PHOTOGRAPHERS WORST EXPERIENCES
It’s World Photography Day today and we are super excited here at Ijeworks.
It’s a day when photographers come together to celebrate the creativity and nuances of photography that captivates us for years. Photography is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving what you have captured and it lasts forever. It remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything.
A lot of people have had so many experiences working as a photographer and these experiences could be bad, good, or both.
We reached out to some photographers to share their worse experiences with us.
Here are few bad experiences some photographers in the field have had:
Shyne
In my early days as a photographer, I volunteered to assist a senior photographer to shoot at an event just to gain more experience. I was just about crossing a barricade when I heard praaaaahhh. My trousers got torn. immediately I lost the self-confidence that I was still trying to build. I had to sit down throughout the rest of the program.
That experience has taught me to be extra conscious though.
Emmanuel
I have had three experiences: Someone telling me that I am not competitive, that’s why they reached out to me for a shoot. I picked the phone up, dropped it off on the client, and increased my price immediately
A client booked me and didn’t drop a deposit, I had rented tools and all and she canceled the night before the shoot. It was a loss for me
A client also booked for a shoot, I did everything, collected the deposit, and guess what she didn’t pay the remaining fee and has never asked for the pictures
Lekan
The moment I thought my battery was charged, I got to the event late, the battery came flat.
Joseph
Well, I’ve had several experiences that weren’t favorable but if I was to reply professionally, it would be the issues experienced from external storage and the way it can be unreliable. I did wedding coverage (photo and video) with my brother and we backed up all files directly to an external hard drive. When it was time for post-production, we split the files according to how we’ve decided to share the workload, along the line the drive crashed. The saving grace was a third-party recovery app that was paid for. All files were retrieved but then the delivery was delayed.
Kene (South Africa)
I can’t really pick the worse, but I’ve had a couple of bad experiences as a photographer, Most are equipment fails, not charging flash and camera batteries before shoots, not copying card files outs, forgetting stuff on locations after shoots 🤣. I’ve also had situations where people try to disrespect you at events or functions because you’re a “photographer”. I shot a wedding where I was the only black person at the entire event. people were looking at me like I was an alien 🙈. Then the best man took it on himself to try and ridicule me, he calls my name in a funny way and they will laugh about it, I tried to correct him and figured he was doing it to make fun of me “funny guy”, I ignore me him. he repeated it, I stopped shooting, walked up to him and said “if you do that again, I’ll break something in your body” and walked back to my position. That’s how it ended. 🤣
SamBak
I traveled from Ibarapa to Lagos to cover a traditional wedding. I stay in Yaba. I told my folk that I would leave the house early around 7 am to meet up for 10 am and that the TM was fixed. I arrived a few minutes past 10 am. When I got there, the bride was not ready, the groom was not in sight. So I waited till around 12 noon and I asked how far? They said I should calm down and that they would soon begin. The traditional wedding started some minutes to 5 pm. I snapped and left around 6 pm. They were not done but my place was far from the venue. I got home around 10 pm and then edited and sent the pictures and I was paid something that did not cover my transport. I wanted to cry. But we learn, and we move!!!
Korede
Just a particular day I was trying to get a beautiful shot of this Butterfly but I couldn’t get the shot I wanted because I couldn’t adjust its position so as not to scare it away.
Eventually, I had to settle for a picture that wasn’t what I initially wanted.
Tobi
I once shot a wedding outside Lagos for somebody I know for free. I gave him the price for a second shooter, photobook, frames, and stuff, but I didn’t include my own fee because, what are friends for? he said he was going to add 50k for appreciation; in my mind, cool… That job almost made me depressed.
They complained a lot about the pictures, I showed the pictures to my colleagues, nobody saw anything wrong. I doubted myself, I felt like an impostor, I thought I didn’t know the work, they spoiled my name.
I was so depressed that I stopped responding to the wife (client).
To deliver I eventually delivered and they gave me my co shooters balance alone. I said I thought you were going to add this amount, the man’s implied since his wife complained a lot about it, no show. Did I mention I shot their prewedding too?
They had me on a zoom meeting with the supposed best man who is a graphics designer to lecture me on how to edit pictures cos apparently, they said the wife was not looking like her normal self (when she’s done makeup and stuff) to do a photoshoot… see I called my friends that I had a bad feeling about shooting the wedding after the pre-wedding experience but I had already committed plus wedding was in another few weeks hmph!!. Omo shoot for people that value your work sha.
Are you a photographer?
Share your experience in the comment section.