Profit Margin

In the last few days I've heard a lot of people lamenting the existence of low price (or even free) stock imagery. Clearly, this contributes to the de-valuation of our work. I want to relate the following story that shows what photographers may be up against in some cases.

Earlier this year I photographed the namesake of a non-profit for a magazine. I liked the image, and after it ran in the magazine, I put it up on my website.

Several months later the non-profit contacted me about using the image in some of their collateral and marketing materials. I responded that I could give them a quote if they could give me the specific usage they needed.

They came back saying "We're non-profit and don't pay for photography. Other photographers in the past have just let us use their pictures for no charge." Of course, I'm not non-profit. I explained that, despite what the "other photographers" do, my business is set-up to earn a living from the licensing of my photographs. Perhaps a discount could be negotiated, but nothing would be given away free of charge.

They were so offended that I wouldn't give it to them that they called the magazine, which had my back. About two weeks after that, I received an e-mail from the attorney for the subject, requesting that I immediately take down the image from my website. I wanted to let them sweat it out because I thought it was vindictive and pathetic, but my attorney wife disagreed. I did the right thing and took it down.

I'm not sure if they found another photo of this person that sufficed, and I don't care. But apparently they're so confident that they can get stuff for free that paying for it genuinely upsets them. Clearly, I would not consider this non-profit to be representative of a sophisticated photo buyer. However, "good enough" imagery is proliferating the web, and usually at no- to low-cost.

This example just gives me motivation to hone my own vision, so those that hire me do it for a unique type of imagery that's not available elsewhere. And to pay fair market value for it.

There's a great example of sticking to your guns on Photo Business News here.