Where are we now?

[Ganesh H Shankar]

I came across this below YouTube video at this link.

We started CNP about 7 years ago with creativity and new visions as the foundation of the forum. With no commercial intent we set this high bar for ourselves mostly for fun and as a challenge. Now it looks like professional photographers (those who make a living photographing) have started finding it a need in today's world of free images for survival! It was inevitable I guess..

Your 5 minutes to watch this may be worth..

[Ganesh H Shankar]

I think this is not just limited to photography. The world wants creativity in every field. Five to ten years from now getting 99.9% in a professional course may help a student just make a living (since there will be class full of them). Practising/solving last 20 years question papers will not help our kids - at least that is what I believe in. While a kid (may be just with 70% score or a school drop out) with very creative thoughts may win hearts of entrepreneurs and will have an opportunity to shape the new world. There were so many personal music players before iPod was invented! There is no denying that the huge success of Apple is due to creativity and art, not just engineering. The first wrist watch was made in 1530. Can you imagine Apple sitting pretty with pre-order for 2.3 million iWatches which will hit the market in a day or two? and its first watch? Why? I think it all goes back to creativity and art!

Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up.

― Pablo Picasso

Yes, that is a big problem. We, the parents and valuation system are to blame who push our innovative young minds to the never-ending wheel of marks.

Back to photography, would it have helped if we had no access to millions of images (Flickr/Facebook) which we wanted to imitate when we started? Should we blame Newton (inertia) for the challenges that we face now?

[Vijay Mohan Raj]

Ganesh,

Very apt topic for CNP. Everytime I interact with my photographer friend whom I have known for over a decade has a lament and its common. "There are no good images being made" which actually means there are so many people shooting exactly like I do.

The video exactly tells you that how your image skills are not the ones you need to be successful and also important is how technology is even making artists redundant.

I remember the French kite photographer Nicholas Chorier who is now based in Pondicherry was commissioned at huge sums of money. Now with drones taking over, his skills are certainly not sought after. He did a small shoot for me during a holiday in JLR and ofcourse produced very good quality stuff. I was left wondering how could anyone make a living knowing that as a client we hardly paid anything.

Companies which need photographers are all like the corporates, they will only take in people who either are too successful or somebody who has connections.

The young raw but talented photographer is called in as if Charity is being done.

I think CNP as a group being non-commercial can always debate this because it does not affect us. But the truth is it hurts us big time as well.

If anyone asks you for a print for an exhibition, the person expects you to print it and give it to him. He does not even bother to print it himself. The other end is they ask for a digital files and never bother to do checking whether they need to color correct or sharpen or even provide a copyright in the image or outside it. I think time has come that a template or charter needs to prepared for people who expect free images to atleast follow an etiquette as to how to request images and how to behave once they recieve them.

Some famous wildlife magazine behaviour is so rude that I feel how do we really work with such people.

However, I have seen some extremely nice people also and let me tell you it is very rare to find such a person.

regards
VMR

[Ganesh H Shankar]

The young raw but talented photographer is called in as if Charity is being done.

Very true VMR. Unfortunately, I think this is chicken and egg situation for young photographers/artists who are getting exploited in the name of "publications". Once they realize and stop free contributions publications will find next set of "free photographers". Somewhere in the corner my mind I do think a world class publication publishing a world class content do need to source its content from a professional photographer. Unfortunately there aren't many such publications.

I think CNP as a group being non-commercial can always debate this because it does not affect us. But the truth is it hurts us big time as well.

If anyone asks you for a print for an exhibition, the person expects you to print it and give it to him. He does not even bother to print it himself. The other end is they ask for a digital files and never bother to do checking whether they need to color correct or sharpen or even provide a copyright in the image or outside it.

Agree with you 100% VMR. Some of us can laugh at this prevailing truth since it may not financially impact some of us here. However, don't we share a moral responsibility of not marginalizing works of our professional photographer friends? I think that is a deeper topic for another debate.

I think time has come that a template or charter needs to prepared for people who expect free images to atleast follow an etiquette as to how to request images and how to behave once they recieve them.

I think this may eventually happen when demand and supplies balance. As of now there are lots of free images and "free photographers". I think a hard working creative professional will indeed survive at the end meeting demands of a very few high quality world class publications and art galleries. I think we will get to see lots of interesting visions in the coming years..