Why do magazines have shrink wrappers?

And I don't mean those on the top shelf!

Answer: Because if you skim the content on the newsagent's shelf, you'll find it's not what you were led to believe from the cover.

For the first time this month I bought Black and White Photography magazine. Quite prominently on the cover it stated "45 B&W digital papers for you to choose" - I thought how useful, a commentary that I'll be able to use as a reference.

There was a free supplement . "Printing for Digital Photographers" - "Features both Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom".

So what was the problem? Well, the Digital Paper article turned out to be a product listing, one product per line, with less information on the qualitative aspects of the papers list than you'll find on a retail website. And the supplement was frankly useless. It was a puff for a book, contained NO content for Lightroom users but one tutorial on Apple Aperture!

I find this more and more with magazines. Misleading information on the cover - and then the more secret the content, the more it is likely to disappoint.

Photography and the credit crunch

In my new disciplined time management regime, Thursday is due to be my "stock shooting" day or "awayday" as I sometimes put it. A day to get out and do some stock photo shooting - but it's going to be cold, wet and windy, surely a day to stay indoors?

No, hang on, after years of an artificial smile all over the face of businesses pretending that all is well, bonus induced smiles on the face of those who just happen to to have been in the right place at the right time (while there, just following the herd), and a smile on the face of all those dollar stock photos being sold for identical uses on the websites and brochures of businesses pretending to full of 'nice' people, we suddenly face a crunch. A reality check. Thursday should surely be the day to get out into the City of London and take photos of miserable people on a miserable day....

Except it's not like that. It's Joe Ordinary who suffers when the people who run the City fantasy world get things wrong. Joe Ordinary sold a loan by the commission led salesman, who got a bonus on his commission because he sold Joe an insurance policy that won't pay out, a salesman who worked for a company with a huge call centre and a $1 photo of a girl with an artificial smile on its website, a company that got the money it lends through a multiplicity of clever deals all organised by clever people at another bank to stay (just) within the letter of the law in terms of the policing of a marketplace where all is geared up to give overpaid and under-talented people big bonuses for making more clever deals.

When it all this cleverness goes pear shaped, Clever Jim won't suffer. At least not in a way that normal people use the word. He'll just get a reduced bonus, or perhaps none at all, but he still earns 10 time what Joe Ordinary earns. Sure, some Clever Jims will lose their jobs, the unlucky ones, but not many. The system will have a quiet year or two, a few more years of relative conservatism before swinging into action again in mutual cleverness because if you are not inclined to be clever (or lucky, or of course arse lick) you are left behind. The surest way of all in this environment to lose your job.

How will this affect the assignment photographer? At least in my line the number of assignments should not fall too far. But art budgets for brochures and annual reports may be slashed. I see this as an opportunity for me to compete in new markets; I don't want to present myself as being cheap, undercutting, but if I can get across that the way I work allows people to generate the images they want in less time and less cost because of my methods and lower cost base.....

If there is a move towards using more 'real' people (rather than the artificial smile) then I stand to gain. The 'real' message is one I intend to push. Will the photography market reject artificiality? There's a section of the market that will always do out and buy the $1 pretty girl but I think there will be many out there who see that it's time for a mood change. We will see.