The Worst Excuses I've Ever Heard For Not Wanting to Pay a Photographer Appropriately

Why do people think artists should be free? I just laugh now at people who ask me for exchange stuff. If I pose for you, you can put it in your portfolio. Gee, thanks. Last time I checked photo equipment isn’t cheap. Also, everyone who uses a free “friend” always ends up regretting it, because guess what, it’s not as easy as it looks. I have a regular job too, because of all the free work needing to be done

Comebacks for photographers:
- You can use the photos you shoot for us for your portfolio. A: My portfolio is packed with great shots, which is why you chose me.

- This is a charity event, you can use it as a tax writeoff. A: What a coincidence, I’m trying to raise funds myself.

- We’ll be able to pay you in lots of free samples of our product. A: If you were a bank, I would consider your offer.

- We’re looking for an intern that will carry lights, retouch the photos, and work the camera. A: Bwahahahahehahahawhwhwaaaaahaaaaaa!!!

EVERYTHING is a charity case these days. My new years resolution: I don’t work for free. Accountants don’t work for free, Retail associates don’t work for free, Tax preparers don’t work for free.. Photographers don’t either!

My favorite lines have been:
“I just need a CD, that costs like 25 cents.”
“But I can print wallets at Walgreens for 10 cents each..”
“So, I know we haven’t seen each other since high school.. I am getting married, and I’d LOVE for you to come to the wedding. I know you take pictures, so you being our photographer could be your present to us!” (Which, I told her I don’t give that expensive of gifts.. I was NOT invited to the wedding.)

Also – I love that because my clients know I work out of my home, 95% of them show up LATE. Like, an hour late. Clearly I have nothing better to do than sit at my house and wait for people to show up. GRRRR

Well, with the rise of digital, there’s the demise of at least one excuse that was used on me more than once: “Well, we’ll pay you for the film!”

Haha. The best one I’ve had is: “We changed of drummer so we don’t see the point of having photos with the former drummer now”. They made me come to the gig, I had to pay for the bus to get there too. I reminded them many many times…. Never got paid. I precise…. It was like £30, just for a small gig in a pub so it was cheap… Especially split between 5 mucisians.

I was once asked (actually, it’s been more than once) to photograph bands at gigs for free. I always ask whether they will come to MY party and play for free. Cue stony silence.

Here’s a stunner I got recently. I had a client cancel because they couldn’t afford the session, I’m still learning and in a rural area so my fees are very reasonable. Got the, “we’re just going to have my sister take out pictures.” Ok, good luck and have a nice day. Couple days later, “we got our pictures on a cd and we were wondering if you could photoshop them for us? That wouldn’t cost much right? It’s just computer stuff.” So you want me to take someone elses poor photos, fix them, give them back, and not charge much after you gave me the shaft? Yeah, I’ll get right on that.

Them: “The photog down the street only charges $xxx.xx amount. Can you match that price?”
Me:”Oh, well why don’t you hire that photog?”
Them:”They have only been in the business for a couple years and we like your work better.”
Duh.

Wow…how’s this for timeliness? My initial emails to this client regarding what exactly I do and what exactly they would receive was explicitly clear. Now, I receive this email from the client!

“I guess I miss understood this process.

I did not know we needed to pay to get our photo’s off of EventPix and was under the impression we would receive a dvd of our photos with the $150 we gave you.

I don’t understand why we paid $150 for photos we do not have access to print or own? The mark up on EventPix and for you to burn a dvd is absolutely ridicules. Digital storage space is dirt cheap these days, we need to find a different way to get us OUR pictures at a way cheaper price. You can’t charge someone $150 to take their photos then more than double that price to give them access to print their photos. What is the purpose of having photos taken if you can’t print them? Can you email us just the jpegs of a select few photos or I can set up an ftp site for you to download them.

Let me know if you have any ideas but we need to work this out, this is an unacceptable price add on to photos we paid for.”

Uh…

After working exclusively for an event for 4 years I was called in to go over my contract. There was a lot of discussion about my fees and “other photographers lined up to take my job.” In the end they stuck with me…

Until the next year. Half way through the event my contact at the event pulled me aside and told me that the higher ups had decided to not bring me back that year. I had already worked half the event and they didn’t have the decency to call me and tell me that they were replacing me. Then I found out why.

The woman they hired was “working for free” in exchange for being allowed to sell the images online.

In the end I had the last laugh. Apparently, the other woman’s work was complete crap as they continued to use my images for the next few years in all their advertising, program books and such – until the event had to close it’s doors due to being financially unsustainable.

They attempted to put on a smaller event. The posters were snapshots, supposedly taken by the other photographer. The large banner behind the stage was made from cut outs of images that I had taken years earlier.

After 25 years working in photography, I’ve heard so many excuses for rebates, discounts and people saying whatever to avoid pay photos or processing. People don´t appreciate our work, or don´t consider photography as a serious work, and digital processing made it worst. I found out being ask for ID pictures with retouch!!!!! They showed up wearing T-shirts looking like they just woke up and expecting me to deliver them a photo in a nice suit with a great matching tie, a perfect hair do and even good shave!!!! and a quick service with no extra charge. Or senior ladies wanting to look 10-20 years younger or slim in all their vacation pics, and asking for extra discount because they´re printing a lot.

I heard all of those and many, many more.

“It will be good for your portfolio.” If my portfolio is so bad, why are you asking me to shoot for you?

“It’s a tax write off.” You don’t know didley about finances, do you? Give me a dollar. Ok, now here’s a quarter for you. That’s the equivalent of a tax write off.

“You’ll do it for that price or you’ll never work in this town again.” Well, no other photographers will work for you, and they’re all surviving, so I guess I can, too.

“But the account executive told the client that the whole job would just cost $5000.” Well, the account exec can pay the remaining $10,000 then, can’t he?

“If you give us a break on this first job, we’ll pay you full rate on the next.” No, I’ll give you a break on price on the second job–if there is a second job–if you pay me full rate on this one. (Thanks to 1970′s NYC photographer Al Satterwhite for that one).

“But the art director told us you quoted $21,000 for the job, not $36,000, and that’s what we told the client.” I didn’t tell the art director $21,000, and why is he on vacation this week?

“I know these budgets are tight. We all feel it.” Then why is your house worth five times what mine is?

“I’ve decided to award you this pro bono shoot.” You’re AWARDING me a freebie? Gee, thanks.

“This invoice is much higher than your estimate.” My estimate didn’t include $2000 in additional model fees, an extra day of shooting, and a buffet lunch for 20.

There’s much more. Thirty years worth.

One of my favorite cartoons from years back showed a guy sitting on a bed in a prison cell, holding a trophy. The caption read, “Who ever thought you could win a CLEO award for murdering the client?”

Sure you can download the pics from my CF card!

Over my dead body!

I really like the shots you took of us, could you send me a large print to hang in my office?

(stunned silence)… followed by “sure, if you will send a check to cover printing, photoshopping, compositioning, photographing, time, travel, meals, hotels, training, equipment wear and tear, replacement of damaged equipment and the assistant fee!

I’m afraid I can’t distill this one into a quip, so it’s an anecdote.

I was a photographer in Milwaukee.
My rep was regularly in NYC, as some art directors had asked to see her and see my book. At one big ad agency, the art buyer sniffed, “why would my art directors ever want to travel to…Milwaukee?”

My rep just said, deadpan, “Because they like my photographer’s work.”

I’ve seen some real garbage work out of NYC. Not everyone is a superstar just because they have a zip cod that starts with “1″.

In regards to a retouching request:
“I could do it myself in about 20 mins if I had the right equipment so……”

Well bully for you. This is what I charge…. Not sure how you know you can do it if you don’t have the equipment…..

Last year I did a western governors conference and shot the speakers, who I gave my business card to in case their company needed a photo of him/her. A manager of a gigantic international corporation with billions of annual revenue contacted me asking for an image of their employee for their blog — for free. I quoted him a price instead. He declined but not because of the price. That wasn’t the issue. He didn’t want the hassle of having to do the paperwork to get me paid; thus the free approach.

While we’re on this here are two must-see videos:

http://bit.ly/lZQYmh

http://bit.ly/lsDnW7

Answer: I can go bankrupt all by myself, I don’t need your help.

Once a girl from a Thai temple invited me for their prayer Ceremony (after seeing my camera). then she added ” prehaps you can practice ur photography skills by taking pictures of the event.”

How come none of the truly great photographers get this?

It’s my experience that photographers in general are poor at the most important skill in putting bread on the table – selling. Too many over sensitive and emotionally immature types. It’s all me, me, me

Seeing how much some here make off photography makes me want to cry with my 1d mark 2, 50mm 1.8 and 3 manual focus lenses.
I had hoped to afford a used 28mm 2.8 this month but i have to wait until next month because amateurs can not do photography for cash in my country and being unemployed hits the camera budget hard.

One of my favorites: 
I sold one of my prints at an art show.  A year later I was going through a music website and saw the print as the album cover for a band.  I contacted the band and asked them to remove my image from their website as they have neither permission nor had they paid to use the image and in addition the scanned version of my image was of inferior quality.  The guy who purchased the print wrote me back and said I purchased the print at your art show so the image now belongs to me, and I can use it however I want.  What are you going to do about it?  If you want it to look better send me the jpeg. I had my attorney contact them.  They’re manager called my attorney back and said we have already used the image to print the CD’s and the CD cases so we can’t stop using it now.  The band member who bought the print form me told everyone he shot it and should the rest of the band really suffer because the lead singer is a jerk?  My attorney responded that they could keep the image if they licensed all use of their music to me.  The manager responded how is that fair it’s the bands art why should they share it with some photographer?  My attorney suggest they consult council they’re going to need it.  

that last one…. holy shit

This is full of so many true experiences. I’ve been a professional photographer for 25 years and it is just so difficult to get people to see what quality looks like. And why you have to pay for the eye, the vision, not the guy/girl with the camera.

I just started a blog called Say No To No Pay. (http://saynotonopay.com) – Trying to spread the word and post enough examples to make an awareness to businesses.

And I reposted this post. So, thanks!

But I only want a picture of the stingrays that you already took