A Career In Visual Communications

Posted on 3/11/2013 by Jim Pickerell | Printable Version | Comments (0)

If you are a young person who wants a career in visual communications where are the opportunities likely to be?

They are least likely to be in print publishing. Last week we reported that Time Warner is preparing to get rid of some of its magazines due to declining revenue and profits. Here is how the company’s 2012 revenue and operating income broke out, along with the percent of increase or decrease in each segment of their business compared to 2011.

  Revenue Operating Income
Networks $14.2 billion, +5% $4.9 billion, +10%
Film and Television $12.0 billion, -5% $1.2 billion, -3%
Publishing $3.4 billion, -7% $0.5 billion, -20%
      Total $28.7 billion $6.1 billion



The trends are clear. It is easy to see why investors want to get out of the print publishing business.  Print publishing is primarily funded by, and dependent upon, advertising.  Advertisers are, and have been for some time, moving away from print to Network programming, and secondarily to cable programming that to a large extent recycles what has been produced for the networks.

Does this mean there will be more opportunities to sell video clips for television ads?  It is unclear, but it seems advertisers are spending more to run the same ads more frequently than to create a greater number of new ads.

There may be more lower budget projects for the Internet, but it is unclear whether these will make use of clips or more frequently use material that is shot specifically for the project and closely tied to the product or service being advertised.



In my opinion the future of video is in telling compelling stories, not just capturing pretty images. You’ve got to find a way to tell a story with sound, narration and images. Creators need to work on all these skills. If you can’t do them all yourself then you need to put together a team that can – and find a way for the team to work in a cost effective way.

Growth In Video, But Not Movies


The Economist has an interesting report on the decline of the motion picture business and the continued rise of TV.



Between 2007 and 2011 per-tax profits of the five largest studios (Disney, Universal, Paramont, Twentieth Century Fox and Warner Bros) fell around 40%. They represented less than 10% of their parent companies profits and that share is expected to decline to around 5% by 2020. Between 2006 and 2012 the six big studios cut the number of films they produced each year from 14 to 54%. They released a total of 134 films (average 22 per company) last year
 
In 2011 American cinemas sold 1.28 billion tickets, the smallest number since 1995. That number was up to 1.36 billion in 2012, but the added revenue was not enough to offset the increased costs of production. The share of Americans who attend a cinema at least once a month declined from 30% in 2000 to 10% in 2011.

Instead of visiting movie theaters consumers are spending more of their time watching television re-runs interspersed with advertising. Advertising revenue and the revenue from selling network shows for cable reruns are generating the profits for investors.


Copyright © 2013 Jim Pickerell. The above article may not be copied, reproduced, excerpted or distributed in any manner without written permission from the author. All requests should be submitted to Selling Stock at 10319 Westlake Drive, Suite 162, Bethesda, MD 20817, phone 301-461-7627, e-mail: wvz@fpcubgbf.pbz

Jim Pickerell is founder of www.selling-stock.com, an online newsletter that publishes daily. He is also available for personal telephone consultations on pricing and other matters related to stock photography. He occasionally acts as an expert witness on matters related to stock photography. For his current curriculum vitae go to: http://www.jimpickerell.com/Curriculum-Vitae.aspx.  

Comments

Be the first to comment below.

Post Comment

Please log in or create an account to post comments.

Stay Connected

Sign up to receive email notification when new stories are posted.

Follow Us

Free Stuff

Stock Photo Pricing: The Future
In the last two years I have written a lot about stock photo pricing and its downward slide. If you have time over the holidays you may want to review some of these stories as you plan your strategy ...
Read More
Future Of Stock Photography
If you’re a photographer that counts on the licensing of stock images to provide a portion of your annual income the following are a few stories you should read. In the past decade stock photography ...
Read More
Blockchain Stories
The opening session at this year’s CEPIC Congress in Berlin on May 30, 2018 is entitled “Can Blockchain be applied to the Photo Industry?” For those who would like to know more about the existing blo...
Read More
2017 Stories Worth Reviewing
The following are links to some 2017 and early 2018 stories that might be worth reviewing as we move into the new year.
Read More
Stories Related To Stock Photo Pricing
The following are links to stories that deal with stock photo pricing trends. Probably the biggest problem the industry has faced in recent years has been the steady decline in prices for the use of ...
Read More
Stock Photo Prices: The Future
This story is FREE. Feel free to pass it along to anyone interested in licensing their work as stock photography. On October 23rd at the DMLA 2017 Conference in New York there will be a panel discuss...
Read More
Important Stock Photo Industry Issues
Here are links to recent stories that deal with three major issues for the stock photo industry – Revenue Growth Potential, Setting Bottom Line On Pricing and Future Production Sources.
Read More
Recent Stories – Summer 2016
If you’ve been shooting all summer and haven’t had time to keep up with your reading here are links to a few stories you might want to check out as we move into the fall. To begin, be sure to complet...
Read More
Corbis Acquisition by VCG/Getty Images
This story provides links to several stories that relate to the Visual China Group (VCG) acquisition of Corbis and the role Getty Images has been assigned in the transfer of Corbis assets to the Gett...
Read More
Finding The Right Image
Many think search will be solved with better Metadata. While metadata is important, there are limits to how far it can take the customer toward finding the right piece of content. This story provides...
Read More

More from Free Stuff