Hacking Photography - one Picture at a time
They say the best time to start a business was 10 years ago. But guess when the second-best time to start a business is? That’s right, it’s today! Seriously, there isn’t a ‘best time’ to start a business, you just have to make the decision and do it. That being said, however, there are some things you need to consider and put into place before jumping in.
In this video, Julia Trotti walks us through her top three essential things that you need to start a successful photography business.
When was the last time you had your photo taken? I mean, not just a quick selfie or holiday snap, but an actual portrait of yourself taken by another photographer?
For most of us, it’s often a case of the Cobbler’s children having no shoes. We are so busy and focused on our clients that we rarely ever have time to update our own professional photographs. But in today’s age of visual branding, it’s more important than ever to practice what we preach, and actually have a nice professional up-to-date photograph of ourselves for our website and social media.
New Zealand based camera slider and timelapse gear company, Syrp has announced that it’s rebranding itself to Syrp Lab and that its products will be also rebranded and brought into the fold of the new Manfrotto Move ecosystem. This isn’t the first name that’s been rebranded under the Manfrotto banner recently with “Lastolite by Manfrotto”, and simply “Lastolite” before that, also bring brought under the Manfrotto name.
According to the announcement, Syrp Lab is essentially going to be come an R&D facility working on “the next generation of tools for creators” covering a range of brands across the Vitec Imaging Solutions collective. They’re also turning to education, teaching users of Vitec products how to use them and create the best content they can.
Well, there’s been a lot of speculation about what’s going to happen to the name Olympus since its acquisition by JIP was completed at the beginning of the year. In February, the newly formed OM Digital hoped to be able to keep using the name Olympus and it looked like they might for a few years.
But in August, it was rumoured camera models were expecting to be renamed and now it looks like the brand as a whole is, too. And, yes, the two previous logo trademark registrations (here and here) were correctly assumed to be the new brand for Olympus cameras. Olympus is now OM System.
While the fate of cameras formerly produced by Olympus seems in good hands with the recently formed OM Digital Solutions, the name itself has had something of a question mark over it since the news of a takeover first broke. Initially, it looked like JIP were planning to kill off the Olympus brand name fairly quickly, with an official statement from Olympus that it will continue “for the foreseeable future”.
A short time later, OM Digital Solutions confirmed in an interview with Digitec that they had secured the use of the Olympus brand name and would continue to use it “for the next few years and for a longer time than we had originally assumed”. Now, though, it looks like that might changing speculation around the web prove to be true.
Lastolite by Manfrotto (since 2016), previously known as Lastolite when it was acquired by Vitec in 2011 is rebranding again. This time, it’s dropped the Lastolite branding completely and will now become part of the Manfrotto brand. The company says that the rebrand is “in response to industry and consumer behaviour changes over recent years as still and moving images continues to converge”.
The Lastolite by Manfrotto section of the Manfrotto website has already been modified to reflect the change, pointing users to the newly branded products. Although, for a while, they say that you may still receive products with Lastolite by Manfrotto branding.
Sometimes, branding or naming products doesn’t always go as a company intends. They call it one thing, they want us to call it that thing, but then the general public calls it something else. Apparently, Nikon’s two new mirrorless cameras are a case of this.
According to Nikon, they’re not the Nikon Z6 and Z7, they’re the “Z 6” and “Z 7”. The space is, apparently, important, although the world doesn’t seem to care – or have noticed.
Turning your work into a brand is not an easy task, and it may seem overwhelming if you’re just starting it out. In this episode of Chase Jarvis RAW, Chase Jarvis meets Ben Von Wong. They share some tips and thoughts that could help any photographer who wants to build a brand and grow their business.
When you say “branding” to most photographers and filmmakers, all they think about is how their logo looks. Branding, however, is so much more than a pretty logo. It’s what you want people to feel when they hear your name or see your work. Branding sets up a level of expectation to potential clients and customers. It’s what separates you from your competitors.
But how do you even begin to think about how you brand yourself and your work? This video from filmmaker Kris Truini helps to explain the basics with some tips to get you started. This is by no means a complete guide, but a good starting point to get you up and running. These tips will lead to more questions, but that’s a good thing. Questions make you think and push yourself. There are no shortcuts.
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