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SEEKING CALM IN THE EYE OF THE STORM
By Greg Smith
Independent Photographer and Storyteller
Bluffton, S.C.
It's hurricane season in the South.
Tropical Storm Allison was easy on us here in Bluffton and Tropical Depression 2 never quite developed. But the experts (granted, they're in Colorado, not hurricane country) have boosted their estimates of the number and severity of this year's storms.
As a waterfront homeowner, I need to be on guard. And as a photojournalist who has covered some half-dozen major storms, I ought to be ready. As far as my eye and equipment, I am. The only problem is, whom would I make the pictures for?
The New York Times, for which I've worked in the past, has lost the Tasini case pressed by independent contributors in the Supreme Court, then responded to the plaintiffs with more threats and intimidating tactics. As I write this, some dozen professional and labor organizations have just completed a protest rally in front of the Times' offices on 43rd Street. My March letter (see the Digital Journalist April edition --http://www.digitaljournalist.org/issue0104/smith.htm), which took publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. to task for claiming the Times "fully compensates" its independent contributors, certainly didn't boost the paper's interest in hiring me.
Furthermore, I have just received from the Times the single worst contributors contract I have ever seen. It demands all copyright to work I might produce and ever have produced for their publication, guarantees me only a 25 percent kill fee for assigned work, insists that I indemnify one of the largest media companies in the world against all complaints concerning my work (making no exceptions for objectionable material created during the editing process), insists that I not allow any conflicts of interest or appearance thereof, then wraps all this up with a final paragraph that prevents me from rescinding the rights-grab and indemnification portions of the "agreement." It does NOT mention any increase in the ridiculously low rates the Times pays contributors. And I won't sign it. You shouldn't either.
TIME (now TIME-Warner/AOL) has stalled us for years over amending their low rates and rights grabs. Several key contractors have quit over changes in their contracts. Newsweek just lowered its rates, while asking for more rights. Many famous contributors to that magazine have declined recent assignments. Working as a stringer for The Washington Post requires signing a bad contract, while collecting only $175/day. The wire services are worse.
Nevertheless, major storms seem to attract more major media every year. And every storm I cover, I see more yahoos taking unreasonable risks to make pictures. I've found myself a few times taking similar risks in order to compete. And for what? A byline, expense coverage (so long as I produce receipts) and enough pay to take the bride out to dinner -- assuming I don't have to pay for damage to my car, my person or my gear. Not too many years ago, our clients would cover such risks and pay space rates that exceeded our assignment fees. Now they give us contracts that indemnify them against such losses as well as any consequences our reporting might have. Space rates, when they're paid, are stuck in the dark ages (especially compared to the target prices of the EP Estimator -- http://www.editorialphoto.com/contracts/estimator.html.
I can't work, let alone risk my life and gear, under these conditions. And I can't believe anyone trying to actually pay his or her way in life (let alone prosper) can either. Yet the media moguls insist we lose money in order for them to continue racking up double-digit profits. We are asked to invest in their future, while we starve or live off others in our present. They insist on acquiring the rights to our images, yet they're unwilling to compensate us additionally for the value that we hoped would give us a chance some day to retire.
Such are the concerns that draw me from making pictures to fighting for the chance to make a living in our business. I write columns like this, read and post to several e-mail lists each day, volunteer on the state board of the ASMP, help host local photographers' meetings, teach business practices along with photography to my workshop students, spend inordinate amounts of time on paperwork for each assignment and obsess over contract language.
Occasionally I still
make pictures.
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And the same issues lead me to make portraits and document weddings. For much of this summer, that's what has absorbed my time. I've photographed several weddings, delivered large orders from others and tried to cope with the family portraits on the beach that are popular during vacation time on nearby Hilton Head Island. I spend my time sorting proofs, stuffing albums, producing estimates, dealing with photo labs, compiling bills, selling and making prints in the darkroom. It's commerce, but it's not journalism. I'm a run-and-gun player in a game of stall ball. |
I also spent a week in June teaching black-and-white photography to 7- 12-year-olds at Charleston's Gibbes Museum Studio. We looked at slides of my work, learning how I approach light, composition and timing. We wandered downtown Charleston, taking turns making pictures with my cameras. And after Ritz Camera processed our film, we spent two exciting days (four classes of up to 15 kids each day) printing in the darkroom. This week I'm teaching a two-day workshop (lesson and gallery walk Monday, followed by an assignment to document the community, with a critique on Thursday) for adults and children at the arts center on nearby Hilton Head Island. Such workshops are exciting. They're fulfilling. They're exhausting. But even though I'm more expensive than most visual artists in residence (for K-12 schools and similar summer programs), it still doesn't pay enough to ensure a profit for my business.
However, I don't want to just whine about what's happening in my world. Almost like the clear skies in the eye of a hurricane, a certain amount of calm surrounds me here on the three wooded, waterfront acres I call "The Last Resort." Life ain't too bad.
During my six years as a full-time, independent photographer, I haven't lost money or amassed any long-term debt. I've collected some very cool images and stories. I've had great experiences and learned some great lessons. I've generated some net income (although nowhere near a "living"); I've made sophisticated computers and cameras (and their results) available to my family; my business pays for one vehicle; and my children have part-time work with me whenever they want it. I live a full and flexible life with my family here on the river.
| A few mornings back, when friends called on a cell phone from the river to ask if I could go kayaking, I was able to join them for a couple of hours of wandering the marsh at low tide -- when the birds are busiest fishing. I do this often, and I spent dozens of hours this past winter feeding clouds of hungry sand gnats while documenting our bald eagles, who raised twin eaglets this year. I photograph wood storks, egrets, herons, ospreys, cormorants, small shore birds, dolphins, work and play on the river. I continue a 20-year black-and-white documentary project on this rapidly changing and special South Carolina Lowcountry where I live. For the past three years, I've helped a Daufuskie Island native write a cookbook and reminiscence. And I'm here for my children, two of whom start college in August (I'll write about that next month). |
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So far this year, I've gained three new major magazine (2 million-plus circulation) clients. One has quickly given me two assignments, signed my contracts, paid extra for post-production work and generally treated me like a professional. Another has also treated my work and me fairly, and even though editors there don't sign my contracts, they don't reject them and they adhere to my terms. The third has been sloppier, slow to pay and return originals, but when they dropped my credit lines by mistake, they quickly agreed to double my fees. Our negotiations were cordial, professional.
As I look to my 44th birthday, my knees and back aren't as supple as they once were. But they remain strong. I might just need my first glasses soon. But my vision is better than ever.
I have important stories to tell. My skills for telling them are the best they have ever been. I love most of my work.
We're supposedly living in the most media-rich society man could imagine. But outlets that will pay for real journalism are rare and endangered. Those that pay full freight for important stories seem to have disappeared. Heck, photographers are even suing (and winning judgments against) the great, yellow Geographic, which now publishes vignettes more often than full-blown stories.
The expensive court battles and predatory contracts make it clear the media giants perceive value in our work. But they also see we love what we do. And some among us are blinded by that love. They ignore good business practices and effectively subsidize our clients. Big media companies take advantage of this. Many of the bottom-price-feeding photographers are staffers for newspapers and other businesses. Some have a spouse (as I do) or a trust fund to pay their bills. But all who sell their work for less than it costs to produce hurt themselves and the rest of us who are trying to make a living in this business.
And I submit to you, dear reader, that by damaging the viability of being a professional photojournalist, they threaten the future of democracy. Look back through the Pulitzer-winning images (http://www.newseum.org/pulitzer/). See how many pictures changed the course of public opinion and history. See how photojournalism has prompted society to right wrongs and fight important battles. And imagine if those pictures were never made, because the photographers couldn't afford to make them.
As Albert the Alligator exclaimed in Walt Kelly's "Pogo" comic strip several decades back: "We have met the enemy and he is us!"
I've learned tough lessons over the past few years about the real costs of operating as an independent photographer. And I've seen dozens of other photographers have their eyes opened to economic realities. It's both a wonderful and a terrible thing to experience. But understanding your real costs and fighting to collect them, plus some profit, is essential to survival -- of both you and our profession.
I nearly always surprise folks when I explain to them that $400/day (more than most newspapers pay and the average figure for many very large magazines) is a money-losing fee for my services. Assuming I could shoot 100 days in a year -- and given my lack of assistance, the many other tasks I must do to stay in business and my remote location, I don't think that's possible -- I would only gross $40,000 at that rate. It's a rare business that can turn more than 30-40 percent of its gross into profits. And the overhead costs of cameras, computers and cars (not to mention office space, insurance, telephone bills and license fees) are particularly high for photographers. Folks, $13,000-$17,000/year isn't a living in 2001.
A decade or so back, if you could generate that much income (adjusted for inflation) from editorial assignments, then you might still get by on the additional fees from selling stock photography rights to your images. But with contracts stealing our rights and a consolidating stock photography industry that has actually lowered fees paid for image uses -- especially images remarketed from assignments -- the equation no longer balances. We must get paid more and must retain our rights in hopes of our marketing opportunities improving.
Please, if you make pictures for anybody, anytime, for any pay, learn this stuff. Go to Editorial Photographers (http://www.editorialphoto.com). Get yourself a graduate-school-level education in our business by joining the EP e-mail list at that site. Check out studio management software, such as fotoBiz (http://www.fotobiz.com). Learn your rights and how to protect them at the U.S. Copyright office (http://lcweb.loc.gov/copyright/). Join professional organizations, such as Advertising Photographers of America (APA, http://apanational.org/) or the American Society of Media Photographers http://www.asmp.org) that are fighting for our rights and educating photographers. Pressure other professional organizations, such as SPJ/SDX and NPPA, to take action on these matters.
And by all means approach this profession with your heart, your head and...
Courage,
Greg Smith
