Amateurs vs Professionals

The problem for an amateur is that he/she has no reason to take a photograph.
Terence Donovan

I'd like to start a discussion on the subject of amateurs vs professionals. I thought this quote was a good place to start.

Alain

I would venture 99% of all the photos taken since 1829 have been shot by amateurs, not that means crapola, but it is a reality. So, I guess my question to answer the first draw, is what constitutes a professional? Is it a webpage and a few sold images? Is it someone who earn their sole income from photography? And if the latter is true, how do we construe the criteria for a good professional?

Alain Briot said:

The problem for an amateur is that he/she has no reason to take a photograph.
Terence Donovan

Click to expand...

I disagree with this premise Alain. Because it equates earning money (by being a professional) to having a reason. Ergo, money is the only reason why one would photograph. Obviously not true.

Alain Briot said:

The problem for an amateur is that he/she has no reason to take a photograph.
Terence Donovan

I'd like to start a discussion on the subject of amateurs vs professionals. I thought this quote was a good place to start.

Alain

Click to expand...

Well, Terence is clearly wrong. Amateurs of today are tomorrows superstars. All amateurs have, to greater or less extent an inner drive to bring home some of the wonder and beauty around them.

Asher

Alain,

This is a discussion I have seen in several places - so what kind of Professional you are looking at?
You have of course the fine art variety, but there are wedding photographers, photojournalists, forensic photographers, technical photographers of all sorts (high speed events, orthophotography to name two of many), then you have the bread and butter photography like portraits for ID cards and other portraits so frequently seen when you walk around in cities, photographers hired to document something (there is a photographer working at the German Museum un Munich who is a full-time employee and his work is to document everything in the museum for the catalogue, but also posters, books etc.) and there are many other varieties I forgot.

Alain Briot said:

The problem for an amateur is that he/she has no reason to take a photograph.
Terence Donovan

Click to expand...

For me the distinction between amateur and professional is simple: A professional makes a living from what (s)he earns by her/his photography, an amateur doesn't - which does not prevent him/her from earning a little or more money from it, but there is the other job that allows him/her to pay the rent and actually live. There is no clear line between both in this definition, as some people strive to become a professional and do the other job just until they earn sufficiently doing their photography so they can give up the other job.

If you look at the variety of specializations for professional photographers, there is a surprisingly large fraction where you can assume that the reason to take a photograph is just the money. These photographers often have an artistic interest, but not for work - like quite a few amateur photographers.
Othe other hand there are amateur photographers who have many reasons to take a photograph like documenting life in the place where they live, striving for perfection in a field of photography of their choice etc.

I do not like the vs. here, I would prefer to see it as some sort of coexistence but I am aware that there is a large number of amateurs who give their work happily for free just to see it published which led to an erosion of prices in many places. What I would like to see is some sort of convention that amateur photographers not striving to become a professional use a non-commercial license for their work (which unfortunately does not prevent some companies from using these 'free' pictures anyway, but that's another story) to create a separation market-wise.
I am just afraid that this will remain a dream of me.

Sorry if this might have turned into a rant, but this is my opinion

Best regards,
Michael

Professional photographers have a reason to take a photograph: their clients are interested in having that picture. The result will of course be payment, but the client's desire is essential: a pro does not need to find a subject that interest him, he needs to find people and photographs what interests them. For example, Alain Briot could have no interest himself for US nature (probably not, but just assume so) and just have realized that there is a market for color landscapes of the US deserts, he would still be a pro and take the pictures the clients want.

The reasons why advanced amateurs take pictures are less obvious to me. Sure, many amateurs take pictures because they want to document their travels or the growth of their children, family events, etc... But I don't think that Terence Donovan was speaking about these amateurs, but rather about the kind of people who, while still technically amateur since they don't get paid, invest almost as much time and money as professional photographers in their hobby. What is the reason for their efforts?

I suppose that most of these advanced amateurs look for the social status associated with being an artist. Actually, when one read photo forums like dpreview or flickr groups, that desire is quite obvious from the numerous discussions about "how to turn from amateur to pro" and the implied principle that amateurs have lower status than professionals. So these advanced amateurs actually work like professionals, not necessarily from the quality of their work but from their desire to create pictures that satisfy criteria set by others: the images that they perceive as "defining a professional". But by working for imaginary clients without the monetary reward, they indeed set themselves up for the trap noted by Terence Donovan: they have a hidden reason for taking photographs and no reward. Indeed, from the outside, it looks as if they had no reason.

Michael Nagel said:

I am aware that there is a large number of amateurs who give their work happily for free just to see it published which led to an erosion of prices in many places.

Click to expand...

It is worse than that. It is not sufficient for the work to be free for it to be used, the photograph also needs to be fit for that use. The large majority of free pictures is never used and photographers who want their photographs to be seen have realized that they need to produce the kind of pictures that publishers need if they want their pictures to be published.

Say, for example that you want your travel pictures to be seen in a travel web site: you need to produce pictures documentary of hotel facilities or tourist attractions, not artistic pictures or pictures showing the non-tourist parts of the country. You need to produce the pictures traditionally associated with hotel catalogues, because hotels are the actual customers of these sites. By doing so you will actually be forced to work as a pro: making the pictures that please the customer instead of making the pictures that interest you, but you still don't get the pay. Conversely, the site is willing to lower the criteria of quality. But the criteria of fitness to the purpose still remains.

The same is true if you want to be published in a newspaper, illustrate a magazine article or even be added to google earth or wikipedia. The pictures need to fit the purpose of the publisher.

Jerome Marot said:

Professional photographers have a reason to take a photograph: their clients are interested in having that picture. The result will of course be payment, but the client's desire is essential: a pro does not need to find a subject that interest him, he needs to find people and photographs what interests them. For example, Alain Briot could have no interest himself for US nature (probably not, but just assume so) and just have realized that there is a market for color landscapes of the US deserts, he would still be a pro and take the pictures the clients want.

The reasons why advanced amateurs take pictures are less obvious to me. Sure, many amateurs take pictures because they want to document their travels or the growth of their children, family events, etc... But I don't think that Terence Donovan was speaking about these amateurs, but rather about the kind of people who, while still technically amateur since they don't get paid, invest almost as much time and money as professional photographers in their hobby. What is the reason for their efforts?

I suppose that most of these advanced amateurs look for the social status associated with being an artist. Actually, when one read photo forums like dpreview or flickr groups, that desire is quite obvious from the numerous discussions about "how to turn from amateur to pro" and the implied principle that amateurs have lower status than professionals. So these advanced amateurs actually work like professionals, not necessarily from the quality of their work but from their desire to create pictures that satisfy criteria set by others: the images that they perceive as "defining a professional". But by working for imaginary clients without the monetary reward, they indeed set themselves up for the trap noted by Terence Donovan: they have a hidden reason for taking photographs and no reward. Indeed, from the outside, it looks as if they had no reason.

Click to expand...

Amateur photographers make images, simply for the love of photography,best practiced in one's free time. Some professionals shoot for the same reasons when they have free time to shoot what they want.

Hi, Alain,

Alain Briot said:

The problem for an amateur is that he/she has no reason to take a photograph.

I'd like to start a discussion on the subject of amateurs vs professionals.

Click to expand...

Well, they have special golf tournaments for that.

I thought this quote was a good place to start.

Click to expand...

Well, I'd hate to start anything on a premise as silly as that.

Of course, Terence Donovan, being (at the time of his death) assumedly a "professional photographer", is not at all qualified to opine on the motivations of amateur photographers.

From Wikipedia

Professional

A professional is a person who is engaged in a certain activity, or occupation, for gain or compensation as means of livelihood; such as a permanent career, not as an amateur or pastime. The traditional professions were doctors, engineers, lawyers, architects and commissioned military officers. Today, the term is applied to nurses, accountants, educators, scientists, technology experts, social workers, artists, librarians (information professionals) and many more.

The term is also used in sports to differentiate amateur players from those who are paid—hence "professional footballer" and "professional golfer". Many companies include the word professional in their store name to imply the quality of their workmanship or service.

In some cultures, the term is used as shorthand to describe a particular social stratum of well-educated, salaried workers who enjoy considerable work autonomy and are commonly engaged in creative and intellectually challenging work.

Due to the personal and confidential nature of many professional services, and thus the necessity to place a great deal of trust in them, most professionals are subject to strict codes of conduct enshrining rigorous ethical and moral obligations.

Amateur

An amateur (French amateur "lover of", from Old French and ultimately from Latin amatorem (nom. amator), "lover") is generally considered a person attached to a particular pursuit, study, or science in a non-professional or unpaid manner. Amateurs often have little or no formal training in their pursuits, and many are autodidacts (self-taught).

Amateurism can be seen in both a negative and positive light. Since amateurs often do not have formal training, some amateur work may be considered sub-par. For example, amateur athletes in sports such as basketball, baseball or football are regarded as having a lower level of ability than professional athletes. On the other hand, an amateur may be in a position to approach a subject with an open mind (as a result of the lack of formal training) and in a financially disinterested manner. An amateur who dabbles in a field out of casual interest rather than as a profession or serious interest, or who possesses a general but superficial interest in any art or a branch of knowledge, is often referred to as a dilettante.

The lack of financial benefit can also be seen as a sign of commitment to an activity; and until the 1970s the Olympic rules required that competitors be amateurs. Receiving payment to participate in an event disqualified an athlete from that event, as in the case of Jim Thorpe. In the Olympics, this rule remains in place for boxing.

Many amateurs make valuable contributions in the field of computer programming through the open source movement. Amateur dramatics is the performance of plays or musical theater, often to high standards, but lacking the budgets of professional West End or Broadway performances. Astronomy, history, linguistics, and the natural sciences are among the myriad fields that have benefited from the activities of amateurs. Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel were amateur scientists who never held a position in their field of study. William Shakespeare and Leonardo da Vinci were considered amateur artists and autodidacts in their fields of study.

Radio astronomy was founded by Grote Reber, an amateur radio operator; radio itself was greatly advanced if not founded by Guglielmo Marconi, a young Italian gentleman who started out by tinkering with a coherer and a spark coil as an amateur electrician. Pierre de Fermat was a highly influential mathematician whose primary vocation was law. During her lifetime, Maria Agata Szymanowska was considered an amateur pianist and composer.

************

Best regards,

Doug

Werner von Braun, as an amateur, advanced the notion of guided rocketry, to be noticed and subsumed by the 3rd Reich military and then Hitler himself for destroying London. The original test area was destroyed by the British and so was replaced by a massive industrial level rocket factory in a disused mine, (using slave labor of interned Jewish and other prisoners on a brutal work schedule with limited food).

Captured by the Americans, he lead the USA's reach for the moon. So let's not underestimate the "amateur", for brilliance, achievement for evil or good!

Asher

I have made my living from photography since 1979. People and in particular my clients - always classified me as a professional photographer. During the 1990's I owned a Main Street studio where people told others that they hired the "professional photographer" in town and recommended me. I never much liked the term, but it was a way of identifying me as the photographer someone would hire to shoot a portrait, wedding or commercial assignment - unless they wanted to take a huge gamble on uncle Joe.

For times where photography was crucial and of importance, most sought out a professional - - - in other words someone who was in the business. Commercial assignments would only hire professionals. Another aspect was that to work with a "Pro Film Processing Lab", you had to provide proof that you were a professional photographer -which would be a business license and tax exemption number.

So much has changed in the industry since around 2008 though. Now it doesn't seem to matter much whether you are a professional photographer or not. The general public really doesn't care (my opinion only). Everybody is a photographer or on their way to being one and offering their services to make a few bucks. Even if you carry the definition of professional, the prestige has been taken out by the fact that it is increasingly difficult to make a living as a "professional photographer"

So even though technically, the term professional photographer has nothing to do with the abilities of the photographer and is a more a legal reference to whether it is offered as a service for income - - - I don't feel that it matters much anymore. I still make my income from photography, however I'm more of an amateur photographer now than I ever was.

-----

Is there something here we didn't know already?

Best regards,

Doug

Doug Kerr said:

Is there something here we didn't know already?

Best regards,

Doug

Click to expand...

I think that there are many people who are taking up photography and attempting to make a business or living out of it - that struggle to know what it means or is required to be a professional. Or they may feel that they aren't worthy as photographer, unless they can be labeled as a professional.

If I think back 30 plus years when I began - it was a concern - - - especially with "Professional Photographers Associations" dictating what they thought constituted being a professional photographer. It is easy to have experience and understand the difference or meaning, and so not understand why it isn't obvious to everyone. My View Only


-----

I used to photograph for money and I danced to the paying client's tune. Retiring from pro photography, alias small business administration with occasional camera use, was a liberation.

Now I photograph in pursuit of personal art and lavish such time, effort, and money on my work that I could never afford as a professional and still stay in business. And I am free to use far grander camera equipment than I ever could when shooting to someone else's budget.

As for the reason, art is compelling reason enough. As Picasso famously and coarsely put it "You are truly an artist if you know you have to make art like you know you have to piss".

Hi, Maris,

Maris Rusis said:

I used to photograph for money and I danced to the paying client's tune. Retiring from pro photography, alias small business administration with occasional camera use, was a liberation.

Now I photograph in pursuit of personal art and lavish such time, effort, and money on my work that I could never afford as a professional and still stay in business. And I am free to use far grander camera equipment than I ever could when shooting to someone else's budget.

As for the reason, art is compelling reason enough. As Picasso famously and coarsely put it "You are truly an artist if you know you have to make art like you know you have to piss".

Click to expand...

We can always rely on you to hit the nail on the head!

Thanks.

Best regards,

Doug

"An amateur practices until he can get it right; a professional practices until he can't get it wrong."

I don't think the distinction is as easy to make as some would like it to be. My wife majored in music. She's played in professional orchestras, and for a time lead a string quartet that played in weddings (over 200 of them). She almost never practices except for gigs. She has taught over 1,000 kids how to play violin, and her advanced students who attempt to make region orchestra usually succeed. I don't think anyone would dispute that she's a professional operating at a fairly high level, but music has never been her primary source of income. In fact, that is true of most of the professional musicians that I know -- nearly all of them have other jobs that they rely on, or spouses with good jobs.

So while the quote I gave is somewhat humorous, it seems to get at an important truth. The quote that starts this thread seems to miss the point. I don't "need" to photograph things from the standpoint of money because I don't try to sell them, and I don't "need" to do it from the social standing thing, because most people don't know I do it, and even if I did, playing bagpipes seems way more exotic than making photographs. But I "need" to be photographer, in the same way I "need" to be a musician. Art is a means of expression; it helps keep me sane.

Thank you to all for sharing your experience and viewpoints about amateurs and professionals. Please continue.

Of course there is a reason!!

Nothing, and I mean nothing, is done without a reason.
If it is, please give me an example..just one example would suffice.

Start with an erroneous premise....

fahim mohammed said:

Of course there is a reason!!

Nothing, and I mean nothing, is done without a reason.

Click to expand...

I agree. So what is your reason?

Alain Briot said:

I agree. So what is your reason?

Click to expand...

" So what is your reason? "...More correctly ' reasons '...

Here are a few amongst many..

Documenting travels, cultures, people that I find of interest to me.

Keeping a diary of the family's important events..births, marriages etc.

Trying out new cameras..generally i use it on something interesting ( to me ) to see how the cam functions, responds, outputs the results, its advantages and disadvantages as opposed to others I have.

To share photographs I take with family/friends and some on forums such as OPF.

To help out some close friends who ask me to take photographs for them on some special occasions ( for them ) such as a marriage, graduation etc.

Take photographs of special themes ( like Moroccan Mosaic Tiles ) for hanging in my room.

Keep practising photography to improve my photographic technique.

Few times I have done unpaid photography for charity work.

To help me relax and take my mind of things.

On occasions to give my ego a boost; when someone comments positively on an image I took.

Being retired, I need something to keep me and my mind occupied.

Would you like some more reasons?

Thanks Fahim. Those are great. You can certainly list more if you have more.

I'm reminded of the time that a woman I was having dinner with mentioned that she had heard a TV announcement reminding women of her age that they should have their breasts examined regularly by a qualified professional.

I showed her my Professional Engineer's license.

Best regards,

Doug

Love hurts

All I can say is I get really depressed when I'm not shooting. There are times I would be willing to work for free. I love taking portraits and it's not always about the money, it's about creating art and how it makes one feel after seeing the results.


Photo Website

Richard Rives said:

All I can say is I get really depressed when I'm not shooting. There are times I would be willing to work for free. I love taking portraits and it's not always about the money, it's about creating art and how it makes one feel after seeing the results.


Photo Website

Click to expand...

That is very true. Taking portraits or engaging in meaningful and satisfying photography - isn't all about the money.

Some like myself prefer to be entrepreneurs - - - have the freedom and flexibility and access to clients and work that we would be privy to based on that model - - - and have the option to work at something that we love while making our family income using photography as the means.

Others have no desire to do anything other than take photographs or portraits while having another way to sustain their livelihood. Based on similar experience and ability - one is not inherently better or more qualified as a photographer than the other - Correct?

No need to be depressed. No need to worry about working for free. Those are things that you can control and dictate. Feeling complete in the craft of photography, is about what satisfies you and those who like what you do.