How to become a professional photographer

1, know your equipment. Many people misunderstand that professional photographers must have professional equipment or various lenses. It doesn't matter if the camera is good, but a good photographer should understand the principle of photography. Before you become a photographer, you should know your equipment like the back of your hand.

2. Establish a portfolio. In order to get more customers, you need to build your own portfolio and show others your level. Choose photos with different themes to expand your professional scope. Make sure your folder contains a lot of photos, not just 5 or 6. When customers choose photographers, they will choose photographers with a large number of excellent works.

3. Decide your major. If you love portraits, explain that your major is portrait photography when you promote yourself. If you are good at wedding photography, emphasize that you are good at wedding photography. Finding a major and major is good for your business development.

4. Apply for a business license. Since you want to be a professional photographer and do business, let's get a business license. Look at the relevant national laws and regulations on opening a private studio online, so as to truly become a legitimate businessman.

5. Manage funds. To run your own business, you need to manage your own funds, establish classified bank accounts and classified accounts, and balance financial revenue and expenditure. Prepare a computer, record your weekly expenses, and look at your income and expenses every weekend.

6. Set a goal. It is good to combine your interests with your career, but you should set a bottom line for yourself. Set a goal, such as how much money you want to earn, how many photos you want to take or how many photos you want to sell in a certain period of time, so that you have a quantitative goal.

7. Make a timetable. Photography is best to do part-time jobs, and full-time photographers are also good. But before you quit, calculate how long it will take you to take one photo at a time and plan your schedule accordingly.

8. sign a contract. Before taking pictures of customers, you must sign the contract and write down the parts you need to be responsible for or exempt from. If you are not familiar with the signing process, then hire relevant lawyers to help you. This will not only be safe and secure, but also reduce your work pressure, which will be beneficial in the long run. Or you can join the photographer's working group, so you can use the contract that the group has made as a template.

9. Determine the price. When determining the price, we should take into account the time required for each photo, equipment cost, printing cost and so on. These are all factors to consider when determining your hourly salary or the fixed price of each batch of photos. Compare with other local photographers, see how much they order for each order, and adjust according to their own skills and specialties to make their prices competitive.

10, advertise your business. The key step to becoming a professional photographer is to expand your business circle. Build a website, make a business card, or publicize it through social networks, and seize every opportunity to talk about your work and business with people you meet. People like to hire photographers who are famous or recommended by acquaintances. At the same time, the photographer's personality is also very important. So make sure these three points-fame, connections and character.

In addition, post-retouching is also very important, so don't be stingy when buying retouching software. If you shoot landscapes, you should have at least two good cameras.