Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for legitimizing personal work as a way to learn and get experience.

Nick Onken actually has a great post over on his blog on shooting tests.

http://nickonken.com/blog/2010/07/how-to-set-up-a-test.html

The “renting a bunch of lights and stuff for the weekend” is definitely on my list for when I get back to London.

This catch-22 actually exists not just in photography or freelancing. Even corporate hiring managers, particularly in this economy have so many candidates to choose from. Would you hire the kid out of college with nothing to show than a few school projects, or the guy that has done the very same thing you want him to do for the last 10 years, and will have a running start and no maintenance whatsoever?

There are companies (and countries) that opt for the latter in most cases. But the kid out of college with no experience can still be a steal for two reasons: Most of the time he’s more hungry than the guy that after 10 years is bored out of his mind, and looks forward to watching football more than sinking his teeth into a real project. Also, that kid while not working for free (sic!) will be more affordable.

So if you want to break out of this cycle, you need to play on these strengths. Be voraciously hungry and show it without tipping into obnoxious. And figure out who is more conservative vs. more adventurous.

And figure out how you can setup a bit of a startup capital so that you can fund some personal work. As long as you’re willing to pay reasonable rates you can always assemble a team and build that initial portfolio that takes you to the next level. At some point the portfolio is good enough to make your next project pay for itself, and then go from there. It’s very hard to bring any type of business off the ground without some startup capital, whether you’re freelance or have a cool idea for a manufacturing business.