Powerpoint Presentation

This week we where all split into small groups and we all had to present a short power point presentation about the report we have to write.
I found this a nice easy task as I don't mind speaking to the full class never mind a small group.

Here is my presentation:

I think I got the point across about what I was doing my report on and everyone thought it was a good subject and they understood how I was going to find my results. I also enjoyed listening to what other class members where writing their reports on.

Tessa Bunney

In a previous lesson we had a visiting lecture from photographer Tessa Bunney, unfortunately I was unable to make the lecture as I had a photo shoot that over lapped. My fellow students that went to the lecture told me how interesting it was so I decided to have a look at some of her work online.

I looked on her website and found a lot about her, shes a documentary photographer and has had her work published in many magazines. I also had a look at her work and found it very interesting, here are some of my favourite pieces.

Model Release Forms

When I work In my own studio using paying customers and also when I use models for my uni work I have a model release form that I ask all clients to fill out/ the parents of the clients to fill out, I ask them to do this because although I own the copyright of the image because I took it, there faces are still in the image and if I was to go putting photos of them on my social networking sites and my blogs they might not be very happy about this.

Here is a print screen of my model release form I use:

Its very simple and straight to the point but is very important when it comes to working in the photography business and especially considering I work with a lot of children.

Christening

I had a email inquiry today about photographing a christening, the client wanted a price for the service and a couple of hours at the after party, she also wanted a disk of all the images and if possible an album created on my photographic page with all the images in.
I wasn't sure at all what to charge! I decided to look online and see if I could get any help, I found this really helpful website that has lots of information about photographers rates : http://www.londonfreelance.org/


From this website I decided to pick a price to charge per hour, I decided on £20. I think this is a reasonable price as I haven't done any christening photography yet.

I will be needed at this even for 3 hours roughly, I have agreed on it being 3 hours at minimum so thats £60.
I then had to decided on how much to charge for the time it will take me to edit all the photos, The client explained she didn't want any special shots taking just natural ones throughout the day this reassures me that there shouldn't be too much editing to do and 1/2 a day should suffice. I have said £75  for have a day of editing.
Then there is the cost of the disk on top of this, I have decided to charge just £30 for the disk as I feel anymore would be too expensive for christening photography.

£60
£75
£30
____
£165
____

£165 is the total I charged this client, she was happy with this price and came down to my studio and paid half of it as a deposit, the rest will be paid a next week, a week before the event.

Running a Business and Self Employment

In this weeks session we did all about running your own business and being self employed.

The most common three elements of a self employed business are:

• Sole Trader
• A Partnership
• Limited company

In my own time I decided to look at websites that are useful for starting up your own business, cause although I already have my own studio, I actually work for my mother. 

Here are a list of the websites I found to be useful:

https://www.gov.uk/starting-up-a-business/start-with-an-idea

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-16595152

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/startingup/

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/smallbusiness/article-1583963/A-guide-setting-business-starting-company.html

http://www.barclays.co.uk/BusinessBankAccounts/Startingyourownbusiness/P1242558528795

My Survey Questions

After thinking hard about questions to use for my survey I decided to keep it very simple and straight to the point here is the list of the questions I have used with the possible answers:

How much would you be willing to pay for one 6x4 print?

1. Under £5
2. £10 - £15
3. £15 - £20
4. £20 - £30
5. Over £30

How much would you be willing to pay for one A4 print?

1. Under £5
2. £5 - £10
3. £10 - £20
4. £20 - £30
5. £30 - £40
6. Over £40

Would you expect photo print packages from a professional photographer?

1. Yes
2. No
3. Other (Please specify)

Would the price of photo prints sway you to decide on using a specific photographer?

1. Yes
2. No
3. Other (please specifiy) 

I think these questions are fine for me to get the answers I need to write my report. 

Pricing and costs

Our lesson this week was on pricing and costs which I found very helpful because of me deciding to write my report on this subject. Most of what was spoken  about in this lesson was helpful to me too as everyone had different opinions on what was right to pay.

There was some website that Jill said we might find useful so I decided to look at these in my own time 

one of them was the a-n The Artists Fees toolkit.

Quote from site - 'This toolkit takes artists step-by-step through a process to calculate an individual daily rate and prepare quotes for freelance work' - I found this extremely useful! 

Report Writing

For this module we also have to write a report, Last year I wrote a report on the ethics behind using photoshop to edit childrens photos.
I have thought a lot about what to write my report on this year and I am going to go with what people think is acceptable to pay/charge for prints within the photography business.

I'm going use the website www.surveymonkey.com to create a survey, I did this last year, I will get photographers and members of the public to fill in this survey so I can college data and results as to what they find acceptable to pay for prints, here is an example of one of my questions from my survey this year:

I have kept my questions very simple and straight to the point so that I can achieve the best results possible from my survey. I am going to post this survey onto many photographic Facebook pages, onto my own classes Facebook page and also on my photographic Facebook page. I have decided to post it on my own photography page because on there I have clients that have bought prints from myself so they will have an opinion on what they are willing to pay.

I also need to recap my memory on how to write a report Thankfully Jill has supplied us with a presentation of information about writing reports, I took notes from the presentation:

• Not an essay – a more structured form of writing
• Based on fact rather than pure argument
• Identify the purpose of the report – an overall aim with identified objectives of how to get there...This must be linked to your design specialism

The title of the report – this can be the question to want to answer or the overall aim

 Your name

 Module Title

Course

Date of hand-in 

• Acknowledge any help that you have received in collecting the information for the report

• List all the main sections of the report in sequence with the page number they start from
• If you include charts, tables or diagrams these should be listed separately under “List of Illustrations”

• A short paragraph summarising the main contents
• Methods used
• Conclusion reached
• Any recommendations

• Give the context of the report – what you want to find out
• State your objectives clearly
• Define the limits of this report
• Outline the method of enquiry
• Offer a brief background of the subject

• How did you get your research – there must be reference to both primary sourced and secondary sourced research.
• All students will undertake either interviews/ questionnaires or both. 
• How did you compare the data and how did you select your subjects for interview/ questionnaire

• Present your findings clearly and appropriately
• Graphs/ tables/ percentages/ diagrams 

• Analyse and interpret the data
• Explain the significance
• Identify important issues, only use fact
• Outline any problems encountered and try to present a balance view

• Bring together the main issues – do not bring in any new information
• Keep it clear
• List any recommendations – if appropriate

• Additional related information like the completed questionnaires etc..This should include an analysis sheet of all returned questionnaires
• Information that does not need to be read but can be consulted by the reader
• Include a list of all companies/ individuals targeted both via e-mail and internet

• Leave wide margins for binding – spiral binding is the best and most professional style of presentation if appropriate for your report
• Use clear headings
• Clearly label illustrations i.e. Table 1, so that they can be referred to in the content
• The first draft needs to be carefully read and checked, make necessary changes and present professionally

After looking through this presentation I am prepared and feel ready to write my report, I just need to collect more results using my survey.