From: phr@soda.berkeley.edu (Paul Rubin)
Newsgroups: rec.photo
Subject: Re: Amateur vs. Pro (was Re: International Photographer)
Date: 24 Jul 92 09:23:07
Organization: CSUA/UCB
	<PHR.92Jul23130212@soda.berkeley.edu>
	<1992Jul24.041623.15860@PacBell.COM>
NNTP-Posting-Host: soda.berkeley.edu
In-reply-to: jpglori@srv.PacBell.COM's message of Fri, 24 Jul 1992 04:16:23 GMT

In article <1992Jul24.041623.15860@PacBell.COM> jpglori@srv.PacBell.COM (John P. Gloria) writes:

   In article <PHR.92Jul23130212@soda.berkeley.edu> phr@soda.berkeley.edu (Paul Rubin) writes:
   >By most people's definitions, a pro is someone whose primary source
   >of income is photography.
   >
   The key word is *primary* source of income.  I work full time for
   Pacific Bell and I occassionaly shoot weddings, retirements and
   other events.  I recently sold my first photograph as opposed to
   selling my services and I consider myself an advanced amateur, NOT
   a pro.  My income from my photographic services do not comprise a
   majority of my income.

The term I usually hear for this is "semi-pro".  Applies to
other fields too (audio, musicians, etc.).  There used to be a choral
group in Illinois called the Chicago Semi-Pro Musica.

   >
   >Around here, the press passes you need for the police to let you into
   >news events like riots are issued by the police depts themselves;
   >generally you need to be employed by a newspaper or news agency to get
   >one.  This means a real newspaper, not an amateur one.  They do issue
   >some to freelance pro news photographers but these are -very- hard to
   >get.  You need to have a large track record (lots of published work)
   >to get these.
   >
   Your second point has validity insofar that a press pass is
   required.  However, if it looks *official*, you can get by most
   lines of security.  Case in point.  A friend of mine sent something
   like $50 to an organization (IFPO?) and he received a very official
   looking Membership Card.  He has strapped his F4 & 8008 Nikons with
   his 300mm lens on one body and a zoom on the other, monopod, photo
   vest and his Membership Card pinned to his vest and has been able
   to shoot with the *press* folks at the Oakland A's/San Francisco
   Giants/49er's/concerts without anyone ever stopping him. (I believe
   he pasted a passport photo on the card and re-laminated it.)  --

Hee hee, this is pretty good!  I guess the concert security was
less uptight than the Berkeley and SF cops.  'Course someone with that
much photo equipment and a laser printer could make a very impressive
looking "press" card without sending anyone $50...

Once you're past the security checkpoints things are often more
relaxed.  For the first launch of the Space Shuttle, I drove from NYC
to Cape Canaveral with 3 other people to watch the launch.  (We did in
3 rental cars during the trip but that's another story).  This was to
do news coverage for a college radio station.  We had two legit
reporters, and the other two of us were going to pass ourselves off as
techies (not completely untruthful).  NASA gave us press credentials
for the two reporters but would only give us one techie badge after
1500 miles of driving, so we drove into the Kennedy Space Center
compound with 3 people in the rented car's passenger compartment
(whose badges were carefully scrutinized by the entrance guards), and
1 person hidden in the trunk!  We had worked out a system for
shuffling the badges around if we were hassled (don't stick too close
together and "oh it's on my jacket, let me go get it"), but once we
were on the site nobody cared about badges.  We were there for 48+
hours, got fancy press kits, saw a great launch, and heard what was
later claimed to be the loudest noise ever made.  (This was from the
solid boosters.  The noise was so loud it damaged the launch pad; they
added a sound damping system afterwards which made later launches much
quieter).

Obligitory photo thing for above story: some news photog left a
beat-up 55/3.5 Micro Nikkor on our table and never came back so I hung
onto it.  I tried to locate the owner by phoning Nikon with the serial
number, but no luck.  I didn't have any Nikon equipt. at the time
so I lent it to someone who messed it up by getting sand in it at
the beach.  He offered to pay to get it fixed but I figured easy come,
easy go... I never got to use it.

Oh yes, we were the only college age people in the press area.
Everyone else was grizzled veteran reporters and photogs who were
blase about the launch, but we were real space buffs and started
jumping up and down and cheering when the shuttle finally went
up---then suddenly noticed that dozens of photogs were taking pictures
of *us*!  Some kind of human interest angle I guess.  I don't know if
any of those shots ever got published.