Photographs and bartering

I picked up the proofs and CD of my images last week. They look wonderful in my opinion. The photographs I had taken include:

Photo's to show the functionality of the product
Photo's to show scale - I did this in relation to another product
Photo's to show the quality of the product up close
Mix of photo's showing in use and not in use.

When I have my site up and finished, I will be able to have thumbnails for everyone to check out as well as if I want to sell on third party sites.

My payments to him were to cover the cost of studio time, proof sheet and CD of images. As we looked at the photographs more, I realized, there was going to need to be some slight touch ups. Instead of paying him another 50 to 100 dollars, he agreed to do the touchups for one of my products. Given that I am thinking of a retail price of $25, that is a significant savings on this work.

Don't overlook bartering to make payments as well. Certain of your partners may have clients that are your target market. It is well worth exploring!

Photographs

Once you have your product in production, I highly suggest getting professional photographs taken. I recently found a local photographer that was willing to do two hours of studio time for a very reasonable price. He has experience doing commercial work. I did find a photographer that has worked with national clients but to be honest, he was much more expensive. For the distribution channel, this is the best result for me. In addition, he was willing to do all the photoshopping and clean up for one of my products. Barter at its best. It gives me a lot of confidence that people are willing to do 1-2 hours of work for what for me is a nominal price. I am picking up the CD and proofs tomorrow.

When you do get photographs done, make sure you are getting full copyrights on the photographs. I have had some want to provide a "license" and maintain the copyright. This is a big mistake and be careful when you look at the contract your are signing. I had one photographer that was out of the running right away as he wanted to license the photo's of my own photographs to me. When I read the contract I was appalled.

Essentially I was accepting a license to use print and digital for "marketing" purposes and was not allowed to transfer the license without written permission from the copyright holder. You don't want to lose control of your product so be very careful and make sure when you get a bid for photo's that you specifically state you will maintain all copyrights on the product.

There is a wonderful interview at San Jose Mercury news with Max Levchin. If you do not know who he is I am sure you know the companies he has started incuding Paypal, slide and Yelp. What is interesting is all the various iterations his companies have gone through to be he companies they are. Link is here:

http://www.mercurynews.com/business/ci_14128572