Working during COVID-19 crisis is really challenging but all we need is just creativity and the good news is, there are tons of potential ways that we can do to work from home as a photographer. Dear friends my name is Bima and thank you for visiting my blog, today I wanna share to you how I working from home and keeping my self being productive during this crisis period.
Back in the past few days I receive so many whatsapp text from my photographer friends who being stuck and got no idea how to earn money during this Corona crisis, the worse thing about this situation is majority of their client are cancelled their photo session without any further update. In fact about 2 years ago I read a nice article from Problogger that telling me about variety of income source, it’s such wonderful information because they teach me to make other source of income that will made my day.
Yesterday I make my self for being productive by shooting some simple things that nearby my house, it could be my neighbour house, outdoor plant and some nice flower and you could read my story about that day on here! Generally it’s almost same activity but now I will shoot some things without getting put from my house’s fence till I found some wild oyster mushroom and dead mango skin that located right in front of my house.
Hold On, Do You Want to Know Why I Shoot This Ridiculous Things for?
Portfolio?
For sure but I have another awesome mission to do by using all photos that I got during this morning session and it’s called a microstock photography. I learn about it within past 2 years and found something cool that gonna be future investment as a digital asset for photographer like you and me so no matter what you concern with in photography than you always can monetize your photos into something that could send you a potential and unlimited income from every sales that you got.
So I hope you got my idea that what we you gonna do here is not only adding your portfolio but also working and wondering that it belongs to something called as a,
Digital Asset!
And why this is so important for your next future?
Have you ever read Robert T. Kiyosaki’s book called Rich Dad Poor Dad? because inside that book there is chapter that called as Cashflow Quadrant and it tell us about what kind of job that we have now. Generally there are 4 kind of job, I will be investor, B will be business owner, S will be self employee, and E will be employee.
Photographer like us will be in “S” side and we will be the same with other professional like musician, doctor, architect, actor, and athlete, what make us different with somebody that located in “E” quadrant is we will get money from every single job that we’ve done which is better than employee who getting money for once in a month a.k.a monthly salary. Since we are in “S” quadrant it doesn’t mean that we can’t grow our job into bigger business so that’s why we creating digital assets that will make us get money over and over again even when we are not shooting a wedding or any single other photo projects.
Like a Richie Sambora, this cool guy is over than 50 years old and he still performed on a stage singing I’ll be there for you song and earn money from his performance, but do you know that this guy also earn money from the royalty? and this is what we running for. You and me are same, we are a photographer that only get paid when we doing a photo shoot, now what we gonna do is trying harder to get money even when we’re not shooting any single photos or even when we sleep with our kids, sounds good right!
What is Photography Asset Looks Like?
I belive that there gonna be vary of photography digital asset but the easiest thing is the photo it self. As a photographer I believe that you got thousand of images that can be your digital assets and trust me it works so great during past 2 years. Before I share about earning and what photo that gonna be sold in Shutterstock, now I will telling you about my passion in photography. Back in 10 years ago I was running wedding photography business with my wife Nina so for the first time impression you also may visit my portfolio to see my works.
As a wedding photographer who serving destination photoshoot than I will be have another advantages and that is traveling!
So what I shoot in my microstock photography business is about travel and foods, yeahh I know you love it too but everything on the next session is depend on your passion. Let me share some photos that I had during my traveling session on the way to wedding destination project.
I got another one,
Some people see that photos just as an ordinary and useless files but I see it all as a digital assets that will bring money back to me. All we need now is just the right platform that could help us to sell those photos and I could say that Shutterstock is one great platform where you can sell million of photos, video, design, animations to worldwide market. Even there still many company like Adobe, 123rf, Getty Images and some other else but if you just starting your microstock business than try one platform first, it will help you to stay focus and put a deep hard work in it.
If you see my Shutterstock portfolio than you also can see my collections which is come with more specific gallery from all the photos, yes you can make it too for your self.
What Photography Gears That I Must Have?
It’s up to you because you can use any photo gears that you already have now. My first suggestion is, just use whatever you have in your house even it just an entry level DSLR or simple and old mirrorless camera just like mine. Surely I shoot in wedding with more proper camera but if I go for travel and work as a Shutterstock Contributor than I only use my Canon EOS M with its tiny lenses and it works so great during past 2 years I shooting for microstock photography.
In fact I use this EOS M both for capturing photo and recording videos, all of them are my digital asset that can be sell on Shutterstock. I got few accessories that I use for making a vlog so I consider to buy some additional gears like Boya video microphone that I can use in my Canon EOS M and my Samsung A10s which also I use to make a video content.
So if you check all of those gears in Amazon than you could consider that all my microstock photo gears are really affordable but it still works well to run out in this business.
How About If I Just Have a Smartphone?
Yeahhhh this is what I’m going to share to you today, in my work from home series I challenge my self to shoot everything than doing post production with my Samsung A10s so I want set everything done in my smartphone. Look at this homemade cappuccino, I made it together with my wife and upload it on Shutterstock than it sold to someone from Istanbul just within a days.
What I use before taking my cappuccino photo is simply display it on my dark brown cupboard with a window light effect and even it’s not a good latte art but this photo still being sold just within 2 days, it’s quite fast for my journey.
Now I will share to you about what my Samsung A10s could do to make great photos that can be sell on Shutterstock and today I’m stay at home and try to get some cool photos from something that inside my house’s fence. Today I shoot for wild oyster mushroom that grow in the dead mango tree so I shoot it together with the sexy tree skin which some with amazing textured so on and so far.
You can make it too!
See that, it seems nothing special for you but really matter for someone out there who looking for that stocks, in fact you always can make a sales even while you sleep by using Shutterstock and it’s worldwide coverage. I know you can make it too because it just an ordinary photographs that you might usually do in your daily activity.
Once you know about exposure, composition, and post production than I sure that you will always have a change to make a better earning than me, all you need to do is just sign up as a Shutterstock contributor and upload as many photos that you have now and don’t stop for doing this. At the first time I join this niche than I only have $5/month and even you get the same or lower amount than me but please don’t stop and keep thinking about your future investment through this digital assets.
Now take a look for some simple photos of mine that already being sold,
Go for it, now is your turn and change your previous habit for just uploading your photos in social media and got only likes and comment into something that more profitable and that is by uploading your daily photos to Shutterstock and start to earn cash from some ordinary photos that seems to be important photos for agency, blogger, and news maker around the world. I hope this article help you to find an inspiration about how to work from home as a photographer and if you have another opinion about it than let me know about it on my comment form below.
I’ll see you soon my friends!