Towards the end of summer

How do you know when it is time to push through just a little bit longer or to face facts and say this isn’t working? Where’s the line separating determination, knowing what you want and faith in your own ability from plain stupidity? If you know, let me know cause I sure as hell don’t know anymore.

I have got emails to editors, submissions to magazines, introductions letters, entries to competitions, tweets, likes.. you name it, coming out of my ears. I do get published, and I do have work coming in, but I am still not making a well enough living.

Non of the online magazines I have submitted work to, pay for the content you provide. Yes, it’s cool to be published but I also like to get paid. And yes, it is my choice to enter my work in the first place. The thing is, that I feel that something is wrong in this whole set up. To illustrate my point, consider the following.

I personally believe that in order to create a high quality and healthy online culture business, magazines should pay  journalists and photographers for the work they do, and magazines should be paid via subscriptions and through selling ads.

Yet, I just came across an online photography magazine that charges photographers $35 to submit their work to that magazine. Wait a sec.. you are charging me to provide you with free content for your magazine? That is wrong. Isn’t that kind of like biting the hand that feeds you? OK, fair enough, the one that feeds you are the readers buying your magazines and the money you make from the ads on the site, but you can not charge the one who provides you with content. And you do not pay them in return when you do publish their work. Boo..

To be continued.. I need coffee.

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Press Enter

As you probably know, I have been scouring the net for publications, submissions, competitions and whatever -ions one can find. I even entered a competition a few weeks back. Uh-oh:) The deadline only passed yesterday and have  nothing to report just yet.

I came across two calls for entries that seem really interesting, and they maybe something for you as well:
– The British Journal of Photography’s International Photography Award 2011
One can submit singles and series. The deadline is September 15th, at 9 A.M.

– Carmignac Gestion Photojournalism Award – this years theme is Zimbabwe.
The deadline is September 30th. I would love to enter this and collaborate with some one on this. Send me an email if you do too.

Speaking of collaborations, I would love together with some bloggers/writers on a few project when I get back to Cape Town. Perhaps we can do a feature on Cape Town fashion or music send it off to magazines in SA or elsewhere? Sounds like fun to me, anyway. Please, let me know if you’d be keen.

And yes, I did finish writing the Business Plan the other day. Will fine-tune and print it later today. It was the first time ever that I made a SWOT analysis, and must admit that I find it “clarifying” to say the least. There’s something about seeing your strengths and weaknesses listed like that.

And apparently, the gay bears are totally catching on 🙂

A different time in space

A different time in space

 

If I was the melancholic type, I’d wish it was still that time in space but that’s a different story..

 

Yesterday. Kind of an odd day. I woke up to a very grey and wet Utrecht. Waking up in a new place is always a bit odd to begin with. You see, I am staying at friend’s place who’s on holiday in Jordan right now. I used to live next door to him (at this place: hello operator ) so everything is very familiar but not the same. And not mine. Anyway, it was the day of my first photo shoot and first job interview since getting back to the NL. I was hired by a copy writing agency to do a corporate shoot for an in-house magazine. The shoot was originally planned at a building site but seeing how the weather was utterly crap I decided to change locations. I felt a little out-of-place doing so as I’m not really in charge and the outside location had been approved by the 3 parties involved but hey, feeling a little odd is better than coming across as incapable ’cause everyone would have drowned during the shoot and the photos could quite possibly have turned out crap. So I changed locations and I am glad I did. The shoot went by quite fast and I had fun doing it. People were friendly and cooperative and it was nice telling people what to do again:)

 

 After the shoot I had to rush across town (on my bicycle, in the rain) to a school for a job interview. The interview went well but I am kind of hoping I don’t get the job as I am looking for something with a bit more weight to it. I have gotten another photo job for at the end of this month and that’s quite cool too. Am a little worried about not having received an invoice yet for FotoFestivalNaarden (the invoice comes *after* you’ve paid and entered the competition and basically serves as a confirmation notice). I hope they received everything in good order. If I don’t get in because they find my work not suitable that’s one thing but to not get in on administrative errors is uhm, *another*.  I also have to keep my eye on the S.I.P. deadline and start working on my proposal. I really do think I could do a good job on writing a reasearch paper on photography. Plus, apply for jobs on this side obviously. And there’s still the Itch submissions, and Mahala… and Hollands Diep.. And… 🙂

 

And I have a meeting with a fashion magazine next week and am quite excited by the idea. I don’t want to say too much as I am afraid to jinx it. Spurred on by the meeting though, I decided to take all the Swimming Upstream interviews, re-read, re-edit them and write one more general article on the Cape Town creative scene. I approached some young corporates in the creative scene to counter balance the interviews with the artists. I wonder what magazine editors, gallery owners or journalists have to say. So far I approached 4 people but only heard back from one so far, thanks Shani/The Imaginarium. Then again, I only asked people last night:)

 

So my question to you is, when you think about the Cape Town creative scene what springs to mind? Is there anything remarkable, odd or lacking? There is so much creativity in CT but what do you think of the quality of work that is produced? Should the local government provide for.. for what? Is there anything that Cape Town really needs?

 

 

A different time in space… I don’t know why that random remark gets to me so. Being back in Utrecht is a step back in time. Trying to get work here with work I did there so I can go elsewhere. I have one foot here, another there. Trying to connect the dots. I already know here my heart is as I know exactly where my mind wanders. Time. Space. I need both. Whatever. I’m here. My heart not. It’s probably a decision you make. But I did that in June ’09 already when I quit my job.

 

Like I said, time for more coffee.