Do you sell your pictures?

My Mum's an artist and does quite a few craft fairs and the like all through summer. I frame and canvas mine up and she sells them for me.
 
I watched Junior Apprentice the other day and a guy was selling his landscapes for £500 each :eek:. They were good but I've seen similar if not better quality work by people on here, some of you guys could be making a killing.
 
I don't at the moment, but I've got the whole summer holiday ahead of me now, and would be interested in maybe selling a few. Gives me a good incentive to go out of my way to take new ones as well. Anyone got any ideas about where I could start doing something like this?
 
jr1104 said:
I don't at the moment, but I've got the whole summer holiday ahead of me now, and would be interested in maybe selling a few. Gives me a good incentive to go out of my way to take new ones as well. Anyone got any ideas about where I could start doing something like this?
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Shooting what? ;)
 
jr1104 said:
Landscapes mostly. I'll be living in the Lake District, so plenty of places to explore.
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Whist the Lake District is beautiful, I think the place is saturated with landscape photographers now, all producing excellent but 'samey' type shots.

You don't need a place like that necessarily to get shots that will sell. In fact, I think there is a market for stuff that isn't instantly recognisable as a lot of the Lakes landscape is, folks like a bit of individuality sometimes.

Either that, or you could approach photographing that area in a different style or going well off the beaten track and visualising places that general tourists don't get to.

I'm not saying pictures from the Lakes don't sell, they do, but you'll be competing with some very established and competent photographers who are in the market place already.

As for selling them, actually getting your target audience/buyers to see your work is the first big hurdle. I think websites work better for established 'name' photographers, but I know a couple of photographers who have setup local one day exhibitions in village/town halls or other public space featuring photographs of the local area. If that area is a tourist one, it's surprising how many folks you see walking out with a 20" canvas under their arm!

It's mainly about having a body of work to sell though first of course, and I'm not sure how you'd go about selling a handful of good shots, other than through the photo agency channels, if they'll accept them.

Good luck whatever you do anyway! :)
 
Cheers, thanks for the help. There are quite a few cafes and pubs around which have photos on the wall for sale, so approaching them might be an idea.
 
The_Abyss said:
My Mum's an artist and does quite a few craft fairs and the like all through summer. I frame and canvas mine up and she sells them for me.
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At what sort of size and price? :)

I'm thinking of doing a bit of this this summer too.

Alongside that (well that along side this) I've set up my website for sales and am going to get some shots mounted in some "higher class" establishments, alongside a brochure in each, and see if I can get rid of any...
 
It depends on the location where I'm selling to be honest. Dunwich, Snape and Aldeburgh, all coastal or near coastal towns do very well and hold a high price. Most of the buyers are from London, looking for something for their second home or something to take back to remind them of their holiday place. As long as the subject is local to those areas, I can normally get anywhere from £30 to over £100 for a larger canvas. The higher value ones are the exception rather than the rule though, and on average I tend to find I double my money on the cost. There are always few that don't sell, and I end up letting these go for cost or below at the end of the season.

If I get enough decent stock (I reckon I need around 25 to 30 really good shots) I'm considering hiring out one of the local studios for a week next summer or during one of the half terms. They go for between £400 and £600 for the week, but the commission rates are quite low - 20% and they're always busy. It would take a big outlay in printing and framing in advance though - just need to get off my butt and get to it :D
 
I do but generally it's either people taking a fancy to a particular shot or specific requests for images, I shot the brochure photos for a friends travel company a while back, a week away produced about 2700 images from which about 300 were good enough to hand over and maybe 130 were used I think. Got my expenses dealt with and a reasonable amount of cash (I'd have done it for expenses to be honest, it was a fun week's holiday for me) and gave them all rights to the images in return.
 
bigredshark said:
I do but generally it's either people taking a fancy to a particular shot or specific requests for images, I shot the brochure photos for a friends travel company a while back, a week away produced about 2700 images from which about 300 were good enough to hand over and maybe 130 were used I think. Got my expenses dealt with and a reasonable amount of cash (I'd have done it for expenses to be honest, it was a fun week's holiday for me) and gave them all rights to the images in return.
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What camera did you use?
 
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