A money making idea

ANACONDA

Get proficient at photographing coins if you aren't already.

Contact people who have registry sets without photos (or advertise to them) and tell them that you are going to be at the next big show in whereville and would they like to schedule a time when they can have their coins photgraphed by you?

If I had a registry set and didn't know how to photograph my coins (and apparently many set owners don't) I would certainly pay good money to have photos to show them off especially if I had carefully selected my coins based on their beauty (as opposed to their insert numbers).

I'm not sure how much you could charge or how much of a response you would get but if you were good at it, knew how to effectively advertise and could take the photos fairly rapidly, my suspicions are that you would do quite well.

Placid

Pretty good idea.
I guess you just give the customer the memory card or email the pictures to them?
Some people can't figure out how to post pictures either so maybe you do that for them too if they trust you with their password.

291fifth

A major show like the ANA or FUN would probably be the best/only place to try this. I doubt it would be worth the effort at any lesser show. I think about my own market and kind of chuckle. These cheapskates wouldn't pay for anything.

Bustman

It certainly won't make you rich, but it may work. There may be a fear factor involved. One would have a hard time convincing collectors to travel with their valuable collections.

FatMan

I know the leg humping pug already sets up at shows and images coins. See his sig line.

BAJJERFAN

A better way is to buy some folks for what they are worth and sell em for what they think they are worth.

airplanenut

It can be a pain, though--it's much easier to photograph in the dark.

ccr

I suggested something similar to my brother - in -law. Photography is a hobby of his and has a good eye for it too. So, as a sideline, I suggested that he should photograph peoples valueables or properties for sale and/or insurence purposes. So, I agree that it is a pretty good idea to make money even as a freelance sideline. Insurance agancies do need as well as the owners need photograghic evidence to prove that they have what they claim they have.

ANACONDA

Good ideas. I do think that one problem may be to get collectors to bring their coins to shows, however I think collectors are even more reluctant to mail them away for any amount of time.

solid

Just a few days ago I proposed a hypothetical situation to Jeremy, in which
someone with an extensive collection would offer to fly him to their location
in order to photograph their coins over a one or two day period.

I think this would be money well spent, and without the risk of transporting
a valuable collection to a show.

Ken

photoman

You would have to photograph a lot of coins and work them up when you returned home to make it profitable.

We at ANR have thought about setting up a photo booth at our tables at shows. If I had a constant flow of coins I could photograph about 500 coins in a day and then it would take about a week or so to process them for the customers. Oh yeah, and then continue to photograph coins for our catalogs and web. A lot of work but not impossible.

Doug
ANR

BAJJERFAN

I had a board member shoot some images for me. Some were sent to me by email. When I went to upload the images to my registry set across the street I had problems with either the image name from C: drive or the file size being too big. The images uploaded just fine from the CD version tho.