Cost of Professional Photographs

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What are people paying for professional pics these days?

I did a charity ride at the weekend and was shocked that the cheapest photo price was higher than the ride entry! What do people think is reasonable for a standard size pro pic? Am I being tight thinking over a tenner is too much?

Thanks
 
Personally I think over £10 is pretty steep too! I was out hunting Sunday and have the choice between two photos from different photographers. One is £13.50 for a 7" x 5", the other is £10 for the same, or £8 for a high res digital image. Think I know who I'm going with!
 
my favourite local event photographers charge £7 for a 5x7 and £12.50 for A4 or £5 for just the digital image, but that is also supplied free with any purchased print. I think this is ok, especially compared to other local ones who charge anything from £12-£20. But I would buy twice as many photos if the price for one was nearer £5, anything over £10 is a bit much particularly if the picture isn't all that special.
 
If the pics are under £10 I will invariably buy two. If they're more than that they have to be amazing for me to buy one at all and I certainly wouldn't get two!
 
I think I did a similar thread a while back. Most of ours seem to be around £12 - £15 at the least and that puts me off buying. I do wonder if they were cheaper if they would sell more so actually make more.
 
Captain Bridget said:
Personally I think over £10 is pretty steep too! I was out hunting Sunday and have the choice between two photos from different photographers. One is £13.50 for a 7" x 5", the other is £10 for the same, or £8 for a high res digital image. Think I know who I'm going with!
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As a photographer (not horsey), you guys all have to remember you're not just paying for the image - you're paying to help cover that persons travel to/from the event and spend all day there (most photographers aren't paid to be there), the equipment which is very expensive!!, insurance, training that photographer has had, time for the person to edit the photos (with expensive software) and then get them printed. £10 is not expensive for a print. £8 is actually IMO too cheap for digital, the digital images should be more expensive than the prints since you can make as many copies of that as you like. Please remember its not just some random person clicking on a cheapo camera with no overheads that you're buying from!

I don't intend to get into horse event photography as its just too difficult for the very reason that it takes an entire day in often horrid weather and horsey folk still won't pay much at the end of it! If you think an image is £10, that photographer will need to sell a lot of images to cover their days work...
 
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I don't mind paying the prices as long as the images are good. There is a company who cover a lot of events local to me and they always take fantastic photos, and will often do a deal if you buy more than one. Most photographers I've seen charge more for digital images because you can make copies, which you can't with prints. Happy to pay £10-£12 for a print, but I don't buy many as they need to be good for that. I went to an event last year where the photographer was charging around that price, but the photos were AWFUL. Every horse had been caught either at the second before they leave the ground in front of a jump, or just as they'd gone over it. Really, really bad photos, and they wondered why no one bought any. They took about 15 pics of me and my horse, not a single one was at the right moment, I refuse to pay £10 for an image taken too early or too late, I can get my sister to take pics like that for free ;)
 
MagicMelon said:
As a photographer (not horsey), you guys all have to remember you're not just paying for the image - you're paying to help cover that persons travel to/from the event and spend all day there (most photographers aren't paid to be there), the equipment which is very expensive!!, insurance, training that photographer has had, time for the person to edit the photos (with expensive software) and then get them printed. £10 is not expensive for a print. £8 is actually IMO too cheap for digital, the digital images should be more expensive than the prints since you can make as many copies of that as you like. Please remember its not just some random person clicking on a cheapo camera with no overheads that you're buying from!

I don't intend to get into horse event photography as its just too difficult for the very reason that it takes an entire day in often horrid weather and horsey folk still won't pay much at the end of it! If you think an image is £10, that photographer will need to sell a lot of images to cover their days work...
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Given that you arent just paying for the image you buy, but also the time to take all the ones you don't buy, I often wonder why there aren't better multi-buy discounts - surely once you have taken the photographs, you want to get as much money from them as you can - the overall profit being more important than the profit per print sold?
 
MagicMelon said:
As a photographer (not horsey), you guys all have to remember you're not just paying for the image - you're paying to help cover that persons travel to/from the event and spend all day there (most photographers aren't paid to be there), the equipment which is very expensive!!, insurance, training that photographer has had, time for the person to edit the photos (with expensive software) and then get them printed. £10 is not expensive for a print. £8 is actually IMO too cheap for digital, the digital images should be more expensive than the prints since you can make as many copies of that as you like. Please remember its not just some random person clicking on a cheapo camera with no overheads that you're buying from!

I don't intend to get into horse event photography as its just too difficult for the very reason that it takes an entire day in often horrid weather and horsey folk still won't pay much at the end of it! If you think an image is £10, that photographer will need to sell a lot of images to cover their days work...
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Although I do appreciate the time, skill, effort, etc, that goes into event photography, this makes it sound like the photographer is doing competitors a favour by being at the event! At the end of the day it's a business and, as another poster has said, it's about making a profit overall for the event. The higher the prices, the less pictures that are likely to be sold, so the prices go up for the next event, less photos are sold again. A vicious circle!

Remember how much it's cost each competitor to be at the event - day to day care of the horse, training, tack, clothing, entry fees, start fees, diesel, cost of keeping the lorry/car/trailer on the road..... Another £15 or so per photo is not that easy to justify at every event!
 
Just checked the prices at the last show I went to and it starts at £17 for a 6x8 image, which is interesting as it was £20 last time I looked on the site, and a low reg digital image is £20.
I think they were slightly cheaper on the day but I was mucking out my boxes and getting ready to load up for a long journey home and forgot to go and do it.

I would *maybe* buy one or one each at that price, possibly none. Another show with cheaper prices in the summer, I bought about 3 beautiful images of each horse.


chestnut cob said:
I don't mind paying the prices as long as the images are good. There is a company who cover a lot of events local to me and they always take fantastic photos, and will often do a deal if you buy more than one. Most photographers I've seen charge more for digital images because you can make copies, which you can't with prints. Happy to pay £10-£12 for a print, but I don't buy many as they need to be good for that. I went to an event last year where the photographer was charging around that price, but the photos were AWFUL. Every horse had been caught either at the second before they leave the ground in front of a jump, or just as they'd gone over it. Really, really bad photos, and they wondered why no one bought any. They took about 15 pics of me and my horse, not a single one was at the right moment, I refuse to pay £10 for an image taken too early or too late, I can get my sister to take pics like that for free ;)
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Yes, I was disappointed first time I took one of mine to BEF futurity, with the best will in the world, money in my pocket, and an enthusiastic owner, there still wsnt a single picture that was worth buying. And this is an event I really wanted a pro pic of. They were so bad though, in case it was my horse being unphotogenic I looked at most of the horses and all the pictures were dire. Supposedly an equine photographer too. I've never bothered looking at the pics since as it's no longer important to me to have one anyway.
 
Interesting, as my son is a photographer who's just
starting out, he also does video, very handy when I'm competing. What would you consider a good price for video and photos given on a usb stick, not printed only digital image?
 
I always buy a digital image and then I can do what I like with them. One of the photographers that I regularly use charges £3.50 per image, the other charges £1.50. This works out brilliantly as I can buy a few images an not have to find somewhere to display them. They are stored on my laptop, used on FB and forums and I can print them as photos, onto canvas or anything else if I decide to.
 
The last event I went to, I bought 6 images (high resolution) on a CD at £5 an image. It was a special event, we had done quite well and the photos were really good so I was happy to pay that. The photographer also advised that if they were bought on digital format, you were allowed to post them on the Internet (i.e Facebook etc) to share with friends.

Then, without me knowing, my husband had them all printed (large) and put into a multi-photo picture frame as an anniversary present which looked lovely! I totally believe they were money well spent.

I have also been to the same event two years previous where a different photographer was used. Her prints start from £15 each (7"x5"), and high resolution digital prints were 4 times the price (£20 each!) with no discount for multi purchases. I didn't buy any of hers.

I totally understand a photographer has a significant amount to spend on start-up costs, as does any self-employed businessman/woman. However, once you have the equipment, your expenses are time, fuel costs and insurance. I totally believe that if they were a bit cheaper, more would be sold. If they were a standard £5 for a digital image, I'd buy one at every show I went to.
 
Nicky44 said:
Interesting, as my son is a photographer who's just
starting out, he also does video, very handy when I'm competing. What would you consider a good price for video and photos given on a usb stick, not printed only digital image?
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If he's just starting out, my top tip would be for him to get into wedding photography (what our company does) as its a big earner ;) You're out all day same as with a horse event, but you get to go to pretty mansion houses to deal with really happy people (generally!), get a nice 3 course dinner for free (normally) and then get paid a £1k - £5k for it. Baby photography that I specialise in is also a good earner, people pay lots for their baby memories ;) I think its very tough to be a horse event photographer but if he has the video then that'd probably be pretty popular (but he'd need several manned cameras up in places round a XC course?). We also do some video in one of our packages and present it mixed in with music and photographs - could be a unique selling point?
 
Last month I paid £6 for a low resolution digital file. never again. It's crap! can hardly make it out and good for nothing :( i'd expect to pay £2 for something of that quality and £6 for a high resolution. I won't be doing that again.
 
I went to a training event where the photographer did a deal, 15 quid and a disk full of photos ! I have ended up with over 250 of me and the ned absolute fantastic value, really good idea !
 
I'll add a different side to this conversation. I am an event photographer in the south west. I cover riding club, pony club level, local agricultural shows, a few qualifier shows for bigger comps... you get the picture (ha, excuse the pun!). I am just entering my 3rd season covering events (after many many years freelancing).

Onsite I charge £12 per mounted 9x6 print, 3 for £26, 6 for £45. Website prices for unmounted 9x6 £12, 7x5 £8.50, 12x8 £16.50 all plus postage, low res digital file £4 each. This is my revised price list, a slight increase from last year but we have done a winter with this price structure and not one person has complained about the price of prints.

I'll explain my outgoings for a show, and you may understand why print prices are 'high' (I don't think they are, but some of you seem to think cheap is good).
- Insurance, camera/printer equipment (cost to purchase and wear and tear), trailer equipment, staff wages, media, mounts, fuel for car, fuel for generator, payment to be at show ranging from sponsoring a class to a fee to attend, lunch. All of those things need to be paid before I even take a penny from the business for the day. My camera equipment cost in the region of £2500 and it's not top of the range, my printer was £1000 and every time I buy media it's a 3 figure bill, generator £400, sales trailer etcetc... Event photography is not cheap and requires a huge amount of financial input before you even get going.

You may all say to sell them cheap at a fiver a print, but that means more work for my sales staff to essentially turn out the same profit- my cost per print is still the same regardless of what I charge. I won't devalue my product. There will always be 'photographers' who sell them cheap and cheerful for £3 a 9x6 print, they don't stay in business very long.

We have a very loyal, regular client base and our diary is nearly fully booked from April-September despite this being only my 3rd season running under my own name. I don't think my prices are expensive, they aren't cheap either, but we never have a show not worth going to and our diary as I said is fully booked this year- we must be doing something right! But I won't cover a show unless I know I can cover it well, and I have high standards- having worked with other photographers at Hickstead, county shows, BE events I have had fantastic experience in the event photography world before setting up on my own, their high standards have rubbed off on me and I expect that of all my photographers too.

If you all think our prices are too expensive, please try a day in our shoes! First to get to an event, last to leave, working in all weathers, no breaks, on your feet all day. Then you get home and have to upload all the photos to your website whilst unpacking the trailer/car, cooking dinner, answering the emails asking why the pics aren't online yet... It's not as glamourous as it seems!
 
Twizzel said:
I'll add a different side to this conversation. I am an event photographer in the south west. I cover riding club, pony club level, local agricultural shows, a few qualifier shows for bigger comps... you get the picture (ha, excuse the pun!). I am just entering my 3rd season covering events (after many many years freelancing).

Onsite I charge £12 per mounted 9x6 print, 3 for £26, 6 for £45. Website prices for unmounted 9x6 £12, 7x5 £8.50, 12x8 £16.50 all plus postage, low res digital file £4 each. This is my revised price list, a slight increase from last year but we have done a winter with this price structure and not one person has complained about the price of prints.

I'll explain my outgoings for a show, and you may understand why print prices are 'high' (I don't think they are, but some of you seem to think cheap is good).
- Insurance, camera/printer equipment (cost to purchase and wear and tear), trailer equipment, staff wages, media, mounts, fuel for car, fuel for generator, payment to be at show ranging from sponsoring a class to a fee to attend, lunch. All of those things need to be paid before I even take a penny from the business for the day. My camera equipment cost in the region of £2500 and it's not top of the range, my printer was £1000 and every time I buy media it's a 3 figure bill, generator £400, sales trailer etcetc... Event photography is not cheap and requires a huge amount of financial input before you even get going.

You may all say to sell them cheap at a fiver a print, but that means more work for my sales staff to essentially turn out the same profit- my cost per print is still the same regardless of what I charge. I won't devalue my product. There will always be 'photographers' who sell them cheap and cheerful for £3 a 9x6 print, they don't stay in business very long.

We have a very loyal, regular client base and our diary is nearly fully booked from April-September despite this being only my 3rd season running under my own name. I don't think my prices are expensive, they aren't cheap either, but we never have a show not worth going to and our diary as I said is fully booked this year- we must be doing something right! But I won't cover a show unless I know I can cover it well, and I have high standards- having worked with other photographers at Hickstead, county shows, BE events I have had fantastic experience in the event photography world before setting up on my own, their high standards have rubbed off on me and I expect that of all my photographers too.

If you all think our prices are too expensive, please try a day in our shoes! First to get to an event, last to leave, working in all weathers, no breaks, on your feet all day. Then you get home and have to upload all the photos to your website whilst unpacking the trailer/car, cooking dinner, answering the emails asking why the pics aren't online yet... It's not as glamourous as it seems!
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And reading this I feel even more humbled because Twizzle takes a wicked photo. Really, I don't see why people would grumble about such prices, IMO is pennies to pay for someone capturing some beautiful memories for you.

Twizzle, I'd pay far more than you charge for these lovely memories xx

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If I can get a 7x5 for a tenner or less I'm happy, if jpegs are a fiver or less I will buy a few (and buy pics that I would not deem good enough to have as a print). Any more than that and I give them a miss. I totally understand the costs involved, my husband is also self employed and I have to do his books, but some of us have a budget to work to and sometimes it's a squeeze to get to a comp at all, let alone shelling out on pics as well.
 
Thanks everyone for the replies. Maybe the ride was "too cheap" but it doesn't sit right with me for the photographer to earn more out of it from me than the charity or ride organisation, and the entry being good value would be largely why there were lots of people to photograph.
 
It's up to the organisers what they charge for entry though. We often have to pay a fee to be there or even a percentage of what we take on the day. My prints are more expensive than an unaff show jumping round but never have any complaints, what I charge and what the organisation charges are totally separate entities.

I always find it interesting how many people are happy to pay for food from the caterers and neves take lunch with them, yet aren't as forthcoming when buying photos. But then we always take packed lunch to events ;) also how many people expect a photographer to be there and moan when there isn't one, but never buy photos...
 
We are very lucky with our normal ride photographers as they are reasonably priced, they often do offers, they take ruddy good pics, and they also support us as they let us use their pics in our publicity (so the ride does get something out of it too).

From a personal point of view, I do take a few pics at rides myself for publicity purposes, so I do have an understanding of where ride photographers are coming from, but likewise I have an understanding of when they are taking the pee...

I saw some really excellent ride pics from a guy I hadn't heard of just recently - they were gallopy ones in a wood and he'd got everything blurred apart from the body/head of the horse. Such a sense of speed with the exact right amount of focus where it counted. I know how hard it is to do that kind of pic (I managed it once, by accident, and the guy taking my photo class was really impressed) so to hit the mark again and again and again, well done that photographer. I would pay over the odds for a pic like that.

I also want the photographer to have considered the background. If I'm at a ride I want to be reminded of the ride, not just a hedge that could have been anywhere....

I've come across 'lazy snappers' at shows, too. You can tell the ones that understand horses and how they move, and which have just unthinkingly stuck their camera on 'sports'... We did a few big shows with our youngsters and I didn't buy any of the official pics because to be quite honest our amateur ones we'd taken from the edge of the ring were better. Felix was reserve champion Arab at Hambleton and the official photographer didn't take a single pic of him (unless you count a pic of his bum behind another horse as a pic of him) - took loads of all the others but none of him.
 
Since I have had my horse I haven't had a single pro photo taken of her at a show or hunt where a pro photographer has been there :-(

I bought a couple years ago when I was riding other horses but would love a nice one of my girl.
 
EstherYoung said:
I also want the photographer to have considered the background. If I'm at a ride I want to be reminded of the ride, not just a hedge that could have been anywhere....
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Agree with this, you can tell the more "amateur" type pro photographers as they'll set themselves up at a really boring jump on the XC course for example, when really they would get a lot more sales from being at the scariest jump on the course as this is what we all want photos of ourselves doing! But at the same time, a lot has to to do with decent light as well so sometimes the scariest jump is in a dark bit of wood or something so not ideal. A proper photographer wouldn't miss special photos like Champion ones for example but they may have been elsewhere, depends if they're on their own.

Re the photographer who charged £15 for a disk with 250 photos on it, well he won't be in business long!
 
MagicMelon said:
Agree with this, you can tell the more "amateur" type pro photographers as they'll set themselves up at a really boring jump on the XC course for example, when really they would get a lot more sales from being at the scariest jump on the course as this is what we all want photos of ourselves doing! But at the same time, a lot has to to do with decent light as well so sometimes the scariest jump is in a dark bit of wood or something so not ideal. A proper photographer wouldn't miss special photos like Champion ones for example but they may have been elsewhere, depends if they're on their own.

Re the photographer who charged £15 for a disk with 250 photos on it, well he won't be in business long!
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Yes agreed, £15 on a disc is too cheap, way too cheap. And were those 250 photos of any decent quality? Because without being rude even we don't produce 250 photos of every horse, a rediculous number of images.

The problem with XC especially unaffiliated is you need to get everyone. I always put a photographer on the 2nd or 3rd jump- it may not be the scariest or biggest but you need to account for those that will also get eliminated, if you've got them going over a very early jump then they will at least have photos from 1 fence.

Light can be an issue as can backgrounds, clean backgrounds can be hard to come across. You may have the most fantastic big jump but if the sunlight is in the wrong place it won't work. Hard one trying to please everyone! R.e championships in showing, missing one is a big no no like magicmelon says and any event photographer should always cover the championships- if they are off in another ring then they should have more staff ;)
 
MagicMelon said:
Agree with this, you can tell the more "amateur" type pro photographers as they'll set themselves up at a really boring jump on the XC course for example, when really they would get a lot more sales from being at the scariest jump on the course as this is what we all want photos of ourselves doing! But at the same time, a lot has to to do with decent light as well so sometimes the scariest jump is in a dark bit of wood or something so not ideal. A proper photographer wouldn't miss special photos like Champion ones for example but they may have been elsewhere, depends if they're on their own.

Re the photographer who charged £15 for a disk with 250 photos on it, well he won't be in business long!
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I think a few photographers have said that the problem with scary fences or more difficult fences is that they may not be jumped very well so the picture would look rubbish and so is not bought!

Re photographers costs, a good camera will cost £1,000 ( I know people using more expensive ones but your'll get decent images from around the £1,000 mark. Then you will need computers and software probably another £1,000 and then your trade stand. £££? However these are one off sunk costs and every business has set up cost. The day to day running costs are simply fuel, ink and photographic paper, mounts, CDs, USBs etc So actually the running cost of a business is very low. At a BE event or the average small to mid sized show, fun ride etc you get 200 competitors and the bigger shows a lot more so at £10 an image your on £2,000 a day. So your running costs are covered and your into profit or recouping your set up costs a lot quicker than most businesses!!! I appreciate not everyone buys a photo but some will buy two or three.

At the big events like badminton I saw more spectators buying images than riders aswell. Also don't forget the photos can be sold to magazines at a much higher rate and riders sponsors also pay really well for them! More like £50 an image.

Also if you have the gear their is no reason just to specialise in horses! Can do weddings etc when you don't have events to go to. It's clearly a viable business as there are so many photographers.

Last time I purchased images I got 2 standard size in mounts for £18 which I was really pleased with. If it's too expensive I don't bother!
 
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