Fees for use of photo

Bearmann wrote:I was just curious. Has anyone ever traded a photo to a newspaper or magazine for some free advertising? I don't mean a photo credit, but an actual ad placed by the photographer?

I supplied a cover to a magazine free of charge (no budget, etc. etc.). In exchange they gave me full credit, logo, address and phone numbers on the cover, plus a full page inside ad. Turned out to be one of the most profitable images, in terms of coverage I ever "sold."

Bob

If anyone has illusions of being a highly paid magazine photographer---

I was just reading in another forum about a guy who sold an image to EOS magazine. The inside photo (p. 51) netted him roughly $35.

Dick Ginkowski wrote:If anyone has illusions of being a highly paid magazine photographer---

I was just reading in another forum about a guy who sold an image to EOS magazine. The inside photo (p. 51) netted him roughly $35.

Like I said a while back in this thread"welcome to the world of professional photography" . This is a major factor I took into account and all I can hope for personally is that I can string enough work together to make a passion worthwhile. Of course I'm also hoping that once a relationship is established with my clients I can explain the facts of life about the cost of living. I've done that in other businesses that I've owned. I do have one Golden Rule though: NOTHING FOR FREE! (Or next to free).

Robert Ludwick wrote:

Bearmann wrote:I was just curious. Has anyone ever traded a photo to a newspaper or magazine for some free advertising? I don't mean a photo credit, but an actual ad placed by the photographer?

I supplied a cover to a magazine free of charge (no budget, etc. etc.). In exchange they gave me full credit, logo, address and phone numbers on the cover, plus a full page inside ad. Turned out to be one of the most profitable images, in terms of coverage I ever "sold."

Bob

Bob,
Sounds like you bartered a good arrangement. I don't know what an ad in the publication would go for but a full page ad in pretty much any magazine would probably cost more than most will pay for image use. Glad it worked out for you!

Dennis, great topic, and glad to see that you handled it like you did.

• Posted by Ron Niebrugge
  
  If you want to support your Parks (I do), why not donate money? By the way, money donations are tax deductible. Or better yet, why not sell the images to the Park Association at market value, and then donate the resulting proceeds back to your favorite park - the result is the same, plus you maintain photography values and get tax deduction!

This is a pretty interesting idea. Something to consider is that for people who file a Schedule C for their work in photography but do not itemize deductions on Schedule A can only claim the revenue, not the offsetting expense of the donation.

Also, for anyone filing Schedule C with positive net income, the revenues are additionally taxed for self-employment income. So where it would appear the two transactions would effectively cancel each other out (deduction offsets the revenue for zero taxable income), there is, with taxes, always something else to consider.

It would be great to see legistation passed for market value deduction of donated artwork, if anyone hears of any updates please keep us posted!

Great thread.

"It would be great to see legistation passed for market value deduction of donated artwork, if anyone hears of any updates please keep us posted! "

That would be nice but I can see where the problem would be. I could make up say 100 12x18 prints, advertize them for $100 each and donate them to a local Audubon center for example who are always looking for them, and take a deduction for the $10,000 retail where it only cost me about $500. Pretty good deal

When people donate appreciated stock it's easy to calculate the fair market value for the deduction. The same with cars (blue book) and other items with fairly straightforward market values. It will be interesting, if this legislation passes, to see how we are supposed to substantiate the value.