Making Your Camera Pay Part 8

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, as _Photo-Era Magazine_ or a magazine such as _Shadowland_. The _Architectural Record_ demands 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 as _American 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

COMPEt.i.tIONS

Compet.i.tion 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 compet.i.tion 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 Magazine_ and _American Photography_, conduct monthly compet.i.tions. The monthly prizes for the Advanced Compet.i.tion of _Photo-Era Magazine_ are $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 of _Photo-Era Magazine_ a.s.signs 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 Photography_ also conducts monthly photographic contests. For these no subjects are a.s.signed. The prizes for the Senior Cla.s.s 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 Compet.i.tion, 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 Compet.i.tion. Both _Photo-Era Magazine_ and _American Photography_ supply data-blanks which must be sent with entries.

Compet.i.tions for amateur photographs are also conducted by the _American 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 compet.i.tions by many magazines; and many manufacturers conduct occasional, if not regular, prize-contests.

Probably the largest company to offer prizes in compet.i.tions 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 cla.s.ses of photographs, the cla.s.s 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 workmans.h.i.+p, 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 compet.i.tions.

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 on _Ansco_ film and _Cyko_ paper, or other Ansco products. Burke and James, makers of _Rexo_ cameras, "use photographs for advertising-purposes which must be of unusual interest and must ill.u.s.trate 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 const.i.tution" 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 furnis.h.i.+ng 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 publis.h.i.+ng company. The photographer then has parted with his _entire rights_ to it, and cannot sell it elsewhere, _unless_ one 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," _provided_ those 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 to _Popular Mechanics_, which buys a print _marked_ "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 labeling _each print_ as: "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 loses _all_ claims 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.