Newborns are hard work!

So a newborn session typically takes 3 hours. 3 lovely hours of cuddling a new squishy baby. But also of stopping for feeds, rocking and remembering just how hard a newborn is. No newborn session is ever complete without at least one of us being peed on. More of what I do can be found HERE

You can find more about my photography here
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Before and After

A number of people have asked me how this photo was done! So here exclusively I will show you how! My glamorous assistant, aka Kitty, my daughter, hung onto the fabric for dear life in gale force wind, while I snapped shots, and with the help of my much cursed other assistant, Photoshop.   , I did the rest.

 KITTY                                    

 

And here is another photo from the same shoot. 

How to see if anyone is stealing your images

I often have wondered if posting my images on Facebook, Google+, twitter, my blog, etc is safe. I do always watermark my images and put a copy write notice but, you never know......or can you find out? I'm going to show you how to have a check to see if anyone is using your images. The common term for this type of search is called "reverse image search" I did this in Firefox, but I believe the process is very similar in other search engines, the wording might be a bit different, but if you can learn to use a dslr you can learn to do this!

The first thing I must however tell you is, if you have a dslr camera, you should be able to put specific info into the metadata,(if you don't know how, do a search with the make of your camera ) Well when you do this make sure you put your name in and phone number. Then in the case of ownership deputes you info is always there.

                                                                      

 The first step is to find your image on your site and right click. A pop up box will appear click "copy image location"

 

               Take this copied number and paste it in your google search bar. Click search!

The next page will look like this on, click on where it says "search by image"

and....

  

The next page will show you hopefully that your image isn't being used anywhere else, or will show you where people are using your images, even if they have cropped the image or altered it, like removed the watermark.

Photographers should not work for free

By definition, " a professional photographer" is someone who makes an income taking pictures. Yes, it’s something we do for fun, but at the end of the day, it’s our profession. In order to have a successful profession, you have to make a sustainable income.

•  It’s a business and like any business, start-up costs are expensive.

•   Equipment is expensive, as is maintaining it. The average camera body I use is $3000, lenses $1000 each, Speedlight(Flash) $800, Memory cards $80 each, etc, etc, when I add it all up, my camera bag alone has about $10 000 equipment in it, then there is the pc you need. I have a macbook pro, and photoshop, and add on actions.....That's another 10 000, plus training and college.....

• Photography is time-intensive and time is money.Most people think it is just arrive at a shoot, click, click, click, upload, crop, and make money. It's not. I spend on average 30 min editing each image and then often just throw away the results.

So how do I go about letting people know that I do not work for free?

The first reason and it’s simply this: I, as a person (i.e. friend, daughter, advocate, etc.) am a separate entity from my business.

For example, say I have a friend who owns a dress boutique. I would never expect (I hope) to be able to shop this boutique for free, to just take any clothes I wanted. 
Why not? The business is a separate entity from my friend and subsequently, our friendship. The same is true for photographers.

We wouldn’t expect a free jewelry from a jeweler, free meals from a chef, nor flights from a pilot. But for some reason, photography has slipped the radar on this and it’s a common expectation that we can do our work for free.

With some good communication and armed with a few examples, we can help others to understand that we’re a separate entity from our business and we cannot make a profession out of something done for free.

Make sure you have price lists available, when friends ask you to do a shoot, say sure, I'll send you my prices, what is your email? Of course offer them a discount or something extra, but don't work for free.