The business of modern day (color nature) photography

[Bill_1856]

Fatali?

[mrladewig]

For the sake of this argument it does appear that placing an emphasis on "no manipulation" does help increase sales when it is marketed to the general public in the touristy types of places.

Mr Lik and Mr Fatali are two examples of fairly successful landscape photographers who have built their marketing around the notion that they don't use a computer or filter to manipulate the image. But their galleries are also built as a rather flashy sites and they contribute to the marketing of their images. For example the Peter Lik gallery in Key West, FL had private viewing rooms for the images.

But they have their dumb gimmicks too. For instance the Michael Fatali "Waiting for the light" stat. If you're not smart enough to look on the calendar to calculate when the full moon will occur... But at the same time, we all know that sometimes you often get blue skies or overcast but rarely get clearing storm.

But Van Camper is largely right. People are in general attracted to high saturation high contrast images. They have some mistrust of digital because its well known how easily digital images can be manipulated (paste in a different sky sort of stuff), but they don't know that this is rarely done (dispite Mr. Willards claims to the contrary). But they also don't care whether you used an Arca Swiss or a Canon DSLR. In general they want to know that the images will match the couch and that it is of high quality.

[Dave Wooten]

If one's business is that of making money selling landscape prints then it becomes a means to an end. It is quite accepted for wedding photographers to "enhance" the beauty of the bride and not always be totally documentary. If the photographer delivers what a satisfied customer wants and appreciates, who am I to judge anothers successful means to an end and or business practices.

[Drew Wiley]

I'd like to put my cards on the table. My philosophy of photog is to help people see
something I actually saw. It's about perception. The choice of film and printing technique all contribute to this, and there's no such thing as a totally realistic way to do this; but the first impression is nonetheless real. Otherwise I'd be a painter. Those
people who appreciate this will buy my prints, assuming they can afford them. But I'm not going to stoop to the level of a Kincade or Fatali just to make a buck on a sucker.
You'd have to pay me fifty grand to put a Kincade on the wall, and then I'd nail drywall over the color-blind abomination. But that's taste, not business. The fact is, what Kincade does is on the very borderline of legal fraud. Having someone in Mexico put a few dots of paint on a glorified poster is not an honest definition of a painting.
Fatali is a different case. He can print. But when he sandwiches two or three transparencies together and claims he actually witnessed the scene, it's dishonest.
Never mind his run-ins with Smokey the Bear. I have certain friends who make a decent living selling honey-soaked digital prints I personally dislike due to a lack of
sophistication, but I have no desire to take them to task for it. They're having fun and
doing what they enjoy to support themselves. But they're not lying about how they got there.

[Patrik Roseen]

From looking at the discussion here and also previous threads on related topics, it seems there are as many views as there are people in the discussion.

I have noticed that people use different words for nearly the same thing, but there seem to be subtle differences.

Is a photograph the same as an image?
Is an image the same as a print?
Is a photograph art?
Is an image documentary?
Is a print art?

So what is it we are producing and selling...and what are people buying?
Do people buy the same as we are producing?

Those who are successful sellers...is it because they produce what people want to buy or what people think they buy?

If all a buyer wants to have is an image over the couch...why bother selling them an unmanipulated photograph, or spending 14 days in the dessert capturing the scene on one filmsheet in the first place?
If a buyer wants to buy art...why explain in detail how it was created killing the magic?
If a buyer wants to buy a photograph...will a manipulated image be accepted?

.................................
To me a photograph means capturing a scene on one film sheet or digitally in one raw.

Most digital captures require some manipulations to get the colors right when presenting. I would still call this a photograph.

If something is added by sandwiching filmsheets, massive dodge and burn, or using digital tools the result would be an image. Depending on the amount of 'manipulation' it might get into the field of art.

Whether this image is art depends on the 'artist' or the judgement of the viewer.
.....

I have understood the question as talking about a 'photograph' - and if I was buying a photograph I would not accept something where manipulations were made either removing or adding to what the scene looked like in the camera.
If I was buying an image or even art...anything would be accepted.

[Drew Wiley]

If you want to make a lot of money quick open a McDonald's franchise, not a gourmet restaurant. Better yet, be a drug dealer. It wasn't that long ago that the FBI shut down a major gallery doing something only slightly more egregious than Kincade. In fact, there was a full-time FBI contingent assigned to just one town known for its tourist galleries, and they got several convictions. There are certain legal definitions of fraud where the act market is concerned. When you walk into one of those places
and see slick salespeople talking you into spending thousands of dollars for an "investment", when the artwork is worth less than the frame itself, that's not the kind of business model I care to follow. In some cases, I've seen wholesale price lists for certain items selling in the thousands, with the net cost actually under twenty
dollars! Taste is a different subject and no doubt far too complicated to apply a blanket rule to. Sometimes I get a literal visceral feeling of nausea from viewing photos
or paintings. I've spent my whole life basking in the light of an outdoor world so beautiful that I simply want to share some tiny piece of it. Why would anyone want to
fabricate an imaginary substitute? Could it be that in this age of digital golf and electronic tiddlywinks, people just haven't bothered to actually see?

[Bill_1856]

Clyde Butcher's hominy about selling color landscapes (which he did very successfully before going full-time B&W) was that they weren't purchased for the image, but how it would match O.T.C. (Over The Couch).

[Bruce Watson]

If you want to make a lot of money quick open a McDonald's franchise...

I think you got that backwards. If you want to make a lot of money, be smart like McDonald's and start selling franchises. Or better yet, be McDonald's lawyer. The franchisee always gets the short end of the stick, and usually it's extremely short indeed.

[Marko]

I've spent my whole life basking in the light of an outdoor world so beautiful that I simply want to share some tiny piece of it. Why would anyone want to
fabricate an imaginary substitute? Could it be that in this age of digital golf and electronic tiddlywinks, people just haven't bothered to actually see?

Not that I totally disagree with the nausea part, although I have a pretty good idea where I could be stricken by it so I tend to avoid those places to begin with.

But as for why would anybody want to "fabricate imaginary substitute" - isn't it exactly what you are doing when you "want to share some tiny piece of it"? Only in a way that conforms to your own vision.

If you really want to share the experience of the beautiful outdoor world, you should open a country inn or something along those lines and let the people see the real thing.

[Drew Wiley]

I was a painter before I learned photography, know the difference, and appreciate both for different reasons. I own a set of watercolors better than anything you can buy anywhere, period. All handground from rare pigments all over the world. I grew up
close to a famous painter. Marketing is a different subject. I certainly have my share
of smart ass MBA's to deal with - they come from the day labor line at Starbucks and usually end up there again six months later. Don't need their help. If I get hungry I can
always go back to architectural or commericial photography - would much rather do that than prostitute my landscape work to the lowest common denominator of taste.