Talking to Photographers
Are you willing to risk your love for photography in order to make a career out of it?
The thing I miss most about writing for photo magazines is the opportunity to call up amazing photographers and pick their brains. So much of my own personal photographic education has come from these conversations, and if you diligently read every word of every interview, you surely learned a thing or two about photography as well.
The most exciting part is when these folks impart some sliver of wisdom, or a tidbit about their process, that scratches a persistent itch of my own. I’ve grilled darkroom masters about paper and chemistry and asked National Geographic photographers why they favor a certain lens. I’ve asked Magnum photographers about their process and encouraged celebrity photographers to dish the dirt. It’s incredibly interesting fun.
These conversations often devolve into two working photographers talking shop. It’s a thrill when a world famous photographer asks what I think about some product or process, and it’s fun to realize that no matter how great and famous you may be, sometimes your challenges are the same as my challenges.
Of course it’s the inspiring “eureka” moments that keep me coming back for more. Every interview isn’t filled with them, but most conversations do uncover something that helps me better understand the art, science, craft and business of photography.
All of this is to say, I want to keep interviewing great photographers about how and why they do what they do. So I will.
Below is my latest interview with an inspiring photographer. This one helped me put into perspective my existential questions about the state of the photo business. TLDR: Not only can you still earn a living in photography, you can blaze your own trail and do it exactly the way you like. If that’s not a silver lining I don’t know what is.
Can You Still Earn a Living as an Outdoor Photographer?
I’ve been writing a lot about dark clouds lately, and not enough about silver linings. Sure, there’s lots of change in the photo business, and change can be scary, but the sky is not falling. Just ask Jeff Brenner.
Last year I stumbled upon his distinctive wildlife photography and called him up. We spoke a few times and I eventually got his beautiful animal portraiture featured in the now defunct Digital Photo magazine. (Find that interview here.)
When I decided to resume interviewing photographers, Brenner was my first call. And thankfully when I told him the twist—that I wanted to gauge his concern for the future of the photo business—he didn’t bat an eye.
“I think that’s a very valid concern,” Brenner told me. “Should I be encouraging people to get into this industry? I struggle with that as well. I think the best way to handle it is providing the truth—give all the context, the good and the bad, and people can make their own decisions. So I like that ability to just give an honest answer. A lot of people ask, ‘Oh, cool, you’re a wildlife photographer. That must be the best thing ever!’ And it’s like yeah, well, at times it is. But it’s also been a really challenging journey over the last 10 years.”
Brenner got his start photographing real estate. It was precisely the ticket to ease him from a 9 to 5 day job into the world of freelance photography.
“If I didn't have the real estate photography job,” he says, “I don't think I would have been able to be a full time wildlife photographer. That allowed me to get into an industry that was still lucrative, and it also allowed me to work with a camera every day. And even though I'm photographing architecture, with lighting, which I don't necessarily do in nature, it still is making me a lot more comfortable with the equipment that I use, and understanding how light impacts a scene and all those things.”1
Real estate photography also allowed Brenner to work for several years building his wildlife portfolio on the side. It’s an approach that is increasingly effective for breaking into a crowded market.
“It took that length of time for me to be able to say, okay, now I can start trying to earn an actual living with the wildlife,” Brenner says. “So when I transitioned out of the real estate industry I started splitting my time between half wildlife photography and the other half commercial jobs with outdoor companies. Even with AI, I still think creating lifestyle images for brands, there’s still an opportunity there. But unfortunately it’s so saturated with social media, you’re probably going to get peanuts, as far as payment goes. If you even get a payment.”
Oversaturation is a recurring theme, perhaps because it’s the biggest challenge in the business today. The supply of photographers outstrips demand for our work. Surprisingly, Brenner finds it easier to earn a living selling prints than taking on assignments.
“One hundred percent,” he says, “That’s absolutely the case. I realized if I wanted to make an actual living through commercial work I would be working 80 hour weeks trying to get enough jobs to make a decent living. It is easier for me to make a living through nature photography— really, just selling prints of my work whatever genre you fall into, or subject matter—it’s easier for me to sell prints of my work than it is to work for commercial businesses.”
“That being said, at this point I’m about 10 years into it. It took me years to establish the credibility to be able to market my stuff as fine art. I wouldn’t tell somebody, ‘Hey, don’t go into this commercial stuff, don’t go into real estate photography, go photograph nature because you’re going to make more money with it.’ Not the case. Over time, yeah, you will. But before I transitioned to wildlife full time it took me six or eight years, 20 hours a week on social media, building my foundation there, going to art fairs, trade shows, taking advantage of all these summer events and getting in front of my clientele, my target demographic—which is Big Sky, Montana, Bozeman, where a lot of these people have second and third homes and they want to outfit their beautiful mountain modern homes with work that has come from nearby national parks. It took a lot of work to create a social media presence, to create these connections and establish that credibility. Because what I have found with wildlife photography is there are incredibly talented nature and wildlife photographers who may only have been in it for a year, and their work is amazing but they haven’t had the longevity for a high value client to look and say, ‘I want to spend $2,000 on this person’s work to put in my home.’ They want something that has some sort of history to it. That’s why I’ve found I have a higher possibility of bringing in a larger income from these print sales, which I never thought would be the case. I thought print sales were dead.”
“Probably 75% of my income comes from print sales,” Brenner continues. “The only reason it’s 75% is because I have one commercial client that I still work with every year. It’s one I’ve kept around because it’s a great job: every year I get paid to go to Yellowstone for a week and a half to photograph. The shoot is 85% wildlife and landscape photo and video. The rest is their product incorporated into the Yellowstone landscape. And 100% of the profits from their sales for that collaboration go to nonprofits and conservation organizations. That in and of itself is reason enough to do it, but it’s also coincidentally a great job.”
The job of wildlife photographer sounds great too, but Brenner says even it can become a drag if your priorities get out of whack and you focus too much on results, losing perspective on the process.
“Throughout my time in wildlife photography,” he says, “I've really focused on the story behind each image. And what's really hard for me to balance is separating that love of wildlife photography from the business side of ‘I need to go out and get this shot, I have to get these.' It takes away from the authenticity of it, I think. I have taken a little bit of a step back from social media because I needed to rediscover my love and passion for what I've done. Because I was letting the business side overtake it.” 2
“You can’t help but have it take away from how you used to romanticize doing photography for a living. It can’t help but be tainted when you’re like, ‘Okay, I have three days to get these images that the client absolutely needs.’ So the last couple of months I’ve had to take a step back from, ‘You have to do this! You have to capture this!’ and I started going back to Yellowstone with the mindset of just putting myself in as many places as I can. And if I just increase the probability of me having an amazing encounter, and if I get something incredible, that’s awesome, I’m so thankful for it. And if I don’t, then there’s always next time. It has allowed me to re-establish that connection that I had when I first started.”
“I need to take some time to myself and recalibrate, sort of rebalance,” Brenner says. “It's very difficult. I started realizing that my work didn't evoke the emotion that it used to, at least for me. I felt like, okay, this is a cool photo but I just remember being so frustrated leading up to this shot where I wasn't seeing anything all day, then all of a sudden it was this awesome encounter and then I have to shift my mindset to be like, okay, really take in the beauty of this moment. That's a hard thing. Because then when I do tell the story, if I'm in this bad mood and it wasn't really this magical experience out in the wild, I'm not going to write and tell you that it was. Because now I'm lying to myself, not only to the viewer, but to myself. How could I feel good about future work that I put out, knowing that at any point well this wasn't a great story but I can just go in and tailor it to manipulate the viewer into thinking this was like the greatest moment of my life? That would take the joy out of it.”
Brenner has an obvious enthusiasm for wildlife and the outdoors. He’s living the dream of many. But does his enthusiasm extend to the next generation of nature photographers who hope to follow in his footsteps?
“I definitely do encourage them,” he says. “There’s two different ways I’m approached. One is—and I get this all the time—hey, tell me what filters do you use on your images? And how can I earn a living with photography tomorrow? That approach is not one that I really indulge, if somebody comes up to me with the mindset of ‘I don’t want to do the work, how can I take shortcuts, how can I just jump to where you’re at right now?’ I feel super thankful that I get that opportunity, but it isn’t lost on me how much work and sacrifice it has taken to get to that point.”
“If I’m approached with, ‘Hey, what are some tips you can give me, I love what you’re doing, how can I start on the path of becoming a full-time wildlife photographer?’ That conversation is one that I love to have. I tell them all the great things, but I don’t leave out the things that have been really challenging. There’s a lot of unpredictability and uncertainty. I always ask them, ‘Are you willing to risk the love that you have for photography in order to make a career out of it?’ If the answer is no, then I would keep it as a hobby. Or at least don’t put the pressure on right away of, ‘I need to go and get this shot to sell prints and make a living.’ Because that’s a quick way to add a lot of stress onto your work. And if you don’t know how to juggle that it can really take away the love and you can start despising going out. For me, fishing is a great pastime. I love doing that when I want to clear my head. That’s something I wouldn’t want to sacrifice. I have no interest in doing that professionally. I want to have the feeling that I have when I go out fishing now.”
“My photo teacher asked me that same question,” Brenner says. “Are you willing to risk it? And for me, yeah, I was. In the times when I’m starting to lose that, when I hit that slump, I now know how to combat that feeling.”
“I know a lot of people who have started,” he says, “and they’ve been gung ho about it. But then they hit their first rut and they think the love is lost, there’s no hope for me to enjoy this again. Yeah, it’s a fight to maintain that passion for creating. If you must do it, and you truly understand and acknowledge the risks involved with losing that fire, if you evaluated all the pros and cons, alright then, let’s get down to the nuts and bolts of it. It’s an incredibly rewarding career. I would never want to do anything else. But I remember even just a few years ago it was like, ‘I don’t know if this is something I should continue pursuing.’ Because it’s not easy. But you know, you get over that hump and it’s just the most rewarding thing. I love it so much.”
To see more of Jeff Brenner’s beautiful wildlife photography, find him on Instagram or at his website, JeffNBrenner.com
“I would say that’s still a very lucrative niche,” Brenner says of real estate photography. “It’s a saturated market, which most areas of photography are, but because there was a big learning curve it’s not just like anybody and their mom can get into it. If you don’t have the correct lighting, if you don’t have the correct knowledge of how to set up your lighting, you’re not going to do well and you’re not going to get jobs.”
“At the peak, when I was spending the most time on social media, I would try to post four to six photos a week. I would always edit those images, ensure that before I posted them on social media they were prepped for a large format print. That would take time. And when I would post the photo I would take the time to type out the story of it, so people could establish that connection and create that moment in their mind. And that would take time. And then I always wanted to be very engaged. People are taking time out of their day to look at my images, and the ones that would take extra time to comment something nice and supportive, I always wanted to reciprocate and comment back and thank them for their words. So that all would take time. And I would do that at night after I would finish all my work in the day. From 10pm to like 3 or 4am every night I would be working on that side of things. The algorithms reward you for being engaged and present on their platforms, so there would be other photographers that would comment on my stuff, I would reply to that comment and then go look at their recent photos and comment—hey man, great job on this, I love the lighting—and just be a part of that community. It just takes so much work. And it can be so draining. And it was so hard to be like, man, I’m wiped out, it’s been a long day, but I need to go spend four or five hours on social media now. You can’t help but have that hit your love of creating.”