What's up with all the WACK ASS content out there?!?!?!

My birds are more like crows and magpies than chickadees, sorry.

You ever feel bad about ruining threads like that?

nope

I agree. How many amateur "photographers" are there now? Seems like everyone ran to K-Mart, picked up a 35mm, found a skank friend of theirs, and got 'em developed at the 1hr photo.

At least the pros can make an average model look decent. Then again I'm sure the real pro stuff costs a fortune, so whatever.

Don't knock amateurs.

From a certain perspective, I am still very much an amateur. I have simple equipment, and taught myself photography. I still produce unique content, and seem to have hapy customers.

More importantly, though... Everyone starts somewhere. If we didn't have new people daring to enter the industry, then we wouldn't end up with any new ideas or growth. Sure, you get a lot of bottom-feeders, but in the end you get some good stuff, too.

You noticed

It's not that "Amateur Photographer with no style or class" is not a popular niche, in fact it is.

The problem is, it's over supplied. So those with it have to discount to make it sell. It's then oversold, because a lot buy purely on price, then there is too much of it on the net, (I will scream if I see another cameraman getting a BJ) so the sites stuggle to survive unless they are well established.

We shoot this kind of stuff. A bit harder to find, yet easier to sell.

i think by amateur photography, he means stuff that looks like it was done at home. for example, take a look at some of the content at www.fantasycontent.com
it's got poor lighting, poor colour, out of focus, etc. like he said, it looks like it was shot with a 35mm from walmart. (but don't get me wrong, i love their content as it works well on my site)

if i were to compare your photography to some of theirs, you'd see the difference.

How bout stuff like this:
http://www.amacontent.com/trailers/432.wmv
http://www.amacontent.com/trailers/427.wmv
http://www.amacontent.com/trailers/400.wmv

Ian
I never knock amateurs, in fact I used to teach them. You probably were an amateur and now a professional learning his trade and doing a very nice job too. Why? You have class, style and integrity.

An amateur is someone who does something for the love of it and not for the money. The guys I'm hard on are those who buy a cheap camera, get a local girl to sit with her legs open then snap away. The girl thinks the guy is a loser, this shows on her face, the poses are WRONG and the quality of the actual image is usually crap.

They then come here spamming it like mad expecting everone to buy it. And I get flamed for calling garbage, garbage. If I put up a website with the same integrity as these guys shoot content I would get flamed. But these are content providers so we have to be nice to them.

They are then left with a ton of content that in a bad/soft market no one who has bought that level wants to keep buying. So they start the 50% off sales, then 75% off and now we have 95% off. Sometimes through a marketing genius, who is taking a cut.

I amnever hard on the amateur, I was one once. I loved shooting and had shot many a naked girl pic before I did it for money.