I started to become interested in doing photography in the late 90’s. I remember asking my father to take me to downtown Cleveland so I could take photos of the buildings. I enjoyed driving around the Flats area and taking photos of the clubs and bars. I would stay in the car of course, being too young to actually enter the bars and clubs but I’d hold my disposable camera after rolling the window down and take photos. I enjoyed taking photos of barns that were old and dilapidated during my trips to Amish country with my grandma. In the early 2000’s there were tornados that went through a northeast Ohio suburb and I asked my dad to take me to the area specifically so I could see the damage and take photos. I enjoyed taking photos of destruction or things that were old and weathered. Photos of concerts were also a huge deal to me. I was determined to sneak my disposable camera in even during times after 911 when pat downs by security were a necessity. I felt a sense of accomplishment when other girls were stopped at the security check point at concerts and were told to take their camera back to their car or throw it out and I went through, my camera safely hidden. I was never one of those people that just ‘watched’ the concert without taking photos. Photos are a way to freeze memories and time. How can you relive something if you don’t see it again? Memories in your mind fade over time. It was not uncommon for me to leave a photography developer location a few days after a concert with two full envelopes of developed photos that I had taken at a concert. As years passed I continued to enjoy taking photos of old places like malls and amusement parks. I also enjoyed taking photos of animals that were outdoors.
Two years ago right before my vacation to California I got a new camera. That’s when I really started to take photos. I started taking photos of the sunrise. I’d go outside in the morning in the bitter cold weather of the winter time, knowing each moment out in the cold air was self destructive to my lungs but I just needed that photo of the sun just creeping up above the trees. I just needed the glow of color in the sky. It became a regular tradition to take photos outside as soon as I woke up. I’d go out in the snow. Sometimes not bundling up like I should, just so that I didn’t miss taking a photo of that bird I saw on the tree outside. Growing up I was afraid of thunderstorms but I became courageous and gutsy and actually started to stand outdoors during storms just so I could get photos of the storm shelf cloud coming closer or try to get a shot of the lightening bolts. Even being outside during a time when a tornado siren went off. I took the new camera with me to California and I enjoyed taking photos of the Santa Monica Pier and other interesting sights in the cities. A few months after my return from California I started wondering how I could share the photos. I was also struggling to find a job I could do from home due to my disability. I wanted to find a way to incorporate a hobby with something that could help me make a bit of side money since selling knitted items and jewelry didn’t really work out. I discovered a site called ‘Fine Art America.’ I didn’t want to use a site like photobucket or flickr since those were going the way of the dinosaurs. I knew if I wanted to be serious about my photo taking I wanted the photos to be on a professional site. I joined with a free account and uploaded 25 of my photos.
I started posting on the message board on Fine Art America and quickly realized that there were members on there that were egotistical and know it alls. They were overly critical of everything you posted. Even giving you critiques when you didn’t ask for them.
I went ahead and started sharing the photos on Instagram and Twitter. In the first few months of having the free account I made a few sales. Things were looking promising. And a few close family members said my photography was really good. I continued to take photos and I wanted to post them too. But to do that I’d need to get the premium membership. Seeing as though the photos I did have on there were getting somewhat decent views already by September of 2017 I bought the paid membership. My husband was hesitant to allow me to do this, which is understandable. I had gotten some great comments on my photos from some members during the first few months on FAA which helped boost my confidence level. To manage a paid membership on FAA it takes a lot of time. For each photo you up load there’s 10 to 15 questions you must answer about each photo. You have to input prices for each item that you’re selling. The basic things you could sell on FAA in relation to your photography was things like framed art pieces, canvas prints, t shirts and I think one other item. I did this for each of the 500+ photos that I posted on Fine Art America. The membership was $30 and brought about great new features and more items I could sell. I started uploading photos to the site in anticipation and excitement. I wanted to really put myself out there.
I was told by members of the FAA message board that I needed to get Pinterest. I got Pinterest and started sharing links to my photos on that account and uploading screen shots of watermarked photos that I had taken. I ended up adding the ‘Pixiels’ site feature which I had forgotten comes free when you get the premium membership on FAA. On pixels you get even more items you can sell of your photos. You get a nicer looking site layout. At this point I had around 1,000 photos on FAA/Pixels. With a Pixels account you could sell cards, pillows, fleece blankets, duvets, shower curtains, tote bags, phone cases, towels, yoga mats, spiral notebooks, portable car chargers, pouches and a coffee mug. This resulted in even more questions to answer about each uploaded photo. Each item I had to input a price into the system.
To share on social media it also took more time because my photos were not originally watermarked until I started putting them on Fine Art America. Once I did that, I had to screen cap each watermarked photo and then share it individually to social media. I also opened an Instagram account specifically for my photos. But it was a bit difficult to share the link to my photos since Instagram only allows ‘clickable’ links in the bio and not on each individual photo. So viewers would have to copy and paste the photo link into their URL if they actually want to be connected to my FAA page. I private message people on both of my Instagram accounts asking some of my followers or people I followed if they could share my photography on their account and only 1 or two people out of the bunch of people I asked actually agreed to share it for me. Many flat out told me no.
I also started sharing links to individual photos and the link to my photography site on my husbands FB. It got two or three shares and maybe a few likes but eventually it got down to one share and one like. I tried sharing the link on there weekly. I also invested in making business cards which I eventually stopped using since my FAA link changed to a pixels link and after that I didn’t really feel motivated enough to get new business cards. Only two or three people really distributed my cards to begin with. I even dropped off small stacks of my business cards to some local businesses which I don’t think helped me any. I even made a slide show advertisement on Youtube which had appearances from my dog to advertise my photos. I shared this on social media too.
Around this time I also started sharing my photography photo links and account link to Twitter. I had a decent amount of followers by the time I started sharing links to my photos on Twitter. Around 5,000 followers I think. I had some shares and some comments from followers on my photos. I was also in a few Twitter lists specifically for Pixels/Fine art America. I even DM’d some of my twitter followers about my photography asking if they’d check out my photography/share my photography link. Almost all of my DM’s went ignored. As months passed and I shared links to my photography page and links to individual photos daily it started to annoy my twitter followers who started to unfollow me due to the amount of photography sharing I was doing and the amount of asking to share my photos I was doing. It was even brought up in the FAA message board that I was sharing too often on Twitter.
I continued to use Pinterest. Uploading links to individual photos. I reached out to some photography groups on Pinterest and tried to see if I could share my photo through their photography groups since they had done so for some other photographers. That route was less than successful as it seemed like to share through pinterest groups was just a dead end street. My private messages to group owners weren’t returned and the requirements for them to share your photo was like jumping through hoops.
As the year came to a close I rounded out at making around 100 dollars. This is after I paid my membership. But as the next year started the annoyance and frustration grew due to the views/interest in seeing my photos/buying photos faded away. It became a constant revolving door of daily sharing on Instagram (both accounts) and on twitter and Pinterest. Me asking people to share my link. Private messaging followers and getting no responses.
The annoyance from others became more vocal on twitter and it turned to anger. People became sick of me sharing photos on my Twitter wall. I deleted that big twitter account and got a new twitter account and started to follow a few of the same people I followed before but the annoyance when I started to share my photos quickly followed. Either annoyance or ignoring my posts or not seeing my posts. I tried to turn to FAA for guidance but the only response I got from members there was blatantly telling me that I wasn’t trying enough to get my photos out there or that my photos weren’t perfect enough. I always seemed to be one step behind the other members. I was getting some ‘likes’ on my Instagram posts but the viewers weren’t going to my FAA page. I could tell because on FAA/pixels you can check your view count for each photo. No one was actually messaging me either about how to buy photos even though I made sure with each photo post to make sure I posted that I was ‘selling’ photos as well. I went to the FAA message board one final time pretty much at a loss of what to do. A few members told me I had to set up at a craft show. Which seeing as though I had made 100 bucks the first year and only 30 the following year once you figure in the cost of the space at a flea market and the cost for the table and the cost of buying the photography pieces to sell I knew I’d be in the negatives when it came to profit.
In the middle of 2019 I got my own FB account back again. I started to share links to my photography site and made a fan page for my photography. At that point I also deleted my instagram photography account, my other Instagram account and my Twitter account. The times I shared my individual photo links on FB it either got no likes/comments or got maybe 1 or two likes or one share. Even though I have over 200 FB friends. I stopped really using pinterest since so few groups wanted to actually share my photos and people weren’t really ‘commenting’ on my photos. As fall arrived, I looked back at my FB fan page I made….and realized even with sharing the fan page on my FB wall it only had 2 members. I became unmotivated to go through the steps to upload more photos to my FAA/Pixels. It is now December 1st of 2019 and the last time I made a sale was in April. That’s despite the fact that I was still sharing on FB and I still had my pinterest account though I wasn’t really adding more photos on there than I already had.
In the end when I was thinking about taking down my photography account from FAA/Pixels, I realized it was no longer about wanting to make some money from selling my photography items. It became more about… acknowledgment. Actually being seen as a talented photographer. Maybe not on the same level as what you see in fancy photography books but some form of talent. What I didn’t want was to feel like my talent was being ignored, passed by, forgotten about or that my attempt to be acknowledged was making people angry or annoyed and this is what I got the majority of the time over the last two years. I wanted to share and be seen. I wanted people to see my photography and acknowledge it in some way, either by likes, views, comments, shares etc. My journey to have a decent following of my photography became more and more about people being annoyed by it than admiring it. Or they ignored it or simply due to the screwed up logarithms of social media didn’t even see it. In the end there were only maybe 8 or 9 people that really truly loved my photography. And that’s with having my photography up for two years and over 1,000 photos posted.