X
ART PHOTOGRAPHS
An art-photograph may be either of two things: a photograph, itself artistic; or a photograph of some artistic thing. There are markets for both. Artistic photographs are used by calendar and postcard makers; also, by photographic magazines, and magazines given to the beautiful in art or literature. When submitting such photographs to makers of postcards and such, they should be submitted in the usual manner.
The subjects used by card- and calendar-makers are interesting landscapes, beautiful seascapes, pretty girls, attractive children, and animals, as every one knows. Such pictures are sometimes bought outright—indeed, they usually are; but some firms pay according to their value as indicated by the demand for them after publication. Thus, one firm pays on a fifty-fifty basis.
An example of beautiful photography, at the same time picturing an unusual or artistic subject, will usually find a market in a photographic magazine, asPhoto-Era Magazineor a magazine such asShadowland. TheArchitectural Recorddemands that its prints, although of architectural subjects, be artistic and beautiful. Indeed, there is such a wide market for photographically artistic prints of beautiful subjects that the photographer is doubly rewarded who can supply these, as well as hot-off-the-bat news-photographs.
Artistic photographs are printed on sensitive-paper of a surface suited to their subjects, and are trimmed so as to carry the correct compositional balance; and after, they are tastefully mounted.
Photographs which are not themselves artistic, but which are of art-subjects, may be prepared as are other photographs intended for publication. Such photographs are of statues, pictures, new art-museums, art-collections, paintings, mural decorations, drawings, and anything at all of interest to artists. Material of such sort is sought by such publications asAmerican Art News,Art in America,Art and Decoration, and others that appreciate the very best.
In short, the photographer may market his game among a wider patronage if he can bring down birds of paradise as well as ducks and geese and the common denizens of the air.
XI
COMPETITIONS
Competition is the life of business. Certainly, then, an aspirant for honors from publishers experiences no lack of life. Often, however, after a print has proved unavailable for publication, when offered by the regular process, it may be entered in a photographic competition where current interest is not essential; and so, perhaps, even bring home a larger cheque than it could have captured otherwise.
The two leading photographic publications,Photo-Era MagazineandAmerican Photography, conduct monthly competitions. The monthly prizes for the Advanced Competition ofPhoto-Era Magazineare $10.00, $5.00 and $2.50 in value of photographic goods. Although cash is not paid, a prize awarded will go a long way toward obtaining for the photographer a desired piece of apparatus, or in supplying sensitised material, developing-agents and such with which to produce photographs intended for other magazines. "The contest is free and open to photographers of ability and good standing—amateur or professional." The publisher ofPhoto-Era Magazineassigns subjects for each month, as "Winter-Sports," "Speed-Pictures," and so on. Since the photographer must buy supplies in any event, the awarding of such to the amount of $10.00 is a distinct help.
American Photographyalso conducts monthly photographic contests. For these no subjects are assigned. The prizes for the Senior Class are $10.00, $5.00 and $3.00, paid in cash. "Any photographer, amateur or professional, may compete." This magazine last year held an Annual Competition, which it intends to repeat, with prizes of $100.00, $50.00, two of $25.00, and ten of $10.00, not to mention one hundred subscriptions for the magazine. Highly artistic work is necessary for recognition in the Annual Competition. BothPhoto-Era MagazineandAmerican Photographysupply data-blanks which must be sent with entries.
Competitions for amateur photographs are also conducted by theAmerican Boy, which offers monthly prizes of $5.00, $3.00 and $1.00 for "the most interesting amateur photographs received during each month." These are worthwhile.
Photographs of popular interest are used in monthly competitions by many magazines; and many manufacturers conduct occasional, if not regular, prize-contests.
Probably the largest company to offer prizes in competitions is the Eastman Kodak Company. The Eastman company for many years conducted a yearly contest with thousands of dollars in prizes offered. Last year, it decided on an innovation; the running of a monthly contest with prizes of $500.00. This practice has been continued for many months and shows no signs of being discontinued at this writing. Prizes are offered for four classes of photographs, the class being determined by the camera with which the photograph was made. In all, twenty prizes are awarded each month, the highest being $100.00 and the lowest $7.00. Frequently one person wins two or three prizes. The photographs entered must be of good workmanship, of human-interest and must preferably tell a story. No subjects are set. Upon writing to the company, a leaflet is sent which gives rules and an entry-blank. A good many photographers have cleaned-up in these competitions.
Now and then, different manufacturers and magazines, who do not ordinarily do so, offer prizes for photographs. At every opportunity, the press-photographer should enter his prints, for if they win a prize, he has the advantage of a larger remuneration as well as a boosted prestige among editors and publishers.
XII
PRINTS FOR ADVERTISING
Advertisers who are manufacturers are all possessed of the belief that the buying public is painfully ill-informed of the unequalled merits of their products. Consequently, any photographic evidence of the superiority of their goods which will enlighten the public is welcomed with open arms.
Any photograph that shows plainly the excellent service that any product has given will bring the photographer's own price from the manufacturer. The demand is almost universal.
Makers of camera-lenses are continually on the lookout for unusual photographs made with their products. The Wollensak, the Bausch and Lomb, and the Goerz companies frequently buy negatives that portray vividly some features of their lenses.
Makers of camera-shutters also buy photographs which were made with cameras equipped with their shutters. Usually, the point emphasised in the pictures bought is the shutters' ability to "stop motion" at their high speeds. As press-photographers frequently find it necessary to use the shortest exposures given by their shutters, they should have something in their negative-files which the shutter-makers should be eager to obtain.
Makers of photographic material other than lenses and shutters often buy examples of work done with their goods. Thus, the Ansco Company "uses photographs of natural scenes for advertising-purposes," the photographs being made onAnscofilm andCykopaper, or other Ansco products. Burke and James, makers ofRexocameras, "use photographs for advertising-purposes which must be of unusual interest and must illustrate their goods in use, or be made with their cameras or films." Inasmuch as the news-photographer, in his daily work, finds many unusual things, he should find no difficulty in selling a few prints to camera-makers.
An advertiser is always seeking any information likely to help sell his product. If, in your work, you see an old storage-battery with electric energy still unimpaired, or a well-preserved tire, or a shaving-brush of "strong constitution" unweakened by much use, it would very likely prove profitable to photograph it and describe your find to the company that makes the product.
Thus, an insurance-agency may buy a photograph of a garage destroyed by fire, the cars in which were fully protected by their insurance. A maker of strong-boxes may appreciate a photograph of one of his boxes raked out of, perhaps, the same fire, the box having held valuable papers which were fully protected from the terrific heat. The makers of a portable typewriter once purchased a photograph of one of their machines which had fallen from an airplane and which had to be dug from the ground; but which, of course, suffered no injury whatever because of its fall and burial. If you should unexpectedly come upon Irvin Cobb writing a masterpiece with his Neverleek fountain-pen, snap him (with his permission) and see what the makers of Neverleeks say. Manufacturers of patent roofings use photographs of roofs covered with their products; makers of steam-rollers want photographs of roads tamped by their machines; and so on and on and on.
It is wiser to write first to the advertising-manager of the particular company favored, and to inquire if he is buying photographs that show plainly the unparalleled merits of his excellent product, and if so—etc., etc.
Some advertisers will ask you to name a price for your work, and on such an occasion you should judge fairly the value of the print to them. If they require the negative also, raise the rate. Any prints should be worth $10.00 even to a small manufacturer, and if it is acceptable at all, a larger firm should pay from $25.00 to $1,000.00 for suitable propaganda. This branch of press-photography is little used by many workers, yet it is remunerative.
Besides furnishing the manufacturer with advertising for his product, the photographer supplies himself with some advertising to the effect that "he delivered the goods once, and could do it again, so there."
XIII
COPYRIGHTS AND OTHER RIGHTS
If, as often happens, one photograph is useful to more than one publication, is it all right to sell the one photograph to as many magazines as will buy it?
When a publication prints a photograph on its pages, it copyrights it in the name of the publishing company. The photographer then has parted with hisentire rightsto it, and cannot sell it elsewhere,unlessone of two precautions has been taken.
The first precaution is the writing on the back of each print: "First Magazine-Rights Only." Those "mystic" words mean that the print is offered for publication only one time, after which it again becomes the property of the photographer. That is, the magazine, when buying such a print, buys only the right to print it the first time. Immediately after its publication, it becomes again the property of the photographer, although he cannot of course sell "First Rights" again, any more than he can sell the same horse twice at the same time.
After "First Rights" has been sold, the photographer may then sell "Second Rights,"providedthose words are written on the back of the second print. "'Second Rights' is the right to publish a photograph in some other publication than the one in which it originally appeared." For instance: a photograph of a novel shop-window display may be acceptable toPopular Mechanics, which buys a printmarked"First Magazine-Rights Only." But the same photograph may be acceptable too to an advertising-magazine, and so it buys "Second Magazine-Rights." Unless these terms are written on the backs of prints which are sold to more than one magazine, trouble is apt to result.
Another plan by which it is possible to sell a photograph to more than one publication is the labelingeach printas: "Non-Exclusive" or "Not Exclusive." When that is done, the photograph may be sold to as many editors as care to buy it.
If no mention of any rights or of exclusiveness is made at the time of sale, it is inferred that the publisher buys "All Rights." In that case the photographer losesallclaims to the photograph; if he attempts to sell it again without the consent of the editor who first bought it he is breaking the copyright laws; in fact, he is selling another's property.
There is no need to affix any such terms to any photograph which can sell to only one, or which is to be offered to only one magazine. Magazines are more partial to prints which they can buy outright, and thus acquire "All Rights." Indeed, there are very few prints of enough value to sell to more than one magazine.
Now we plunge deep into the mysteries of copyrights. When a print is copyrighted it is unalterably the property of the personfirstcopyrighting it until he signs "Transference of Copyright." A copyrighted print may be published in a dozen publications if they will buy it, and it still remains the property of the one who first copyrighted it. Copyright laws were passed for the benefit of those who "promote the progress of science and useful arts." This is done "by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to use their respective writings and discoveries." Under this law, "author" includes makers of photographs, and "writings" includes photographs.
The process of copyrighting a photograph is not an involved one. A request should be addressed to the Register of Copyrights at Washington, D.C., for a few copyright-blanks, form J1. (Form J1 is for photographs to be sold, J2 for photographs not to be sold.) One of these cards is then filled out, and two prints of the photographs sent with it to the Copyright Office, as well as the necessary fee. "The fee for the registration of copyrights ... in the case of photographs, when no certificate (of copyright) is demanded is fifty cents; for every certificate, fifty cents" additional. A certificate is not usually necessary, and is useful only in cases of disputed copyright ownership, etc. The fee should be sent only in the form of a money-order to the Register of Copyrights, and the photographs must bear the mark of copyright, which is "either the word 'Copyrighted' or the abbreviation 'Copr.' accompanied by the name of the copyright proprietor. In the case of photographs the notice may consist of the letter C inclosed in a circleprovidedthat on some accessible portion of such copies ... the name of the person copyrighting shall appear." Upon the Copyright Office receiving the photographs, the sender is notified; and again, when copyright is granted, he is sent a small card notifying him, or the certificate is sent to him if he has ordered one. Then the print is considered copyrighted.
It is useless to copyright any except those prints of extraordinary value, the rights of which the photographer wishes to retain at all costs. The average quality prints are not likely to be stolen, and so the copyrighting of them is unnecessary. If the photograph is merely to be offered to two or more publications it is only necessary to mark each print as directed in the foregoing paragraphs.
Publishing companies are business-institutions which are of necessity conducted according to the highest ethics. To unwittingly sell to another magazine a print one magazine purchased as exclusive, would be likely to exile the photographer's work from those particular magazines. The photographer should remember that a print of his making is not his property once it is first copyrighted by someone else,unlesshe has sold only certain rights of it. It is nothing less than theft, to make a photographic copy of a published photograph and to offer it as original and unpublished. The photographer should never try to sell what is not his own work. But since not many have the urge to do so, undue emphasis on that point would be offensive.
"The sum of the foregoing advice is that the author (photographer) should exercise common sense in disposing of rights," says J. Berg Esenwein, editor of theWriter's Monthly, in one of his books. "In most cases it would be better to allow the publisher to have 'All Rights' than to forego the chance of a sale; but nearly all magazine-editors are disposed to be reasonable and will agree to share any future profits that may arise from supplementary sales of a manuscript (photograph). The chief point is that author and publisher should clearly understand each other, without the author's losing his rights, yet, without harassing the publisher by making unnecessary stipulations regarding a trifling matter."
The law of copyright should be followed strictly when attempting to submit the same photograph to more than one publication or buyer. If the photographer keeps an eye on what rights he has sold when he cashes his cheque, and governs himself accordingly, he will sail along without trouble of any kind.
XIV
ILLUSTRATED SPECIAL ARTICLES
It would require a surveyor of extraordinary skill to mark the boundary between the lands ofPhotographs-With-Explanatory-DataandArticles-Illustrated-With-Photographs. Since the dividing line is so vague it is not difficult to pass from the one to the other.
The jump from the making of photographs to the writing of non-fiction is not a difficult one to make. In his rambles after salable photographs the press-photographer may unearth a subject to which a single photograph does not do justice. Then the making of more photographs and the writing of an article about them is the logical and the progressive and the more remunerative thing to do.
Indeed, subjects which would not sell otherwise may be made very useful to an editor by the writing of an enticing article around them. At once, there is a means of broadening one's market and of disposing of photographs, by themselves, unsalable. An illustrated article naturally calls forth a fatter cheque than would the text or the photographs alone. There is as much a demand for illustrated articles as there is for photographs; so that the photographer with the ability to tell facts simply and clearly has two avenues of revenue.
Many illustrated articles sold to magazines are just groups of photographs with interesting texts written about them. A search through a few magazines reveals a broad variety.
FromPopular Mechanics:
FromIllustrated World:
FromPhoto-Era Magazine:
FromScience and Invention:
These are articles written around several photographs—not merely illustrated by them. Besides the classes of magazines mentioned there are numerous others—almost any publication that uses illustrations in fact—which are in the market for illustrated articles. Such magazines cater to outers, hunters, sportsmen, business-men, physical culturists, travelers—almost every class of reader.
Having produced and sold articles written around the illustrations, the writer-photographer cannot other than form an idea, now and then, of an article a magazine should want which may be illustrated; but to which the illustrations are supplementary rather than basic. In such cases, the writer will have greater chance of acceptance if he, by means of his camera, makes several photographs to illustrate the text.
Even if an article is acceptable without illustrations, it will bring a bigger cheque nevertheless if it is illustrated. If the lack of illustrations makes the article unavailable, then the photographer has the means of making a cheque grow where none grew before. His camera stands him in good stead. There is no editor but prefers an illustrated article to an unillustrated one—unless his magazine is pictureless from policy.
Then, from having his pictures printed without his name attached, the photographer blossoms into a writer whose work appears under such a head as "'How Fruit is Raised on the Moon,' by John Henry Jones, with Illustrations by the Author."
Although the jump from the making of photographs to the writing of non-fiction is easy, you may slip at the first attempt. But hammer away and soon the nail will go in. "For know ye, there isn't a magazine-editor in the business who wouldn't buy an article from his worst enemy if he thought it was good stuff for his magazine."
The photographer must not only "smell out" news; but he must, by the sensitiveness of his "nose" tell just how much the news is capable of being worked up. He will find it comparatively easy to write illustrated special-articles where before he sold just photographs. And such ability stands not far below that of the fictionists.
XV
THE HIGH ROAD
Not much of an exalted vocation, the selling of photographs? Not, perhaps, proclaimed from the housetops as a handsomely paying vocation; but one which may be cultivated into almost anything having to do with inveigling publishers into writing cheques.
When you receive your first cheque your sensation is something like that of the man who has passed through a cyclone and has come through with his "flivver" still in the barn. But when the first contribution isprinted! The world is yours! You have broken into print! If not into type, at least into printing-ink.
When the excitement wears off there are many branches that beckon. The press-photographer may specialise—he may devote all his efforts to some one branch of the work, as the making of photographs of celebrities, of microphotographs, of almost anything. Witness the amateur photographer who quietly went about photographing the interior of every church in New York, and who then "cashed in" on them to the amount of $4,000. You may even obtain a position—or job—as press-photographer on a big metropolitan daily, with all the world before you and part of it dropping every Saturday afternoon into your pocketbook.
Then, you may be sent overseas—and be paid great oodles of money. Or you may devote all your time to the making of calendar-photographs, or to illustrating stories photographically, as is the fashion now with some magazines, seeTrue-Story. There are so many opportunities to grasp that if you look about you and select the specialised branch in which you desire most to work, there is no reason in the world why you should not do it—and, perhaps, earn $10,000 a year at it. "Do one thing better than anyone else and the world will beat a path to your door."
Having broken into printers'-ink, it is comparatively easy to break into type. From selling photographs one may easily advance to the writing and illustrating of non-fiction. And your fame as a non-fictionist, together with the training you have gleaned, may cause you to forward a work of fiction to an editor acquainted with your name—and lo! from the ranks of the "snap-shooters" you have risen to the highest class of scribe—the successful fictionist.
And that, too, is not difficult for him who wills and works. "And work. Spell it in capital letters,work," advised Jack London. "Work all the time. Find out about this earth, this universe; this force and matter, and the spirit that glimmers up through force and matter from the maggot to Godhead. And by all this I mean work for a philosophy of life. It does not hurt how wrong your philosophy of life may be, so long as you have one and have it well.... With it you may cleave to greatness and sit among the giants."
Another agrees: "Draw long breaths of confidence, of faith in yourself and your work.... Strike 'despair' out of your dictionary! Get into your chair! Do your stint! Be just as much of a fool as you like. It is your privilege and mine. Then you will have amusing reminiscences. No great writer but can look back and say, 'What a fool I was!'"
Realisation results from "ten per cent. inspiration and ninety per cent. perspiration." A liberal quantity of this mixture will bring one to the High Road. The High Road is smooth. But anyone may travel it who wishes—and works sufficiently hard. Not much, the making and selling of photographs? The start of the trail may be barren and unpromising; but the persevering fellow who follows it persistently will find that it suddenly widens and blossoms and lo, opens full into the High Road.
THE END