I wonder how much of this downturn.........
This is a lot of it.
The economy.
People want to cite mobile phones and the web but honestly semi serious to professional photographers didn't care much for tiny cameras that would fit in your pocket and rarely carried a camera 16 waking hours.
Photographers that produced good work, didn't have any desire to throw it up on anything for the world to see for free. That's what's new about the world of images, the free view syndrome.
Sure, digital let everyone have a semi professional result in capture and printing, but there is only so much wall space, so many things you really want to personally shoot and once again, shooting your cat on the sofa isn't usually that interesting, regardless of the camera.
In the professional world the lighting, the grip, the supports, the production is pretty much the way it was a decade ago, except we now shoot digital and view it that second and the overall numbers are squeezed down, i.e. less margin.
That's true in all industries, western world or emerging markets. The real money for the average person is much lower than before and you can't have 1.6% growth in an established market and labor participation the lowest it's been in 36 years and in turn think people have extra money to spend on $2,000, $4,000 to $25,000 camera systems.
I think the digital upgrade syndrome let the imaging equipment world ride high, but now it's leveled. Now do you really need 40 million iso, or 80 million pixels?
Probably not.
Cameras don't make content, people do, cameras don't decide what is interesting, how to conceive or stage a shot, light it, place it, or even when to push the button.
Talking equipment is fun, takes your mind of more pressing issues, but it's just that, talk. Just like most content, commercial or artistic is just data with not that much originality.
It's out there, there is good work being produced every second, but there is also a lot of clutter that gets in the way.
My studio's business is good, but we work harder because we have a larger skill set, offer more and never stop pushing. That's really the key to any endeavor.
I know the realities of our industry, but I also know that if your going to work, your really going to have to work.
As far as the other issues like Getty giving away stock photography, that's fine as I gave up on stock a long time ago. So if Getty wants to proliferate the market with free imagery, it makes that imagery less unique, less valuable to a commercial client, which in turn makes commissioned projects more attractive.
The wheel always spins back.
IMO
BC