Tom Kahler is an English photographer and videographer who primary works in lifestyle and automotive imagery. I have been following Kahler on Instagram since he had a following of around 10k so have been following his career journey for a while. He has grown his photographic business in a short period of time, being in his mid-20s and working with big companies in the automotive industry such as Lamborghini, Bentley and Aston Martin. His career goals are most definitely inspirational and I think there is a lot to observe here from a marketing and promotional area since he has been able to grow a freelance career in a short time.
Kahler’s website is a good source of inspiration for me. He separates his genre portfolios, Automotive and Lifestyle and then has a whole client list where the viewer can go into individual shoots and view all of the photographs. This is a really good way to show off your entire portfolio in minutes while having the content on their for people to stick around a little longer and go into individual client shoots that you have done. This is something that I would like to develop in the future, I want to separate all of my commercial work to my fine art work with different names as well. This will enable a clear audience to both websites and way of work.
This Podcast was made when Kahler was 25 and he had been self-employed for around 3 years. At the beginning of the Podcast, the conversation was about how he entered the self-employed world and found his feet in the photographic industry. His journey as a photographer began when he was still studying at six form. Working as a runner for photographers to build and gain experience. After school, he then went and got a part-time job and carried on photography on the side. Taking any little job that he could get gained him experience in the industry. While looking for a garage to buy car parts he saw a new garage which he approached. He did some self-promotion and asked whether they needed any photographs taken for their website. They did indeed and after the shoot, the owner of the garage offered Tom a full-time job as a photographer for a website design company that he owned. He took the job and that was the start of his professional photography career. He had this job for 2 years and then moved to Canada for 6 months. Here he tried to start a life and carry on freelance photography. However, this did not work and he returned to the UK. On Tom’s return, he started up his freelance business and started pitching himself to clients. It was a slow start but he began to get job after job and his work has only gone from strength to strength.
While also taking photos for money, Tom’s love for travel and adventure meant he was always taking photos of the things he was up to, uploading them to Instagram which slowly got him a healthy following on Instagram. This then leads to clients coming to him through Instagram which meant the work started to come to him. He said that to get work he would reach out. Pitch an idea to a client as to whether they would be up for it and quite often they were.
I have learnt a considerable amount from listening to Tom talks about his career. As a young photographer he is an inspiration and the steps that he has taken to get to where he is, is not out of reach for me. Perhaps I want to do things differently and most definitely will create a unique image for myself but the process that Tom has gone through and his use of website and Instagram has made me think about how I will go about going freelance.
Kakler is part of what I would call the “Instagram” Photographers. Much of their work is for consumerism, advertising and commercial gain of companies. Their feeds look beautiful, selling a perfect lifestyle of adventure, fast cars and luxury. This is not something that I want against my name. I want to become a photographer that young people can aspire to be in a realistic and open way. Sharing all of my experiences and helping others grow their careers by showing all aspects of mine.
Being a Freelance Photographer
There aren’t many photographers out there that actually want to give away the secrets of the industry. One of the most important things that people very rarely give advice on is how to actually bring work in so that you can support yourself. Money is something that I feel like people are afraid to talk about and some don’t have the confidence or want to discuss. Very few Youtube videos or online articles give away how much people are charging per hour or day and I feel like it makes it hard to work out as a beginner in the freelance world. These videos are of two American freelance photographers talking about their work and what it means to be a freelancer.
I want to be a freelancer so that I have the freedom and control over how much money I earn, how many days a week I work and how I pick and choose the jobs and clients that I want to work with.I feel like a big part of being a freelance photographer is trial and error. You will soon find what brings in work and what does not. At the moment the only work that I do is that work that lands in my inbox. Admittedly, there is not loads of work flooding my inbox, however, it’s a nice feeling when I do get asked to do the occasional job when I am not actively looking for work while being a student. This is something that I want to build on over the summer and during my 3rd year of uni so that I have some legs to stand on once I graduate.