How much are your images worth?

Two months ago a design company expressed interest in buying the rights to use my images. They wanted to buy an initial 100 images as first batch. I was pleasantly surprised since the only other time I sold my images was years ago – a couple of pics to a travel website, and one to a local airline for their inflight magazine. Just small deals, but this one now is big. Photography is just a hobby, and if I get to earn on the side, well why not. They asked for the price of a picture. I gave them my rate. They were aghast. They said their current photographer sells them at a low, low price. I was shocked at learning of their photographer’s rate and commented that their guy was almost giving away his images for free! I searched for their photographer’s images and, bragging aside and with all due respect to that photographer, there was no point in comparing. The company owner admitted that my images were far superior in colors, details and composition, and were exactly what they were looking for. I said quality images don’t come cheap, just like any other quality product and service out there. They were upfront enough to admit that they had no budget for my rate. Did I budge? I’m always a reasonable guy, so I lowered my rate a bit considering that they were a start-up and were buying in volume. They said they’ll think it over and would contact me. A couple of months passed and I haven’t heard from them. Did I regret my decision? No. I still believe that quality images come at a premium. Every picture I take carries a part of me with it – my patience, my knowledge, my passion, my style. Heck, a bit of my soul is on every image I make. I can’t sell that for “two-cents” worth! You want cheap, then you’ll have to settle for a cheap image somewhere else. The flower pic above was one of the many they were interested in. What do you think?

Gosh I miss this community! I miss my blogger friends here! I hope everyone is doing fine. As I always encourage everybody – keep on clicking!