hours] = 200
College recruiting (15) x [20 hours] = 300
Corporate events (12) x [20 hours] = 240
NGO editorial coverage (10) x [30 hours] = 300
Magazine features (15) x [8 hours] = 120
News coverage for wire service (20) x [3 hours] = 60
Total “billable” hours a year of 1220 divided by 8 hours a day gives you 152.5 days of “billable” time.
Now, this is a figure when you are starting maybe 30 days that you can find work in a year.
RED ALERT!!!
You will need to assume that you either 1) have saved enough money to offset your lack of jobs until you get enough jobs or 2) have another job.
A successful photographer will likely have around 100 “billable days” of work in a year. Using the 152.5 days of work a year will give you a $ 589.18-day rate if you use the default numbers in the NPPA calculator–DON’T DO THIS–use your numbers. For illustration, this would give you a $73.65 per “AVERAGE” hour rate that you “MUST” charge at the minimum, or your business model will be upside down.
I say average because, on some jobs, you can charge more since you might have little or no competition or the going rates in the market allow for a higher rate.
Don’t Quote Hourly Rates This exercise is to help you know your costs, not to give you the rate to quote. Combine it all Now that you know your “Cost of doing business,” you will combine this with actual expenses associated with a job. Here are some of those expenses you will add to your base:
Travel Expenses
Prints/CDs/Online Fees
Shipping Costs
Photo assistants
Makeup artists
Food costs (snacks for day-long shoots, for example)
These expenses are not an exhaustive list, but this will go on top of your $589.18 if it is a day-long shoot.
Usage Fees I discussed how to calculate these earlier, and this will go on top of the $589.18 plus expenses that will give you some idea of what to quote.
Trade-outs While you have everything to quote a job and are ready, some things are negotiable. For example, if a client gives you 50 copies of the coffee table book you did for their organization, you could trade this out for a lower price because you can now offset some advertising costs. You can then give these books to potential customers, helping you land a new client.
I know some photographers who trade out the retail value of their services, say with a restaurant. They give them $2,000 worth of photography for $2,000 worth of food. It is a win-win because the business costs maybe $1,000 for the photographer and only $1,000 for the restaurant. The photographer takes potential clients out for dinner at the fine dining restaurant, and it helps them seal the deal. The photographer just saved $1,000 in expenses for overhead.
Summary If you know these figures, you will feel confident that you can pay your bills doing the job when quoting prices. You also will feel that you did the right thing when they offer you less than your rates for a job and you turn them down. Finally, once you have the numbers, you can still be creative to develop solutions that make you the right fit for a job.
Here are monthly expenses and income based on minimum wage for a household of two children and two working adults in metro Atlanta. These numbers come from Fairness for Georgia Families.
Last blog I talked about usage fees. This is part 2 of 3 on pricing.
Your first step in know what to charge for photography projects would be the first step in any business you decide to start. How much does it cost for you to live? What is your home budget to pay the bills?
The table above is from research done in Atlanta, Georgia on the cost of living for a family.
What is scary is the actual take home salary of the two adults working at minimum wages is easily $12,500 less than their actual bills. The expenses are the average lowest rates.
Do you know what your monthly or annual budget is for you to live? Even if you do not go into business for yourself, you need to know this. Too many folks and most likely those working at Capitol Hill have the same problem. They have more going out than coming in.
If you are not upside down and have money in the bank and still don’t know your budget, just start tracking your spending. By knowing this number it will empower you later when you have someone ask your price and you know that if you don’t charge X amount that you will in reality be paying them to take your work.
Believe it or not this is one of the biggest reasons business will fail. Not knowing what they need to take home can impact what the business needs to succeed.
If you want to do photography full-time then you need to take this first step. My next post will help you with the cost of doing business, but you need to know what you have to take home to pay the bills before you can go to the second step, so take some time and get those numbers on paper.
I get the question from former students, colleagues and newbies all the time—“What should I charge?”
There are a few parts to that question. I am going to address the usage part here. You need to know how much you need to break even. We call this the “Cost of doing business.”
It has stock prices, assignment pricing, magazine pricing and quote packs
To figure the cost of doing business you take your living expenses of home and combine them with your overhead costs for running your business and estimate the average price you need to charge to cover this.
For jobs where folks are not buying prints to put on their walls at home you need to know how they plan to use the photos. We call this usage. This is what I want to address, because this is where you have room to negotiate. Your cost of doing business figure you have to charge that much or you are loosing money.
Quote packs are great for helping a client get more usage and for calculating the value of the package
The way someone uses your photos can vary the price you charge. One of the best comparisons is the music industry. If you buy a CD of a pop group you can play this on your own device all you like, but if you have a business and you play it over the intercom system you legally should be paying the artist more money to do that.
A company on Wall Street cannot use the music on the CEO’s personal CD for the advertising campaign.
I love the coach feature. It helps you know how to negotiate with a client.
This is also true for photography. The photographer maintains those rights to use the photos and can regulate how the images will be used. The client who hires the photographer can negotiate for some or all rights.
How do you know what this is worth? I use FotoQuote to help me get some idea of the rates I could charge. My recommendation is to buy the software and use it to help you know how to negotiate and get a fair market price for the use of your work.
When you shoot with your point and shoot camera one of the most important controls you have is your ISO. Most point and shoot cameras will not let you choose your shutter speed or f/stop. My Nikon P7000 lets me do pretty much everything that my Nikon D3s does in terms of picking modes and setting ISO.
Why do you want to change your ISO? Well often on Auto ISO it will only go to ISO 400. That is what my camera does on AUTO ISO. But I can override it and set the camera as high as ISO 6400.
Choose the highest ISO and then start taking photos.
f/3.2 1/70 ISO 1600
Zoom in on the back of the camera during the concert and see if the photo is sharp. There are two things affecting the sharpness shutter speed and how still you are holding the camera. If the pictures are not sharp, see about propping the camera on something like a chair, table or railing and then take photos.
If they are still not sharp there is one more thing affecting the sharpness–the people in the photo. They could be moving. So, if this is the case you need to shoot even more to get just a few in focus and sharp photos. Wait till the musicians pause in their actions–not necessarily in the music. They may hit a high note and hold it and this is when you want to shoot.
(f/5.6 1/25 ISO 1600) Because I held the camera really still and the musician Chuck Leavell paused in his motions I got a sharp photo. Lots before and after this wear not as sharp. I could have taken the ISO up two more stops, but I liked the look at ISO 1600. Had none come out sharp at this ISO I would have dialed the ISO up to 3200 or 6400.
f/5.6 1/100 ISO 1600
Summary: If you plan to take photos at a concert and you want some good shots, then you are going to have to shoot a lot.
Tips:
Keep the ISO high as possible
Remain as still as possible when pushing the shutter release
Pick moments where musicians are still but still playing
I want to show you the variety of headshots you can have that are all similar except for one thing—the background.
Nice outdoor look for a background
As you look through these photos of my daughter Chelle, you may like one photo more than another, but notice how the background can set a mood, compliment or distract your attention. Remember pretty much all the rest of the photo looks the same in all the photos.
I recommend a simple and clean background. Next I recommend if your background has patterns or texture get as far away from the background so it is not so sharp and distracting.
The garage door is plain but the patterns are a little distracting
Background is simple and works OK
If want to make the photo outside go to the shade side of the house and have your subject face away from the house. The open sky will light them and not direct sunlight. This makes for softer light on the face. Also, you can turn on your flash to add a catch light in the eye and give more life to the eyes.
To make your photo inside find a plain wall rather than a busy wallpaper or busy background objects. Keep the light simple and soft, maybe a window for the light on the face.
If this is for something professional like for LinkedIn to find jobs, blog or website, get a professional to help you. Remember you only have tenth of a second to make a good impression.
Background is OK, but is dark
Even tho subject isn’t next to background–it is still distracting
