The Disappearing Middle

Friday night, Leesa and I headed down to Redondo Beach, California, to meet with some aerial photographers, one of them being a friend of Leesa's. These photo-aviators were attending their annual, national conference at a hotel in the Redondo Beach marina.

While we sat and chatted in the hotel's bar, sipping drinks and talking about (what else?) photography, the group of airborne shooters we hung out with voiced many of the same concerns and frustrations as other groups of photographers regarding the current state of the professional photography business, make that the business of taking pictures for a living. (Many manufacturers and others who provide products and services to photographers are doing better than ever.)

One thing that sets these photographers somewhat apart from other groups of pro shooters is that they are, quite obviously, aviators FIRST and photographers a somewhat distant second. But still, issues regarding the recession and how it is effecting their photo biz (many of them make much of their livings shooting for property and land developers, architects, etc., not exactly booming businesses these days), the Quality Bar being lowered, shooters giving away content for free or at very low cost, and how the evolution of digital technology and low-cost/high-end image capturing devices has brought so many more shooters to the game. Issues of copyright assignment and licensing were also voiced.

One of the people we were socializing with said, "There's not much middle anymore. There's a small group of people shooting the really high-end, big-money stuff and there's everyone else getting pushed to the bottom of the photography pay scales."

Wow! That kind of says it all.

"Wait a minute," I objected, "The difference between you people and everyone else is, in addition to camera gear, you need an airplane and a pilot's license. That takes a lot of training and it costs quite a bit to purchase and maintain your aircraft. That has to cut down on competition."

Immediately, the pilot/shooter corrected me. "You don't understand," he said, "We're mostly people who already were pilots with airplanes. We figured out we can help pay for what we love doing (flying) by letting photography cover the costs of some of it."

I nodded, beginning to understand their concerns.

"The problem is," he continued, "Too many weekend pilots have figured this out and, since cameras are relatively cheap and no-brainer to use to capture fairly decent pictures, everyone with a small plane and a decent (small format) camera is suddenly an aerial photographer."

An unsettling aerial photography epiphany suddenly struck me.

The pilot continued: "Look at wedding photographers," he said. "Everyone's a wedding photographer now. Almost anyone getting married has a friend or a relative with a digital SLR and those photographers are willing to shoot their friends or relatives weddings for practically nothing. And photographers trying to break into wedding photography, often as a part-time/weekend business, think the best way to approach it is to practically give away their services just to get the experience. With the exception of people who want really high-end wedding photography, that's what's happening. The middle part of the business is vanishing. People who could once make a decent living shooting weddings are now faced with more competition than ever before and many of them are being pushed lower and lower with the rates they're able to charge."

I was beginning to become depressed. Make that, I was now completely depressed. If photographers as specialized as aerial photographers are getting clobbered with the same issues as most other photographers, where is it all going?

I wish I knew.

But wherever it's all going, it's not giving me warm and fuzzy feelings.

The gratuitous eye-candy at the top is Margo. I shot this image of Margo a few years ago. I lit her with a single-light source from above: A modified Mole-Richardson 1k "Baby" with a strobe fitted into it and the Baby's Fresnel lens intact.