Intro
- Passion for the subject is important to keep you going through the dark times!
- A project that provides a coherent body of work gives your images meaning. It is not enough to make one-off pretty pictures.
A little self-discipline
Embarking upon a photographic project with specific objectives is a very satisfying way of developing your own photographic practice
- Need to stay focused, provide a long term objective and a means to an end.
- Simple ideas are normally the best.
- Seek to establish a consistent visual language which will lend coherence to the images
Let me tell you a story
A project provides an excellent framework for you to develop your visual communication skills and a way of speaking photographically.
- It is all about communication and the development of a personal visual language
- The visual language needs to sit on top of the content in a satisfactory way.
- While the natural home for the would seem to be a book, exhibitions provide additional opportunities to market and sell. Make use of that.
Determination to succeed
The first step is to identify an original and worthwhile theme, then comes the tricky business of sticking with it through thick and thin.
- Can be a lot of costs involved depending on the scale of the project.
- Working through funding bodies can be challenging.
School days and beyond
Projects are considered an important part of photography education, underlining their contribution to every photographer's development.
- At post grad level almost certainly be fully project based, requiring the setting of objectives and terms of reference by the individual photographer
What floats your boat?
There is no set way to approach a photographic project - the only criterion should be that you choose a subject that interest you.
- What is important is to have an abiding interest in the subject, a passion that will drive you to explore a subject or issue in the deepest, most thorough manner.
- What cannot be passed on is the instinctive curiosity and fascination, the passionate interest and lateral approach needed to get to the soul of a subject.
- The project needs a story, to have some form of exploration, the objective to reveal something new.
- Several projects features in the book do not tell a story as such, but careful attention to approach, style, lighting, composition and process results in a coherent body of work which is revealing of its subject and of the photographer's relationship to it.
- Keep it simple - pare your idea down to its essence
- Consider carefully "Is my idea truly suited to photography?"
- Choose a subject that intrigues you and about which you want to discover more
- Set yourself a plan of action to provide a framework for the project
- Persevere: stick with it and negotiate setbacks or problems as they arise
- Don't be put off if the project, or the way you are approaching it, changes en route; this is part of the process of discovery.
Mission control
Settling on a plan of action will provide something to measure progress against and it is also the first step towards calculating your budget.
- Take time out to write down your plan of action as a set of bullet points. This way you can be sure your objectives are clear
- This list can then form the basis for any written application for support or sponsorship
- Similarly, you will be able to articulate your intentions when speaking about the work and your ambitions for it.
A question of scale
Early in the planning process you need to get a grip on the scale of the project - how long and how much will it take to complete.
- Without a clear idea of the scale of what you propose, you are not in a good position to plan it
- Scale affects to important factors of time and money
- Your time may be your own, but deadlines loom if there is an exhibition or publication on the cards.
The need to count the cost
Books and exhibitions don't grow on trees - a professional approach to budgeting is an essential part of your project plan
- If you don't ask you won't get. Try your regular suppliers - retailer, hire shop, processing lab - or film and paper manufacturers, to see if they are prepared to support your project. Even if they are unable to provide free materials or services, they may be prepared to give you a discount.
- Having an exhibition or publication lined up will improve your chances of obtaining commercial support, because of the publicity you can offer supporters
- Take time over promoting your exhibition, there are plenty of publications crying out for material to fill their listings pages.
Some potential cost headings to look at:
- Exhibiting: Venue hire. Also look at lower profile venues such as bars and restaurants
- Exhibiting: Print making
- Exhibiting: Mattes and framing
- Exhibiting: Press release publicity
- Exhibiting: Poster production
- Exhibiting: Invitation design
- Exhibiting: Private view hospitality
- Exhibiting: Transporting the work between venues
- Exhibiting: Printer and poster sales commission going to the gallery
- Exhibiting: Catalogues and books sales, commission going to the gallery
- Book production: Pre-press (do yourself?)
- Book production: Print, inclusing paper and binding
- Book production: Commission on distribution
- Book production: Marketing and advertising
- Book production: Mailing costs if selling on-line
- Book production: PR, free copies of books, press releases
Put your best foot forward
Getting your work published or hung on a gallery wall involves the sales process: here image selection and presentation are paramount
- Don't let all your hard work down by poor presentation
- Don't include too many images in an initial submission - it's off-putting
- Target the selected portfolio carefully at the person who is going to view it
- If in doubt, leave it out
- Prints of manageable size are the easiest and most effective way to show your work
- A CD presentation of your work is a useful and inexpensive adjunct to the print portfolio
- A personal visit to a prospect allows you to work wonders with your sales technique, but it's not always possible . . .
- . . . which means that a portfolio pack that you mail must be effective and professional
- Don't take 'no' as a personal affront - finding out why will help you in the future.
Hold the front page
Even before the project is completed there could be opportunities to get some of the work published, thus raising its profile and yours, too
- For obvious reasons photography magazines present the best market for your work, and one you are likely to be familiar with. Research the market! See The Freelance Photographer's Handbook published annually by the Bureau of Freelance Photographers (BFP) - www.thebfp.com
- Don't limit your ambitions to full blown portfolio-style coverage. While that's very nice and will polish your ego, you can benefit from and capitalise on any form of publication for the work.
- Don't be precious about your work being used outside of its intended context
- All publicity is good publicity
- A feature package of words and pictures will always be more saleable than the pictures on their own.
- Photography magazines are hungry for images, but much the greater number of images are used to illustrate 'how-to' techniques.
- Gauge a level of interest with an initial email. Follow up submission should include CD and prints.
Aim for the hall of fame
Don't overlook awards that offer the potential for free publicity, an exhibition, publications in an awards book - even prize money.
- Only enter your work if it fulfils the brief properly
- Don't overlook the small print
- Exploit to the full any success in your CV and marketing
- Some competitions offer bursaries that might fund your project
Working with printers
- First find your printer. Possible use the services of a print broker (Google the term).
- Check they are set up to tackle your job - do they have the right sized presses to print the size your require?; are they equipped to do the finishing and binding?
- Visit the printer in person
- You will need to provide a detailed spec . . .
- It is vital that you supply your image files in the correct colour format. An RGB image will print in greyscale
- Once you have placed an image on the page don't go back and resize it. It won't change the way it looks in the document but it will when it is printed.
- If you have to resize, redo the layout too with the new file
- Throw away any old image files that have been superseded, so they don't get used by accident
- When printing in duotone, add the Pantone grey ink to your software colour palette and remember that it and black are the only two colours you have to work with in the rest of your design
Someone to share the bill
Funding bodies and awards schemes exist to help in the pursuit and publishing of arts projects
- Arts Council - check the websites
- 'Prizes and Awards' published by Dewi Lewis (dewilewispublishing.com)
- Securing an exhibition venue - and ideally a series of venues - is key to obtaining funding support.
- If you can get a funded gallery interested in showing your work, this will pay dividends when applying funding yourself as the gallery will be experienced in dealing with funding bodies and know who best to approach
- If your project is deserving of support from the arts funding budget of your local or regional authority, this is the first place to look. Grants may be modest, but such support provides a lot of leverage when approaching one of the bigger agencies later on.
Self publishing
Want the job done properly? Do it yourself!
- The book of the show. An exhibition provides the perfect excuse for you to burst into print
- Short run strategies - the hand-made artist's book is now joined by digital "on-demand" print services
- Publish on the internet
