Studios and facilities
I have worked for a long time in a large, fully equipped, photographic studio – with everything from lights to backgrounds, dark rooms to storerooms where all useful equipment was kept, with sets and still-life compositions.
During those years photographers were looked on as magicians or witch doctors. No-one could understand how so many photographs came out so well, one after another. These photographers understood chemistry and the techniques which had been handed down from their old teachers, and they possessed “do-it-yourself” skills.
Towards the end of the 1980’s the average photographer easily earned about 300 million lire per year (€150,00.00). Everyone needed a photographer, otherwise there wouldn’t be any photographs!
The eighties. The emergence of large retailers. Companies had to get their products known. The only means to do this was by advertising in magazines, on billboards along the roadsides or on walls. Good photographs were needed, not ones that were taken on the kitchen table using a Nikon F or, even worse, the Olympus Miu, just to mention some of the unsuitable equipment for taking commercial photos commonly used by “unauthorised” people.
An optical bench (large format view-camera) was required, together with a photographic film, perhaps Kodak Kodachrome, perfect lighting and lots and lots of knowledge of what was about to be undertaken.
Companies paid a lot of money for photos that today would be considered “easy” and therefore poorly paid. One shot in a series for a catalogue on a 4x5” sheet film could cost up to 150,000 lire (€75.00) in the early 1990’s.
At that time, as today, to take a good photo, it was necessary to check the light. The couldn’t be any parasite reflections, or out of place lighting. Everything had to be prepared in a photographic studio.
A photographic studio was necessary. Or rather, it was extremely useful to have one.
How much could it cost to rent a 400 sq. mts. garage in the early 1990’s in Florence? About 900,000.00 lire (€450.00). That meant that six still-life photos would pay the rent. Everything else was profit. All the professional photographers had a photographic studio (except, of course, photo-reporters).
The nineties. The beginning of the end. Suddenly, internet and digital photography came on the scene.
At first no-one realised the importance of either of these. “Internet” … what do we need that for?” “Digital photos” ... There’s no comparison with a film!”. These comments were common at that time. And yet, these two revolutionary inventions of the 1990’s are at the bottom of today’s photographic disaster.
I would rather not go into how an increasing awareness of either one or the other has affected our profession. The results are by now known to all. Let me get to my conclusion – how does today’s photographer pay the rent for his studio?
Let’s examine today’s market. Which companies need beautiful and impressive pictures of their product? All of them. But as I wrote just a few lines previously, very few rely on photographers to take them. Almost all companies hand over a Nikon D700 or Canon 5D to one of their employees, who knows almost nothing about photography, and tell them to take some photos. The photos “come out” because today’s cameras are able to make up for what the modern photographers lack in skill. The light will be only just right, because hardly anyone knows any more what the word “photography” means, or what is beautiful or ugly, or technically right or wrong. But nobody cares any more. The product will be advertised on Facebook with a 280 pixel photo and the purpose has been reached. Millions of people will see the product and a fair number of them will buy it.
Going back to my question – What does a photographer do with a photographic studio today?
The trend began twenty years ago and has now reached its end. Photographers have done away with the darkroom, and now the studio. Hardly anyone has one any more. Perhaps those who own some premises and so do not have to pay rent, either for fun or as an hobby are able to keep their photographic studio open. In order to take the occasional photograph on commission from the ever more rare company looking for a professional photographer it is much more convenient to hire a studio from a specialist theatre. Like the ones for cinemas, for television or for large photographic productions such as Superstudio 13 in Milan. It isn’t worth paying rent for that 400 sq. mts. garage which in the meantime has gone up to €3,000 a month! No one does it any more. And whatsmore, how much is a company prepared to pay for a studio photograph today? And how many of these photos are necessary to pay that much rent?
The solution to the problem is in the 3 Ms, or in other words the famous three “m” words for professional photographers today – multimedia, modularity and mobility.
Multimedia, apart from the technical implications, without a doubt means a choice connected to a new model of communication and presentation which is not affected by the “sense of place” connected to a physical space. This permits actuality.
Modularity means that the professional becomes able to arrange his commercial offers by adapting them to the various aims of the clients. This permits flexible price lists.
Finally, and above all, mobility, means that today’s photographer is able to move around with his equipment to all companies and clients and can create a location and a setting thanks to his improved technical skills. This means not having to pay “that impossible rent” and yet be able to offer a “studio” photographic service. Making use of, when necessary, a hired photographic studio or the clients own premises.
The challenge to embark on and defend this profession is succeeding, depending on the extent to which the professional is able to align and follow these three rules.
It is necessary to understand the tools of the photographic studio and then go to where there is one available. It is no longer the client that comes to the photographer. Today it is we the photographers who go to the client. Today it is better for us to set up a photographic studio, a setting, an on-location backdrop in the warehouse or showroom of the client to take the photographs commissioned. A travelling studio is required and the photographer should know how to manage a dismountable and transportable photographic studio.
“Photography is changing. The Darkroom is changing with photography”.
This motto is ever more up to date and suitable in a world that is undergoing radical changes. Our school, which has always been in the forefront in the photography, anticipates the contemporary changes that our assailing our field. The reasons for which we have alienated the darkrooms (but not the teaching of darkroom way) have made us do the same with our photographic studio. Obsolete, expensive which turn into higher fees for our students. To what end?
But don’t think that we no longer teach studio photography, or that our famous practical courses do not involve teaching students to work with studio equipment. Of course not. I invite you to look at this short video (please click the link) about our still-life course from our 2011/2012 academic programme which was made during a lesson in that course. For certain you will not see the students sitting in a classroom taking notes! And yet the photographic studio that we have set up, with the professional equipment that you will see and which is made available by the school, you will not find today if you make a visit to the school, in that very classroom. Maybe that is the actual equipment which I am using this very minute, whilst you are reading this article!
Our technical programmes have not changed. We teach about film, the darkroom as well as all studio techniques, lighting techniques, practical use of studio equipment, indoor and on-location settings, setting up backdrops and the use of every type of equipment required in professional photography. How do we do it? We create every kind of set, anywhere, on the spot. We teach our students the art of knowing how to bring home the best result thanks to the technical preparation regardless of the initial conditions, using any means and in every situation. Always. Today, more than ever, demonstrating how important it is to understand the equipment, know how to choose it according to the need to mount and dismantle quickly and easily in order to move it from one place to another. We teach modern photography, for the new photographer, in the global market of today and tomorrow.
For this reason we no longer have a photographic studio. Our studio is wherever we want to take a photo. Whether it be the classroom where we have lessons, the square in front of the school, a friend’s villa which we use as a setting for fashion shoots or any other suitable place. Our students learn how to use single-torch flashes, generators, batteries, beauty dishes, banks and window-lights, diffusers, stands, continuous lighting, butterflies, giraffes, booms and dollies, still-life tables, opaline tables, opaque tables, spotlights, backdrops and any other instrument required by professionals.
Something you will need the day you start working – adaptability. Anyone who cannot move on his own will be quickly excluded from the market.
Are you worried that companies do not pay as well as they used to? Well, even you do not like paying an enormous figure for a course in photography! Everything has to be calculated according to the times we are living in. The cost of our course includes all the knowledge handed on by our teachers to you, as well as the practical work using equipment.
When you come to us you get your hands dirty. And yet we do not have a permanent photographic studio.
You will learn quickly here. We know how to keep up with the times.
The cost of our course is affordable. And the results possible. Because we know how to follow the market.
The Darkroom is the effective choice for a world that is changing.
Michele Pero, Academic Director
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