I’ve been a long time follower of the Strobist blog ( if you’re a photographer and you don’t know about this blog, shame on you!) and recently a post on working for free came up. This got me thinking…

I also took a look at what Chase Jarvis (one of my fav. photographers) had to say and he brought up some great points.

I’m no where near where these guys are in their career so let me bring forth my perspective.

First of all, I guess you can call me an amature photographer that’s trying to break into the industry. Starting about a year ago I will admit that I’ve done a ton of work for free… even when it’s not beneficial to me. I’ll chalk that up to my inexperience and gung-ho attitude towards anything that might get me exposure. Fast forward to now… I still haven’t broken into the industry but I’ve learned a lot so let me share with you.

When deciding to work for free you need to ask yourself these questions:

1. How will it benefit my portfolio?
   I’m still in the process of fixing this. About a month ago I started to do clean beauty shoots and I feel I’ve gotten to the point where I’m decent at them. But I still have models approaching me requesting these kinds of shoots for trade. Stupid me, I accept. It will not add anything to my portfolio as I do not need 10,000 clean beauty shots. I gotta learn to turn them down.
2. Will this give me exposure in the areas I want to work in?
   Again, something I’m working on. I use to scour craigslist looking for every and any photographic job. I soon realized that it was getting me no where and doing these odd jobs that I had no interest in was just killing the fun. Essentially, it was turning into a job instead of a passion.
3. Will this introduce me to connections I need?
   This one I’ve been pretty good with. But it did take awhile to learn. In the beginning I use to work with any and every model that would work with me (I suppose this is the same with everyone) but after I got together a decent portfolio I would still work with any and every model that would work with me. I eventually learned that it’s pretty pointless to work with newer models (unless you’re giving back and helping out someone with potential). Newer models will not have many (if any, especially internet models who are just doing this for good pictures for themselves) connections that they could refer you to. So it’s just a dead end.
4. Is this worth my time?
   Keep in mind that each time you do a shoot, it’s costing you money. Sure you’ve already paid off all your gear, but remember the wear and tear on your gear, gas to get to and from the location, the potential for your gear to get damaged, etc, etc

So that’s my story and how I go about determining if I should take on a job for free. Of course I still haven’t broken into the industry so all that might just be hog-wash. But hopefully it works!