November 15, 2020

 

The Abandonment Of The RM Photographer
 

Great photography is intense immersion into the interior or exterior scene with a rush of adrenaline that opens your eyes to the possibilities present, which one you choose is up to your emotions on that particular day, your self-awareness and a deep connection with the emerging subject finally showing parts of itself, details opening, becoming possibilities as mother nature helps you with your visual creations.

Once we entered the digital era of taking photos not making photos then the photography universe broke apart. The ease of use of these digital cameras, auto exposure, built in filters, auto focus in the camera bodies allowed everyone the potential of making a good image. To take images and get good results was now only a lucky accident away but soon with a little practice the making of great images was possible.

But this new automated technology undermined the professional photographers way of life by cheapening the cost of taking images for now instead of sending your film to a lab to have processed all you needed to do was dump your memory card onto your laptop and edit and submit to whoever was interested. It doesn’t matter in today’s climate of over saturated image creation whether you are a professional or an amateur, it is the image that counts and really always has been that way.

And what photo agency you are with, Rights Managed or Royalty Free either way your sales are diminishing yearly as I write this for with the overwhelming amount of images being taken and uploaded to stock selling sites the buyers have basically an infinite amount of choices to choose from and all the choices are being sold for pennies on the dollar.

What a great return to the photographers working hard to spend money traveling and making images that reflect their inner nature to see one of their images being sold for peanuts.

And let’s face it Rights Managed image creations are over and done with. Why would anyone want to send in RM imagery when no buyer will even look at them? Getty Images my agent for decades has eliminated RM imagery from its photo site and like all the other big Photo Agencies goes strictly with RF.

With so many images uploaded around the world every second how can a photographer earn a living from his craft. You can’t and you won’t, those days are gone forever.

Those billions of new photographers out there just snapping away and through luck and timing creating images that could compete with the old school professional photographer is the culprit for the evaporation of any worthy sales.

Once this explosion of image snap shots grew exponentially the professional photographer was an old relic of the past era when artists felt their talents in connecting with the deep internal revelations of purpose seeking more than just an image but a masterpiece by creating something from their inner intuitive force, by seeking images that others couldn’t take and these photographers roamed the world in making images of unbelievable beauty no matter what the cost to them mentally and physically.

When film became obsolete you no longer had to worry about processing costs it changed photography forever now everything is done in camera with memory cards and then uploaded to computers and then submitted. Now everyone is a potential photographer and this undercuts the professional photographers ability to make a living by selling his images to news papers, magazines, art galleries, etc., and submitting these classic images to the photographer’s photo agencies.

Back in the day all agencies were rights managed and usage of their photographers  images was regulated and sold for a specific purpose and priced accordingly, the photographer received 50% of the sale. Then came Royalty Free and this undermined the chances for a RM photographer to make a living created images. 

Now everyone is a photographer and the billions and billions of images taken hourly, daily, monthly overwhelms the senses of the viewer and photography is seen not as an art form anymore but a product like lettuce, a hobby, a means to take images of your life and post them on social media to get likes and to be seen by others!

And also why not send my images to a photo-agency they are paying me pennies on the dollar but it feels good to get my image bought for peanuts.

By allowing your images to be reduced to cheap products on sale at grocery store prices you have undermined the natural flow of reasonable pricing and allowed the buyers to dictate to the photo agency the price they demand no matter how hard you fought to create the image you are now at the mercy of the buyer and the photo agency that makes their money on volume pricing that creates a billboard ad of look at our lower valued pricing and this they claim is a new model, a win win situation for the agency and the photographer bull shit!

This will demean the image and the photographer’s talent by accepting anyone calling themselves a shooter and any image they submit that is almost in focus and has detail in some shadows areas and highlight areas and this is the new outlook of what photography is becoming. It no longer is an art form with intense purpose through the image creator efforts to make the image but now anything goes as long as the agencies
can take advantage of the new photographers and at the same time say bye bye to the old guard of image creators that know that stock photo business is now a dollar store bonanza of selling peoples lives away by pricing photographs for peanuts.

Who cares about the aging photographers that made their livelihood through creating beautiful landscapes, portraits, underwater images, mountain climbing and more. 

There is no honesty and integrity now in photography, a once creative art form!

In the past your goal of image creation could be a slow process with your subject revealing itself to you in parcels as you get more familiar with the details becoming realized and the scene begins to dictate to you your inner vision its possibilities, at this stage the photographer doesn’t push his intuition toward any detail but allows his consciousness to let go of his narrow thoughts and just flow with the landscape before you until you have that fluidity of sight and reflection that allows you to see beyond the details of the physical space before you and opens your vision to encompass the reflection in your mind of a unique presentation of nature no one else has made. Your visual foundation is special and only you can see through the infinite details of a scene to create your inner cohesive image vocabulary.

In order to become your truth, your purpose you must merge with your individual self and not the socialites commonality of the herd instincts. Don’t be fooled into following the crowd, that is a dead end, your photographic vision is to understand the complexity of your physical nature present fighting in a vacuum of mental conformity unwilling to free themselves from the tyranny of fear, accepting their narrow vision as the truth unable to break free from the easy manipulation of redundant behavior and false gods.

These milestones of seeing beyond the surface glitter and not to be duped into ignoring the plain details that when composed properly succeeds with a new vision and better still a vision that you have recognized and explored with full understanding and precision once the scene presented itself from the clutter of details trying to misguide you to their commonality.

There are times when you find that your one subject is immersed in the infinity of details and it begins to hinder your ability to relax and go with the flow of your selected, potential scene. You are present but stifled and you need to just step back and allow the scene to formulate a new series of details that intrigue your artistic talents and by relaxing and letting the scene settle itself in your eyes you begin to unravel your frustrations and begin to see the composition that will become your inner vision externalized.

Your new found subject suddenly opens your emotions and gives you a necessary foundation of details, light and composition that will compliment your patience by capturing this unique landscape.

Photography even in a crowd is an isolating journey.  Each of us have our own path to take. The question you must asked yourself is do you have enough self-awareness to free yourself from the bonds of the addicting cliche, societies need for redundant snap shots without depth or persuasion, all of us meek sheep without a unique voice.  

With the explosive conformity of images created for social media overwhelming our senses, reducing photography to a cliche without purpose, just ego’s trying to be seen but what good photographers need to do is just keep on trucking creating images that mean something more than pennies on the dollar.