I’m a photographer, I don’t need writing skills!
Many photographers don’t consider writing to be of any benefit to them. But they are oh so wrong. If you want your photographs to be seen, published in a magazine, exhibited, posted on the internet, or become seen by the eyes of the public, good writing skills will rocket you there.
An example: you send some photographs you took on your last trip to Tahiti to a travel magazine. You caption them, number them, date them, etc. and send them off. They may land on the editor’s desk if you’re lucky. They will probably be filtered out of the system by a sub editor, journo or someone else. The reason being that someone has also sent them some photographs of Tahiti. They are not as good as yours but there is a captivating story with photographs. An entire package, the editor does not need to do anything but publish. Your photographs however, have no story, the captions are dodgy, and she will have to pay an editor to write a story and re-do the captions. Too much trouble and way too expensive.
If you send a magazine a package, and it’s good, you will get the work. A publisher loves a photographer that can write; this will save them a lot of trouble. They will want your work. They will ask for work they require; they will pass work your way in favor of the photographers that can’t write. You are in demand and ahead of the others.
Writing is a skill that can be acquired or learned. Again most people don’t realize this. Anyone can be taught how, it’s a skill that can be learned like anything else.
Have a look at the following short course. It shows you what the editor wants. You need to know this if you want to write about your photography.
