SL Photographer's purpose?

Ehhh ... I'll throw my 2-cents worth in here .. considering I'm a SL phographer and all *grin*.

I've been a RL photographer and advanced Photoshop user for over 15 years. (not tooting my horn, just stating fact) Having said that, there is nothing I do that you can't do yourself, as long as you're willing to invest the time and money. As a SL photographer, I offer to you the following as part of my service:

In-world photo studio with a large variety of photo backgrounds.
Studio lighting, to ensure that the light hitting your avatar is flattering
Portability ... the ability to come to you and shoot photos, or to shoot in any location
A large selection of poses and props

All of those were a monetary investment.

Add to that my RL experience in composition and framing

Once I have taken your photo and saved it to my hard drive, it goes through an extensive workout in Photoshop to clean up any "pointed boobs", rendering errors, clothing seams, misaligned prims, etc. Lighting is enhanced. Color and saturation is enhanced, The entire image is softened. Backgrounds may be pushed out of focus to give a shallow depth-of-field. Entirely new backgrounds may be created. The list goes on and on.

I provide RL previews of your images on my web site before I upload into SL. I also provide RL prints and posters if you like. One person wanted an 18x24 print of her and her husband. I printed and shipped to her.

Books and portfolios ... something you can set on a coffee table and share your photos with others.

I just completed a 2008 Calendar for a client. It showcases 12 girls at his club, and provides a useful item for any home or business ... a calendar. It hangs on the wall and on the first on the month, you flip the page.

I'm sure I could come up with more ... but the fact is, as a SL photographer, I bring you these items and more. Sure, you can do it yourself, but I bet I can do it faster. I've learned the techniques. Why waste a week trying to figure out how to get the look? Just pay me to whip that out for you.

Also, keep in mind that I'm not making any real-life money out of the deal. In RL, I charge $125 / hour for my photo services, and $35/hour for Photoshop and lab time. In SL, you can reserve an hour of my time, receive 10 photos, and a leather portfolio for $2500 - $3000 Lindens. Let's do the math:

At a $250 Lindens / $1 USD exchange rate, you're paying me $12 USD for a $3000L package. That's an hour of photo services and at least another 2 hours in Photoshop, plus upload and building your portfolio, so call it another hour. In RL, that's 1 hour at $125 + 3 hours at $35, for a total of $230 USD, plus the cost of any prints you order.

You paid me $12 USD for $230 USD worth of work ... and I'm not getting to sell prints (well, usually ... sometimes people do order RL prints)

So, it's obvious that I'm not doing it for the money .. it's just a fun way to enhance my SL existance.

Hey, Kevin Smith doesn't deserve th...wait...yes he does.

the drop down list that you mention is greyed out for me, I can not drop down anything on the list that is just below the custom size boxes and quality slider.

any suggestions?

Ahh, what do photographers do? duh, take pictures? Of course they're better then the ones you take yourself. Jeeezz.

Aww, thankoo Toy. Also, if the folks at NCI liked the book an all, do ya tink I should donate a copy to them to display? More'n happy to, if they'd want it.

Also..
***BLANTANT SHAMELESS PLUG MOMENT (but sorta on topic)***

Voting starts next week for winner of the 2007 Uncanny Valley Expo, but they announced the finalists today - an one of the piccies I have in the show is a finalist!

http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2007/10/the-uncanny-val.html

An did I mention the show will be closing dis coming weekend?

Mari

This is a really odd question. In the real world, anyone can take snapshots, from any angle, also. So what exactly do real world photographers do?

From reading all the posts here, I kind of buck the trend. I'm not much into studio shots. I much prefer to do shots in the wild as it were. I like the emotion that carries with a real event -- someone's wedding, someone lonely, etc. I also never post process my photos (not counting adding a frame aound it or maybe some text) except for the goth crowd that likes a specific action I have. I might even stop doing that since I don't charge for the photos so I ought to get to do what I want, not what someone else wants.

I enjoy the challenge of getting a picture clean from the game engine that is beautiful just as it sits. Just as in the real world, careful attention to pose, lighting, and background makes up for hours and hours of work in photoshop.

Indeed, IMO the best SL photographers do little, or no, post processing. The skills, as others have implied, are the same composition skills a first world photographer needs.

It's the same as models, really. Why are there models in a world where anyone can be beautiful? Because some people want to spend more time doing it than others, or want to make it the focus of their SL. That's about all.

He really isn't kidding, either.

Whether an SL (or a RL) photographer gets her results in camera, or from extensive post processing, makes little difference. It's all pixels in the end.

Some people have a good "camera eye" and can shoot outstanding pictures on the fly. Others spend time setting up lights, posing their subject, walking all around to find the best angle. Still others take the shot into Photoshop and work magic.

How the photographer arrives at the end result isn't important. It's the end result that matters. IMO, anyway.

Very well said Lindal. Ultimately it's the photo that speaks - how it was produced is actually of little consequence. Of note, I have been frustrated quite a few times with post processing because I didn't make note of what filters I used or the sequence of application of said filters.

Post processing is an art in it's self, and in fact requires a very different set of skills to taking a picture.

As such those, IMO, who get 99% of their result from the raw picture are, IMO, a lot more impressive in their photographic talents than those who spend ages in post processing.

That isn't to say that using such skills isn't skillfull and impressive, it is, just that it's a different set of skills.

"Hi I'm Chas, I follow Michael Bigwig around looking for ways to flame him. I love flaming him. I've devoted my life to it...watch, I'll do it again by quoting my own quote here."

This guy cracks me up. He's like my archenemy. But it doesn't really work because I'm too indifferent to wear my cape.

Post production is vital; it is just as important now in the digital age as it was back when Ansel Adams was dodging and burning real photos in his dark room. I fully agree that a natural "eye" for composition and original photography is first and foremost important, but to say that post production might "cheapen" the value of the shot is unfair.

Back in the days of "analog" photography (for lack of a better word,) the photographer had to know exactly how to expose a negative, what sort of paper to use, how long to time the exposure, the strength of the chemical baths, and all the tricks with lights that one can use while in the chemical process. It's a delicate, consuming practice but without that post production we wouldn't have some of the true art pieces that we cherish today.

I think we refer to it as film and digital.

LOL

Well I will add my response as well. I too wondered what the purpose of a photographer is in SL and I too have a photography hobby in rl.

Taking a snapshot simply as a memento is easy and almost anyone can do it.

Taking quality portraits or having your picture put onto an enhanced background takes a lot of work.

As an example, my SL studio has done weddings and fashion shows for modeling agencies. Sometimes we shoot about 200 or more photos. With lag, and the avatars moving, or the flex clothing not resting quickly, it takes a lot of shots to get a few good ones.

Sometimes the weddings and shows can take 3 hours of time. Then we have to sort through the 200+ photos and select the best ones. Then we clean them up with lighting or other issues. Then we prepare them for the client to choose from. Sometimes they only take 10 photos. Yet the time spent from start to finish for us can be 5-6 hours of work.

Why does the client want this? For a wedding album. For a press book. And they don't want to be bothered with the post production work.

We give them full permissions on the photos they buy, so they are free to send them to friends.

In fact, we have been busy now as couples and friends want to send holiday notecards.

So I agree with many who posted already. The clicking part is easy. It's the additional work that takes time and requires talent. And since the photos can be saved to your computer, they are a good memory of your time in SL.

Take a pic of the backgound alone without the people or whateever the main subject is. In photoshop, make a blurred version of the background and upload it to SL as a texture. Make a board and apply the image to one face, set to 'bright', put your subject in front of it and take new pic.

best way to do the background only so that it matches the pic is to take the normal pic, then without moving your camera hit ctrl shift alt 4 to get rid of people, then snap a new one ^_^