To think that school photographs are abominably expensive?

[Birdly]

Just got the DC's class photos. Lovely pix of them with their friends and teachers in a cheap as chips cardboard frame - £10.50 each! EACH!

So that's 2 DC and, ideally, I'd like to give a copy of each to my mum. That's £42.

Has the world gone mad?

CD's are sold as copyright released. Parents can do what they want with the image - legally

If you wrote Cd's on your literature I wouldn't buy them.
Not that I would anyway. I have a camera.

"If you wrote Cd's on your literature I wouldn't buy them. "

What do you mean?

CD for a graduate is £115 plus the gown hire £40 pus travel expenses and extra tickets for ceremony at £22 each which makes for a very expensive day when you are on a scholarship and a low earner.

£115 for a CD???? That is taking the mick!

The lot I work for charge £20 then as I said before. £5 per added/extra image.

£115? Blimey!.

why do companies play on emotion....not everyone can afford things like this and photo companies play on this as it is a one off event when you graduate. I have only been able to afford an 8 x 10 of my son as it was £63 for one of the group aswell.

Any more questions?

SchoolPhotoPRO, CDs (plural) does not have an apostrophe. Check literature for grammatical errors before releasing it to schools/parents.

The profession of photographer has changed almost beyond recognition since the advent of digital photography- school photographers cannot maintain the same level of earnings as they did before digital photography came along. If people are dissatisfied with a service which inflates its prices in order to compensate for the loss of earnings, then it is quite possible that the profession of school photographer as it was no longer exists. This is also no longer a lucrative enterprise for schools as the take up is so low.

Perhaps the industry needs to take a fresh approach by negotiating a smaller cut for schools and/or selling different products- maybe 'documentary style' images whereby a photographer takes photos of the school/teachers/children going about a normal school day which can then be sold back to the school for publicity purposes as well as to parents?

CDs or CD's...? Most style guides suggest CDs is preferred, but it's not clearcut.

Eh?

Try here (search for 'Representing plurals and possessives'). Or here ("Apostrophes are generally considered optional but are not 'preferred"). Or many other sources...

Informal poll here

So what would you as mums, want from school photos????

I will gladly pass on your comments.

Space hopper? who was that with?

Very interesting... You should take it over to pedants' corner and garner opinion.

I see the logic wrt photo's, as in 'phone and 'plane, and the pluralising of things with no multiples (do's and don't's), but a CD is no longer written using periods and should be pluralised as Compact Discs, i.e. with no apostrophe- what do you think?

Maybe I should, I'm definitely a pedant .

Back on topic though... I do always feel obliged to buy the photos, buy why indeed are they so expensive? I also get a bit miffed at the different combinations. This year we had DD1, DD2, DD1 + DD2, DD1's class... in my day I think families were done as groups only. (I was so pleased when my older brother left and I finally got a photo without him, ha ha.)

I didn't mean my last post to sound like 'fuck off to pedants' corner', sorry!

I am on pedants' corner all the time, and I love grammatical discussion; not trying to have a go...

Spacehopper. I meant What was the Photography Company? there many small ones and about 30 odd National.

Those prices you were charged are way off the mark.

That's OK tethersend, I didn't take it that way. By the way, I'm on the fence about these myself, though I always have trouble with multiple apostrophes, like don't's, but that's just because I think they look silly .

Still waiting for graduation photo from 20/07/10. They have taken my bloody money and I have got nothing yet[confused} So i guess that is going to cost me an 0845 phone call again.........more money

YA definitely not BU - I am a teacher in a secondary school serving a socio-economically mixed area. Increasing amounts of parents/carers from all backgrounds, year on year, don't bother with the rip-off which is the standard photo pack offered by H (can't mention the biggest UK company by name). I don't blame them for the reasons many posters have outlined above. We were caught out last year, however, by the same company which was contracted to take our DTDs' graduation photos: not only was it an outrageous rip-off as discussed above (I suppose at least we got two for the price of one as they'd done the same degree at the same place :) ) , but the quality of the photography was awful. When the final photos came out, my husband, stood between the two girls with their mortar boards on, looks as if he has 5ft wide shoulders, and my son, to their left, looks as if he has an artificial arm with a claw hand ! Clearly H are not too fussy about the calibre of their 'photographers' as our end result was only good for one thing - a laugh !

yes i agree the quality was crap...the photographer moved his mortar board to sit absolutely straight and made DS1 look like a right nerd and he really looked as if he was ready to hot somone with his certificate or pass a baton in a relay.

The photographer wouldnt even take another one to get us right...(it was such production line photography,insensitive and unprofessional).she had DS1 standing almost square on which is completely wrong...obviously badly trained as they should not stand square as they look like idiots.

I do hope they wont be doing DS2's when he qualifies.

Actually, by then maybe i will treat myself to a new camera as i have a much better idea of a photo composition than the so called paid professionals.

Eighty-nine fucking quid I spent on ds nursery pictures. 4 big pix of him, one of the group and 5 little ones. Fucking rip-off.. - were they just prints in mounts, in high quality folders, with frames?

There are some companies that do premium products - all very nice and worth every penny. If you explain what you received and what the style was, we could comment.

Also... is the bad language necessary?