Hmmm I agree with about 90% of what you are saying David. It is a little bit
hard to compare a shot taken with expensive gear, via expensive travel, to
expensive locations of an exceedingly rare species in a highly remote place to
sweatshops churning out masses of clothes cheaply using cheap materials and
sold for expensive prices in developed countries.
I was recently approached by a publication to use my shots of Orange-bellied
Parrots, without payment. How do they think I took those images? By taking
free interstate and chartered flights, with free gear, free meals and free
accommodation? The answer is no to all of those questions.
What I hope for with these conversations is for photographers to think twice
and take a stand in order to stop our industry from diminishing even more into
the cheap commodity that it has become.
Inger Vandyke
Professional Wildlife Photographer and Writer
Expedition Leader - Western Tibet Expedition (16 September - 7 October, 2013)
Assistant Publicity Officer - Southern Oceans Seabird Study Association (SOSSA)
Guest Lecturer - Photography, Freelancing and Photo Journalism - Bond
University, Gold Coast, Australia
Mob: +61 402 286 437
www.ingervandyke.com
Date: Mon, 23 Jul 2012 12:55:28 +1000
Subject: What value a photo?
From:
To:
CC: ; ;
It is a fact of life that the "digital revolution" is changing things in many
areas. We see banks and others moving their call centres overseas to take
advantage of lower costs - expedited by the improvement in computers and
communications. In my former area of employment (luckily I am retired now) of
software development there has been an increasing tendency for large software
projects to be contracted out to developers in India and other places. There
are now websites devoted to getting quotes for software development from
individuals - and the lowest quotes are usually from India, China or similar
countries and are at prices that would make it impossible for an Aussie
developer to compete. I gather even the "grunt work" in law firms and
accountancy is now being sent overseas.
In non-digital areas of course we see similar things - how much manufacturing
is left in Aus?
In many cases it is only jobs that require a physical presence - such as a
tradesperson - that seem safe from such competition. Taking photographs of
course fits into this category - but the same digital revolution now makes it
so much easier for anyone to take lots of photos without the expense of
development and printing which used to hold people back - and some of those
will be acceptable to publishers.
So whilst we all benefit from the changes in society - bank charges would
probably be higher if they did all these jobs in Aus - there is an increasing
threat to many jobs. It has of course always been like this - not too many
steam train drivers around now - and probably always will be.
So whilst I have the greatest sympathy for those whose livelihoods are
threatened by amateurs, you are not alone as many others face competition from
cheap labour in other countries, which you will not do!
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