Bear today, gone tomorrow

So I’m trying to get hold of a bear costume for a shoot next week. But apparently there’s been a bit of a rush on bear costumes. I could hire a crocodile, a parrot, or a Scooby Doo, but all the bears, even Winnie the Pooh, have full diaries next week. So the credit crunch obviously hasn’t hit the bear costume industry. Either that or there’s a bear convention on at the NEC. I shall keep hunting…

Introducing...

Our new assistant, Tomasz, started with us this week and is already showing us he knows his stuff, especially when it comes to Photoshop. Even an experienced photographer like me never stops learning and it’s always good to have an enthusiastic photography student around who has the time to learn all the little tricks that enable you to tweak an image to perfection. Tomasz is originally from Poland and is studying photography at Solihull College. Take a look at his work at www.tomkawalek.com

Ladies and gentleman, I would like to thank…

Photography competitions are everywhere. A quick google search will reveal hundreds of them across the world in any given month. Fabulous, you might think. I’ll enter a few and hopefully get some recognition, win a prize, be able to call myself an award-winning photographer… So I’m preparing to send off some of my very best images when the terms and conditions catch my eye. Hold on a minute, what does “"you grant a perpetual and irrevocable right to use your images worldwide and in all media without further recompense to you"” mean?

And herein lies the problem. Why is this company or organisation really holding a competition? Is it because they’re passionate about visual imagery and wish to seek out and reward the best photography they can find? Or do they want to get their sticky mitts on your best images and then use them anywhere in the world, for any purpose they like, FOREVER? And you thought you were entering to win a shiny new gizmo or world recognition!

There’s one organisation fighting this trend for poor terms and conditions for competitions and that’s Pro Imaging – the international web-based group of independent professional photographers. I’m a member, and I’m keen to promote them to fellow creatives as they campaign for the rights of photographers and also explain in simple terms the issues around copyright and licensing.

Check out their website www.pro-imaging.org And watch your back if you’re entering any competitions!