I have complained to Kalmbach staffers through the years about their low payments for photos, and my close friend Kevin Keefe good-naturedly reads me the Riot Act every time we get into this area. But my equally good-natured "bitching" has paid off, as Trains magazine increased its payment for cover photos by 50%--from $200 to $300--effective with the October 1997 issue (my photo, by the way). Still, this is a low-ball figure compared with other consumer magazines, but compared with Trains magazine's rail-oriented competitors, this is very good.
Trains gets a lot of work from me at their standard rates only because of my 25-year friendship with Kevin, and I am glad to help out my friend whose hands are tied in the area of photo payments. Whenever he leaves the magazine, my photo submissions to Trains will drop off sharply. But our friendship also is a symbiotic relationship, with one hand washing the other. For me, some of the payback for low-pay photo rates is the access to an event or location otherwise off-limits to myself and most other outsiders. So I get to ride in the cab of the 844 for three hours, and have Steve Lee do a photo run-by just for me with nary another soul around. Such non-monetary compensation is not in lieu of a photo payment, but is some icing on the cake for my willingness to do the photo work for the magazine's going rate. I am not getting rich with such largess, but, am I having fun! Heck, a big corporation like Union Pacific only pays $100 for any photo they reproduce in their calendar. I won't go out of my way to shoot photos for it, but if I have a nice UP photo hanging around from some other photo shoot, I'll submit it for consideration for the cost of a 32-cent stamp. So far I am 2-for-2 with UP, with a $200 return on my 64-cent investment, which is better than Fred could get for me by reading Kiplingers. (Sorry Fred, it was just too good to pass up! We're still friends, aren't we?) My best such 32-cent train photo investment was $900 and a free 4-tape video (which I sold for $80) for the one-time use of a steam loco photo I had lying about. If someone is making money from the sale of a magzine, book or video, then why shouldn't the photographer make some profit as well? Museums charge upwards of $25 for the use of one of their photos, yet we photographers are supposed to let book publishers make their profit from our work with little or no payment to us. I have yet to hear of anyone asking a museum to reduce or waive their fee, and museums are in the non-profit business! Why should we pro photogs--who definitely are in the for- profit business--be asked to reduce or waive a fee for someone who also is in the for-profit business? That is bass ackwards to me. For the record, I never charge a fee for historical society use of my photos, but I feel that public television should pay for the use of photos for the same reasons that publishers should pay. I mean, look at the royalties that the creators of Barney get each year--they are making millions and get free advertising every day, yet I am supposed to let PBS use my stuff for free? I don't think so, pal. With a standard press run of 3,000 copies, a railroad photo book with 150 images in it would have to sell for an additional $1 in order to pay the photographers an extra $20 per photo for their efforts. Is that asking too much of the consumer? I think not. John B. Corns--"Anything for a buck!" --> SPORRS: Serious Photographers of Railroad Related Subjects
