Am I good enough to charge?

[nifheim]

Eh I never know if I am ready to start charging for photography. I was thinking of figuring out what the average price is going around and reducing it by 30% at first. I am have my logo which I just designed, working on my flash site and I am going to pretty up my blog (since this is just to throw some work up) but am i good enough to charge or should I just keep shooting for free?


Thanks!
removed - thank you again

[candleman]

shooting what exactly?
i see cats, flowers, events, landscapes, medial looking stuff... what are you going for here?

[zona5101]

A quick check of Craigslist rules out any coorelation between ability and charging people money...

[nifheim]

I guess to freelance for portrait & event photography. I just put a var. photography as a reference to see if I was good enough. I know that sounds so undefined but that is my problem how do I know what I should be doing when I just do a mishmash of all different works.

[nifheim]

Originally Posted by zona5101

A quick check of Craigslist rules out any coorelation between ability and charging people money...

That is my fear - i shouldn't be charging people for money to shoot for them. I am not saying I should be top dollar but not sure if I should be shooting for free still.

[Jim Bryant]

You know, I've looked at your site and there's a few areas in photography you need to improve on. I'm not saying that you shouldn't charge, but take in account to at least charge event and sitting fees and fees for computer post processing. However, there are some nice images posted. Work on your fill flash work!

[nifheim]

Of course I have lots of room for improvement! I just wasn't sure if it was so bad that I should be charging. Thank you for your input.

I am going to be taking classes in the fall and possibly if I can scrounge up the cash, perhaps some photo store classes they have locally.

[BK553]

Originally Posted by zona5101

A quick check of Craigslist rules out any coorelation between ability and charging people money...

So true. You're stuff looks good, but to charge, consistency is key. Can you get the shots you need, every single time without fail? That's the key to doing it for money. Anyone can take nice photos every once in a while, pros gotta do it every. time.

[nifheim]

I would say in a series of 20 shots about on average 8 are good and about 6 are excellent. The only time I have issues is when its a setup shot - i don't do well at all with manipulating people and I tend to not use photoshop as much as possible - if anything I will use curves or a level or bump up saturation. Pretty much everything is shot as seen.


The only other problem I ever have is with flash work (my equipment is D80, SB 800) because when I shoot press conferences and with fast action my flash can't seem to do a rapid shoot. I just purchased new batteries to see if this will help but I don't get how you can get like series of shots out so rapidly with a flash because on my camera even with fresh batteries in the flash there is a pause. And since I can't push my ISO with out having grain I need my flash.

[Jim Poor]

Originally Posted by nifheim

I would say in a series of 20 shots about on average 8 are good and about 6 are excellent. The only time I have issues is when its a setup shot - i don't do well at all with manipulating people and I tend to not use photoshop as much as possible - if anything I will use curves or a level or bump up saturation. Pretty much everything is shot as seen.


The only other problem I ever have is with flash work (my equipment is D80, SB 800) because when I shoot press conferences and with fast action my flash can't seem to do a rapid shoot. I just purchased new batteries to see if this will help but I don't get how you can get like series of shots out so rapidly with a flash because on my camera even with fresh batteries in the flash there is a pause. And since I can't push my ISO with out having grain I need my flash.

If you're getting six "excellent" images out of a series of 20, either you're outperforming all of us, including Ansel Adams, or you're not editing very objectively.