Life in Mumbai, or Bombay or whatever you call it these days.
- I’m sowwwy.
Hello everyone. Its been a LONG TIME. The reason? Well, I was in NYC for a month meeting, schmoozing, and I can admit having a bit of the ole PBR. Then I was in Mumbai for two days and then off to Europe for more meeting, schmoozing and as I can certainly admit a LOT of the vino. Anywho. I’m back in Mumbai for the next few hours and then I’m off again to Portland, Oregon where I’m sure I’ll have plenty of photo related stories to share. To tide you over here are a few test shots from a relatively new Rollei TLR shot with the most expensive film every purchased… across the piazza from the Duomo. Oops.
Milan. What can I say.
OK, I’m off to the airport to take a 16 hour flight to Atlanta and then a 6 hour flight to Portland. Another plane just crashed. Thank God I’m on a Boeing. Fuck Airbus.
- The FUNNIEST thing ever unless you’re me.
I thought you all might like a glimpse into my everyday negotiations with clients. Its amazing.
xxoo
Michael
- God help me.
I signed up for twitter.
https://twitter.com/mrubee
Add me.
- Every Once in A While
I’ve been bouncing back and forth between Mumbai and New York lately, in fact I’m about to bounce over to the airport and get on a flight from Bombay to JFK, but I just couldn’t leave before I had a chance to say talk about this crazy experience I had the last time I was in New York.
I’ve started working more on personal projects and one of the latest ones calls for medium format film. I have one Rollei TLR but I wanted a couple more, one for a back up and one that is a little faster. I started calling around to all the usual subjects but no one had one. I wanted to buy one in NYC so I could put my hands on it, make sure it worked right and there were no issues with the glass. I must have called 10 different places before I even caught a lead. I was talking to this guy in the Bronx who was a total handful. He kept telling me in this old school jewish NYC accent, “I don’t have one fella, but if you want a Bronica, have I got a Bronica for you.” Eventually he gave in and recommended I call this guy out on Long Island.
I knew the minute he answered the phone that I’d talked to this guy before. When Tamarkin was still in NYC, up the block from Union Square where Redux (my agency) is, I bought a couple of focusing screens for my old Rolleiflex 3.5 from him. He was nice enough on the phone but I had never met him in person. Well I called him again and he said that he had a bunch of Rolleiflexs’ and this time I had half a day open so I decided that I would go to Long Island and meet this guy in person.
He did not disappoint. Jimmy Ko and his wife (who’s name I didn’t get) are possibly the coolest camera shop owners in the world. Jim and Chris at Pro Photo Supply in Portland, I’m sorry, to the crazy Orthodox guy at B&H who always scolds me for not going to Shabbat services, YOU SO LOSE. You might be fun to tell stories about but Jimmy Koh is the bomb.
This guy LOVES CAMERAS. He loves Rolleiflexes, he loves Leica’s. He has an AMAZING collection of these cameras. So good that you have got to take the LIRR out to Bellmore and get your ass over to his shop to check it out.
I’m serious. He’s amazing. I was there for a couple of hours looking through his collection. I found two Rolleiflex cameras I liked, and bought, a 2.8 and a 3.5. Good cameras, fair prices. When I ran a roll through the 2.8 the 12/24 switch didn’t work and I got really sad because I needed it for a shoot that weekend. He looks at me and smiled and says, “I spent 3 years training as a Rollei tech in Germany. I’ll fix it right now”. I shit you not. He popped the damn thing open and figured out what was wrong with it. He says, “Some guy didn’t know what he was doing, he couldn’t fix it so he just took out the part. I have another one”. No problem.
IT WAS AWESOME.
The guy is seriously fantastic. He really cares about the cameras he’s selling and about the people who are buying them. I can’t say enough good things about him.
Get this… After I bought the two cameras I realized I needed a case. I didn’t have anything to bring them back to the city in. He gave me a vintage bag and when I asked him if he had the taxi number to take me back to the train station he wouldn’t have it. He drove me back himself. That Jimmy Koh, he’s a stand up guy.
Here are a few other wonders from Jimmy’s store…. KOH’s CAMERA
- The New Black
Is out of focus the new black? Matt Eich and I had a long conversation about shooting styles and the ruts we all get ourselves into. I always shoot sharp as a tack. When I went through some old film I found today this image jumped out at me. Maybe I should do this from now on. I mean really, sharpness is over rated no?
- America found
I found some 3200 speed film on my desk and got it processed a few days ago. It looks like images from J and I’s Utah road trip this past fall. It took about 2 seconds to figure out where these images were from because nowhere in the world looks like the American West. Nowhere.
- Man oh man…. Kodak Gold.
Wow. I haven’t used this stuff in ages but as far as affordable 35mm color neg goes in India, this is it. You can buy it anywhere and get it processed almost anywhere. Its got this look that just screams India. Not the bright shiny chome India, the other India, the rough dirty one. Its freaking fantastic
- Rattan Tata in Time Magazine
I photographed Rattan Tata for Time Magazine’s coverage of the Nano. They used these:
and I liked these:
- Self Worth
I’m sitting in a five star hotel in New Delhi writing this and two tables away are two freelancers talking about the death of the newspaper industry, just amazing. Since October things in the business have gotten a bit dicey for all of us. Many friends of mine have been laid off by papers in the States. A few good dailies, including the Rocky (one of my favorites) have gone the way of the Dodo. Its a very frightening time in the news business.
One of the reasons I started this blog was to share my photographic experiences with other photographers. A major part of that experience is the business side of photography and in times like these how we, as photographers, as freelancers, as journalists deal with our clients is the of the utmost importance. Placing a value on our time, or vision, our creativity is getting harder and harder to do with magazines cutting budgets and work drying up.
Recently, an editor from a magazine (who shall remain nameless) contacted me for a job. A travel piece on Mumbai. I’ve shot it 10 times already. No problem. I know it inside and out. 48 hours in Mumbai. I ask for the locations they would like photographed and a budget. From experience I know this is a two day job with two long day charges. Up before dawn shoot till 8, breakfast, shoot indoor locations, lunch, nap, evening light shooting, night shots, home, rinse and repeat.
The editor emails:
The text for the story will be in on Thursday the 26th and it would be great to have the images in the following Thursday 2nd. My budget for this piece is $500 SGD
500 SGD is around 325 dollars. That is not enough money for a job like this. I politely turned down the work not only because the money was much too low but also because I was booked with other jobs until well after the deadline. I did however make sure that I explained that the money was much too low saying:
My lowest day rate (8 hours) for a travel magazine assignment is $500.00 USD plus expenses including digital transfer, transportation and meals for the day. I’m happy to work with you but I can’t do it for less than that.
Now I understand that times are tough but as photographers, as communicators we need to place a value on that work. It is important to get paid for the work that we do. Not excessively, but reasonably. We have to pay our rent, we have to eat, we have equipment to purchase and maintain, we have to live. People pay for the plane tickets that the airline sells. They buy the products that are advertised in the magazine and they read the stories while they are going to far off cities and stay in expensive hotels.
The editor responded:
That is a shame. I understand the fee isn’t as high as you would like but please understand that this is for a low budget airline that is only seen within India – which unfortunately for us, means our budget is low. We are based in Asia which reflects our budget and we pay in SGD.
It is a relatively new magazine and I have found if hard to get hold of good photographers based in India. ____________________ our London office recommended you to me and I was hoping we would be able to build a working relationship. I could draw some budget from a different article and up the fee to $600 SGD , can you work with this?
She also said in a subsequent email:
I would really like to work with you on this, as is would be great to get your work in our magazine.
The editor literally offered another 50 dollars. But more than that the editor said something very, very important. She said that I have found if hard to get hold of good photographers based in India. She values my work. She likes my work. She wants it more than other photographers that she works with. On a side note I have to say that there are a number of incredibly talented photographers in India. There is no dearth of talent here. I could name 25 photographers in Mumbai and New Delhi that could do a fantastic job on this story. But back to the real issue here. This editor wants me to shoot these pictures because she values my work, unfortunately that value does not transfer into monetary compensation. In addition she wants to start a long working relationship based on an initial sub standard pay rate.
Not a good way to start a working relationship. When I start working with someone I want it to be based on mutual admiration AND mutual compensation. I do not like to be taken advantage of whether it is intentional or not. I’ve been thinking about this issue lately so I hacked out a response:
I agree, my work would be great for your magazine. I’m not saying that because I have an absurd opinion of myself, but instead because I have the ability to photograph a good story with well composed, thoughtful images that people enjoy seeing. Getting my work to the point where my images look this way took a lot of time, training and sacrifice. Look at it this way because it is exactly the same thing; I love the way a 5 series BMW drives. I love the way it looks and the way it feels. It is a fantastic car. I could go into a dealership and tell them that I want to give them 25k for the car and they would say no. Not only because it costs 60k but because it is WORTH 60k. My work is worth much more than 500 dollars a day plus expenses. That is my lowest rate for small magazines and it is only there because sometimes I will take assignments that interest me for less than I normally charge. It is not negotiable.
That said, I do want to work with you on future projects so if you can find the space in your budget to hire me I think we could make some great pictures. I’m CCing this email to my agent so you can contact them directly for assignments. I’m often unreachable for weeks at a time while traveling and working in extremely remote areas. Laura knows my schedule and can book me accordingly.
The editor should be getting into the office in a few hours. We’ll see what she says. I don’t think the budget will move to a place where I’m happy with it and it really doesn’t matter for this job because I’m booked solid until well after the deadline. My hope is that she will begin to understand that if you want good work from experienced people you need to pay rates that reflect the product.
What do you all think? What would you have done? Questions? Comments?
- Bees…
Did you ever think you’d see this outside your hotel window? Good thing they don’t open!
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