Photography: a job to skip college for?
Susan Johnston from PayScale.com posted an article on HotJobs.Yahoo.com, that I have to disagree with. The article discusses seven jobs that Ms. Johnston believes you can skip college and still pursue. What’s the first job? You guessed it! Number One is Freelance Photographer.
Ms. Johnston interviews Al Lee, Director of quantitative analysis at PayScale.com:
1. Freelance Photographer: $47,800 median salary
Lee says that non-degree jobs tend to fall into one of two categories: technical or entrepreneurial. Being a freelance photographer requires a high degree of business savvy in addition to photography skills. Depending on the type of work you do, you might take product shots, family portraits, corporate head shots, wedding pictures, or other images, and then touch up the pictures digitally and send them to clients for review.
In all fairness, Ms. Johnston does start her article with a bit of a disclaimer saying “these jobs do require specialized knowledge, obtained through either a vocational training program or an on-the-job education. (And many people in these occupations do have college degrees, so one certainly can’t hurt.)”
Photography is not just about taking pictures, Ninety percent of the time a photographer is not behind the camera. A photographer must do much more than just “take pictures”. You can learn the science of photography on-the-job or even at a two year college or vocational program, but you cannot learn how to run a business, handle clients effectively, market your business, and make your venture profitable without some dedicated time learning the liberal arts, as well as, business and marketing skills.
It scares me that Ms. Johnston’s article also lists Nuclear Power Reactor Operator and Air Traffic Controller as jobs that don’t require a college degree.
This sounds like more of a knee-jerk reaction to the poor economic times. I’ve heard the debates on CNN & other news channels, but, regardless of the economy, a good, well rounded education is important no matter what career an individual wants to pursue. As a person who believes in pursuing education and personal betterment for the entirety of my life, I think this article by Ms. Johnston is, well, just wrong!
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About the author
Kevin Michael Reed (Google+, Facebook) is a fashion & beauty photographer and producer/director based in New York City and Los Angeles, CA. He is the President/CEO of RedFOG Visual Media, a production company in New York City, and a partner in Passion of Photography, Inc, a company dedicated to teaching photographers and sharing our passion through charitable causes. Kevin has lectured and hosted workshops throughout the United States and the world teaching photographers the business and creative sides of photography. (Kevin's Fashion & Beauty Photography Portfolio can be seen here).
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