Question for you. Does the world really need another photograph of an elk?

This is an important question and one that gets raised within the professional community on a regular basis. More than that, photo buyers are often asking the same thing.

Did you know that one of the easiest ways to sell fine art prints is to first sell the work to magazines? This is so counterintuitive, I know. However, time and time again I am reminded of this fact.

One of the questions we get most often from photographers trying to break into the business is, “How do you know what to charge for your work?”

How much effort are you willing to put into selling your wildlife photography? What if I were to tell you there are ways to make truly passive income from all those photographs you have sitting around and it’s not from selling with Getty? In this article, I am going to share with you one of my top business strategies for making sales to magazines every single month – over and over again.

In my last couple articles, we discussed the 3-2-1 strategy of backing up photographs. While this backup strategy is universal amongst professionals, stopping there misses a giant step in what it takes to be successful in today’s world as working photographer.

In the old days, keeping a copy of your photos offsite usually meant a stack of hard drives in a safety deposit box someplace. The idea behind this was to make sure you were safeguarded against any sort of catastrophic scenario such as your house burning down or being burglarized. If you have all your photography eggs in one basket, and sh** hits the fan, then you stand to lose everything.

But that was then, and this is now.

Let’s get one thing straight, right off the bat. If you are going to make a living as a wildlife photographer, then you need to start looking at every photograph you create as a business asset. Why? Because that is exactly what they are.

One of the biggest hurdles that all professional wildlife photographers will face at one point or another is what I like to call artistic ennui.

When I do portfolio reviews for aspiring wildlife photographers, the most often repeated compositional mistake that I find is photographers placing 100% of the emphasis on the animal. Ok, sure, this is wildlife photography. And wildlife is kind of the point of the photograph. However, just because the animal happens to be the subject doesn’t mean that the animal is necessarily the most important part of the equation or composition.

Are you using Smart Previews in Lightroom? If not, you may be missing out on one of the best features Adobe built into this program for professionals.

If there is one copyright myth I hear most often, it's that copyright laws only protect photos registered with the U.S. Copyright Office and you have to add a copyright notice to the photograph physically.

Let’s clear this one up right now.