Hey! My name is Amy and I'm new to this site. I was recently laid off from my job at a photography studio and I'm not sure what to do now! A photographer friend of mine said I should look into doing freelance work online. I have no idea where to even start so I'm hoping to find some answers from this forum! I did retouching for almost 4 years at my last job. We mostly did children, families, and high school seniors. I have no experience with weddings or commercial type stuff. That's pretty much it. I look forward to learning and sharing on this forum!

Thanks!

Hi Amy!
Freelancing is definitely the way to go. It might take a while to find clients, and it can get a bit lonely working from home all the time, but I personally prefer working for myself. I can work at 3 a.m. in my pajamas while eating ice cream if I feel like it. (grin)

You can either keep working for portrait studios, or look for photographers who do model/actor/corporate headshots. That's a good next step up. Cold emailing and great samples are the key - be able to write a polite introductory email with a link to a before/after gallery....and then send the email to photographers/studios you find online....at some point you'll hit pay dirt. =)

FTP, Paypal, and websites like http://www.sendthisfile.com are good friends of mine.

Good luck!