Influencer industry is a tremendous market. In fact, influencer marketing grew from $1.7 billion in 2016 to a mind-blowing $9.7 billion in 2020. This year, the market is projected to expand to a whopping $16.4 billion industry. But with social media becoming saturated with influencer content, from digital creators to fashion influencers, activists, and opinion makers, standing out is harder than ever.
A quick search on your Instagram reveals that one good photograph with a well-written message can amass millions of likes. No wonder influencer photoshoots are getting more professional from the brands that sponsor them to the incredible photographers that create them. Speaking of the latter, they have seen this and that, and while some influencers are great to work with, others are anything but inspiring.
“What is the most outrageous photo shoot request you have received from an Instagram 'influencer'?” asked Redditor u/peaches1687 and the thread went viral, amassing 61k upvotes. Photographers used the opportunity to speak up and share the most delusional requests they received from social media creators, so get ready for some cringe and eyerolls.
#1
Not a photographer personally but a few of my close friends are. My friend we’ll call Sara is a pretty successful photographer for only being college student. About a month ago Sara and I were meeting up for lunch at our University’s Food Court and shes fiddling with her cameras prepping them for a big shoot she has that night when this very attractive girl walks over and starts chatting us up. She makes a few minutes of casual conversation mostly inquiring about Saras cameras, and then finally asks if she’d be interested in doing a shoot. She immediately throws her pitch which had to do with modeling some very risqué outfits up in the mountains just outside of the city and then a few photos directly in the center of downtown. Overall the whole pitch was something that bordered very close to being p*rnographic in nature. Sara tells the girl her typically rates and also states that because of the nature of the shoot she’ll have to charge extra as its not something she typically does or is super comfortable with. The girls face when Sara mentioned the price went from enthusiastic to very “are you kidding me?” She then buts in and says “I have over 85k instagram followers, do you know the kind of exposure working with me would give you? This is a once in a lifetime chance for you.” Sara responds telling her that shes an in house photographer for 3 of the cities largest concert venues, works as a photographer for the newspaper, and is a highly recommended wedding photographer on top of it all. “I don’t work for free” My favorite line she said during this was “I work with people much more famous than you on an almost daily basis. I’ve shot photos for Marilyn Manson, Motley Crue, Shania Twain, Post Malone and a bunch of other musicians that come through and was paid for all of it. Your exposure isn’t worth anything to me” after that the girl got really upset and walked off.
434points
#2
I got invited to a friends wedding as a guest. When the wedding was a few weeks away I posted on facebook about some arm surgeries. They messaged me asking if I could still shoot photos. I could not - and they uninvited me. I was never asked to shoot photos, just invited as a guest. Perhaps they assumed I’d bring my camera? I’m a hobbyist, not a pro.
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344points
#3
Had an "influencer" try to set up a shoot with me. When I mentioned my price she was shocked because she was under the assumption that I was going to pay her for some reason.
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284points
Bored Panda reached out to Rich Soublet, a headshot and portrait photographer in San Diego, California who shared a couple of insights into his work, as well as what is it like to work with sometimes difficult influencers.
In a response to the question "Photographers of Reddit: What is the most outrageous photoshoot request you have received from an Instagram 'influencer'?" from Ask Reddit, Soublet wrote: "Been a wedding photographer for 12 years. I ROUTINELY get asked to do entire weddings for free. Not even always from Instagram influencers. One time this guy (whom I didn't even like that much) asked me to do a wedding for free for his friend. Someone I didn't even know existed at all until this interaction."
He added: "I just imagine walking into a restaurant and asking for the absolute best meal they have for zero dollars and then telling them it will be good for their business to do so." The post received 2.5k upvotes on the thread.
#4
Influencer asked me to shoot and before I even had the chance to give her my prices she decided to give me hers, over $300 for ME to shoot with HER for 30 minutes, one of her main selling points was she could “teach me how to leverage and grow my social media”.
Girl was 15...
Edit to clarify: She was asking me to pay her $300+ when in reality at a minimum she should be paying me. I don’t even charge that much haha
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246points
#5
Had someone ask for me to do a videography shoot of their new house being built. They said $200, but they wanted me to go each weekend for 2 years and shoot it to build up a time lapse and stuff. I definitively said no
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230points
#6
I own a wedding photography and videography company in Florida. A YouTube “famous” couple inquired with us for their wedding and demanded all of the unedited images and video along with the copyrights so they could edit themselves for their YouTube channel. It’s a request we’ll gladly honor, for the correct price. For those of you who don’t know, copyrights to 800-1500 images and 12+ hours of video goes for tens of thousands of dollars.
They offered to pay us less than half our regular coverage price for everything. Hah. Bye girl. When we told them we wouldn’t accommodate their request, the bride had her MOTHER call me to yell at us for “ruining” their wedding.
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222points
Soublet recounted that he politely told him "No I'm not going to do that." He said: "Not only were they asking for a free shoot, but it was also on Halloween! Give up a holiday I love to make no money for someone I don't know? No thanks."
Soublet who is a professional photographer said that photography has been a hobby since he was a kid. "In college, a friend asked if I could do their headshots and I thought 'It's just a photo of their face, how hard could it be?'" He added: "Hard. The answer is hard. They came out nice though (for how good I was at the time) and I figured 'Maybe I have something here.'"
#7
A few years back I was in Acadia National Park and we did the Beehive Trail hike. For those unfamiliar it’s basically as close to rock climbing as you can get non harnessed as you are going straight up a cliff on iron rungs and stuff, so super fun and you are rewarded with an amazing view at the top. Most people take a quick snap there at the lip, as most do at the peak of their hike, and then move on to the more rocky area (but less a nice view) to rest.
Anyway while we were there resting two Instagram girls got to the top, and promptly took over the best view of the lip to take various yoga poses. (Because that was totally a natural thing to do after scrambling up a cliff?) For at least ten minutes- families were coming up asking if they could take a picture, but they literally said “we were here first” and “we’ll be here awhile” when asked if they were almost done.
We ended up leaving before they were done but it still boils my blood thinking about it.
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209points
#8
I do documentary film and I had a non-film job in college and I met this lady who was maybe 30 ask me to do an "Instagram video like this" and she showed me a professional video-shoot done with a greenscreen, lights and set. I told her I could probably get pretty close to quality (with my University's equipment) but it would take time to get a crew together & reserve a studio. She told me no, that I should just record it with my phone. I told her that's not what they did for the Instagram video she just showed me and she said "It's on Instagram, that means they recorded it with their phone." She dropped it after I mentioned I charge money and wouldn't just "do it to be nice." She has like 10 followers and three of them were pornbots.
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179points
#9
Work in a camera store and do photography myself, hear stories about this sort of stuff all the time. Usually just ask model shoots for exposure but I’ve heard and seen stories (there is a fairly popular one at the moment about a photographer in Chicago) about people asking for full wedding shoots for exposure. Not always ‘influencers’ asking these questions either, sometimes arsehole people ask this stuff and then say stuff like ‘well if I had that equipment then we’d be able to get the same results’.
They just don’t have respect for the time that goes into the art form.
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169points
When asked why so many influencers and people in general try to get free photoshoots, Soublet said that "it's a combination of people thinking photography is easy and knowing that photographers love taking photos. They're banking on your love of creativity to jump at the chance to make something new and have people see it. Also, a lot of people want to get without giving."
#10
Not an influencer necessarily, but a band.
I have a really close family friend from high school who plays in a local band, and he usually does a pretty good job at getting me on the guest list, whether or not I actually want to take pictures. However, I do bring my camera with every time, just in case.
I usually use the opening band(s) to dial in my settings and see what angles look good for the stage setup, because they didn't even know I was going to be there in the first place, and I'm there because of my friend, so obviously I want anything I give to him to be some of my better work.
Sometimes if the other bands notice me walking around and snapping pictures during their set, they'll come find me after the show and ask for some of the pictures. If I managed to get any that look decent, I never have a problem sending them copies of the photos for their social media pages. Some bands even offer to give me a free t-shirt or hat or vinyl of their newest release, etc. Which is always appreciated.
As with any photo that hasn't been purchased, (done for exposure) I place my watermark on the lower right corner of the picture after I'm done editing. It's not obtrusive, it's pretty tasteful in my opinion, and it just ensures people know who took the photo. Sometimes bands can't remember my name or forget to tag me in a post, no big deal, humans make mistakes, I get it.
So after this one concert in early 2019, the lead singer of an opening band (one I had never heard of) comes up to me and says "I saw you taking pictures during our set, would you mind sending those to us for our Instagram?" I said no problem, give me a few days to import, edit, and upload the photos and I'll email you everything. She followed it up with "We're on tour right now, so we're pretty hard pressed for money, but we'd be happy to give you a shout-out on our page and direct bands in the area to look into you for concert photography." I said "yeah that's fine, I already got free admission to the concert through another band so I'm not super worried about the money, besides this is more of a hobby than a job." And we went out separate ways.
Fast forward about a week and I decide to go check their Instagram to see if they had posted anything from that show, and sure enough, they had. However, not only had they not tagged me in the post, they had completely cropped out the watermark I put on the picture. So much for the exposure I guess.
I reached out to them on Instagram and also commented on the post using my photography profile, not my personal one, and just politely asked them if they'd add my tag to the photo as not only was it my actual photograph, but it was also my edit. Well, they blocked me. Only on my photography profile though. I checked their Instagram on my personal when I started reading this thread, and sure enough, that picture is still on their page, and they hadn't even deleted the comment I made on it saying "I'm sure it's an honest mistake, but I'd appreciate you giving credit to the photographer who kindly sent you these photos with nothing promised but a shout out."
Some people's kids, man
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165points
#11
Wedding Photographer here, they said they were influencers with a great following that they'd promote me to but when I asked for their handle online, silence.
I get this is a lot as I'm fairly well known so an easy target when people look.
Exposure? People die from exposure.
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163points
#12
Someone asked me to shoot her entire wedding, a full day, an engagement photoshoot underwater (I do underwater photography also) and some 'honeymoon' shots somewhere... All for 'exposure'... I straight up said no, politely and she kicked off in a patronising way asking me if she knew who she was and what it would do for my career... She had about 10k less followers than I did and I don't even do weddings as I had pointed out so it wasn't even in my best interest even if she had millions of followers.
Oh and an 'influencer' guy asked me to do a nude photoshoot for him for free. I declined but wished him luck... He then sent a dick pic. I reported him.
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153points
What's important for people to understand is that photographers provide a service that holds value, otherwise you'd never ask a photographer to take photos, Soublet argues. "These humans deserve to eat and be housed and those things can't be paid for without money. If you value the work someone creates, pay them to create it for you."
#13
Did a shoot with this girl- supposed to be a typical collab. Once we met up she was bossing me around, wouldn’t listen to my suggestions and was talking to me like her employee. After the shoot she demanded I send her the hundreds of raw photos so she could edit them herself and that she didn’t want me to post any so that they would seem like she took them herself. I sent her 3 pics and erased the rest. Never talked to her again. Some models are a trip.
150points
#14
I do street photography every so often. I was once offered "influence credit" for pretending to be in shock that I found her in the streets of my town. I would take a bunch of photos of her at the spot and give them to her. This would all be recorded by her, I hope, boyfriend. I wasn't allowed to use the photos myself and all I would get is a tag at the end of the description.
I said no thanks. Then snapped a couple photos of her.
She said she would sue me.
I said we were on public streets and I'm a hobbyist who doesn't sell. I dont need model waivers.
Never heard from her again.
Never used photos either. Shes not interesting.
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147points
#15
Been a wedding photographer for 12 years. I ROUTINELY get asked to do entire weddings for free. Not even always from Instagram influencers. One time this guy (whom I didn't even like that much) asked me to do a wedding for free for his friend. Someone I didn't even know existed at all until this interaction.
I just imagine walking into a restaurant and asking for the absolute best meal they have for zero dollars and then telling them it will be good for their business to do so.
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143points
#16
Had someone ask me to do more than a week of videography for them and create a promo video for $200... Not a day... For the whole week.
130points
#17
I noticed an ad on Facebook for a local bar that was looking for a photographer, so I fired them over an email asking for more info.
The bar wanted me from midnight till 2am on a Saturday morning, for approximately 300 photos, all edited and delivered by midday the same day.
For this extraordinary amount of work, said bar was willing to pay £50.
I politely declined and informed them that any professional photographer would consider those kind of rates an absolute insult.
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129points
#18
I have a friend who owns a popular bar. He has signs up discreetly saying there is a $100 up charge if you are an “influencer and ask for comps.” He literally charges people $100 if they ask him to comp the check because they will mention him. So far he says he hasn’t gotten a single chargeback from a credit card company when he’s done it (I think he has only done it a few times with particularly obnoxious people).
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128points
#19
A related story but exactly what OP is asking for, we were on a road trip and at the Toketee falls near southern Oregon. Now this falls is located at the end of a trail about a mile long. The trail leads to a vantage point that’s about 40-50 feet above the fall. If you are a rock climber, then you can probably scramble to the base of the falls but it’s quite a scary endeavor.
The day we were there, we saw two influencer couples at the parking lot. We noticed them because the girls stripped down to their skimpy bikinis at the parking lot and they had some snorkeling gear as well. Now this is a pretty popular spot on insta and so the parking lot was packed with quite a lot of kids and families around.
They started the hike the same time as us and were planning on various poses and shots the whole time. Finally we reached the end of the trail and they realized that all those cool shots on insta means scrambling 30 ft down a wet rock face to the bottom of the falls. The disappointment was palpable that day. The bickering while hiking back was even better. It still cracks me up to think about that day.
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128points
#20
I do photography on the side since I’m mostly film/video.
But I have a friend who has an Instagram account as a side business for fun. I told her I would do a photoshoot for her if she helped me with my resume and cover letter.
Although she has tons of company’s that give her products to review for free, the photo credit she gave me honestly didn’t lead to any followers on my Instagram. So yeah, anyone who wants exposure for crazy work I don’t think knows that they actually don’t give any exposure.
In my case I was the one who brought up the deal and honestly I would have done it for free to get out of the house because she’s my friend. But yeah, that photo credit doesn’t do anything in my experience.
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127points