Amateur Photographer

I recently got binned (again) from an exhibition and it has gotten me thinking about the relationship galleries, websites and magazines have with photographers

We are all proud of our work, some of us are very good, but most of us hold down day jobs. Following photography as a career is just not possible for a lot of us. However there has been an increasing appetite to tap into us as a market.

Magazines tempt us in with competitions winning kit that isn't as good as we've got whilst retaining the right to sell our images. We are tempted with behind the scenes access to national institutions whilst said institution will get access to our shots (including those that haven't won) for virtually zero cost compared to what a pro or stock agency would have charged (think about it, if it's good enough to use, it's good enough to pay for?.). One book company has you pay to enter their competition and when you read how much the prize is against how many entrants there were the previous year the arithmetic falls into place, couple that with a less than top range prize from the equipment "sponsor" then you begin to see that we aren't just being advertised to but are actually paying for that advertisement. Many galleries and competitions will charge to enter their competition and insist on a healthy take on sales of prints from the winning and exhibited entries

The whole business seems to be just about sucking money from amateurs. Are we victims of our own ambition and vanity? probably but the cynicism shown by websites, mags, companies and galleries is breathtaking.

Most of us will want to have an audience for our work, but is lining the pockets of these people the right way to go about it? I'm obviously missing something about how to get your work seen without being a cash cow for somebody.

Please note I am not having a pop at AP magazine, as I've not read it for 20 years, it was just a handy illustration... honest legal guy, it wisnae you, somebody else........ :)