My Last Word On A Tired Subject (feat. Gary Fogelson)

What follows is a re-formatted chat with designer Gary Fogelson of Fogelson-Lubliner and Gary Fogelson fame. Aside from being a stand-up dude who is recognized within his industry, he has many sound observations on the tired subject of free work and free-work-for-exposure experiences.

6:30 PM

Rich Gin: how often do you get asked to do free stuff

Gary Fogelson: rarely asked

Gary Fogelson: although we do some pro bono stuff for tax breaks

Gary Fogelson: "in kind" donations

Gary Fogelson: but that only works for non profits

Rich Gin: right

Rich Gin: such a curious thing, the differences between perceived value of photography and the perceived value of design and illustration

Gary Fogelson: people don't value photography because they think that if they had the right camera they could do your job

6:35 PM

Rich Gin: tough break

Gary Fogelson: too bad it's true

Rich Gin: Have you had this conversation w/ Jac?

Gary Fogelson: all the time

Rich Gin: lol

Rich Gin: life is unbearable

Gary Fogelson: it's a huge problem

Gary Fogelson: for photographers

Gary Fogelson: it sucks

Gary Fogelson: edit

Gary Fogelson: for photographers that want to make money

Rich Gin: truth bomb

Gary Fogelson: i mean, we wanted her to shoot a job for us but they couldn't afford her
so we ended up doing it ourselves

Gary Fogelson: and it was kind of wack

Gary Fogelson: i mean

Gary Fogelson: we got good stuff

Gary Fogelson: but hers would have been so much better

Gary Fogelson: but there's nothing we could do

Gary Fogelson: alo

Gary Fogelson: ha

Gary Fogelson: also

Gary Fogelson: flickr sucks for that shit too

Rich Gin: When I was first starting work in television, there was a spell where I was doing low-budget jobs, but people would still give you a token amount (which usually accounted for transportation) out of an overall respect for your time and because you are MORE LIKELY to have someone do something for you if it seems like you are making an effort.

Rich Gin: They got me through Ted.

Rich Gin: Flickr is an unfortunate situation, really.

Gary Fogelson: i mean

Gary Fogelson: people can treat flickr like a stock source

Gary Fogelson: and most flickr users are willing to do it for little compensation since they already took the photo and they're amateurs

Rich Gin: people DO treat Flickr like a stock source. You saw the shit in the NYT, right?

Gary Fogelson: digital cameras also suck

Gary Fogelson: no i didn't

Rich Gin: http://www.aphotoeditor.com/2009/06/25/nytimes-advocates-stealing-photos-from-flickr-to-decorate/

Gary Fogelson: yeah...

Gary Fogelson: i dunno bout that one though

Gary Fogelson: it's your fault for posting a high res photo

Gary Fogelson: that's why flickr is tarded

Gary Fogelson: for example

Gary Fogelson: from my POV, since i'm not a professional photographer

Gary Fogelson: if someone printed out a photo of mine and framed it, i'd be weired

Gary Fogelson: weirded

Gary Fogelson: but i wouldn't be banging down their door for some money

Gary Fogelson: because it's not my livelihood

Gary Fogelson: but that's how most of flickr is

Gary Fogelson: which causes this problem for the whole industry

Gary Fogelson: the concept of photography as open source or something

6:45 PM

Rich Gin: It's a tiring argument and discussion to have, I guess. I've had it many times myself. I just never thought to ask someone who makes visual stuff for a living

Gary Fogelson: yeah

Gary Fogelson: it's just a value issue

Rich Gin: "visual stuff" /= photography

Gary Fogelson: right

Gary Fogelson: also

Gary Fogelson: i think people also look at photography differently than design because photographers are
"just" capturing images that already exist

Gary Fogelson: (not my opinion)

Rich Gin: true

Gary Fogelson: as opposed to designers, artists, etc who are making it up from nowhere

6:50 PM

Rich Gin: semantic point: I think the use of "capturing" to describe the manufacturing process of photographs is lame. It's like you're a kid in a field hunting for butterflies or some shit.

Gary Fogelson: that's sort of my point

Gary Fogelson: although it depends on the photographer

Gary Fogelson: in the case of the photographs i take, that's all i'm doing

Gary Fogelson: but not in the case of jacqueline

Gary Fogelson: or you for that matter

Rich Gin: You honor me

7:00 PM

Gary Fogelson: ha

Rich Gin: I should just become one of those dudes that sells sunset pictures on the boardwalk

Gary Fogelson: totally

Gary Fogelson: no shortage of sunsets

Rich Gin: like Thomas Kinkade without the shifty Christianity and franchising.

7:05 PM

Gary Fogelson: true

Rich Gin: I have to go talk to some food about this.

Gary Fogelson: okay

Gary Fogelson: have fun

Rich Gin: would you mind terribly if I blogged this? I need something to fill 1's and 0's with.

Gary Fogelson: nope

Gary Fogelson: i don't know what that means though

Gary Fogelson: 1's and 0's

Gary Fogelson: not "blogged"

Gary Fogelson: i'm familiar with that

Rich Gin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binary_numeral_system

Gary Fogelson: oh those kinds of 1's and 0's

Gary Fogelson: i'm familiar with those

An afterthought of sorts. There is never enough work to go around -- anyone working in a creative field or freelancing knows this, but asking people to provide work for free isn't providing a job. I had mentioned my past experiences getting into production work when I was first out of school; an honorarium for the worker to show appreciation for spent time. In retrospect, it's a remarkable thing how much you can get out of someone just for showing the consideration. That's where my real beef in all this is: The lack of consideration by a publication for the providers of their content. Their unwillingness to pay or claims of poverty suggest,

1) Evidence of their broken system (this is not even a controversial point these days).

2) Their lack of respect for their providers (we need stuff to fill space, but we really don't care what it is, otherwise we would go through the effort to get full cooperation of the best-qualified sources).

3) A lack of respect for their own product (see: #2).

I hope this will be my last public conversation about this, though I am sure it won't. I already have follow-up questions for other people in other industries about this same sort of thing.

That Just Happened

Well it seems I was Flickr Blogged and it's like a valve has been released and people from all over the universe are visiting me now so.... Hello. Some background:



This picture is of Jack Lesser, guitarist from The Mighty Handful and bassist for Women. (Women. with a "." to differentiate from Women from Canada). Jack's bands, along with literally hundreds of bands in NYC, play on the all-ages circuit which includes shows put on by Todd P and Joe Ahern*. If you visit The Mighty Handful's Myspace page, you'll find links to bands like Banzai, Le Rug, Radiates, Michael Jordan, Consumer Feedback, Tunnel of Love, Antimagic and scores more. If you're in a position to visit them (you have an office job you hate, say, or are currently unemployed) and take a listen, I think you'll find something for you -- something to excite you or make you pause.

About me: This blog links to bands like this and people whose work I appreciate as well as a running commentary on my work in television and other media. It hasn't been updated recently in any sincere way (Twitter has a way of breaking things down, really) but this could change at any moment with a new job or a new experience.

Thanks for visiting and leave comments.

*At this point I'm more interested in getting content up than hyperlinking. Research and Google are your friends.

This is Just to Say

To all,
The sirs and madams
who want to use
my pictures,

And have high hopes
and genuine wishes
of convincing me
to do so;

You should really have
cash
or check
in hand.

Anna calls her Isobel, but I call her Nancy

The Hasselblad had to go back to her rightful owner (pictured), who came out of hiding to spirit her away. It was fun while it lasted but, y'know, life goes on. That thing was heavy. I'll be fine.

I'm on Twitter for some reason. I only need 140 characters to blog the way I do these days...

Land Shark.

Hi. Go read someone else's blog for a while because it seems I have not posted in over a month. Michelle Lapid's Blog has pictures from a job I did in Atlanta (and betrays the secret identity of one of my clients) over two months ago. See if you can find me. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised. Didn't I tell you I was in Atlanta? I really need to get back on this thing. Sheesh.

An aside; Tunnel of Love is making a return engagement to NYC this Saturday at 7pm. The place? Market Hotel. I've been at Cake Shop a lot lately and it will be good to go somewhere else.

In Local News...

Just walked down Smith St. and watched the paps stalking our friendly local celebrity. They were trying to be so sly about it too -- standing on the corner with their phones to their ears (pretending to call, surely -- why would they want to give anyone else info on where they were or who they were shooting?). Playacting as if their job was important or high-intensity. When she walked past they would hurry along behind her on the opposite side of the street; it just seemed so unnecessary. Granted, I've seen celebrity hunting in Manhattan many, many times and it seems unnecessary there too but now it was too close to home. There's definitely a bad taste in my mouth.

AND YET THERE IS MUSIC

IGNORE PREVIOUS BLOG POST ABORT DO NOT GO TO CRASH MANSION TONIGHT NO HAY BANDA -- THERE IS NO BAND.