This is NOT about people taking photos and posting them here. It is not about amateur photographers trying new things and trying to improve. It is not about people who just enjoy taking photos.
This is about professional photographers who are paid for their work but who blatently don't know one end of the camera from another and believe that "Big shiny camera = professional who should be paid lots"
I was going through some old photos last night and came across these of my son shortly after he came home from hospital:
These were not taken, as you may think, by an over-enthusaiastic young mum with a camera and with no knowledge on how to use a flash. No, these were taken by someone who called themselves a professional photographer.
When I saw the results I pointed out how awful they were and the photographer at least had the grace to admit they weren't very good, refunded my money and gave me a disk of the images.
So, lets see any photos you have which were clearly taken by a fauxtographer.
@dmortega No, not that bad.....but not so great that they merit paying for either IMO...I honestly thought she was showing us some of her photos and then going to show us some from a "fauxtographer" ....compare and contrast sort of thing.
@shadesofgrey --- You should see what I have. My daughter leans in all her pictures. Leans ..... hahaha!!! I did hire someone to come in a take picturess. I didn't have much money and probably got a special. They are not bad either. Not great but better than I was getting at the time. Heck, probably better than I could do even now. ;-)
@dmortega Well I guess in the end if you feel it was worth paying for, then they were worth it....You know what they call the girl with one leg shorter than the other...? I lean. If they were better than you could've done then (I doubt now, btw) then it was probably good you paid someone. I couldn't say without seeing the pictures whether or not the could be a "fauxtographer"........But if someone wants to charge someone else for taking photos or is trying to sell photos that are lacking in quality, or show a lack of knowledge of the subject and photography, I would classify them as a fauxtographer. Just because someone has a camera and their family "loves" their photos, doesn't mean they should be out there charging other people money..............my wife is encouraging me to start a website and all that other stuff that people do as a professional or at least along that road....I feel like I need to get some schooling under my belt and understand the medium and photography as a whole better......speedlites, reflectors, processing work flows, creating actions, how my processing software truly works, just not the obvious stuff, understand all the things my camera can really do, etc etc ad nauseum. I don't feel I am up to that level yet and if I did have a website and offered my services for a fee, I would become a fauxtographer.....so I may put the 3-4 that I feel are truly gallery worthy in a local co-op gallery here and see what happens. If people really do like my stuff, then I may pursue schooling and gain knowledge about photography as a business and go from there....if not, I'll pursue it as a hobby and gain the knowledge and enjoy it that way. Thanks for listening to my rant, Dorrena!
wow @emmar84 sorry to hijack your thread.....felt good to get that out though, been holding that in for a while.
@shadesofgrey I agree, my wife comes up with business ideas every once in a while, and photography was one of them. Have a lab in one of the outbuildings and during our Christmas shows era, tried to take and sell some photos, B&W. Spent a couple hours printing 12 of the same photo and when I was done, I didn't go back into the lab for two weeks. Decided that mas production was not what is was about, I want to enjoy what I am doing and when it came repetitive, that's when I burnt out.
If only I had proof! My senior photos were done by the person hired by the school and though the photos were okay, they weren't worth forking over any money.
So, what did my mom do? She paid for me to get my senior photos done at Walmart... WALMART! That should have been a dead giveaway that the photographer was actually a fauxtographer (not saying all but definitely most are).
They were much worse than the ones done at my school. All-in-all, I have no senior photos but one crappy photo in the yearbook.
Too bad that was 10 years ago, otherwise I might take my own photos. I KNOW I am no photographer (far from it actually) but I would have done a much better job myself. Haha!
@brumbe I'm sure your parents were going to go with ilean and then changed their minds, save you a little bit of trouble.....I'm going to start calling you that now btw as it should have been from the dawn of your time.
I read a story the other day of someone who worked at a camera shop, and the top 3 saddest experiences of it. One of them was on weekends, people coming into the shop with their Canon 7D's, asking to set it up for weddings. as if there is a button for that.
see this 'M', it's an upside down 'W' for Wedding.
it's all hearsay, but seeing some 'professional' photos.. I kinda believe it.
@pwallis Yes, definitley take photos of them to share!
@shadesofgrey Hijack away by all means, you seem to be speaking with my thoughts. I did consider starting my own phtoography business, it's somehting I would love to do and I coudl probably do an okay job but that's what's stopping me. I don't want to do an "okay" job I want to do a fantastic job, I would want my customers to be deligted with what I would produce not just happier it was better than soemthing they could do with their camera phone.
that's one of the reasoens I've applied to do a photography degree in September, I don't elieve soemone has to have a degree in order to be a good photographer but it is an option for me at the moment and I know I would learn an incredible amount.
I stil want to set up a business but only when I feel I can deliver a high quality service, if I'm honest I don't think I would want it to be a portrait business but I haven't defined what I do want enough yet and hopefully by doing a degree (if I get through the interview) will give me the ability to explore different things so I can find exactly what it is I want to do.
@dmortega No they're not *that* bad, there are definitley worse ones on the internet, there are worse ones in my album. The difference is that I don't call myself a professional. The top image would have been quite nice if my sons face wasn't so over -exposed.
The second one, the focus is on the planket rather than my son so there are crisp details in the blanket where as his face is fuzzier.
The others again have too much over exposure in them and the sheet used in the bottom two seems to merge into what he was wearing and in the final one the crop shows wherer teh blanket ends and the grey background starts, that just irritates me!
As you said, they're not that bad, but htey could have been a whole lot better.
When he was a couple of months older I took him to a different company, which now has sadly gone bankrupt, and it was a professional service from start to finish with much better quality photos and I returned to them multiple times before they had to close.
@emmar84 I don't think a degree/school is necessary to understand photography both as a busines and an art....however it puts you way ahead of the powercurve and gives you a great jumping off point.
@shadesofgrey You're right, it's not a necessity but it is something I really want to do. I have been in my current job for 7 years and I have been working voluntarily or for other companies, in this area since I was 14. I'll be honest it's begining to burn me out.
My daughter is due to start school in September and because of the way our business was taken over in December I will not be able to return to full time work without signing a new contract which would mean I would lose nearly £15k a year, half my annual leave, my pension and my benefts such as carers leave.
I'd rather not work part time when there is no reason to and last Autumn my husband suggested I apply for the photography degree course. I went to the open day wanting to do it, I left *needing* to do it!
Even so I didn't hold out much hope as they told us that last year there were about 500 applicants but only places for 35. I applied anyway and I have been invited for interview in April.
I'm not there yet but I'm a step closer.
I'll have to juggle a home life, children, full time education and probably a part time job but I feel it will be worth it for the experience.
We were told that from day one we will do placements with different photographers, be able to expand our CV before we leave university and of course have the experiences that many can only dream of.
Last year a student spent 6 months in New York working with Annie Leibovitz, when her placement finished Annie actually offered her a contract to work with her on a further project.
It wouldn't give me a career and it wouldn't make me the best photographer in the UK but it would help me be a few steps closer to those things
@shadesofgrey Thank you, that's exactly how I see it, an opportunity. Nothing will be handed on my lap just lots of oportunities to show I can do something I love and learn how to improve it.
I'm trying not to get too nervous, it's not until 21st April and I found out I had an interview on 31st January, I've been swinging between unbelievably excited and pant-ruining petrified ever since.
It is a 2 hour interview and I have to do a presentaiton, I have my portfolio ready, I have my presentation memerised, now I just need to pull it off (which man lovely people on here keep reminding me I *can* do).
If you want to cross your fingers for mw on the 21st I would appreciate it!
Only Every Single School Photo Ever Taken!!!
P!x!ephoto are the main offenders here in Oz: they seem to give some teenagers some cameras, send them into schools, give them beige backgrounds designed to make all skin tones look sallow and provide enormous flashes to light up the inside of the basements where they normally decide to set up their shots.
(Can you tell I'm a teacher who is sick of the dodgy photos!!)
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wow @emmar84 sorry to hijack your thread.....felt good to get that out though, been holding that in for a while.
(Thanks for the use of your thread)
So, what did my mom do? She paid for me to get my senior photos done at Walmart... WALMART! That should have been a dead giveaway that the photographer was actually a fauxtographer (not saying all but definitely most are).
They were much worse than the ones done at my school. All-in-all, I have no senior photos but one crappy photo in the yearbook.
Too bad that was 10 years ago, otherwise I might take my own photos. I KNOW I am no photographer (far from it actually) but I would have done a much better job myself. Haha!
@emmar84 I am glad you got your money back.
see this 'M', it's an upside down 'W' for Wedding.
it's all hearsay, but seeing some 'professional' photos.. I kinda believe it.
@shadesofgrey Hijack away by all means, you seem to be speaking with my thoughts. I did consider starting my own phtoography business, it's somehting I would love to do and I coudl probably do an okay job but that's what's stopping me. I don't want to do an "okay" job I want to do a fantastic job, I would want my customers to be deligted with what I would produce not just happier it was better than soemthing they could do with their camera phone.
that's one of the reasoens I've applied to do a photography degree in September, I don't elieve soemone has to have a degree in order to be a good photographer but it is an option for me at the moment and I know I would learn an incredible amount.
I stil want to set up a business but only when I feel I can deliver a high quality service, if I'm honest I don't think I would want it to be a portrait business but I haven't defined what I do want enough yet and hopefully by doing a degree (if I get through the interview) will give me the ability to explore different things so I can find exactly what it is I want to do.
@dmortega No they're not *that* bad, there are definitley worse ones on the internet, there are worse ones in my album. The difference is that I don't call myself a professional. The top image would have been quite nice if my sons face wasn't so over -exposed.
The second one, the focus is on the planket rather than my son so there are crisp details in the blanket where as his face is fuzzier.
The others again have too much over exposure in them and the sheet used in the bottom two seems to merge into what he was wearing and in the final one the crop shows wherer teh blanket ends and the grey background starts, that just irritates me!
As you said, they're not that bad, but htey could have been a whole lot better.
When he was a couple of months older I took him to a different company, which now has sadly gone bankrupt, and it was a professional service from start to finish with much better quality photos and I returned to them multiple times before they had to close.
My daughter is due to start school in September and because of the way our business was taken over in December I will not be able to return to full time work without signing a new contract which would mean I would lose nearly £15k a year, half my annual leave, my pension and my benefts such as carers leave.
I'd rather not work part time when there is no reason to and last Autumn my husband suggested I apply for the photography degree course. I went to the open day wanting to do it, I left *needing* to do it!
Even so I didn't hold out much hope as they told us that last year there were about 500 applicants but only places for 35. I applied anyway and I have been invited for interview in April.
I'm not there yet but I'm a step closer.
I'll have to juggle a home life, children, full time education and probably a part time job but I feel it will be worth it for the experience.
We were told that from day one we will do placements with different photographers, be able to expand our CV before we leave university and of course have the experiences that many can only dream of.
Last year a student spent 6 months in New York working with Annie Leibovitz, when her placement finished Annie actually offered her a contract to work with her on a further project.
It wouldn't give me a career and it wouldn't make me the best photographer in the UK but it would help me be a few steps closer to those things
I'm trying not to get too nervous, it's not until 21st April and I found out I had an interview on 31st January, I've been swinging between unbelievably excited and pant-ruining petrified ever since.
It is a 2 hour interview and I have to do a presentaiton, I have my portfolio ready, I have my presentation memerised, now I just need to pull it off (which man lovely people on here keep reminding me I *can* do).
If you want to cross your fingers for mw on the 21st I would appreciate it!
With all that luck I'm a shoo in!
P!x!ephoto are the main offenders here in Oz: they seem to give some teenagers some cameras, send them into schools, give them beige backgrounds designed to make all skin tones look sallow and provide enormous flashes to light up the inside of the basements where they normally decide to set up their shots.
(Can you tell I'm a teacher who is sick of the dodgy photos!!)