Approaching companies like Getty and AAP for the first time?

[Dprime]

Hey guys,

At the moment I'm working on my folio to get it to a point where I'm confident that its at its best to approach companies like Getty and AAP to put my sports folio in front of them. I expect that I'll be looking to approach them sometime in the later months of this year.

I'm most likely going to enrol in the ACP's "Sports Photography" course, not really for the camera tips, but mainly for the information about media protocols to shoot in arenas, and information about how companies like Getty work. I'm just tossing up whether the $500 fee for the 5 week course is worth it when potentially I'm only going to find maybe 1 or 2 of the weeks relevant.

I've worked as an advertising/commercial assistant for about 4-5 years as well as shooting for the same time, so I can confidently say I know most of the ropes within that area of photography via information passed down from the photographers I assisted, but the trouble I'm having now when I'm trying to move away from assisting is that none of the guys I work for can tell me anything about the ins and outs of shooting sports and who to approach at these companies, which is ultimately where I would like to end up.

I think I've read every sports photographers blog possible on the web, and browsed every sports photography related website gathering information, but nothing is really relevant, and I've also contacted a few well known sports photographers regarding assisting them, and while their responses are positive, I can understand that the very rarely need an assistant, so nothings ever eventuated.

So without treading on anyones toes here, I wanted to ask if there is anyone on here that could shed some light on their experiences working in this area? Like I said, I don't want to tread on peoples toes and have them tell me basically how they got their job, thats not what I'm after, but any direction in regards to putting my work in front of the right people at these places, and the processes of how they work would be very helpful

Thanks!
Brett

[wendellt]

from all my friends at getty they say you only need 10 pictures to sell yourself, if you need more than 10 pics to convince someone your that good you really arent so the best advice is to make a portfolio with 10 of your best of the best images.
for getty an AP they would want to see more of a journalistic set a photo that tells a thousand words they dont hvae to be of any big events even the simplest image can be a strong journalistic image

also i started out as a contributor so it's good to ask if you can just contribute(get paid if your image sells) then work your way up from there

good luck with it, from what ive seen you have spectacuar work

[Dprime]

Thanks Wendell, thats a big help.

I've been told by a few people that although they like my work, I need to have more of the "real" sports photography (ie, in the moment journalistic type stuff that you mentioned) in my folio, so I know what you mean about that. I know thats something I definitely need to shoot more of before I approach them.

I feel though that I'm sort of stuck in a loop hole at the moment with gear, to me it seems pointless to approach them with the intention of shooting sport, without owning something with at least 400mm reach, (I have my eye on the 200-400F4 for my next purchase). So realistically, I'd have to drop a lot of money into that lens, without the guarantee of actually getting paid work to put it to use in the near future. Does that seem logical?

[kiwi]

getty and aap have as far as i know, well was this way last time i checkedm, zero interest in new photographers, to the extent that the last time i checked they were not even taking aplications, or there was a three year waiting list

Try SMP Images instead

[Raskill]

Do SMP still only pay for shots used? They rely pretty heavy on not paying photogs unless images are used, so it's easy to run at a loss. Good way to accred though.

[kiwi]

Im not sure sorry, have never worked for them

I think though, in general, if you want to make money doing sport the closer that you can get to the consumer the better