An Essay by Pino Granata
If someone fifteen years ago would have told me in which direction the world of stock photography will develope on day, I would have said that it´s not a scenario, but a nightmare.
In the last days, Gary Shenk, Senior Vice President at Corbis, has said that micropayment sites are bringing a lot of new customers into the marketplace. Robert Gubas, VP of Marketing at Getty Images, says that with the advent of accessible, moderately priced digital cameras, everyone is a protographer these days and that with the new technologies anyone could become a distributor of photography and reach potential customers.
I doubt very much that these people know what they are talking about.
But I understand that all these big agencies are not on the side of the photographers, because they work only to please their clients and, maybe, to destroy the competitors.
I also have read that a very famous photographer made 200.000 dollars a year and in order to make all this money needed to sell 400.000 pictures.
I don't want to comment these figures. There is no need to do that. Figures speak for themselves.
When somebody says that the low cost of digital equipment, when compared to the costs of analog equipment, leads to sell for such a low price, maybe he doesn't realize that for a professional photographer cameras and film just represent a small percentage of his expenses.
What about the expenses for travels, hotels, gas, cars, meals, air tickets, clothes, etc.? All these things cost more and more.
In the old times we used to determine the price in a different way, and I do definitely think this is the right way. We used to ask the client how he was going to use the pictures and according to the desired kind of use we charged the clients.
Today it is possible to buy a picture for one dollar and to use it for a General Motors press campaign, once priced around 50.000 dollars. Is it very wise to sell this way'? I don't see the point.
What I really don't understand is why we are bearing all this. Wouldn't it be wiser to discuss what are our real interests in the business? Unfortunately, since I don't see a possibility to return to the old system, wouldn't it be much wiser to search for a new way which will let us stay in business, without surrendering to Getty, Corbis and alike, which dominate the market leaving to the competitors just the breadcrumbs?
There is also the danger of Reuters, AP, Google, etc. All these companies ask all the shooters to send them the pictures they take, but they don't say how they are going to pay the pictures they will sell.
I do think that something must be done in order to protect the interest of photographers. What? We need to find a way and that's a very important and urgent issue.
It's no wonder that all the people who in the past used to make and to determine the market, are out of the business in these days.
The big companies hire only people who are ready to please the clients, because as Jonathan Klein used to say, the new dealers don't owe anything to photographers, but only to the clients.
I think that the big agencies are starting to realize that the kind of policy they have practized until now is suicidical and that we possibly have reached the lowest level of the business.
In fact, what comes next, after selling pictures for a dollar each?
Pino Granata is the founder of Granata Images. Granata Images is now run by his sons and Pino works as editorial and stock photo consultant. He is been working in this industry since 43 years.
Related:
- Sion Touhig On Copyright, Photographers´ Race To The Bottom, Media Corporations And Audience Stolen Content (Dec. 30, 2006)
- Picade, The New Photographer-Driven Stock Photo Agency: Forget RF Licensing, Photo Portals and Microstock (Nov. 28, 2006)
- A New Photographic Renaissance, by Pino Granata (Oct. 31, 2006)
- "Just fly in a different direction" (Oct. 10, 2006)
- The Bill Gates Mystery: An Open Letter From Pino Granata To The Founder Of Corbis (Oct. 03, 2006)
- "Is There A Future For Stock Agents?" (Sept. 20, 2006, by Jim Pickerell, Story 873, subscription required).
- Pino Granata: "Is there any future for photographers and agents?" (Sept. 16, 2006)
- Jason Pagan Launches Alternative Photojournalism Agency Anarchy Images (July 18, 2006)
