The Cynical Career Counsellor Explains Your Future as a

Photographer

Sounds good, doesn't it kid? You get to go buy a nice camera or two, a few lights and tripods, maybe put a darkroom in your parents' basement, and voilá--beautiful girls are begging you to take photos of them in their bathing suits or less. It's only a matter of time before Hugh Hefner calls and between shoots in exotic locales and jetting back to the Playboy Mansion for parties with the bunnies you have barely got time to spend half the money you'll be raking in. Yeah, right. Let me set your sights a little more firmly on what really lies ahead:

First of all, digital photography is fast relegating darkroom photographers to the same status as those audiophile snobs at the quaint "record" store downtown--you can pretend all you want, but you're really just a living museum piece if you don't move with the times. You'll need a high-end computer workstation if you're going to compete in this business, and some expensive software to go along with it. Unfortunately, it's getting more and more difficult to convince the average layperson that your high-priced prints are significantly better than what comes off their printer at home.

So it comes down to how well you can "capture" the perfect shot. Your job opportunities will be limited:

First, you could do freelance work for magazines. "Freelance" is a nice word for "no benefits and no regular income" or "you'd better marry rich". Sure, you could score a tidy sum for being lucky enough to be in the right spot at the right time, but even then, it's no guarantee there'll be any more after that.

Second, there's the photo studio. Problem is, the high end studios are dying out. People go to places like Walmart now for family portraits--don't expect to get much in pay or benefits if you end up there. There are also the specialty studios--trying to get both ears in the passport photo or retouch the fat, pockmarked realtor's publicity shots so he looks less like a diseased troll.

Finally, there's the photo lab. You see, a few of them still like the snob appeal of having a real photographer on staff, plus you'll know enough to work the camera sales counter as well. There you'll learn to despise all sunsets and pictures of dogs and grandchildren--after all, it's only the over 60 crowd who won't be using digital cameras soon. Once in a while, a sicko will turn in a film for processing, thinking it's done by machine so know one sees it--at best you'll be disgusted by the fetish activities depicted, at worst you'll testify in court about the horrible underage photos you saw, only to realize an underground network of perverts will have marked you for death, and you'll have to move to some hick town where you're the one photographing the blessed unions of first cousins.

Have fun.