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How Old Were You?
How old were you when you started shooting? how many years passed from that moment till you started shooting professionally? I am now 27 y.o. and have just started... am trying to figure out if I have any chances to become a prof. before I get grey hairs in my coiffure:) share your experience, give me hope:) Dec 15 06 09:27 am Link Started at 21; never went pro... that would mean I'd have to get all responsible an' shit! Dec 15 06 09:35 am Link I was 27 when I started shooting seriously with my first slr. that was 4 years ago. hopefully i'll still be learning and shooting when I'm 87.  Dec 15 06 09:35 am Link Hum, I started shooting around 10. gave up, learned under a pro at 17-19. started shooting landscape ammature. bought a studio went pro at 35. burned out at 45. back to shooting what I like at 47. and here I am. by the way, went gray at 36. Dec 15 06 09:37 am Link leegillies photography wrote: I know I am still learning. still love film though. Dec 15 06 09:38 am Link What's wrong with gray hair? Dec 15 06 09:39 am Link Polina V wrote: Just do what I did... One the grey hair shows up, start shaving your head... Dec 15 06 09:41 am Link Tim Hammond wrote: nothing! showes how critcel you are of your own work. also shows you run a business. Dec 15 06 09:43 am Link I can't remember, it must be 14 or 15.. the first wedding I ever did was when I was 19 or 20. Dec 15 06 09:44 am Link I picked up my first camera in 8th grade (1974) and have never put it down. I worked as seasonal help during high school years for the studio that did senior portraits for my school. I became a member of the Professional Photographers of Ohio when I was 16, and started my own studio when I graduated high school in 1978. I've been educated by the school of hard knocks ever since. Dec 15 06 09:46 am Link Tim Hammond wrote: More importantly, why can't we reset gray hair to factory defaults? Dec 15 06 09:48 am Link I was 13 when I got my pentax K-1000. shot all through high school. 2 years of college. Took abreak and have been shooting professinaly for four years now. Dec 15 06 09:56 am Link Started at the young age of 36!!!! Dec 15 06 10:00 am Link I started at the tender age of 14 with a Kodak Hawkeye Instamatic w/flash cubes. I just turned 43 a few days ago. I have had many jobs as a photographer through the years. Dave Dec 15 06 10:09 am Link Bought my first camera at 17, first slr at 20, took 10 years off for the kids, back shooting now. Still don't make enough to give up the day job!?! Dec 15 06 10:31 am Link Started shooting in 1985, got serious in 2003, got quite good in 2006. Terry Dec 15 06 10:42 am Link Started art college at 18- they made me take an Intro photo class.. old Mamiya 120 formats and tray processing.. been doing it since then, with changes of method and equipment. Dec 15 06 10:46 am Link Polina V wrote: I started shooting at 15. Graduated College at 20 and went to work for CBS as a Photographer/Cinematographer after a year of teaching college. Dec 15 06 10:48 am Link I caught the bug around age 11 with my uncles 110 camera. At 15 I got my first SLR a Zenit yea the Russian camera $100 Canadian with a 50mm. at 16 I got my first Nikon and started apprenticing with a pro photographer. At 17 I was doing professional videos of weddings and some photography. (not of wedding) Photography is still my passion, but I have never really been able to make a living at it. I did manage to pay off my equipment though. Dec 15 06 11:17 am Link when i was 9 in 59 Dec 15 06 11:20 am Link Polina V wrote: Shooting from the age of 12 now 41 do get paid now but as far as pro what defines that word?. If you ever stop learnig quit. Dec 15 06 11:25 am Link It all depends on how much energy and effort you put into it. As well as knowing some of the right people that can really play key roles in moving you forward at an accelerated pace AND having the actual abitlity. I am 34..... started shooting shooting just for fun (architecture, artistic gallery stuff) a couple years ago. Now I have a pretty good (and growing) client list. I don't know what it means to shoot "professionally" or what those exact requirements are, I just know I make a hell of a lot money doing what I love now shooting fashion and commercial work full time. Good luck to ya! MK my dot.com Dec 15 06 11:27 am Link Shot, developed and printed my first roll of film at age 12. Ultimately. through a set of rather unusual circumstances I ended up as a forensic photographer. Many years later I went into commercial photogrphy with my own full servicee studio and am now retired and shooting figurative art. Dec 15 06 11:29 am Link first slrs in the 70's. put em up and never opened the case again until 1998, i think. Still have the beat up Hasselbland case with the original nikon bodies and lenses. Use the 50 nikkor macro I bought 27 years ago to this day to shoot really tight shots. Did a ton of shooting with Peter Schmidt in the 70's and when he moved I went into other things....... a great mentor and photographer. I'm still just a bungling old fool looking for that one "SON OF A BITCH" shot that keeps me goin............as a friend of mine says "even a blind hog will eventually find an acorn" ... its those moments that make me pick up the lens. Dec 15 06 11:31 am Link Took my first photography class in HS, 1978 and accomplished absolutely nothing (except growing some killer buds in the dark room). Picked up a camera in 1985 and never looked back  Dec 15 06 11:34 am Link cool! I just love what I see... you are so different with so different stories and still with the same passion:) good luck to you, each and every one... and thank you for sharing. it means a lot for me, yours, Polina Dec 15 06 01:11 pm Link I started taking surfing pictures of my friends when I was 16. That was 1984. I borrowed my moms Canon AE-1 and zoom lens. I moved with my parents to Maui Hi and became a pro sailboarder. After getting enough of the pro tour I wanted to get back to photography. I got a job at a 60 min lab processing B&W. I then got a job as a photo asistant with a Art Center Alumn. He helped me put a portfolio together. I entered Art Center photo in the winter of 92. Graduated in the spring of 95 (on my birthday) Had 80k of student loan debt. Took a job working in the motion picture visual effects industry. Paid off all my debt in seven years. I am no looking to start my pro photographer career and get out of the visual effects industry. thats my story Travis Dec 15 06 01:25 pm Link I was 9 years old when I started modelling... I turned 19 a week ago, so that's 10 years and going strong! I've never had another job, apart from becoming a make-up artist also a few years ago. I can't imagine doing anything not in the media industry! Dec 15 06 01:27 pm Link I started shooting on an old Sears SLR back in the mid 60's. I was in my 20's. Made the jump to a Ricoh (not much of a jump as Ricoh made the Sears) in the late 60's and then went to the Canon AE1-P when they came out. I like that camera so much I populated my lens collection and bought a second AE1-P as a back up. So now I have 2 AE1-P, strobes and about a dozen lens'. Canon changed their mount so I opted not to buy another Canon. Got a great deal on an Olympus 300E and I like it but someday I hope to finally move to Nikon. After all, all it takes is cash. So now I have been shooting for 40 years and I have been pro and now I'm not. Being pro is so restrictive. Now all I please is myself and the model. I call it art, others may call it something else. Truthfully, I don't care. Larry Dec 15 06 01:37 pm Link I bought my first Pentax K1000 in 1982, at 21 years of age, while enrolled in the photography program at McEwan College. Within three weeks I was picking up work shooting modeling portfolios for two agencies in Edmonton through the auspices of a local pro who had been renting me his darkroom. In a couple of months I was assisting him and shooting weddings and catalogue work, which I did for several years before becoming poisoned on the industry as a whole. I am single at 48 due to a lifelong aversion to weddings created by having attended one a week for too many years...;o) In 1996 I found my love of photography re-awakened by a muse, and returned, almost exclusively shooting Glamour and Fine Art. I now shoot only what interests me, and while the money may not be as good, the peace of mind more than compensates. I still have the K1000, and it has traveled all over the world with me. Dec 15 06 02:04 pm Link I started taking pictures when I was 13. I am 22 now. Never became a pro. Dec 15 06 02:08 pm Link I've been shooting off and on for two years. I've never taken any photogrpahy classes or had any training other then asking questions of other photographers. I like to shoot as a hobby, I don't think this would be a good career move for me at least. Dec 15 06 02:08 pm Link i was 2 years old until school i shot commercials then in early twenties, when i was somewhat of a contemporaty dancer, I was asked and was published right away i shot light fetish and adverts, but mostly art nudes that were published then on and off back into it at age 44 i am finally still shooting with stunning people and i am 47 shhh! they dont imagine i will be any good when imwrite that and that never gets searched for life is full of surprises ... good luck! Dec 15 06 02:20 pm Link I got my first camera (using Cheerios box tops)when I was 7. First sold photographs when I was 12. I never chose to go pro. I had 2 choices for a career and chose the one that gave me good benefits and enough money to not be a starving artist. Dec 15 06 03:48 pm Link Started as a baby till I was 8. Then I hit a really early puberty...really early, so I stopped because I was hideous. No I'm like...eff them, so I started up again Dec 15 06 07:30 pm Link Ought To Be Shot wrote: that certainly is a challenge for a cat! Dec 15 06 07:31 pm Link Starting shooting photos of friends in the 10th grade and had my first professional job at 18. Was very lucky to get a full time assistant job right out of high school and shot models for agencies on the side. Did a bit of free testing at first to build a book then started getting small jobs. I'm 42 and have always shot full time. It can be done! Dec 15 06 07:34 pm Link Anjel Britt wrote: I only shot family snapshots with a brownie before being asked to take pictures. From the start, at the age of 18, it was a paying gig. It paid my way through my college degrees. I quit shooting professionally when I went over to research and development. Dec 15 06 07:36 pm Link I'm 27. My first camera had disposable flashes. Then sometime after that it was the cannon ae1, then the rebel sometime much later, then the 4x5 speed grafex, then the hassey... I don't know if I'll ever call myself professional. Sounds too stuffy. As far as age goes... This isn't a pop punk band. You look at many of the great artists and their best work wasn't until later in their lives after they've really been through stuff. At least thats what I tell myself. Dec 15 06 08:15 pm Link |
