Working for free

Working for free. It’s a subject with no shortage of blog entries, magazine articles and pub conversations in its honour.

And if you’ve taken part in any of them you’ll know that the consensus is clear: for the sake of the industry, for the sake of your fellow photographer, for the sake of yourself, they say, don’t do it.

Well I have to disagree.

Now you’re not about to read an argument in support of old gems like “do this one for free and there’ll be well paid assignments to follow,” or “it’ll be good for your portfolio”. Not for a minute.

But there are times when remuneration, if not monetary, is remuneration still.

Countless photographers will tell you they don’t win the kind of commissions they want just by showing the work they’ve been hired to shoot in the past. In other words, portfolios should contain the type of work you want to attract as much as the work you’ve been hired to shoot before. Show the client what you can do, not just what you have done, is the point.

But to self-fund this work, with models, hair, makeup, and any other moving parts can be a costly proposition.

Well, for every photographer in that boat there’s a budding model, makeup artists, stylist or fashion designer wanting to promote their work or build a portfolio. And each is an opportunity to collaborate, with everyone walking away with the product they want, at greatly reduced or even no cost to you.

There’s nothing wrong with shooting for, say, a fashion startup for no fee if you’re getting something else of value in return. That day’s shoot might net you a portfolio picture to reflect the kind of work you want to be hired for in the future. And you might add other strings to your bow like beauty or hair or high-end motor vehicle photography in the same way, and all minus the overheads.

But remember this: if it’s going to work for you, it must be on your terms. You need creative control from woe to go. You get to conceptualise it, you get to shoot it, and they get to foot the expense. That has to be the deal.

The fledgling fashion designer in this case must accept all this in return for not getting your bill at the end, else they should just hire you and pay your full fee instead.

Find like minded people to collaborate with and this can be a major win-win, and a website like Model Mayhem, with more than six-hundred thousand of them to choose from, is a pretty good place to start.