Photography has emerged as a profitable and awesome career option to many of Indian youths. Photographs can tell, keep amused, surprise or astonish and if presented in the right manner, they can be stunning and artistic.

With the explosion of the communication network in India, the growth of advertising and media and the fashion boom, and digital photography, it has now become a profession with great commercial value. Photos are an indispensable part in both print and electronic media. Thus this is an area offering great scope as a career option for those who have an interest and attributes needed to be a professional. The Indian photography prospect looks extremely promising, with umpteen branches that are offered through the courses for further honing of the skills.

Description of a Photographer
A photographer must be capable to create a good composition of any subject, a piece of machinery, the beauty of human body, scenery or a child`s smile. To be a photographer, a person has to have both creativity and technical knowledge. He or she must have that extra quality and interest in visuals, colour, light, etc. The field of photography is constantly changing with the advancement of technology and hence he or she has to be fast-paced. A photographer can be expected to do the following things as job:


•A photographer has to work at dissimilar location in order to get a perfect image needed by the client.


•A photographer has to know a broad range of equipments and how to work with them like adjusting apertures, shutter speeds and camera focus etc.


•A photographer has to know a complete understanding of traditional films and modern-day digital photography.


•Developing expertise with software like cutting, editing, cropping, changing emphasis, etc.


•Teamwork is important because the photographer has to coordinate with graphic designers, technicians and complete crew.

Eligibility Criteria of a Photographer
There are no precise educational requirements for the full time courses in photography; though, candidates who have cleared the 10 plus 2 exam are qualified for the diploma or certificate courses in photography. These days, lots of schools offer photography at the 10 plus 2 stage as a vocational subject.

Career Scope of a Photographer
A contemporary photographer can work in many options, the notable in the middle of them include:


•Feature Photographers: Feature photography basically involves describing a story through pictures and therefore requires a systematic knowledge of the subject. Many photographers specialize in the photography of wildlife, sports, travel, environment etc.


•Press Photographers: Photojournalists provide pictures to the national and global press. This career role demands an aptitude to photograph all kinds of interesting people, places, sports, political, and community events for newspapers, journals, magazines, or television. A photojournalist must possess a journalistic sense to shoot a good news picture.


•Commercial Photographers: Commercial photographer takes pictures of commodities, exteriors and interiors of factories and machines both indoors and outdoors to be used for company brochures, annual reports, and in advertising and selling.


•Portrait and Wedding Photographers: They take pictures of individuals or small groups, management of subjects like pets, children, families, weddings, functions and activities of sports and social clubs.


•Fashion photographers: Fashion Photography has developed in India only recently. The mass of fashion photography is carried out in either Mumbai or Delhi and involves by extremely sophisticated and well-equipped studios by freelancers who are specially made by fashion houses of advertising agencies.


•Advertising Photographers: They are connected with the photographic departments of advertising agencies, photographic studios. A considerable section of them happen to be freelancers. Advertising photography is perhaps the best-paid and most reasonable branch of all.


•Freelance Photographers: Freelancing has been the most admired career choice among photographers. Photographers who want to be self-employed need to have business management skills. They can do freelancing in any fields.


•Wildlife Photographers: They capture the animal kingdom and plant life in its most natural and habitual form. This kind of photography is a part of Nature photography which also covers landscapes and scenery.


•Event and Concert Photographers: Event and concert photographers have to present at any event like parties, launching of certain products etc. Concert photographers are for taking photos of a big concert with thousands of people.


•Real Estate and Architecture Photographers: Real estate agents and developers need you for picturing different real estate properties and architecture. Take images of a building, room and locality around it.


•Scientific Photographers: Scientific photographer has to look things in great detail and shoot images related to scientific purposes. It is somewhat similar to Micro Photographer.


•Nude Photographer: Nude photographer or erotic photographer is about shooting nude models for magazines and various other adult publications. This is similar to the advertising photographer as a career.

Ways to Start a Career in Photography
The best way to start Photography as a career is as a freelance photographer. Photo journalist or even a photo blogger are also a good option for starting the career. The person has to start focus on building a decent portfolio before he or she expect to get clients initially. Advertising photographers are in great demand in the present day.

Photography Institutes in India
Photography is a wonderful medium of self-expression. With the blast of the communication network, Photography has now become a profession with huge business value. There are so many certificate and diploma courses in photography in India. Beside these, very few colleges offer the bachelor degree in fine arts and photography. Some of the institutes of Photography are as follows:


•Asian Academy of film and television.
•National Institute of Photography Mumbai: They offer all kind of courses from crash course to advance course.
•Centre for Research in Art of Film & Television (CRAFT), Delhi.
•New York Film Academy, Greater Noida.
•The Indian Institute of Digital Art and Animation, Kolkata.
•International school of photography.
•Film and Television Institute of India.
•Fergussen College.
•MCRC, Jamia Millia Islamia.
•National Institute of Design.
•Satyajit Ray Film and Television Institute.
•St. Xavier"s Institute of Communication.
•The Film and TV Institute of Tamil Nadu.

Recruiters of Photography sector
After the completion of this course a photographer can get the job opportunity in various media sectors like - Add media, News media, Documentary firms, Magazines, Event management organizations, Theatre, Movies etc.