This ‘Exposure Calculator’ is for When You Get Asked to Shoot for Free

Have you been asked to shoot photos in exchange for “exposure” but aren’t sure how many “exposures” your photography is worth? Figuring out a exposure exchange rate can be tricky, and that’s where Photography Domination‘s handy Exposure Calculator comes in.

“Find out exactly how much “exposure” you should receive for your hard work, based on important metrics and complicated scientific algorithms,” the calculator states.

After providing some necessary details about you and your work (e.g. your experience level, the genres you work in, and whether you shoot digital), the calculator returns the number of “exposures” you should demand from the person or company inquiring about your services.

The calculator also helpfully provides some other handy conversion rates (e.g. US dollars, leads, and social media publicity).

As you can probably tell, creator Maarten Mellemans built the tongue-in-cheek calculator as commentary on working for free.

“Of course, if you’re serious about becoming a photographer you should almost never work for ‘exposure’ alone,” Mellemans writes. Here’s a longer article he authored on the subject with tips for photographers who receive these types of requests.