Steve Schwindt - Davyn Owen
When looking for landscape photographers to interview it became very clear that 99% of them don't shoot landscapes full-time, but instead have a day job and shoot photos in their spare time. Instead of spending an extra 2 weeks trying to contact a full-time landscape photographer, I contacted one of my favorite "hobbyist" photographers to find out how he makes extra money from photography, and how he markets himself.
My Questions
Do you take photos full-time, or is it a part-time gig?
In what ways do you make money from photography? ex: Prints, commercial photos, licensing.
How do you advertise yourself to clients? Does social media play a big part in advertising your work?
How long have you been taking photos?
His Response
I take photos part-time. I have a full time job and for the immediate future I don’t see myself ever doing landscape photography full-time. Once upon a time I thought I was going to be a lawyer and went to law school etc. It ended up not being what I wanted but while I was in school I essentially started doing YouTube gaming videos. I was very successful with it and did that full time for a couple of years out of school but eventually got burned out (I also wasn’t exactly drowning in money either) so I realized I needed to have balance between work and hobbies, while also earn enough money to feel comfortable.
Landscape photography is a little unique in that it’s probably the least lucrative genre of photography. Nature simply doesn’t pay you to take photos of it. Most of the money in landscape photography is earned through workshops and private lessons, which I’m now doing much more of. I also sell prints and offer licensing - i’ve had decent success with both relative to other landscape photographers but both rely 100% on my ability to market myself, and not so much on the quality of the photos. I credit virtually all my sales in those areas to Reddit popularity, knowing some people in advertising, and then random acquaintances.
On that note, yes, social media is my primary means of advertising. A big focus of my photography isn’t necessarily taking great photos, it’s taking photos to grow my following on Instagram. In my opinion, if you aren’t on social media, you might as well be irrelevant (at least going forward in the photography world). Reddit posts are also a big source of exposure for me as I’ve done quite well there. I’m not a big fan of a local physical presence like doing street fairs or exhibitions. I would still like to grow in this area, but it’s a big pretty big commitment to create an inventory of work to display and takes much more time to physically be present at some of these types of events. So far I’ve had little success selling prints this way, so I plan to either move my photos around to various locations more frequently or just advertise my inventory to my social media presence.
I got my camera probably 6 years or so ago when I started getting involved in the YouTube stuff, so I would occasionally pretend to be a photographer. I wouldn’t say I actually started to shift to photography until about 2 years ago, and then getting serious about it about 1 year ago. I tend to either do something hardcore or not at all, so when I discovered some really talented landscape photographers I realized that was what I wanted to do and went all in. Pretty much overnight I went from normal dude taking shitty hiking/vacation photos to trying to go out at least once a week for more serious landscape shoots. I immersed myself 100% in this little world and work pretty hard at it - still a long way I’d like to go but I definitely feel good about what I’ve been able to accomplish in a year.
His response was very thorough and honest filled with lots of helpful information.
I encourage you to take a look at his photography and visit his website or Instagram to see more great work.
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