What big-name novels are there in the photography circle?

A few days ago, I posted a note about sideline business in Xiaohongshu. The reading volume of this note exceeds 300,000, and this number is still rising. There are more than 10,000 people who like and collect, and almost a thousand people who consult me. I seriously replied to every comment in the early stage, but the number of people behind me suddenly increased dramatically. Even if I don't eat, drink or sleep for three days and nights, I can't reply unless God gives me hundreds more hands. Later, I simply didn't reply, just told me.

From the people I consulted, I found that it was usually Xiao Bai, because many people simply didn't know what they could do, what they were suitable for and what they couldn't do. If no one points out these direction problems and positioning problems, Xiao Bai can only grope for it himself and waste time. Of course, it is more likely that most people are motionless, what was life like in the past, what is it now, and what will happen in the future.

Today, let's talk about a sideline question that everyone asks the most: photography. Back to the title, first of all, I am not a title party. I dare to write this because I have played photography myself. I know this road is completely feasible.

Photography classification

The above is just a rough classification, not 100% rigorous, but it does not prevent you from understanding the category of photography. As the picture shows, there are many sub-categories of photography, some of which are not listed, such as architectural photography, outdoor photography, aerial photography, underwater photography, artistic photography and so on.

When you want to learn photography for the purpose of taking orders, you have to be clear about which direction you want to go, so that you can take targeted actions.

If it is for the purpose of taking orders to make money, I will first promote wedding photography, children's photography, product photography, food photography and activity follow-up. These are all commercial, there will always be demand in the market, and they are friendly to novices. There are large and small lists for you to choose from, and the customer's ability to pay is high or low. You can practice from low-paying customers. Other photography classes have a high starting point and slow results. If you want to love the good, you can learn to learn.

What I share here is to start with the lowest cost and the least time, and then make money by taking pictures. This method is suitable for Xiao Bai who has little money. Photographers probably despise me. Anyway, I'm throwing caution to the wind.

Purchase equipment

Some people say that playing photography is poor for three generations. The point is: play. If you want to play, the cost of photographic equipment can be unlimited. However, if you learn photography skills with an entrepreneurial attitude and the purpose of taking orders to make money, you must have a budget and learn to do big things with small money.

Some people commented that it takes hundreds of thousands to learn photography. I replied below that 1 0,000 is enough. I want to correct here that 1 0,000 is unnecessary, and the actual equipment purchase cost can be as low as making you pee your pants.

Announce the answer first, 5000 yuan is enough.

That's right, enough money. Take food photography as an example: Canon EOS 4000D self-paying camera, JD.COM offers 2688. If you can't afford it, you can buy a second-hand camera at Leisure Fish Flower 1000. Taobao, a computer for retouching, spent 1000 to buy a desktop assembly computer and install a PS to repair a picture of more than 20 m.

I used to open a shop, and I spent 1 ten thousand yuan on a desktop because I had to issue an invoice. Later, it was found that it was expensive, wasteful and had excessive performance. Because I bought more than 300 desktop computers in Taobao last year, I can still issue invoices. I have used 1 year, and there is nothing wrong with it.

The rest, such as photographic lamp, sulfuric acid paper, background plate, reflector and tripod, can be used within 1000.

You can wear a pair of 1000 coconut shoes or a pair of 10 yuan flip-flops if you want to go shopping. But if you want people to pay attention to your clothes and understand the trend, 10 yuan's flip-flops are obviously inappropriate. You may need clothes like coconut shoes, Gucci, equipment and Vimodo. Similarly, some people have won numerous awards for their photos taken with their mobile phones. Some people spend hundreds of thousands on a bunch of photographic equipment, but they may not be able to shoot good works.

Understand the essence, clear the purpose, will not be blocked by expensive equipment. The brand of shoes and clothes above is just an example. Don't argue with me about fashion.

Learning photography

The first step after buying a camera is to be familiar with the buttons and operation methods of the camera. You can refer to the user manual directly, or search for various graphics and video tutorials online. For cameras, the most important thing is to understand the relationship among ISO, shutter and aperture.

In this era of unlimited development of network information, you can find learning tutorials online except learning how to make RMB. Musk is also learning to make rockets online. Of course, the core technology may need to be purchased.

I want to emphasize that no matter whether you study photography or other skills, as long as you are not stupid and have strong personal initiative, online tutorials are enough for you to learn. I suggest you make good use of Baidu, Zhihu, Bili Bili and Tumbler.

In addition, buy two books on food photography and learn them several times from beginning to end. Focus on learning more times, not once, but several times. Like an oil seller, you only know one hand. If you practice some core methods and skills repeatedly, you will get started. In addition to reading and studying, we should also look at all kinds of shooting techniques and skills, expand our thinking and broaden our horizons, so that we can draw inferences in the later shooting.

For friends with weak autonomous learning ability, you can sign up for an introductory offline study class, ask more questions during the study period, even if the questions are stupid, you can ask the teacher to demonstrate more. What is theoretical can be slowly made up by reading later.

Photography is an art, but also a technology, some of which can be quantified. For example, you can shoot many dishes in the same place with the same lighting, the same angle and the same parameters. This process is equivalent to an assembly line, and what the market generally needs is this kind of unified photos, such as restaurant menus.

Finally, you can sign up for online photography courses. Some teachers will provide babysitting services. If you have any questions about your usual shooting, you can ask them at any time. After all, you gave, and you are your father.

The topic says it will take three months, so during this time, you will shoot food every day, brush more food shooting video teaching, and study with high density and intensity. You can go out and take orders in three months.

Take orders to make money

With the equipment and technology, the next step is to take orders. This is actually a painful part for many photographers. They are very skilled, but they just don't know where to find customers. Of course, some photographers with poor skills are also worried about not having a list.

Or take food photography as an example. Why do I keep mentioning food photography? Because this is the closest to everyone, you have to eat three meals a day, so you can practice filming your own meals every day. This is much lower than the threshold of portrait and landscape photography. Taking portraits and landscapes requires making various arrangements, stepping on the spot, making up, choosing suitable clothes and communicating with models back and forth. It's much easier to shoot food. It just lay there motionless, at your mercy.

Ok, how to find customers for food photography? Make sure the technology is ok, and then accumulate some works at home. Of course, during the study of photography, you should also publish your own works on platforms such as friends circle. At this time, you may be lucky enough to receive some loose orders, but they are unstable and unsustainable.

At this time, you can take the initiative. You can find restaurants, cafes, bars, etc. If the business is about to open nearby, ask directly if you need shooting service and show your work to the person in charge. At this time, excellent work is more important than speaking skills. You can collect less money or shoot for free in the early stage, just like some interns prefer to go to well-known enterprises for free or at a discount, just to learn and add points to their resumes.

In the early days, you mainly accumulated cases and word of mouth, and also expanded your contacts. Don't rush to make money. Get to know more restaurant owners and serve them well. The boss can help you introduce customers in the future. Generally speaking, restaurant owners have a wide network of contacts.

There is another way, you can go to the owners of various physical stores nearby and promote each other with their circle of friends. In addition, your customers should be in the neighborhood, local cities, not all of China, so don't spend too much energy spreading publicity online. Of course, if you want to be able to use the Internet for localized publicity, you should do so.

Finally, we can refer to the push mode of local service industry. Getting customers in the early stage will be slower, so be patient. As long as the word-of-mouth is good, the customers behind will gradually increase, because the photography service has a natural spread, and after the filming, you and your customers will send it everywhere.

Execution, persistence, superb skills and good attitude are all important, I hope you understand.

Mobile phone photography The price of the mobile phone I use ranges from several hundred dollars to several thousand dollars.

The SLR I use is also very old. For ten years, the second-hand price is over 1 0,000. Of course, I don't have a fixed photography style, and I mainly use mobile phones, so some of them don't conform to commercial photography.

This article is mainly written for small white users in 34567890-line cities, because they want to learn photography, but they don't have much money, so ordinary people will spend tens of thousands of dollars to learn photography normally.