Vik Orenstein - The Photographers Market Guide to Building Your Photography Business

This is an assignment shot for the Minneapolis StarTribune by Stormi Greener. This image shows the stack of catalogs this woman received during a single holiday season between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

A lot of people say they want to be a photographer, but what do they really mean when they express this desire? Who do people think a photographer is, and what do they think he does?

Basically, most people think a photographer is a visual artist. They imagine a photographer spends most of his time shooting pictures and editing images in a digital darkroom; he makes a lot of money; he gets to work with gorgeous models and glamorous advertising people and brilliant architects and other talented types; he gets to use cool equipment and travel to exotic locations; and he gets to see his work in magazines and advertisements. All this, and he gets to set his own schedule!

Well, this is all true about 20 percent of the time. But the other 80 percent of being a photographer falls into other categories that may seem more mundane at first glance.

So if being a photographer isn't exactly what people think it is, what is it?

Is being a photographer all its cracked up to be, or is it a case of be careful what you wish for, because you might just get it? As in all professions, there is good and bad.

• THE GEAR: I admit it photography equipment is amazing and exciting! A fast lens with (as we say in the business) good glass, is truly a thing of beauty. A new camera bag, with its cunning storage compartments and Velcro and pockets can give me a rush. If you aren't a gear head when you start shooting, you will be one soon.

• THE MONEY: Sure, it fluctuates. If you don't work, you don't get paid. But when you pull down $17,000 for one stock image, make $1,600 for a day's work, have a $6,000 portrait sale, or get $4,500 for shooting a wedding, none of that seems to matter.

• THE COMMUNITY: Whether you belong to an Internet community, a professional association, or just go down to your local professional camera store and talk shop with the sales folks, hanging out with like-minded people is very satisfying.

• THE INDEPENDENCE: When you work for yourself in your own small business, you get to decide what you want to do, and when and how it do it. That doesn't mean you'll get to take it easy it usually means you'll be working twice as hard as you would be if you were working for someone else. But it will be on your terms and on your schedule.

• SEEING YOUR WORK IN PRINT: This is possibly the best thing after the gear. Truly, it never gets old to see your work in print. I have tear sheets I will forever treasure, including a brochure for a medicine to eradicate canine intestinal parasites (with someone else's macro shots of worms floated on top of my adorable images of a little girl and her golden retriever puppy). If intestinal parasites don't even kill the buzz, you know it's good!

• THE UNCERTAINTY: Let's face it we don't go to eight years of graduate school and get a degree that tells the world we are certified photographers. We don't get any fancy initials after our names like esq. or Ph.D. or DVM or DDS. So we have to settle for acting certified. Like the scarecrow in The Wizard of Oz, we have the brains but without a diploma we might not believe it.