How To Make Money From Editing Photos In South Africa
Overview
Although it varies, many full-time photo editors can easily make $30,000 – $50,000 a year with a full roster of clients. As you start to get more and more photos to edit, it all adds up very quickly. Some editors can make far more than this when working on multiple weddings a week, all containing tens of thousands of pictures.
How To Make Money From Editing Photos In South Africa
The appeal of setting your own hours, working from home, and having your own business sounds pretty darn appealing. If you already love editing pictures in your free time, you’re now left wondering how you can make money from your skills. I
Photo editors can make money in a variety of ways. Many professional photographers will hire a photo editor to organize, edit, and export all their photos from a shoot. This not only saves them a ton of time but lessens their workload, making you a valuable asset. As an editor, you’ll make money from retouching images, color grading, removing objects, and cutting out backgrounds to make life easier for your clients.
Although some are more time committing than others, this, like any business venture, takes time to grow. However, over time, you’ll build a vast network of loyal clients who constantly bring you new work.
1. Post Your Services On Fiverr
Assuming you’re starting from square one, Fiverr is a great place to start. In a nutshell, Fiverr bridges the gap between client and artist by putting everything in one place. Rather than having to search high and low for a competent editor, individuals and companies can use Fiverr to find hundreds of great photo editors to work with.
2. Write Tutorials For Websites
As you’ve already seen, there are thousands of tutorials covering every topic of photo editing. From youtube to websites, there’s an overwhelming amount of content.
The truth is that a lot of tutorial websites hire experienced photo editors to write detailed tutorials for their website. When taking on writing gigs like this, you’ll end up getting paid per word you write rather than per article. In most cases, you can expect anywhere from $0.02 to $0.08 per word. This might not sound like much but adds up quickly as you start to write 1000-4000 word articles about a certain topic.
Just think, $0.08 a word at 4000 words is $320. Especially if you’re well versed in a particular editing program, you could finish the whole thing in just a day or two.
That’s some pretty good money just for sharing your knowledge with the internet!
3. Reach Out To Photographers Who May Want To Lighten Their Workload
As a photo editor, your best bet of making a regular income is by teaming up with different photographers. Try reaching out to photographers you know, or have mutual connections with so it’s a less awkward first encounter. Mentioning your services and rates for photo editing, and how you can help make life easier for them.
With that said, don’t reach out to just anyone who takes pictures. Only reach out to photographers who you know shoot in bulk and are dealing with thousands of photos from each job. People who shoot weddings, events, sports, or headshots are your perfect candidates. By taking the editing workload off of them, the rate you charge is a small price to pay for any busy photographer to win back some free time.
4. Create A Youtube Channel To Share Your Skills
If you’re not interested in working for someone else, creating a youtube channel can be a profitable idea. Just remember, this will take some time to get going. After some dedication, your ad revenue and subscriber count will quickly snowball.
On youtube, you need to have a minimum of 1000 subscribers and 4000 hours of total watch time accumulated over the past year. Once you check those boxes, you’re able to start earning income from the ads on your video.
5. Make A Photo Retouching Company
If you’re serious about making money editing photos, consider making a formal retouching company. There are a handful of companies just like this online such as Fix The Photo. These companies will have a website highlighting the services they offer and price ranges to choose from. The beauty of this is that you can easily scale this business model by hiring remote employees all over the world. Rather than doing all the work for yourself, you can take on more jobs with the help of others.
6. Create Your Own Photo Editing Courses
Having an audience of people who like your work is an amazing feeling, but it can be used to help sell your skills. Just like youtube, you can create video tutorials bundled together to create editing courses on specific topics—things such as how to learn photo editing or how to create a certain image manipulation. When people love your work and want to know your tricks, they’ll pay money to learn from the best.
Before you start making courses, make sure you have an established audience. Otherwise, you’ll waste a lot of time having nobody to sell to. If you’re completely fresh to this, start by creating free value for your audience.
You could make daily editing tutorials on your Instagram story, start a newsletter, or try building a youtube channel. Eventually, your audience will be full of adoring fans that would jump at the chance to buy your exclusive premium tutorials.
7. Sell Your Work As Prints Or Stock Images
Alternatively, you can upload your edits to stock photo sites and see who bites. With stock photo sites, you need to make a lot of sales before making any proper coin. That’s why it’s important to have a large stockpile of edits to post before you start.
If you have a unique editing style and are able to make images appear larger than life, people will fall in love with it like any art piece. Before you know it, you’ll be making money from your unique editing style and have your photos hanging in people’s houses.
Reference: bwillcreative.com
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
How much should I charge to edit photos in South Africa?
How much should I charge for photo editing? You should charge $25–$150 per hour for photo editing, depending on your experience, skill level, complexity of edits, turnaround time, and number of photos.
Is photo editing business profitable in South Africa?
Starting a photo editing business from home can be a profitable venture for you. The increased demand for edited photographs on social media need for photographs on e-commerce sites and various corporate and social events have made the business of photo editing, not only sustainable but also quite a lucrative one.
Is photo editing in demand in South Africa?
Photo editing is one of the skills in high demand, with entrepreneurs seeking support to select, edit, and position high quality photos on their websites or publish them in print material.
Can you make a living editing photos in South Africa?
Freelance photo editing is a great way to make a living. This is low-stress, creative work that you can complete while having the TV on in the background. Freelance photo editing also lends itself perfectly to working from home. This is ideal in the current situation we find ourselves in!
Is photo editing a good career in South Africa?
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a photo editor. For example, did you know that they make an average of $30.37 an hour? That’s $63,168 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow -3% and produce -3,400 job opportunities.
How much should I charge for 10 edited photos in South Africa?
This method is incredibly straightforward — if you ask for $1/photo, then $10 will get the client ten photos. This can be beneficial to everyone involved as it’s a clear cut way to charge. It also makes it easy for your client to plan budgets — and for you to forecast income.
Can you earn money with Photoshop in South Africa?
Photoshop can be used to create all manner of graphics, not only photographs. A great way to set up an additional stream of passive income is to sell Photoshop art – create graphics that are ready-made and sold online to anyone who may need visual elements. Graphics can range widely: Icons.
What qualifications do you need to be a photo editor in South Africa?
Bachelors or associate degree in photography, visual arts, or similar. 2-3 years of experience in photo editing, or similar. A complete portfolio of work-related examples. Advanced proficiency in photograph editing software, such as Lightroom, Photoshop, and InDesign.
How many hours do photographers edit per hour in South Africa?
For professionally retouched portraits, the editing time taken per photo would be 1.5 hours. For a batch of 10 photos, that would require at least 10 hours when edited non-stop.
How long does it take to edit a photo in South Africa?
Editing photos can take anywhere from 15 minutes to an hour depending on the degree of editing,” he says. “I use tools like Photoshop to hone quality and make sure I’m getting the right dimensions for each product page. On average, on most days, it takes me roughly 30 minutes per picture.
How much should I charge as a beginner photographer in South Africa?
Entry-level photographers: Those who are just getting started in the world of professional photography after taking some formal education typically charge $50-$150 per hour or $25-$125 per image.
Do photographers hire editors in South Africa?
While some aspiring photographers mistakenly believe that they should be good at everything they do, it might be better to outsource some tasks and find a professional photo editor for hire to save some time. It will allow you to spend more time developing your photography skills and mastering new techniques.