Turning photography into an online money making income stream

We take pictures to imprint happy times in our memories. Most of us enjoy photography and for some of us it’s a hobby but very few of us realize that this hobby can generate an income. Even if you haven’t taken a professional course on photography, or if you have a penchant for it and if you have always found people appreciating your work you can certainly make some money out of it. 

 If you are wondering how you can make money out of photography lets take you through three of the easiest ways to do so: 

 If you have a digital camera handy with at least 3 mega pixels than you are good to start. Alternatively if you already have some good pictures on your hard drive you can start with them. As a new photographer you will obviously not have the expensive equipment needed to take high quality professional images but then not all companies can afford the high quality images. There are several Stock Photography websites that serve various clients like designers, ad agencies and publishers. To begin with find a website that is not too high end. This will ensure you at least a start. Even though you want to make thousands you will be able to build your income stream gradually. 

 Once you upload your images to these websites and they are approved, the potential customers can download them for use. Since the pictures have been clicked by you they are your proprietary which means that every time somebody wants to use a particular picture taken by you they will have to pay you and this will go on till your pictures remain on the website. So it’s essentially a life long scheme. The Stock Photography website will generally give you a percentage of what they make ranging from 30% to 50%. Once your pictures start giving you a decent remuneration you can consider investing in more advanced equipment. 

 The second way is to open your own website. If you think you are not a tech savvy person and certainly don’t want to invest the money don’t fret there is hope. A free sub domain or website is certainly an option albeit not the best one. Alternatively you can go for your own website for as little as $6 to $ 10 per month. Of course you will need to put in some homework, after all every dream has a price but the companies are quite helpful and most of the soft ware is user friendly. Once you have your site up and running you will be in a position to interact with your potential clients directly and even provide photographs clicked to order. The fact that you will not need to pay commission to a third party is just one of the benefits the other one being the credibility you will build for yourself as photographer when you have a website that highlights your talent. 

 Alternatives to the Stock Photography websites where the images first have to go through an approval process are the photo sharing sites. This is mostly a marketing measure. Once your pictures are displayed on these sites it will get you noticed as a photographer. Most of these sites have an avid fan following so your pictures will be seen over and over again. Now most of these sites will not allow you to sell your photographs through them but you can certainly use these sites to advertise and market your talent. They certainly won’t object if you let your clients now in a subtle way that the pictures are for sale and that you can be contacted for the copyrights. 

 A few things to remember before you embark on this new career path are the approval that you will need from your friends and colleagues before you upload their photographs and the time that you will need to click the pictures, edit, catalog and finally upload them. The models in your pictures will have to sign a document for you releasing the rights of the pictures in your favor. Most people hunt for pictures through search engines so if you want your pictures to be selected you need to invest some time to catalogue them with the correct key words.