How do these fauxs get so much business?!?!

[Ouchmyeyes]

There are a few fauxs in my area that seem to constantly have a ton of business.. I don’t know what they are charging, but I know their photos are crap. I guess it’s a possibility that they are barly making ends meet in order to have the steady stream of faux loving clients, but come on! Are people really not interested in getting better photos than they can take themselves with their point and shoots?

https://www.facebook.com/#!/ffphotography12

 https://www.facebook.com/#!/photosbytina

[EyeDocPhotog]

I asked myself the same question here in NYC.

The short answer for me was to check FB and look at the faux’s clients’ comments. That’s what some folks want because there’s so much FAUX out there, that’s all many people know.

[EyeDocPhotog]

AND I will add that neither a potential client who wants quality work nor the photographer he / she would hire have their main focus (or advertising) on social media sites. The pro might have a web presence there (just about everyone has to I guess), but I think they know their prospective clients are not looking for ‘deals’ on FB or Tumblr.

[anonymoususer]

as a customer myself I would have to say there is a lot of shitty work out there being considered good because facebook is running rampant with that so people may look at a photo and think it looks good because 10 other fauxgraphers have just about the same image on their page. I am having the problem of finding a photographer right now who doesn’t do the stupid vignette shit and also doesn’t use sepia and black and white to try and distract from a shitty image. I think the worse part is when they take pictures that I could get the same result with my cell phone and a stupid filter app. Heck I even had one fauxtographer tell me when I asked what kind of camera they use that she was using her iphone 5. really people? I am willing to pay the price for good quality but seriously $150 for iphone images come on now. end of short rant lol

[Trainwreck]

I’m just curious anonymous user?

As a buyer you are in a unique position on a forum of pho/fauxtographers.

Are you at liberty or have the desire to say what you do, what kind of photography you require (portrait, product, wedding, etc.) what you look for, whether you work with photographers directly and on site creatively. And if so what qualities do you look for in a photographer and their photography. Your typical end use. What you require in a contract as far as licensing, etc. And maybe even some success/failure annecdotes?

Just a theory. If you would rather not say anonymous user it would be perfectly understandable. But it would certainly give a unique perspective from the other end of the spectrum that is rare to have sometimes.

[EyeDocPhotog]

My feeling is a person whose writing skills are limited to grammar replete with profanity may in fact not see the difference.

[Trainwreck]

Good point Doc.

Guess it does’t hurt to ask though.  I would love to hear a buyer’s POV here.

 

[cameraclicker]

A year ago, give or take, there was a photo of a young couple that appeared on a thread here.  The couple was by a tree and a dead branch with no bark was between them and the camera.  On camera flash was used and the bare branch was the brightest thing in the photo.  I took the branch out and reposted the photo with the lighting fixed.  Someone claiming to be the customer was very upset!  They seemed to be primarily concerned with supporting a local photographer, and did not care about image quality at all.  They were quite angry that we were disparaging their photographer’s work.  Unfortunately, the rest of what we saw from their photographer was of similar quality.

Privacy laws have changed over the years, so I don’t know if the practice continues.  A scandal was reported in this morning’s paper, a couple of hospital people were selling names and phone numbers to a registered education fund company.  When our first child was born we had visits from a nurse, Welcome Wagon, and  some photographer who took a few photos and returned a week or two later with a couple of prints.  He was surprised I didn’t want his photos.  He wanted to know:  “Don’t you want professionally done photos of your child?”  When our second child was born, we were left alone with family.

I suspect there must be lots of customers that simply accept a “professionally” taken photo is a good photo.  The Emperor’s new cloths, …

[EyeDocPhotog]

“Don’t you want professionally done photos of your child?”

My reply, as I’m sure was yours as well, would be “Yes.”

It is interesting how this phenomenon – in the Hans Christian Anderson story – of public compliance (or just simple comparison to one’s neighbors’ views as a benchmark for their own social caste) is indelibly etched in many layman’s eyes with the same force which propels its absence from a professional’s.

[Yikes2013]

In my area the trend continues to be to give business to the fauxs because they are the “local gal” trying to “make it” (apparently it is not quality photography) whereas I am simply an outsider who has lived and worked in the community for 10 years. They will continually give the “local gal” the business because she was born and raised here while I am “one of THOSE people”. My clientele comes from up to four hours away, so I must be doing something right, but the locals will not see it. I need to get out of here!

[Dinkydonkeydo]

I’ve started noticing this in my area, I’ve just started to really think about doing photography as more than just a hobby. I could be classed as a fauxtographer I guess, but the difference is that I KNOW that I’m not good/confident enough to take wedding photos or something similar, as I just couldn’t handle the pressure of potentially cocking up and ruining everything. Granted, I do actually work for a professional wedding photographer as his assistant (I hold flashes and carry his bag around basically, but it’s good fun) and he does actually let me just take photos with whatever camera he’s not using at the time to take detail photos of the tables, and photobooth photos, and he’s said he wants me to do ‘snap and grab’ (?) photos of people on the dancefloor that just want cheesy group photos like you get in clubs, so I can’t be too bad! But what gets me is the local photographers that photograph horse shows/events that are rubbish!

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Fotofabulous-equestrian-photography/200281763344929?sk=timeline

For example this is one of them. This is their facebook page, and the first pictures I stumble across are blurry. I then notice they have a website:

http://www.fotofabulous-equestrian-photography.co.uk/

‘Oooo’ I think, as they look like they have better quality photos judging by the homepage photos. But then I look into their gallery and it’s the same old rubbish. To me it looks as though they’ve stolen some decent photos off the internet somewhere to use on their website to make them look better. I do photography and my boyfriend is a website designer, and it even had us fooled that they were good, until we looked at the gallery. False advertising. I have not found any of these photos in any of the albums. None of them even come close to looking like that!

And there are many more like them, but this is the most irritating, They do weddings as well! God help us all.

Rant over, it feels good to get that off my chest. xD

[fstopper89]

The funny thing is, (taking into consideration the several fauxtographers in my community charging $40 or less), is that they get so much business, don’t even try to take decent photos (Hello, midday bright harsh sun), don’t consult with clients on what to wear or how to prepare for their session (cartoon characters on the kids’ shirts, hot pink and black striped dress, etc.) and they don’t do any real editing (Just crap on picmonkey or something similar that look more like Instagram filters), that they really do end up making quite a bit of cash. Let’s say this woman in town who does $20 mini sessions has 5 clients a week. She gets $100 and is able to throw 20 poor-quality photos onto a disk, but it doesn’t really take that much time out of her day. I, on the other hand, could get one client every two weeks (I have a full-time job besides, so my photography business is a side venture but I care very much about my work), and make just about the same amount of money in one month as this woman makes, however I am working ten times as hard/long as she is when you include preparation, consultations, correspondence, location scouting, the actual session, culling, editing, delivering, etc. So, fauxtographer over here is making the big bucks with very little effort. I joke that I should just put my camera on JPG/auto, charge $20, throw 50 some unedited blah photos on a disk, all shot in the same locations, and call it done. I’d be rich!

[AndreCosto]

This is related to the thread on the value of a good photograph/photographer. The value of a good or service has nothing to do with it’s cost of production, or how much skill or difficulty is involved. There are plenty of things that are very expensive to produce, require tons of skill and effort, but that no one is willing to buy.

The value of something has to do with how much people are willing to pay for it. If customers don’t see the difference between what the fauxtog does and what you do, or if they don’t think they need what you provide in addition to the fauxtog, or if they are simply unwilling to pay what you charge for what you provide, the fauxtog will do better than you. It is that simple. No one cares how difficult it is, how costly, or how much skill is required to do what you do. They care about whether they want to pay what you charge for the result. Find the people willing to pay what you need to charge to make a living. Or make another living. Simple, harsh, true.

[EyeDocPhotog]

@browneyedgirl89,

I joke that I should just put my camera on JPG/auto, charge $20, throw 50 some unedited blah photos on a disk, all shot in the same locations, and call it done. I’d be rich!

You might, but my feeling is that you enjoy the art of creating fine photographs more than you need the extra money that would come from appealing to masses with poor images.

 

[cameraclicker]

The value of something has to do with how much people are willing to pay for it.

Really, the perceived value has to do with how much people are willing to pay.  And the class of goods/services affects payment too.

The value of a car is that it carries you, and your stuff, from point A to point B.  A taxi can do that too.  So can a bus, or train.  Judging by our highways, lots of people prefer their own car since it will be there when they want it, and it will go where they want it to go.  But a low priced Chevy or Ford will fill that need.  Why are there so many BMW, Audi, Mercedes and Rolls Royces on the road?  Perceived value.  Both ride quality and “surpassing the Jones”.  Diamonds are an even more extreme example.  What is the real value of a diamond.  It reflects a little light and looks pretty.  Except industrial diamonds used as extremely hard bits for drills, most diamonds have no real value, they are just rocks.  The advertising industry has created perceived value out of thin air, and a movie or two.

 

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