One of the great things about photography is that there’s no single answer to the question of how to become a photographer – you could talk to a dozen different photographers and each one would tell you a different story about how they got into photography.
Some people might take a more traditional route involving formal study first, then paid work later.
Others take a more practical route and just go out there and build their experience before gradually making the transition from amateur to professional photographer.
So rather than provide you with a single road map on how to become a professional photographer, here are some tips that you can use to help you on your own journey.
Always Have Your Camera On Hand
OK…so this one seems obvious, and is probably something you do anyway, but it still needs to be said.
If you’re going to be a professional photographer than you need to take professional quality photos – and this means constantly taking photos, analysing shots and lighting, assessing your photos and looking at ways you could improve your work.
It’s also worth noting that while you might want to become a photographer, you might not know exactly what type of photographer you’d like to be.
By taking your camera with you everywhere you go you’ll get a better idea about where your talents lie, and what sort of photos you enjoy taking the most.
From there you’re in a better position to figure out how to make a career out of those talents and interests.
Put A Time Limit On Working For Free
When you’re making the transition from amateur to pro photographer there’s more than likely going to be a period where you’re offering your services for free as a way of gaining experience and building your portfolio.
But you can’t do this for ever.
So it might be a good idea to set yourself a date and decide that after that date you’re longer longer going to do work for free – you’re going to charge for your services and present yourself as the professional photographer that you want to be.
Treat This As A Business Not A Hobby
If you’re serious about working professionally than you need to treat it as a business venture.
Some of the things that you need to do as part of this include:
Should You Specialise?
In many industries the more you can demonstrate your expertise in a specific area of that industry, the better paid you’ll be.
Think medicine – a surgeon is always going to be paid more than a general practitioner.
So does this apply in photography?
Well..yes and no.
It’s a very good idea to have one or two areas of photography where you’d be considered one of the very best photographers in your market.
And this can lead to you earning more money for your work.
But one of the downsides to photography is that the massive popularity in digital cameras has created a situation where many people devalue the work done by professional photographers.
So market conditions may demand that you have the ability to work outside your preferred areas of expertise when things are a little slow.
So for example, while you may want your business to be all about weddings, you may also need to promote your services as a portrait or commercial photographer and provide examples of your work in these areas.
And if you do a good job over the years of building your reputation and creating good marketing systems, you should be able to gradually rely less and less on those extra services and focus almost exclusively on what you prefer doing.
Be Realistic In Your Expectations
If you’ve decided you want to be a photographer and you’ve given yourself six months to be making a living from it, then you’re probably setting yourself up for failure.
That’s not to say that in the first six months you can’t be doing well – if you’ve come from a business background and know what it takes to build a new business than this is without a doubt possible.
But for many people, becoming a photographer is their first venture into the world of working for yourself.
And the learning curve is steep – there’s much more to it than just taking good photos.
So it’s important that you go into this with your eyes wide open – give yourself enough time to succeed and then create a plan to make that happen.
Set yourself time-specific goals and then do whatever it takes to meet and exceed those goals.
Learn From Other Professional Photographers
In many different areas of life you hear successful people talk about the role a mentor played in helping to get them where they are today.
There are plenty of people who’ve been where you are right now (i.e trying to figure out how to become a photographer) so why wouldn’t you try and take advantage of their knowledge and experience.
If you don’t already know any successful professional photographers than you should start doing some networking.
A great way to approach this is to find a successful photographer and offer to help them as a backup photographer - this will usually be for free, but at some point they may offer to pay you.
Either way the money’s not really important - all the time that you’re working with them you should be milking them for as much info as you can about how they get clients, what they charge, what jobs they’re willing to accept, how they got started etc.
Marketing Is The Lifeblood Of Your Business
For many photographers there’s a constant battle going on between the desire to be creative and the need to promote their services.
You can’t survive on pats on the back for a job well done – you need to get paid for your work and have a steady stream of people keen to hire you.
There are countless stories of photographers who simply can’t work out why some of their competition (who they’d regard as inferior photographers), are making a much better living from their business.
The answer to that question is almost always related to their ability to bring in more clients.
Some of the different marketing strategies that you should work on mastering (or pay someone to do for you) include:
Referral Marketing – both from clients and other businesses.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Pay Per Click Marketing
Email Marketing
Social Media Marketing (e.g Facebook marketing)
Copywriting – understand how to write more effective advertisements.
You might also benefit from some basic sales training – many people find the idea of selling themselves difficult, but if you have a process in place for talking to potential clients about why they should hire you (almost like a sales script), your success rate at converting people from prospect to client will definitely improve.
Should You Do Any Photography Courses?
Generally speaking you don’t really need any specific qualifications to become a photographer. Your portfolio becomes your qualification.
Having said that, it’s important that you’re always improving what you do and if that means taking some photography courses then by all means go for it.
A couple of tips you can take note of before you start doing your research into courses are:
Before you start your research think long and hard about the sort of photography you want to do and then make sure that the course covers those areas.
Try and find a course that has a least a small component related to the business side of things, especially if you have zero experience running any sort of business.
Learning how to become a photographer begins with a passion for photography. The path you take from there will depend on your personality, your goals, the amount of money you have to play with, your family situation and so on.
In the end whether you succeed or not has as much to do with attitude as it does with any photography skills.
You must be willing to work at hard at promoting your services, especially early on – even if you find this aspect of your business difficult.
Some people might take a more traditional route involving formal study first, then paid work later.
Others take a more practical route and just go out there and build their experience before gradually making the transition from amateur to professional photographer.
So rather than provide you with a single road map on how to become a professional photographer, here are some tips that you can use to help you on your own journey.
Always Have Your Camera On Hand
OK…so this one seems obvious, and is probably something you do anyway, but it still needs to be said.
If you’re going to be a professional photographer than you need to take professional quality photos – and this means constantly taking photos, analysing shots and lighting, assessing your photos and looking at ways you could improve your work.
It’s also worth noting that while you might want to become a photographer, you might not know exactly what type of photographer you’d like to be.
By taking your camera with you everywhere you go you’ll get a better idea about where your talents lie, and what sort of photos you enjoy taking the most.
From there you’re in a better position to figure out how to make a career out of those talents and interests.
Put A Time Limit On Working For Free
When you’re making the transition from amateur to pro photographer there’s more than likely going to be a period where you’re offering your services for free as a way of gaining experience and building your portfolio.
But you can’t do this for ever.
So it might be a good idea to set yourself a date and decide that after that date you’re longer longer going to do work for free – you’re going to charge for your services and present yourself as the professional photographer that you want to be.
Treat This As A Business Not A Hobby
If you’re serious about working professionally than you need to treat it as a business venture.
Some of the things that you need to do as part of this include:
- Create a business plan
- Have a business logo and some business cards created.
- Get a website online – and make sure it doesn’t look like a free website, even if it is.
- Educate yourself on the in’s and out’s of running a small business.
- Learn about marketing and start promoting your business.
- Charge for you services.
Should You Specialise?
In many industries the more you can demonstrate your expertise in a specific area of that industry, the better paid you’ll be.
Think medicine – a surgeon is always going to be paid more than a general practitioner.
So does this apply in photography?
Well..yes and no.
It’s a very good idea to have one or two areas of photography where you’d be considered one of the very best photographers in your market.
And this can lead to you earning more money for your work.
But one of the downsides to photography is that the massive popularity in digital cameras has created a situation where many people devalue the work done by professional photographers.
So market conditions may demand that you have the ability to work outside your preferred areas of expertise when things are a little slow.
So for example, while you may want your business to be all about weddings, you may also need to promote your services as a portrait or commercial photographer and provide examples of your work in these areas.
And if you do a good job over the years of building your reputation and creating good marketing systems, you should be able to gradually rely less and less on those extra services and focus almost exclusively on what you prefer doing.
Be Realistic In Your Expectations
If you’ve decided you want to be a photographer and you’ve given yourself six months to be making a living from it, then you’re probably setting yourself up for failure.
That’s not to say that in the first six months you can’t be doing well – if you’ve come from a business background and know what it takes to build a new business than this is without a doubt possible.
But for many people, becoming a photographer is their first venture into the world of working for yourself.
And the learning curve is steep – there’s much more to it than just taking good photos.
So it’s important that you go into this with your eyes wide open – give yourself enough time to succeed and then create a plan to make that happen.
Set yourself time-specific goals and then do whatever it takes to meet and exceed those goals.
Learn From Other Professional Photographers
In many different areas of life you hear successful people talk about the role a mentor played in helping to get them where they are today.
There are plenty of people who’ve been where you are right now (i.e trying to figure out how to become a photographer) so why wouldn’t you try and take advantage of their knowledge and experience.
If you don’t already know any successful professional photographers than you should start doing some networking.
A great way to approach this is to find a successful photographer and offer to help them as a backup photographer - this will usually be for free, but at some point they may offer to pay you.
Either way the money’s not really important - all the time that you’re working with them you should be milking them for as much info as you can about how they get clients, what they charge, what jobs they’re willing to accept, how they got started etc.
Marketing Is The Lifeblood Of Your Business
For many photographers there’s a constant battle going on between the desire to be creative and the need to promote their services.
You can’t survive on pats on the back for a job well done – you need to get paid for your work and have a steady stream of people keen to hire you.
There are countless stories of photographers who simply can’t work out why some of their competition (who they’d regard as inferior photographers), are making a much better living from their business.
The answer to that question is almost always related to their ability to bring in more clients.
Some of the different marketing strategies that you should work on mastering (or pay someone to do for you) include:
Referral Marketing – both from clients and other businesses.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Pay Per Click Marketing
Email Marketing
Social Media Marketing (e.g Facebook marketing)
Copywriting – understand how to write more effective advertisements.
You might also benefit from some basic sales training – many people find the idea of selling themselves difficult, but if you have a process in place for talking to potential clients about why they should hire you (almost like a sales script), your success rate at converting people from prospect to client will definitely improve.
Should You Do Any Photography Courses?
Generally speaking you don’t really need any specific qualifications to become a photographer. Your portfolio becomes your qualification.
Having said that, it’s important that you’re always improving what you do and if that means taking some photography courses then by all means go for it.
A couple of tips you can take note of before you start doing your research into courses are:
Before you start your research think long and hard about the sort of photography you want to do and then make sure that the course covers those areas.
Try and find a course that has a least a small component related to the business side of things, especially if you have zero experience running any sort of business.
Learning how to become a photographer begins with a passion for photography. The path you take from there will depend on your personality, your goals, the amount of money you have to play with, your family situation and so on.
In the end whether you succeed or not has as much to do with attitude as it does with any photography skills.
You must be willing to work at hard at promoting your services, especially early on – even if you find this aspect of your business difficult.
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