background preloader

Free Photographer's Pricing Guide - How to Price Photography

Free Photographer's Pricing Guide - How to Price Photography
It’s confession time: I think that the majority of pricing guides for photographers are lame. That’s not to say that they don’t work, or that they aren’t worth the money that people sell them for. It’s just that most of the pricing calculators have some major flaw that makes them not nearly as effective as I think they could be. Most pricing guides rely upon a multiplier that you have to come up with on your own to price your products. Not only that, but no pricing guide or pricing calculator did an decent job of determining business prices when your business offers both weddings and portraits or any other types of shoots. So I set off to create my own method of pricing that took various types of shoots into account and didn’t involve some random multiplier that I had to come up with. How the The Photographer’s Pricing Guide Works The main idea behind the guide is to figure out how much money you’d like to make at the end of the year. Let’s be honest. So let’s get this show on the road!

12 common errors of night photography (and how to fix them) The days may be getting longer, but (hopefully) they will also be getting warmer. Spring and summer are perfect times of the year to explore the world of night photography, but as you can imagine, there are many challenges when working with long exposures. Below we’ve identified 12 of the most common problems you’ll encounter when shooting night photography and offered our tips for overcoming them. Do you have your own night photography tips, or perhaps problems you’ve encountered in your own night photography endeavours that we haven’t covered here? Why not share them in the comments! Night Photography Tips: Painting with light Painting with light is one of the easiest ways to transform your night photography scenes from ordinary to extraordinary. 1. 2. 3. PAGE 1: Common errors when painting with lightPAGE 2: Common errors with moonlit landscapesPAGE 3: Common errors shooting star trailsPAGE 4: Common errors shooting the Northern LightsPAGE 5: Common errors with astrophotography

How To Create Photography Packages That Sell - The Modern Tog Creating photography packages is one of the most popular ways to present your services to your clients. As I have been helping photographers with their pricing and packaging, I’ve seen a number of common mistakes over and over again that are easy to avoid and will help boost your sales. Before making packages, however, make sure you’ve worked through the Photographer’s Pricing Guide to determine how much money you need to be making on average per shoot. We’ll use this information in setting up your packages. So let’s jump right in! Know what your clients want Your packages simply won’t sell if they are full of things that people don’t want. This doesn’t mean you can’t offer products that traditionally don’t sell as well. I do this with canvases. For portraits, I find that my clients want at least one larger image to display in their home, then several smaller images to carry with them, or to share with family and friends. Eliminate clutter and filler Cluttered: Simple & Clean: It’s brilliant.

A 15 Minute Exercise To Help You Improve Your Photography in 2012 A Post By: Darren Rowse Here’s a little exercise for you to do today. It will only take 15 minutes. Grab your camera – what ever one you have handy (I used my iPhone last time I did this) and head out into your backyard (or if you’re in the middle of winter you can choose an indoor location – perhaps your living room – really anywhere will do). Now find somewhere to sit – somewhere in the middle of whatever place you’ve selected. Now for the next 10 minutes just sit there. Observe Soak in your location.Look at the light and how it hits your surroundings.Pay attention to what your setting makes you feel.Look at the details that perhaps you’d not have noticed if you’d rushed through the setting. During this ‘observation’ phase you may like to move around your environment to look at it from different angles – but don’t use your camera yet. Plan As you sit there – begin to think about your setting and the elements in it as a photographic subject and how you’ll photograph it. What will you shoot?

How to Price your Photography for Profit: Photographer's Pricing Guide This post is Part 2 of The Modern Tog’s Photographer’s Pricing Guide series. Here’s the link to Part 1 of the Pricing Guide in case you missed it. Today it’s time to think about one of the main goals of your business: your profit. The first step in determining your prices is to figure out how much you want to take home in the form of a paycheck. There’s two ways to go about this process. Defining Success The first method is to think about how much you’d ultimately like to be making in the future and use those numbers. Short-term Planning The second method is to determine your profit goal for the next year. Things to Consider It’s helpful to remember that your annual salary, if you are an employee for another company, most likely has deductions taken from it for things like taxes, social security, health insurance, etc. If you’re using the Photographer’s Pricing Guide Workbook, click on the “Personal Profit” tab of the worksheet (it’s at the bottom of the screen).

Exclusive Photography Tips For Capturing Star Trails We had featured some great Top star trail photography in our earlier post. If you are inspired by those photos and want to try something on your own. Then read on. We have some exclusive photography tips here in this article from Better Photography . These tips are simple enough that even a armature photographer can experiment with. Image source: Take the Pole Star as a central point to shoot star trails. Some planning needed before you start the shoot. Remember to carry a lock with you so you know how much time you are exposing the image. Hope you like our tips and capture interesting star trails!

5 Consultation Secrets Every Photographer Should Know Consultations are the main thing people use to decide what photographer to hire, so it’s absolutely vital to do things right! Trust me. I had no idea what I was doing when I was just starting out and made lots of mistakes. After trying all sorts of things to see what worked well and what didn’t (as well as learning a lot about sales and marketing in the process), I came up with 5 main things that I believe are key to effective consultations. While I write this mostly from a wedding perspective, every single point can be applied to a portrait pre-sales consultation as well. Here’s my 5 consultation secrets that every photographer should know: 1. When I first approached consultations, the goal was to tell them about me, my services, and get them to book. While there’s nothing wrong with sharing those things, you have to find a way to make it valuable to your clients as well. Educate and empower them and they’ll leave feeling like their time was well-spent, which is a very good thing for you.

10 Tips & Tricks to Photograph Water with Your Phone Explorando el océano. lisboa Oceanário enjoying life water water by luisk on EyeEm Over 2/3 of the world is covered in water, and our bodies are more than 50% water. Water is in us and all around us, so it’s no wonder that it is the subject of countless photographs. We have put together a list of expert tips and tricks to level up your photographs of water. For further inspiration, check out these beautiful albums: water Water reflections and waterfall So let’s get started! 1. As with all types of photography, light is incredibly important. vacation Taking Photos That’s me water enjoying life by Marie on EyeEm 2. While this can normally only be adjusted on cameras (i.e. devices whose sole function is to photograph), there are several apps that allow you to speed up or slow down the shutter speed. To create beautiful silky photos of water you need to slow down your shutter speed. Taking Photos water Nature waterfall by Nathalie Myrén on EyeEm 3. Reflection Mirror river by sasha_tbnv on EyeEm

How to Have Happier Clients using Photography Questionnaires I think I’m in love. My friend Andy recently told me about something called Gravity Forms that he uses for his client questionnaires and contracts. I’ve been doing an informal questionnaire with my wedding clients before each wedding, but Andy and I photographed two weddings together this past month, and we used his questionnaire. Oh. This little WordPress plugin rocks my world. It’s the most easy to create form I’ve ever seen, and being able to use conditional logic (that’s a fancy way of saying that you only show certain questions based upon answers to other questions before it) is just rad. Yeah, I just used the word “rad”. So after figuring it out and getting it all set up, I immediately decided that I had to tell you all about it and why I think you should buy it, too. Not only that, but I created a free contact page for you to use on your photography site, just because I love you and want to save you some time. Why are questionnaires and a good contact form so important? Cool, huh?

Phoster - Make your Own Poster Home Photography Business | What every photographer needs to know to start and run a home based photography business Work with Great Photography Suppliers November 3rd, 2013 Choosing the right suppliers to work with can make or break your photography business. Photographer’s Library – 5 Books to Improve Your Photography Skills September 5th, 2013 There are so many great books available to help us to improve our skills. Essential Principles For Your Photography Website – Part 2: Information is Key October 18th, 2011 When was the last time you visited your competitor’s website? Essential Principles For Your Photography Website- Part 1: Visual Aspects August 23rd, 2011 It would seem like a safe bet to assume that most photographers probably have a website already. What is keeping you from starting your own home photography business? April 29th, 2011 Starting a home based business of any kind is a decision that shouldn’t be taken lightly. Best Practices for Successful Photographers. April 25th, 2011 The Myth of the Shoestring Budget April 21st, 2011 Why is it bothering me so much? December 16th, 2010

Related: