North America Photographic Services Market Size

North America Photographic Services Market Analysis

The photographic service market has generated a revenue of USD 5 billion in the current year and is poised to register a CAGR of 4% for the forecast period. Portrait photography at that time was very different from today. It was expensive, although cheaper than painted portraits, and the exposure times were long. For the first decades, photography was only black and white, that is, in shades of gray. The development of photography involved many experiments in order to optimize the photographic process every step of the way. The field of photography also produced different genres of portraiture, photojournalism, and artistic photography, among others.

Increased business activity for advertising agencies tends to boost demand for industry services in North America. The rising popularity of online photograph databases among businesses is expected to hinder growth. With relatively low barriers to entry, the majority of photography businesses are small businesses or owned by owner-operators. A small home office will usually suffice for most, but for those wanting to have their own studio, operating expenses will be more of a consideration. Additionally, the high cost of professional equipment may have previously been enough to put some off from entering the market, although with technological advances and reducing costs, this is set to change.

Overall demand for photographers, and particularly those with digital photography, editing, and retouching skills, has grown steadily over recent years. However, one of the areas seeing a decline in demand is news photography, as social media and crowdsourcing give newspapers and publishers the opportunity to source images from the public rather than assigning the work to professionals.