It's becoming more difficult to stand out as a fine art landscape photographer. With the introduction of the DSLR camera, "everybody's a photographer." As the technology within the industry continues to advance, it is becoming easier to produce a world-class photograph. The result is that the standard of beauty has raised and it's more important than ever to capture an amazing photograph, display it in a way that makes the image stand out as higher than a standard photograph and market to the right audience.
There is an expectation of surrealism and perfection. Although "everyone's a photographer," generally, people can tell when a landscape photo was taken with a cell phone and when a photograph truly stands out.
There is a significant gap between viewers of art and investors in art. Popularity and a high number of followers is less significant than getting the right art in front of the right audience and in the right place.
Investment in the business is vital. People will invest in those who invest in themselves. Instead of starting small and building upon the craft, the initial investment must be much higher. One example is to make the photograph an experience for the customer, not just a print. A ten-foot acrylic or metal print will bring more attention and be respected more than several small prints in perfect light.
Amateurs are undercutting amazing photographs, which makes presentation that much more important. They may see a print for $100.00 and be satisfied with selling theirs for $50.00.
Success in the industry is 50% photography knowledge and 50% postproduction and image enhancement.
In summary, because the industry is highly saturated with great landscape photographers, it is nearly impossible to put some photos on the internet, build a following and get noticed. A photographer with any hopes for recognition must be purposeful in their marketing approach and become well-known in their hometown. As mentioned, this can be done with art galleries, art fairs, and building a client base of hotels and office buildings.
The industry is still profitable in Galleries, and in workshops. There are more people buying the experience of photography than photographs themselves; particularly in vacation areas. Workshops are still profitable, but knowledge itself isn't enough with the high saturation of free training videos on search engines, like YouTube. People love the places they go for vacation and there is still a market for those who want to take a piece of the place home with them.
Based on the industry trends, hotels, coffee shops, restaurants, and office buildings are still buying local art. Representation in a gallery is important for the collectors of fine art photography, but having a specialized gallery in a highly populated vacation arena is even better.
An article by Nathan St. Andres from March of 2017 identifies collectors as wealthy people between the ages of 26 and 65 who like outdoors, nature and home decor.
People prefer to buy prints of the area they live in. Our portfolio is segmented by geographic area:
The Great Smoky Mountains
South Florida
Transylvania County, NC and Surrounding Area
Central Tennessee
Upstate New York
Initial Market Segmentation will focus on the following interests
Art
Photographic Prints
<Each geographic speciality included in our portfolio>
Age Range of 26 to 65 years.
Income >100,000/year
One opportunity is to conduct a customer survey to include:
Who they are
What do they buy now
Why do they buy it
What will make them buy from us