Documenting trips (edit)

The Fin said:

I hear you! Almost 20 years of food, fashion, liquor, cigarettes, and industrial photography. Spent about 5 years with digital. I felt like my craft died a slow death with the advent of desktop publishing and photoshop!

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And most people today couldn't get a proper exposure without the computer doing it for them to save their life lol.

I knew lots of photographers that always shot in RAW because they weren't confident in their exposures then would spend twice as much time in photoshop fixing everything I never understood it (get the exposure right in the damn camera), but that's the way people do it now

Whistu said:

customers repeatedly walked into their shop take 45 minutes of an employee’s time getting decent information only to in the end expect the store to match the online price, and walk out placing no value on the service and information they just got.

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Yep the magic words are "no value" because there is none in the photography business anymore, everyone can be a "pro" now with their digital cameras and it has overwhelmingly decreased the value of the actual pros that know what they are doing and have been doing it for decades. Almost overnight the industry went to shit. I was doing lots of sports stuff towards the end for sports stock companies, NCAA, NASCAR, Indy Car, etc and had built up a big stock shooting on spec but retaining my copyright. I was making pretty good money for awhile, but then people started giving away their rights for shitty day rates ($100 a day LOL WTF) and a credential and it was all over for spec photography. The only guys I knew that were still making any worthwhile money were guys that had contracts with race teams and stuff like that but they were few.

I look back on it fondly because I achieved a goal that I set for myself, but it's bittersweet because it didn't last very long once digital took over and it was the end of a fun career.

Became a security guard for a beach resort after that and did that for almost a decade

Smackdaddy53 said:

Of course you can but lots of them don’t. We’re not discussing hypotheticals.
Lots of people watch content just so they can potlick areas instead of figuring out patterns and how to fish conditions. It’s gotten so bad that now SaltStrong has a friggin app that shows people where to go based on conditions. People are so ate up with instant gratification that they can’t even learn how to find fish n their own. SaltStrong should be ashamed to be whoring out the resource like that. Cheesy as hell if you ask me.

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I completely agree but to be fair it was only a matter of time until this happened, it was inevitable with technology (hell most of the old codgers despised GPS when it came out) and people are going to take advantage of that technology and situations to make money and/or get attention, that's just human nature. And unfortunately all the new tech translates very well into the fishing industry so of course it's going to suffer the consequences of that. I talked here about how I used to be a photographer for a living, and when digital cameras came out it made it all WAY easier (sound familiar?), changed everything and I was out of work pretty quickly after that. Sure I was upset over it and thought about the "what ifs" but ultimately I moved on to something else. I suspect in this case it could go the same way, with guides and other people making a living at it having to move on to other things whether it's because they are losing money or are just sick of all the people taking over the fisheries they worked so hard for.

For me it was both. I worked hard on my craft, put in my time, nurtured relationships, all for it to mean basically nothing at the end because any Joe Blow can pick up a digital camera now and get acceptable images out of it. Just like any Joe Blow can now get a skiff, watch some youtube videos, join Salt Strong and get on some fish with barely any effort when before all this it could take years to figure it all out.

Zaraspook said:

I am reading about some ‘once upon a time photographers’ here that could not transition into the digital age.

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Oh trust me I transitioned just fine, sold all my film gear and bought brand new digital gear (wasn't cheap) the problem was the pay didn't transition after that lol

Not gonna stick around and take a pay cut to "change with the times" I saw the writing on the wall and bowed out on my own terms.

It's like if you worked as a well paid independent contractor for say....Your state to do plumbing on whatever, whenever they needed you because there weren't a whole lot of guys that could do it well. Then one day someone comes out with a new "tool" lets say that revolutionizes the industry, making plumbing ten times easier and almost anyone can do it now. Well now the state wants you to work for them hourly for half of what you were getting paid as a contractor, because they can hire almost anyone now. With no benefits by the way. Are you gonna just "change with the times" or are you gonna say F this and make a change yourself?

Honestly if I were you and you want actual good results for recording one of your fishing trips, have someone come along with you that can use a camera at least halfway decently and have them record you. If you are doing it by yourself it will not be very cinematic at all because you'd just have a few goPros with one on a mount on your poling platform completely static, and then one on your body which just shows your arms and fishing pole waving around and in my opinion is not cinematic or enjoyable to watch at all.

Better yet if you're really serious, save the money on all the gear and just hire a professional videographer for a day to record you and it will turn out way better than if you are doing it yourself or having someone inexperienced with you trying to do it. I've had my son try to film stuff but he can't use a camera properly to save his life lol, believe it or not it takes experience to get the results you are looking for

Hell if you lived in St.Pete I'd do it for you for a reasonable fee, give you all the video files and you could edit it any way you wanted.