> Why can't photographers get that kind of money for their work? Their > vision is just as essential to the success of the work, their skills > are different but equally disciplined and sophisticated. A very very few photographers can get big money but at the working end (where you are) a jobbing photographer will get less than a jobbing painter. Why? Well, all a photographer has to do is carry a camera and pint it in the right direction. Everything else is automatic these days. Indeed, in the digital era you don't even have to press the shutter at the right time, if the boats are in the wrong place you can move them about in PhotoShop. Basically with photography, "anyone can do it". Artists (painters) however require skill and vision [OK, your lady obviously lacks vision or she wouldn't need your snapshots to work from]. The products of their work are individually unique and have a real archival permanence (despite that phrase being devalued by inkejet manufacturer's bloated claims. Paintings - oils esp. - have a texture as well as colour, the brushstrokes are crafted in the real world. The photographer just takes the neg. to the mall and a machine spews it out .... OK, that's all overstating it of course, but I suspect in the public perception there is some truth ... Bob
