what qualifications do you need to be classified as a professional photographer?

Question

do you need a ba?
a levels?gcse's?

Answer 1

just call yourself one-thats it*

*however study and learning are the key, its one thing talking another doing, if you are good people will pay you, rehire and recommend you if you not you will go broke


a

Answer 2

In photography you do not have to go to formal school and have a degree to be a photographer. But you have to be able to produce good images if being hired to do a wedding, portraits or something for an advertising agency. The tax guys (USA) if 50% of your income comes from something you do.

A professional can reproduce an image again, most amatures can not since they mostly point and shoot and do not know how they got it. (Yes, this just made a few non professionals mad but it is the truth).

1. You should learn the technical aspects of photography and your camera (composition, shutter speed, depth of field etc), once you understand these you will be able to create better
images.

2. Shoot in "M" (manual mode) because you will have more control over your camera and not the other way around. When you are in one of the "Auto" modes the camera will just read the highlights and shadow areas and try to get you a picture. The camera is not smart enough to know what you are shooting.

3. You can start reading all kinds of books on this subject and get information from the internet. This includes web based classes, manufactures web sites to personal blogs.

4. Buy the best DSLR camera that you can afford this also includes good lenses. Take out your camera and manual sit down and go over all the buttons and knobs etc.. this is the best way for you to learn what your camera can do.

5. Start shooting with your camera to get practice and from what you are learning from reading and doing you will get better. Practice does make perfect. Take notes while shooting and then look at your photos on the computer find the best one from that set and see what you did to get the shot.

6. You can get yourself a job as a photographers assistant (be it payed or free) and learn from that person.

7. My suggestion is to find a part of photography that you would have an interest in and point in that direction.

Hope that helps,
Kevin

Answer 3

You don't really need any qualifications to be a photographer. It's not a job of responsibility like that of say a doctor or a pilot or a barrister. The problem is that the photographic industry is a lot more competitive these days. It's easier to become a photographer, which makes it harder to become successful. There are a lot of people going for few photography jobs, and often it's easier to simply create your own. For that you need to be a shrewd businessperson, and have plenty of capital to weather the first year or two before you start turning a profit. Realistically you need to be versatile and a quick learner, there are all sorts of things that aren't related to learn. Accountants, and lawyers are expensive, having your own knowledge helps there. Business and marketing is essential to know for yourself. It even helps to understand politics and history, as it forms a conversation topic with clients, or models and it helps to give direction to your work. Biology, anatomy and anthropology is important if you want anything to do with wildlife, or people, and geography, geology and physics are useful for outdoors photography. And art history is always useful knowledge to have. You see there is no SINGLE subject that you need to know. The most important thing is learning to learn, something that only the top universities seem to do. At Oxbridge, Imperial, UCL, or LSE what you get is told go learn this, you don't get spoon fed, it's down to you and your colleagues to help yourselves, you soon develop habits of just picking up knowledge. It's important you go to a good uni. A good uni also gets you into a good career which in 10 years time you'll have enough capital to invest into a photography business.

Answer 4

you don't have to have a certain degree or anything. just get a lot of field practice and make sure you know a lot of the technical stuff-lighting, equipment, etc. But you can always become certified by the ppa- http://www.ppa.com/i4a/pages/index.cfm?pageid=14 -most people don't really know what it means unless they're in the field, but it's pretty much something you can just show off to them.
Christen

Answer 5

If you are calling someone a professional that person is talented and getting paid for their work.

Answer 6

Technically, you're considered a professional if whatever you are doing brings in at least 20% of your overall income.

I read that somewhere.

Answer 7

To be a professional anything, you must be paid for what you do. That's it. If you've sold one print, you're a professional. Of course being good at what you do will afford you a better living.