By Wayne Cosshall 

Photography is a business for many of us and a hobby for many more. Whether business or hobby, photography can become one of those all-consuming avocations that give us a reason to get up in the morning. Yet, because of the seemingly endless array of equipment, digital files, shoot logistics, and daily business requirements, many of us are often not as organized as we could be.

And that’s a shame. Although you can’t force creativity, disorganization can definitely put a damper on it. Lack of organization can make us feel adrift or as if we're drowning in sea of unrealized possibilities.  

Getting organized empties our brains of needless distractions. The more organized we become, the fewer worries we have interfering with the creative process.

Among other things, being organized as a photographer requires:

• Image organization and tracking
• Organizing equipment
• Planning shoots
• Maintaining contact lists
• Tracking payments, debts and invoices
• Planning image manipulations before getting on the computer
• Getting work done on time

In November, I wrote about using software to help organize images. Over the next couple of months, let’s look at some of the other areas that need to be organized.

Organizing equipment. Most photographers have collected a lot of equipment: cameras, lenses, bags, filters, step-up and step-down rings, cable or electronic releases, flash guns, tripods, and so on. Personally, I don’t have huge amounts of gear but the other day I counted five tripods, for example.

What system you choose to organize your gear isn’t as important as just making the effort to do so. I’ve always liked drawers of various heights for storing camera gear, so when I pull them out everything is all laid out in front of me. I place a non-slip rubber material in the bottom of the drawer and the gear mostly stays in place, too.

Other photographers love cabinets, filing cabinets, shelves, storage bins or whatever. Tripods can be hung from little wire brackets, as can camera bags, straps and USB, FireWire and flash sync leads.

Having all of your gear where you can easily find it definitely helps when it’s time to plan your next shoot.

Planning a shoot. This can involve looking at maps of the location, noting sunrise and sunset directions and times, figuring out what gear you will need, and determining the best way to carry it. You may even choose to make a preliminary list of subjects you might want to capture.

Shoot planning can seem like a task more suited for people with anal-retentive personalities than us creative types. But the fewer logistical glitches you have to hassle with on location, the more you can focus on getting the best shots.

Maintaining contact lists. To build a steady stream of assignments and photo sales, it’s wise to maintain lists of previous clients as well as people who have inquired about your services, attended your exhibitions, or subscribed to your newsletter. You also want to maintain a list of all of the other people and businesses you work with.

Mailing lists are a great tool, because they make it easy to send out invitations, special offers, or that newsletter you always meant to write.

The simplest and most effective way to keep a mailing list is in Microsoft Excel. Setting up separate columns for names, street addresses, cities, states, and zip codes is just a starting point. You can add extra columns for date of last sale or lists of images they have bought from you in the past.

Microsoft Word can draw the info from the Excel spreadsheet to print out address labels or print directly on your envelopes if your printer can handle it. If you use labels supported by Word, such as the wide range of labels available from Avery, and it can all work flawlessly.

That’s it for part 1. More next month.