Something different for the first post with Robin: a transcribed discussion between us about the realities of ‘going pro’ in the current market environment. I think it’s pretty clear that the last ten years have been rather turbulent times for the industry, both for service providers/ creatives and the hardware manufacturers; consolidation has been the underlying theme but also a drop in barriers to entry and a real extension of possibilities at the high end – but only in very rarefied air. It’s become harder than ever, I think, and I’d definitely have liked to have the benefit of experience of somebody who managed to make the shift stick in recent times and who understood the climate; Robin and I have decided to publish this conversation in the hopes that others in the audience might find it useful too. Think of it as sitting in on a conversation rather than a traditional article in the in the usual style of the site.
Advance warning: this may be a lengthy post. MT&RW
MT: Okay, I’ll start with an intro – going solo is probably one of the biggest jumps anybody can make in a professional photography career; if done properly there’s no turning back. The safety net of employment is gone but the freedom to do what you want is enormous – and perhaps daunting. There are all sorts of things beyond shooting to figure out from marketing to how much to charge to client management and how to handle scope creep or random equipment failures. There are days of absolute masochism when you wonder why on earth you put yourself through the torture of hauling 50kg of gear up a muddy hill in the dark at 2.30am, days when you despair at the empty pipeline, but also days where you can’t imagine how life could get any better because you’re being paid to hang out of a helicopter. So: over to you. What concerns/ questions/ curiosities do you have that I can hopefully help you with?
RW: The biggest concern moving away from a stable employment is not having the security of knowing that steady flow of cash is definitely coming in at the end of every month. Turning professional photographer means having the challenge to constantly seeking assignment and finding new opportunities to make money. There is always that uncertainty of clients backing out, or deals not coming through. I guess I am not exactly starting with completely zero ground, I was involved quite deeply in the industry during my time with Olympus. I think the biggest hurdle is to effectively strategize and work out a sustainable plan.
MT: That’s completely understandable. The reality is I personally didn’t make the jump until I had a few jobs lined up; whilst that at least made the first couple of months non-zero, I’ll be the first to admit that it wasn’t good. The reality is that most material work tends to be planned anywhere from one to six months in advance, and some clients may not pay for a month or two after that – which means your cashflow cycle should really be six months to a year once everything is stable. It’s worth taking smaller filler jobs in the meantime to keep yourself afloat, but if there are bigger jobs possible then you may still want to leave yourself some breathing room. And don’t forget the first rule of any business: cashflow is king, not paper profits. I only have one rule: so long as there’s more at the end of the month than the beginning – $1 or $10,000 – that’s fine.
RW: That was a very important rule that you have shared and I will always remember, having more money at the end of the month than the beginning, which really makes sense, to make sure that things keep going.
So looking at my strengths and skills, I can do public presentations, speaking about photography and also conduct workshops/photowalks/photo-sharing sessions. The first, and possibly quickest way for me to make the transition to professional photographer (while building up client base) is to conduct workshops/classes for end consumers. Now that I am not with Olympus, I can do so for other brands as well, broadening possibilities. Small filler jobs, are not difficult to come by. I have been shooting graduation portraits, family photographs, birthday parties, and even weddings, typical photography jobs that are not too challenging just to get the cash flowing in. It takes time to build a brand, and I seriously need to look into that now that I am going full time, and the next priority (actually I am working on this concurrently) would be personal branding. So my next question, obviously – is how much time, effort and what can you share about your branding as “Ming Thein”? It worked so well, and the whole online community knows it!
MT: It’s a good question, and good that you’ve got a transitional strategy to give you some base income to cover the dailies. (Hint: for those of you in the region, Robin will of course be giving more workshops soon, which will of course be advertised here…) I can understand also the slight ‘fear’ that you *must* take all the jobs that come your way because you don’t know what’s next; this fear is something that will honestly never go away, regardless of how established you are. I still have the same concerns every month, and inevitably I land up exhausted because I have trouble saying no. When it rains it only pours, and all that.
Linking what you do to your brand makes a lot of sense, because in essence it’s what people – both audience and potential customers – see first. I would hardly claim to be an expert at brand building – many people say I’m too diverse to be an expert at anything – but this is also deliberate; what I show to clients in my *professional* portfolio isn’t necessarily the same as what I present on the site. The site gives me a bit more latitude to present the work I *want* to do, not the work I *have* done. There’s a subtle but critical difference here: you will probably get hired to do the kind of work you have visible; you therefore need to make sure that work is representative of what you want to do, and how you see as a photographer.
It of course helps if you have a distinctive style and limited subject matter (though this is really not practical in the current market; diversity is survival). It helps if you’ve got visibility, but in a good way – when you’re trying to build a reputation, it may be necessary to trade off visibility and profile of work against absolute pay. This is not to say you work for free, of course – if you don’t value your own work, then nobody else will; which leads to this: always charge what you would like to get.
RW: You are on point about showing the work with the distinctive style that I want my clients to look for in me, and also having a site that experiments and have flexibility to explore more possibilities beyond that. I think writing about photography is a powerful part of branding itself, and a strong sense of curation helps to lead and sway the opinion of the readers into seeing you in what you are capable of. And yes, I remember you lamenting me about dozens of emails you receive and the crazy amount of time replying them! I tyically spend about an hour a day replying comments and emails (surely not as heavy as yours). I think I need to work on “showing the work that is representative of what I want to do” because my current portfolio is just a mixture of all my work that I have done with no clear sense of purpose and direction of where I want to go. Portfolio plays a vital role in branding and that should set my work apart from what is being shown in the main photography site.
[Editor’s note: Only an hour? Pah! Be sure to leave plenty of comments on Robin’s posts 😉 ]
MT: You definitely need to shoot and experiment a lot to know what that distinctive style is, though – and I think that changes quite a lot depending on where you are in your career, what, how and who you’re shooting for. For instance, I never thought I’d land up doing as much industrial documentary as I do, but I found I enjoyed it and what I think of as a very ‘natural’ style developed from there.
RW: Speaking about spending time to shoot, writing on your site, replying comments, emails, maintaining multiple social media platforms, working officially for Hasselblad, and you are a family man! You must have had some mad time management skills! I am afraid my time management itself needs a lot of work (being honest here). How do you achieve work-life balance? I understand that doing what we love doing (photography) full time is probably less daunting than a general 8 to 5 desk job, but still how do you juggle them all, so perfectly?
MT: The reality is that from day one it was much harder work than any desk job I’ve had, and 8-5s were considered a luxury in private equity or consulting – 8-midnight is more the norm. Though I spend less continuous hours ‘in the office’ these days, it’s probably more as you’re always working and thinking and strategising from the moment you get up to the moment you go to sleep. And there’s not much sleep and lots of coffee involved…at some point, I’m sure I’ll be forced to make more choices; I already have been. I’ve cut teaching entirely this year to spend more time physically at home. Even if the total number of hours worked remains the same because of my role at Hasselblad, at least most of the time I can physically be here and stepping out of the study for five or ten minutes through the day to spend with my daughter is quite possible.
It’s still far from perfect: there are things I do have to put off or land up forgetting to do, and I’m sure my family still thinks I’m too absent. But I also believe that if you really want to do something, you’ll make or find the time.
RW: That was one of my fears as well, that now I am self-employed, I will be rolling out of control when I have so much to take care of. however, I think you are sending a very important message here, getting priorities right, which is often not easy to accomplish. This will be something that I will have to figure out on the go, and make necessasary adjustments, and sacrifices if needed.
Getting into practical stuff now: one of the things, which I am in need of learning is relationship management. This would be an area that I believe is extremely important for photographers, managing relationship with clients, suppliers, and different parties. Coming from a company, it was pretty much straightforward: we provide the products and we expect people to do things for us. now things are different so would be nice to know how it is from the side of a professional photographer.
MT: It’s a very fine line between anticipating your client’s needs and just appearing desperate. I find that the best approach is to explain that photography is about communication (if they don’t know it already) – and then try to understand what it is they want to communicate, and to whom. We are visual problem solvers. Our role then becomes the translation of idea to something that uses universal human visual language to express this so that the intended audience sees it, too – e.g. in a simplistic way, grading color warm for a more welcoming feel, or cool for something scientific and sterile. Of course the explanation of this process needs to be moderated depending on the audience.
MT: The Hasselblads are insured, but my Nikons aren’t. I’ve always also believed in pricing the job commensurate to the gear being used – there’s no point charging RM500 for using RM20,000 worth of gear; that’s less than rental; let alone the expertise and time of the photographer etc. There are specialised insurance companies that cover this gear overseas, but only one in Malaysia who does, and the premiums are really exorbitant – that may or may not make sense for you. If you take care of your stuff at the location and don’t do silly things like leaving open bags lying around, you should generally be fine though.
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Ming Thein | Photographer 
a late congratulations on teaming up with robin wong , there are three wed sites i look at for inspiration 1 luminous landscape 2 ming thein 3 diglloyd, its great to see your wed site expand . I think your blog and your output here is one such example… despite the market trend of photography being downward, you’ve been making progress both artistically and career-wise…
To be frank, it’s been years and I’ve not been able to find anything even close the quality of your blog on the Internet.
a late congratulations on teaming up with robin wong , there are three wed sites i look at for inspiration 1 luminous landscape 2 ming thein 3 diglloyd, its great to see your wed site expand . I think your blog and your output here is one such example… despite the market trend of photography being downward, you’ve been making progress both artistically and career-wise…
To be frank, it’s been years and I’ve not been able to find anything even close the quality of your blog on the Internet.
Thanks!
Strange question, but when you and Robin communicate, is it normally in English or Cantonese/Chinese?
How is English used in Malaysia? It is fine for a Chinese to speak to an Indian or Malay in English?
Us? English. Generally you’ll get a sense of the fluency of the other person; if in doubt, Malay is the common denominator.
a late congratulations on teaming up with robin wong , there are three wed sites i look at for inspiration 1 luminous landscape 2 ming thein 3 diglloyd, its great to see your wed site expand . ” I feel like he is wrongly right, sometimes I hit the shutter just to perform the mental act of calculation which precedes a shot, even if it’s just to confirm what I’ve captured is crap.
Thanks!
Hi, Ming. I’ve been a lurker around here for a few years and I must say, at times the mood of this blog feels darker than before. Sometimes I feel the older content have a more optimistic tone between the lines. Here’s an excerpt from one of your earliest posts:
“Doesn’t having more people interested in photography make it harder to be successful?
Having lots of people interested in photography isn’t a bad thing – yes, there’s more noise out there, but it also means there’s more awareness and new/ different opportunities. May the best man win – more true than ever.”
From “Meet your photographer: A virtual interview” (https://blog.mingthein.com/2012/02/13/mt-interview1/)
Similar things are happening in other creative fields: graphics design, film making, etc. There’s a massive proliferation of content, but there’s also a tremendous growth in content consumption. Things become more forgettable as a consequence, but it only made the outstanding much more impressive. Think about recent US TV hits like “Westworld” or “House of Cards”: Neither is big budgeted or established franchises, but both achieved phenomenal success nonetheless. It is indeed harder to distinguish oneself, but one can still do so nonetheless. I think your blog and your output here is one such example… despite the market trend of photography being downward, you’ve been making progress both artistically and career-wise…
To be frank, it’s been years and I’ve not been able to find anything even close the quality of your blog on the Internet. Maybe there are equally talented photographers out there shooting in the field, but they clearly failed to reach to the masses through the Internet. And despite the Internet created the “too many images” problem, it also enabled individuals to touch millions with just a few keystrokes.
Interestingly… finding one’s niche are becoming even more relevant now. In an age of globalization, individualism becomes a rarity. Local business, boutiques, analog photography etc. Even Leica was sprung back to life these days. Interesting days ahead. And I look forward to keep reading a more diverse but still high quality blog.mingthein.com in the future.
: )
If it feels darker, that’s because it is – call it experience, jadedness or just a general averaging down, but it’s even harder now than before to keep the pipeline full. As for reaching a bigger audience: yes, but that same audience is getting saturated very, very quickly – and it’s almost impossible to differentiate between the options without investing the time to understand them, which becomes impossible due to the number of options and so forth…
We try, but it’s increasingly seeming that of late it’s a lot more effort to accomplish less and impact fewer.
I’m cheering for Robin already. Although I prefer to remain an amateur (in the meaning of the word “one who loves something”) since I like my job and have no interest in weddings and other revenue fillers, I appreciate what it takes to be a pro (my mom was a pro for many years).
Being a pro, I have to say that being a skilled amateur is the best place to be – *you* are the client…
I’d agree, with the caveat that every once in a while it could be a good thing that an assignment could force you to learn something new or up your game because of the content or expected product. It takes a lot of discipline to do that on your own with no external pressure.
I’d add a bit more to that: you need to shoot what you want to be hired for before you get hired to do it, except in very few circumstances (where you might have enough similar work or experience to convince the client you can pull it off – you’ll see something from me in that vein for Koenigsegg in the coming months.)
An interesting perspective; it might require you to imagine assignments that don’t currently exist in order to be prepared to execute them. Is that how you came up with your ultra print?
Ultraprint: No, that was just because I could see the limitations of the printing medium – i.e. you see the print and sometimes it distracts from the idea conveyed in the image. A bit like not having enough vocabulary to adequately describe something even though you can see it clearly in your mind.
Imagining assignments is something else – probably more like directing or screenwriting…
Best wishes to both of you in your new partnership! In light of Robin’s transition from employee to self-employed you have posed the topic here as how to survive in the marketplace. A further question I would ask Ming is, with so much of the attention of a professional photog necessarily focusing on money-business, relationships, marketing, managing expectations, etc. as you have described above, how do you sustain the joy of pressing the shutter and capturing light and shadow? What to do when the muse takes a vacation and you find photography itself has become a grind? Has that happened and how did you recover the magic?
Happens more often than you’d expect. The only solution is to keep shooting til it comes back or goes away entirely…
Interesting. I’ve just taken a tactical pause in shooting and purchased some books including the second edition of Bruce Barnbaum’s “The Art of Photography” and he is not of that opinion. “Some photographers advocate shooting something, anything, just to keep you moving under those circumstances. That’s pure nonsense. Why waste time on useless junk when you know in advance that it’s useless junk? Snapping the shutter or pressing the cable release is not an athletic act, so I don’t have to warm up doing it, and you shouldn’t either.” I feel like he is wrongly right, sometimes I hit the shutter just to perform the mental act of calculation which precedes a shot, even if it’s just to confirm what I’ve captured is crap.
This is a tough one to call. I think up to a point one has to keep shooting anything, but once you are sure what the outcome is – i.e. you have enough experience – making crap you know is crap can just be demotivating.
a late congratulations on teaming up with robin wong , there are three wed sites i look at for inspiration 1 luminous landscape 2 ming thein 3 diglloyd, its great to see your wed site expand . i feel your web site will be the #1 for all types of photographers .
Thanks!
I left my job and jumped into professional photography.
Started working from Home (saved all office expenses and invest that expenditure into my photography equipment) Every day and every minute, I worked as an employee for my own company and following discipline. I never thought that I left my job and always believe that Now I have BIG Target to achieve, Lots of new skies to touch, Whatever I earned I invest into my company, Started from DX camera and now I am having FX camera with 5-6 Important lenses other accessories. Now my company name and Logo is patent and having good clientale.
The most Important, I am enjoying as a professional photographer and every company is my client and lot of jobs to shoot.
Happy Photography to you all.
http://www.prasenjeetgautam.com
As someone making the move to freelance photographer in 2017, I can say that I never set out to be a professional photographer. Only after I started to get clients for website design did the demand for intimate business images become the norm. Why pay for generic stock photos when you can hire a photographer to get images of your team. This is also an easy pitch this to your client if you happen to be in the business of website design. A big part of my budding client base is my business acumen, being able to explain the value of good photography in the digital age is the real talent. With the age of automation just around the corner, I believe we will see a lot of photographers and studios make a shift to a full spectrum of advertizing services just to keep clients. Software like workify.co will be a driving force behind this. If there is a task you can’t take on as a photographer, your client is very likely to find another agency that offers photography as well as the service you could not provide.
Both ways – complimentary services for photographers to expand, and for other general purpose creatives to offer photography. I actually think the main motivation is to keep overall revenue sufficient and/or expand client base – otherwise the whole business gets increasingly untenable especially with the price pressure at the lower end of the market…