I read with interest this week a Letter to the Editor in 'The Working Pro', the AIPP's newsletter.
The letter was the perspective of one such 'Mum with Camera' who took umbrage to a more established photographers denigration of this new growth area of the professional photography market.
For retailers this segment is a boom for as they develop their skills they increase the amount of equipment they use in their shooting.
Major US pro labs now have a higher income from the 'Momarazzi' then they do from their established pros.
If you can't beat them (not sure why you'd want to) then train them. Put on events, give this massive part of our market the opportunity to develop their skills. They are very keen to learn and improve.
This segment of our market are not out for a bit of fun - they are serious about their business and so we should be.
Michelle has kindly allowed us to reproduce her letter here.
The Mum With The New DSLR - a threat to the industry or just a passing phase? According to Malcom in his article What do Clients Think (AIPP Nov/Dec 2010), I am one of the biggest threats to the domestic market of photography - The Mum With The New DSLR. I'm not sure where this statistic comes from, but I would just like to put a few things straight about the Mum With The New DSLR. Yes, I have gone on to start my own business as a domestic photographer, shooting weddings and portraits. But, the journey to get to even this very early stage of establishing a business has not come after clicking a few snaps of my own children and some friends' kids and thinking I could do this for a living. Like Malcom, before I had kids I used to think mums must have oodles of time to indulge in hobbies, an idea that is really quite laughable in hindsight. The reality is that with the arrival of motherhood you become so time starved that just two minutes on the toilet by yourself is quite heavenly. As a children's photographer, I'm sure Malcom would be well aware of this if he was listening to his clients. He would also know that mums are so sleep deprived, in the early years at least, that we're lucky if we can manage to take the lense cap off, let alone read the manual of our new digital DSLR. Setting the camera to auto, in between nappy changing, burping and feeding, is about all we can manage, to begin with. Out of the 75 to 100 or so mothers I have met through playgroups, mothers groups, kindys, existing friendships and school, only myself and one other friend could be placed in the emerging category of the 'Mum With The New DSLR' competing in the domestic portrait market. Sure, there were plenty who had digital DSLRs but none who wanted to take pictures of anything or anyone other than their own children. My other mum friend with the digital DSLR camera had to put it on the shelf when she fell pregnant with her second child because she was simply unable to find the time to learn her craft and set up a business. Yes, as Malcom suggests, I know exactly the kind of photographs I want of my kids, but is this what my friends want too? Not necessarily. I have one friend who has photographs taken of her daughter each year dressed up in themed costumes in a photographer's studio. She doesn't come to me and I don't offer to take her photographs - it's not my style, we both know and accept that. I have another very close friend who, on the birth of her second child, went to the renowned Lynette Whitfield King for family photographs, as she did for the birth of her first child. If she had come to me for the job, I would have refused, knowing it would have been incredibly naïve of me to assume I could attempt to match the skill and expertise of such a brilliant photographer when I still had so much to learn. I also draw inspiration from the plethora of brilliant photographers in Australia, who appear to be maximising technology advancements to listen very hard to their clients. They have blogs that invite comments, they use the question and answer website FormSpring, they use Facebook, they use Twitter, all as mediums to listen not only to their colleagues in the industry but to their clients. And their success is evident. Like anyone else venturing into the domestic market, the Mum With The New DSLR needs to fully master her craft. To do this I have spent the last three years studying photography at Central TAFE on a part-time basis, and I have two more years to go if I want to finish. This has entailed forking out a small fortune on babysitters, expressing large quantities of milk (no easy feat), and staying up late at night finishing assignments, before a night of broken sleep and 5am wake-up calls from my children. Surprisingly too, my TAFE classes are not a mothers' group gathering. I was only able to discuss nappy brands and cameras in the same sentence with two other mums, both of whom have since dropped out. While there are a few mums with older or grown up children, the majority of my peers are passionate twenty-somethings keen to make their mark in the photography industry. In the last three months, my children have had all of the following: gastro (x2), flu, hospital trip requiring stitches in the head and a hospital trip with suspected neck injury. While I know I would have to be on my death bed to cancel a wedding shoot (first lesson in motherhood is there are no sick days), I often wonder what would I do if one of my children fell ill or injured themselves as I was walking out the door to shoot a wedding or portrait session. For this reason I have been trying to find fellow mum photographers who have their own business and shoot in a similar style to my own, to network with and have as potential back up in such situations. But I tell you, these Mums With The New DSLRs that are taking over the domestic photography market are pretty hard to find. In my search, I have found the domestic photography market seems to be dominated by a) men without children or grown up children, b) men who are not the primary carers if they have kids, c) women without children, or d)women with older children or grown up children. If the Mum With The New DSLR wants to make a business out of her passion, the stress and time required to make it happen impacts hugely on her family. It is not the same as the mother who can go to work and leave her children in day care. As we all know, a business follows you around the house, screaming for attention, day and night - in much the same way my children do! While I'm sure there are many mothers of young children who contemplate turning their photography interests into a career, and many who tentatively begin the venture, I also think most prefer to keep it as a hobby when they realise they simply don't have the time (or money) to pursue it further. As for the Mums With The New DSLRs who are foolhardy enough to give it a go? We are a, determined, efficient and unshakeable bunch that don't need a lot of sleep, but alas, far too rare a breed to be taking over the domestic market. Yet. Michelle Kiddie
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