Mat Marrash

It's no news that "everyone's a photographer", but over the past several months (years for most professionals), it's getting just plain ridiculous. Dads at soccer games with Nikon D3's and 300 f/2.8's, chaperones at prom with Canon 5D Mark II's and fast primes, and uncle Bobs at weddings rockin' R-straps and Fong-spheres. Are hobbyists ever going to draw the line and just stop trying to compete in the professionals' market? For those who're reading this and scratching their heads a bit, let's start from the beginning. A long-long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away,(or about 2002), the professional photography world was starting to look toward the innovations that digital photography was bringing them. Popular 35mm camera manufacturers were starting to come out with higher resolution, more rugged digital bodies, and the medium format world was already starting to acknowledge the advantages of 25+ megapixel tethered capture. Many large volume, lower cost photography operations such as the one I work for were also starting to migrate, and even starting to utilize the power of the internet for their marketing and sales strategies. But a strange thing happened alongside this boom in professional volume; consumers who'd before not had access to high end film labs and expert developers now could rely on their personal computer to process images. This continuity between professionals and consumers has only increased with the larger scale by which digital photography has propagated itself into the digital lifestyle. What used to be a startup cost of several thousands of dollars could almost be had for several hundred. Image processing that used to cost up to $15 per roll of film could be had for the one time value of a memory card plus software.