Ian, from the architect/customer position - how do you/they discover photographers for commercial projects?
Hi Michael,
I like your monochrome work a lot, too - good stuff.
Word of mouth is definitely the prime way of finding an architectural photographer. It's been a good few years since I was involved in the commercial architecture scene in London (which I assume operates rather like New York), but even over quite a few years I can't really recall all that many successful collaborations with photographers - people were often picked simply on price. Unfortunately, architects fees are not really that high, so there was in many cases little room for manouvre. Clients can be a better bet if you want to earn a real living, but in the commercial field will be less culturally sensitive - and you will have to compete very hard.
The most satisfactory arrangements seem to come from young architects just starting out working with young photographers just starting out - they are usually the same generation and share similar ambitions, and their respective creativities can spark off each other, as well as forming a new "look". That kind of thing leads to a long-term relationship which can develop over decades to mutual benefit. To find such people, though, you need to go where no photographer has gone before - to the young architectural sub-culture, which will be more attached to schools of architecture than wider commerce. And they won't have much money to throw around! (This may help to explain why many successful architectural photographers are failed architects... My own experience is that it is easier for an architect to learn photography than a photographer to learn architecture.) By the time architectural firms are established and publicly visible they will have their own preferences worked out already, and probably their own established working relationships.
The other thing that comes to mind is an agency such as Arcaid - they are well established and very active, and provide a really useful means of contact for themed built environment images - both as stock and for the commissioning of assignments. Their website is well worth looking at:
http://www.arcaidimages.com/home.php. However, rumour has it that few are chosen... Richard Bryant was the founder. They work internationally, but I have no idea whether they have significant competitors in the US; they may do. Some young architects, however, feel that they are too "establishment", although that may be over-critical (and a little pretentious?).
