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  #21  
Old 29th March 2010, 09:43 PM
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Originally Posted by CarlRadford View Post
Moving to a country that really appreciates photography will help - France for example!
Seeing this Carl, I can't help recall a certain Mr Clarkson describing France in the usual derogatory terms when in reference to a visit and it wasn't, I don't think, directly related to photography he said paraphrasing: If this was the USA everything would be in colour but it's France so it's all B&W. The camera then cut to a B&W transmission to emphasise the point. Even Mr Clarkson looked better in B&W!

If I go to France again I must remember to emphasise the "Old Alliance" in case they think I am a "Rosbif" .

Mike
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  #22  
Old 3rd April 2010, 10:03 AM
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Is it possible to make a living from selling B+W Landscape prints and if not, then can it be done with colour landscapes?
I was in a photo gallery recently, located in one the main tourist towns in Cornwall, a friend of mine part manages it. They sell the much sought after and highly collectable, coloured inkjet canvas wraps. I was waiting around the gallery, observing the very intense activity for about 45 mins. I won’t say exactly how much money went into the till during this period but it would have paid me for well over a week’s wages !
I left the shop but had to go back later to pick my jaw up. The takings for an average summer tourist season I could practically retire on.

I have a couple of my very best silver prints for sale in the gallery. Once people see the price ( £195 for a 20x16 framed) they quickly move on and proceed to purchase 4 or 5 canvases at £40 each !!

We’re in the wrong game here people.
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  #23  
Old 3rd April 2010, 11:32 AM
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Originally Posted by bill spears View Post
I was in a photo gallery recently, located in one the main tourist towns in Cornwall, a friend of mine part manages it. They sell the much sought after and highly collectable, coloured inkjet canvas wraps. I was waiting around the gallery, observing the very intense activity for about 45 mins. I won’t say exactly how much money went into the till during this period but it would have paid me for well over a week’s wages !
I left the shop but had to go back later to pick my jaw up. The takings for an average summer tourist season I could practically retire on.

I have a couple of my very best silver prints for sale in the gallery. Once people see the price ( £195 for a 20x16 framed) they quickly move on and proceed to purchase 4 or 5 canvases at £40 each !!

We’re in the wrong game here people.
Seems like a nice little number until you do the sums and you find it is a very little number to be made from it. The cost of equipment to print canvas, the printer, the canvas, the inks, the stretchers, the varnish, the gallery business rates, someone has to be paid to be in the gallery to sell the canvases, the gallery owners take, your digital camera and what's left? The only person making any money will be the gallery otherwise they'd be out of business. But you the photographer will make next to nothing unless you sell big numbers and that means you will spend a lot of time running an inkjet printer which is like watching paint dry. Oh it is watching paint dry.
If you want to make money take up painting and learn a style where you paint fast. If you have any talent you will make money if selling in the right place. £1000+ a painting is easy to achieve once you have a gallery prepared to represent you and your work is of the right type.
You're never likely to achieve that with black and white prints unless selling in highend galleries.
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  #24  
Old 3rd April 2010, 12:12 PM
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Very true of course Rob and maybe I was jumping the gun a little after hearing about amount of money coming through the door.
I guess the point I was trying to make is how easy alot of people part with their cash for cheap and cheerful pretty pictures as opposed to more original handcrafted fine silver prints.

One of the photographers who has a lot of work in the gallery recieves 12% on every one of his canvases sold. A good day he can
shift 20+ @£40 each. Even at just 12% this aint too bad for practically doing nothing. Like all of us, he's out with the camera anyway and once a saleable image is captured and saved on file, the printer does the rest. Material cost isn't apparently that high when the stuff is bought in bulk.
The day job stays of course but this is a nice little top up.
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  #25  
Old 3rd April 2010, 12:21 PM
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Originally Posted by bill spears View Post
Very true of course Rob and maybe I was jumping the gun a little after hearing about amount of money coming through the door.
I guess the point I was trying to make is how easy alot of people part with their cash for cheap and cheerful pretty pictures as opposed to more original handcrafted fine silver prints.

One of the photographers who has a lot of work in the gallery recieves 12% on every one of his canvases sold. A good day he can
shift 20+ @£40 each. Even at just 12% this aint too bad for practically doing nothing. Like all of us, he's out with the camera anyway and once a saleable image is captured and saved on file, the printer does the rest. Material cost isn't apparently that high when the stuff is bought in bulk.
The day job stays of course but this is a nice little top up.
But thats a 106 quid for making 20 prints all of which have to be put on stretchers and varnished and have hanging attached and inks paid for out of £5.30 return on each print. He must be mad.
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  #26  
Old 3rd April 2010, 12:21 PM
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I think one should answer the original question with a clear: NO!

The only market for B&W images are France and the US!

I once had on exhibition at BMW here in Germany while introducing a new car with lots of wealthy people during the opening and I sold nothing to them - the overall tenor was they could do the same!
(But they hadn´t done so). Nowadays every person with a d....-shit is made believe he could do that.

When I sell photos it´s through my website or when I speak to interested people directly (like an estate agent for his new office and that was a real big success).

But I never could earn my living in selling photos. That is very hard, hard work and only a few have reached the top. I never will ;-)
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  #27  
Old 3rd April 2010, 12:30 PM
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Originally Posted by mono View Post
I think one should answer the original question with a clear: NO!

The only market for B&W images are France and the US!

I once had on exhibition at BMW here in Germany while introducing a new car with lots of wealthy people during the opening and I sold nothing to them - the overall tenor was they could do the same!
(But they hadn´t done so). Nowadays every person with a d....-shit is made believe he could do that.

When I sell photos it´s through my website or when I speak to interested people directly (like an estate agent for his new office).

But I never could earn my living in selling photos. That is very hard, hard work and only a few have reached the top. I never will ;-)
I belive it is possible via the web but it is a very difficult. Your work has to be top top quality and the web images you put up must be stunning on screen quality. The work has to have universal appeal so something such as abstract work is good as its always trendy and appeals to a broad audience. But the killer is that you have to have superb search engine placement or no one will see it except other photographers. And to achieve that you either have to pay big bucks on an ongoing basis or put a huge amount of work into it if you are upto speed on how to do it. Then just maybe you can make some money without trawling the galleries and getting your work on show that way.
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  #28  
Old 3rd April 2010, 12:34 PM
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Agreed!
Well said, you can express it much better than me.
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  #29  
Old 3rd April 2010, 01:47 PM
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Originally Posted by percepts View Post
But thats a 106 quid for making 20 prints all of which have to be put on stretchers and varnished and have hanging attached and inks paid for out of £5.30 return on each print. He must be mad.
As far as I understand, he doesn't pay for the inks, canvasses etc or do any of the work, gallery do that and they pay for it. He just collects a 12% royalty fee every time an image sells

Last edited by bill spears; 3rd April 2010 at 01:53 PM.
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  #30  
Old 3rd April 2010, 02:22 PM
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As far as I understand, he doesn't pay for the inks, canvasses etc or do any of the work, gallery do that and they pay for it. He just collects a 12% royalty fee every time an image sells
Ah that makes more sense. But the season is short and you have to pray for rain to drive everyone into the shops and galleries
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