Thank you for your interest in my photography and for your generous offer to use my work for free to promote your book/magazine/website that you use to generate business for yourself. I would love nothing more than to help feed your family while mine goes hungry, because that is just the type of guy I am. Maybe I could feed them the free copy of the book you are offering me. I bet it would be tasty with some salt and pepper. I am also excited for the overwhelming exposure that I will be receiving and the vast number of customers that will be directed my way because of that teeny tiny photo credit you tried to bury in the spine of your magazine. I just don’t know what to say. You have done so much for me.

Now let me tell you the truth.

Good Photography is both hard work and expensive due to the price of equipment, the cost of gas, travel, insurance and self promotion. The shot that you have requested that I give you for nothing was taken inside of a 5 second exposure. The results of that 5 second exposure came from 12 road trips taken to the same location, 26 full tanks of gas, a $5,000 camera and priceless dedication to creating a good image and THAT is just the tip of the iceberg. There is no way I could ever calculate with any kind of certainty the amount of time and energy spent getting that one shot.

But I can tell you it wasn’t freaking FREE!

Now with that being said, I would love to send you a HI RES version of the shot you requested. All you need to do is make my car payment this month but don’t worry, I would be happy to give you “bill credit” with your payment and would gladly send you a free copy of the cashed check!

Ladies and Gentlemen,

PLEASE do not give your work away for nothing. Luckily for me I read somewhere very early on that if I priced my work at next to nothing, it would always be worth next to nothing. I can almost promise you that you are never going to be “found” by “getting your name out there” regardless of how good your work is. When was the last time you saw an image in a regular book or magazine and looked to see who the photographer was? Even if you did that, did you seek them out online to see the rest of their work? Buy a print from them? You get the idea.

The Free Riders are out in full force. Believe me, there are such things called budgets for advertising. There is also a designer who wants to come in well under budget to impress his boss. Do not put it past someone to say they are non-profit, or other reasons why they can’t pay you for your hard work. Yes, there is a chance that if you ask for compensation they will move on to the next sucker, I mean opportunity. If this happens who cares? Do you want the word to get out that you have quality work, and stand behind it or do you want the word to spread that you are an easy target? Please do not fall prey to these type of requests. Your work is valuable and if more people took a stand, the companies that NEED our images for their publications would gladly pay a fair price.

Many people ask me what is a fair price for my images? That, of course is for you to decide but here are a couple ideas. Getty images will usually charge between $100 – $500 for most single use images. You can also find calculators online that use current market data to give you an idea of what to charge however, these usually come back pretty high in my opinion. The key is to ask for compensation but be reasonable. If they continue to say they do not have a budget, ask them to trade for an advertising spot in the magazine. Not a photo credit, but an actual spot to place the image of your choice, your contact information and the services you provide if any. If you are unsure how to begin or are too nervous to throw out the first number, ask them to make you an offer based on their available budget or what they would be comfortable paying for the image.

Remember this post and remind yourself that your work is priceless, until you give it away for free.

To get this started off right I am going to share my recent experiences in finding out where some of my images go, where they end up and who is holding them hostage. I would like to thank Mr. Patterson for planting a seed in my mind and Mr. Schwabel for adding a little water by sharing his personal experience and knowledge with me. Both of these gentlemen are also great photographers so after you read the rest of this, follow those links and have a look for yourself or if you are ADHD and Bi-polar just go right now but please come back when you are finished.

Let’s be honest with ourselves for a minute. We have all picked one hell of an expensive hobby. The GEAR you have just got to have, the POWER we all burn in getting there, the JOY we sometimes experience while chasing the light and the endless time away from our FRIENDS and FAMILY are only the tip of the iceberg. The farther we WANDER the longer the path seems to get. If everything is fluffy bunny rabbits and butterflies where you are right now…you should definitely stay there because the outside world can be a scary place.

If you have been shooting for awhile now and have created some quality work, blindly posting your images online without protecting yourself you are not alone. If you aren’t at least watermarking your images in some way, I would strongly consider it. THIS is an example of a watermark. If you are really paranoid you may want to consider THIS instead. At the very least this will make it a little more difficult to use your images and if someone actually appreciates your work and is interested in it, then they have an idea where to find you. Personally I have spent the last few days finding my images being used like THIS DVD BEING SOLD WITH MY IMAGE ON THE COVER and OR THIS CREATIVE PAINTER WHO DECIDED TO PAINT an exact copy of my image and then sell it for $450 online as well as prints all over the web. In fact, the image the painter decided to recreate is my worst example and I have found it on hundreds of websites that offer free wallpapers, cell phone themes, computer sales & service, dental procedures, spiritual advice and too many myspace & facebook accounts to even think about. Because that image was taken inside the Portland Japanese Garden, I actually had to pay just to have the right to sell my OWN image, while none of those people had to pay a dime. Even worse, this image was taken and processed before I had ANY skill at all and it shows. It is not an image I want everywhere on the web but I no longer have that choice.

Some of you may not be concerned at all about this in fact, some or you may see this type of “interest” in your photography as a compliment but I can assure you, if you ever plan on generating revenue from your photography this should at least shake you up a bit. People are stealing your images and using them for their own personal gain.

So what do I do now you ask? Well, before you do anything else you might want to TAKE UP SOME LIGHT READING and then learn how to REGISTER your images. Once you have gained that knowledge JUMP OVER HERE and pick up this tool to help protect yourself from those who want something for nothing from you. You can (and should) register your images with the US Copyright office so when you find blatant infringement of your images you can do something about it. That’s about it for tonight but stay tuned for other interesting and amusing posts on this topic including “the top 10 excuses why I stole your images” and a “wall of shame” of those who have used mine and have refused to communicate with me when contacted about the infringement. Hopefully you have found something helpful in this blog post and would be willing to share your comments and questions below as well as sign up to follow this blog to get more of the dirty little details in the future.

If you have any ideas you would like to see here on this blog please let me know. We still plan on adding at least 2 more one or two day workshops this year but haven’t decided on locations so I would love to hear ideas on that topic as well.