Paid vs Trade

Ahhh, the photographers (and models) dilemma – who pays who, how much, and what is reasonable?? The topic of paid vs trade has been a long running “flame war” on various forums and in industry, particularly with the rapid growth in the number of people with reasonable gear who think being a great photographer is as simple as turning up and pushing the shutter button!

I came across this great article on FStoppers, which talks about a rating system created by Todd Merrifield of F&B Photography. I like this system because it can be used objectively to rate both parties on their skills and experience, and allows for a reasonable conclusion to be reached on who should pay who.

Of course, there are always exceptions – as a photographer, I’m happy to handle the few exceptions on a case by case basis. My plan is to use this system to handle all the rest – I get a lot of enquiries from models, particularly travelling from overseas, who tell me that they love my portfolio and really want to work with me, but need to be paid to cover the cost of their trips. I understand completely that they have costs to cover, and travelling is not cheap. Being an accredited professional photographer is not cheap either, and with my very limited available time, paying random models for unplanned impromptu shoots probably won’t be a good investment of my time or money.

I will continue to pay models, just like I always have when there’s a commercial or special project, or workshop I need help presenting. Using this system, I’m less likely to pay models simply because they happen to be in town and like my portfolio (and I’m more likely to quote them my very reasonable rates as an accredited professional photographer who’d be happy to help them get some great shots into their portfolio)