After I turned professional, probably the hardest thing I had to learn was when NOT to shoot. If you offer agility people too many choices, they won't make up their minds and won't buy cutting into your sales. If I shoot (for example)Novice Jumpers with Weaves, I will end up with between 400 to 700 photos, depending on how many dogs were entered in the class. I will delete between 15 to 35. My keeper rate is that high. I started photographing professionally using Nikon manual focus film equipment. When you have to pay for film & processing up front, you learn how to shoot the peak of the action without motor driving your shutter to death. At a jump, I take ONE photo, that is all I need. I will "machine gun" my camera in the weave poles to catch many different facial expressions of the dog. I sometimes will "machine gun" my camera on the A frame to catch a sequence going over the apex of the A frame. If I shoot a 3 shot series at a jump, I normally would get 3 shots of a dog jumping with the jump showing in only in the 2nd photo unless the dog is real slow. My camera will shoot 8 frames a second. Probably the biggest sales tool I have is my viewing stations and probably not for the reason you think. Of course, they do increase sales at an event because people get to look at the photos while they are still in a buying mood. But the biggest asset of my viewing computers is instant feed back from the dog handlers. Listening to them talk amoungst themselves while they look at photos tells you what shots THEY are looking for and what shots you DON'T have. This is very valuable sales information and believe me, when I hear a customer say they are looking for "X type of photo", the very next run they have with that dog, I get "x type of photo" for them. I never take any photo, unless I know what I am shooting and why I am shooting it, otherwise it is a waste of my time and a waste of my customer's time looking through a bunch of meaningless photos.
Jim, you are a talented photographer, but you lack the ability to harness and channel that talent toward your goal. You are getting better and you are learning. Don't waste your shots on pointless photos and learn when NOT to shoot. It is probably the hardest thing I had to learn when I was up and coming in my profession.
