Volunteer Photographers Wanted
July 16, 2012 
16 Comments
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UPDATE: Thank you to all those who volunteered. We’re working through some long-term technical issues that are keeping this forum from happening right now, but hopefully we’ll be past this soon.
To start off, I just want to sincerely thank all of you for the support you’ve given me at ImprovePhotography.com. The site is only a year and a half old (our birthday is February 17, 2011), and we are now seeing nearly a million page views each month.
For the last two months, I have been hard at work with a developer creating a new community section of the website, where you’ll be able to share your photos to get feedback, ask questions, and learn photography from each other.
Given the millions of photographers who visit this site, such a community would be impossible for me and Dustin to manage by ourselves. I am looking for photographers who are able to volunteer their time and efforts to make our community the best on the net.
The following are the needs we have…
Editors: Our new community page will include a community blog. On this page, ANYONE in the community will be able to submit guest posts on photography topics they have learned about, share their photography-related experiences, review gear, etc. Unfortunately, I know from past experience that this opportunity is guaranteed to be abused by companies who want us to publish their ads. I need editors who have good English skills to edit grammar and spelling, as well as a solid knowledge in photography to edit for substance. This volunteer position would likely only take 15 minutes a day to edit and approve/delete articles from the community. Naturally, editors will also be able to write blog posts on this community blog as often as they like.
Bloggers: In the last few months, I have met dozens of extremely talented photographers who write about photography on their blogs and share their photos, but don’t feel like they have a way to share their knowledge in a meaningful way. Bloggers will be able to write on our community blog about their experience with photography products, their knowledge of photography techniques, tips they learn from shooting, etc. Bloggers should be able to explain difficult concepts in a simple way, have a good knowledge of photography, and be able to commit to one article every two weeks.
Moderators: In the last 60 days, ImprovePhotography.com received over 108,000 spam comments. Most of these are caught with our spam filter, but some good comments get through, and some good comments are marked as spam. Also, all comments need to be moderated to get rid of rude comments from trolls who attack other members of our community. We try to keep our comments as friendly as possible. Moderators will be given a special username and password that will allow them to approve/disapprove comments and ban the trolls from coming back. Moderators do not need to be advanced photographers at all–just people who want to improve the community.
Community Leaders: Community leaders will definitely receive a lot of recognition on ImprovePhotography, but also need to be able to dedicate the time to grow a community. Our new community page will include ways for photographers in various genres to connect, ask/answer each others’ questions, and get photo feedback. We will assign a community leader to each of the groups on our forum (landscape, portrait, post-processing, lighting, etc) to run and judge monthly photography contests in their group, answer people’s questions in the forum, as well as having the opportunity to do live webinars as you see fit. Community leaders should be very knowledgeable photographers who want to dedicate some time each day to grow an awesome sub-community.
Why Volunteer?
This is a labor of love for people who would like to give back to the community. In addition to the ability to give back to the community, you’ll also get all of my online classes, books, and other products for free, and will get to see all of our goings on before we release them to the community. I anticipate that I’ll be in frequent contact with the community leaders, bloggers, and editors.
If you’re interested in pitching in and growing our friendly community, please fill out the form on the web page below. Please only apply if you have the time to dedicate to this project, and you feel competent in using the web.
NOTE: If the form is not visible below, please visit this page from a desktop or laptop. It may not be visible on mobile devices.
Further Reading:
- 10 Ways to Dramatically Improve Your Photo Blog Overnight
- 9 Things Photographers Need to Know About Memory Cards
- Celebrate Photography!
- Flickr SEO: 6 Tips for getting on Flickr’s Explore Page
OK, I sent a form for the editor position. When I hit submit it said something about “community leader”. Did I have fat fingers on the cell phone? Shame on me!
Lisa, I sent a form in for a moderator and it too said “community leader application”. I don’t think it was fat fingers.
Can you tell me where the for to apply is? I’d love to help out! Thanks in advance.
I would sooooo love to volunteer, but am such a rookie that not sure I could be of assistance. The best position would be editor, but again, I am such a rookie at photography (just moved from “green” setting!). I do want to help!!!
I just applied for the Moderator position It will be best for my schedule and I like the idea of getting rid of the negative.
I applied for Moderator and received this message too Improve Photography Community Leader Application
I applied for Editor and Moderator!! Hope I hear something back!!
A wonderful site for photography. Looking forward to work with this new community.
I volunteered but haven’t heard anything back.
Hi Jim – wondering when you were going to announce the volunteers you’ve chosen? If we don’t hear back does that mean we weren’t chosen? I just didn’t want to miss anything
Blogger. I hope to hear back, seems an excellent opportunity.
Hello, I sent in a form about a week or so ago. Just following up as I am still very much interested and available. Thank you. ~Brandi
I plan to volenteer for the blogger position, but at the current time my own website is not ready. Hopefully I’ll be able to have it up soon to source in the application. When it is, I’ll fill out the application.
I’m definitely available for the Editor’s spot and perhaps as a blogger as well. I’ve already submitted the application and look forward to hearing from you guys; thanks for the opportunity! Oh! I didn’t see it listed but I’d be happy to help moderate the FB page if needed as well.
Out of curiosity, has there been any progress on this? I filled out an application and haven’t heard anything back yet, and I’m just trying to stay on top of things.
Any update on this?