Vicky Brown
Picture Research ExecutiveAre you a graduate? If so, what did you study?
I studied BA Graphic Design at the University of the West of England in Bristol, I specialized in photography within the course. Then I took a Professional Photography Practice course at London College of Communication.
Brief description of what you do.
I work at Corbis Picture library and I source images from our picture library for our clients – commercial clients like advertising agencies, and corporate clients like banks. I find images in answer to a brief given by the client.
What is a standard day for you?
I start at 9.30 and work until 6 pm. I work from a task queue that is put in by our sales team. Tasks will have all the information about the clients and the brief.
I specialize in commercial clients so I mainly work with banks. Clients include Citigroup, Royal Bank of Scotland, Bank of America, Discovery, Sony, as well as working with the branding/design agencies, for instance, Tag and Interbrand. On several occasions I have built picture libraries for clients that they can then dip in and out of themselves.
Others in our team specialize in Media, and we cover for each other at times, but mainly I deal with the clients that work with me regularly.
I only have meetings with clients face to face about once a month or so to take a more complicated brief in person, but I’m in contact with clients by phone on a daily basis, as well as talking all day with our sales people.
What skills have you come to rely on most in your position?
The usual. Communication - verbal and by email. I had to become really organised to turn around jobs quickly – we often have to work to tight deadlines. I need good attention to detail for taking the brief. Visual creativity skills for selecting the right images, and problem solving creative skills to brainstorm for answers to briefs and thinking of creative ways as a researcher to help sales people meet their target. Plus I work as part of a team so you need work well with people.
If you had to pick one positive and one negative aspect of your job what would they be?
Positive is the creativity, the teamwork and working with pictures every day. The negative is that picture research is very desk based and on a computer the whole time. There’s not as much outside contact with clients as I would like. I’m on the phone a lot but I would prefer to get out of the office more and meet clients more than once a month.
How did you get into your role?
The graphic design degree got me into my photography and after doing this course I went on to do my photography course at LCC. I wanted to work as a photographer and spent a year freelancing as a photographer’s assistant after the course. I enjoyed assisting photographers but I didn’t enjoy the freelancing lifestyle, it was tough, stressful not knowing where the money is coming from, so I took a job with Student Services at the University of the Arts which was a regular 9-5 Monday to Friday job. I enjoyed not having to work weekends and late evenings and it was nice helping students who were in a similar situation to mine.
During my time there I spoke with a careers adviser. This helped me to focus and consider my options with my qualifications and the experience I had already as I didn’t want to do another course. I wanted a creative role that was working with photography but was also office based, working 9 to 5, Monday to Friday. This job was advertised on the BAPLA website.
Is there any advice that you would give students looking to get into your field?
You need some sort of work experience or be willing to work for little money to start. You can also do a specific picture research/editing course which may help you get into the industry.
Is there anything else you think we should know?
When I was a student I think I would have liked to know the other options for people who want to work within photography but not as a photographer. Besides picture research you can also work with a photographer’s agent, or look at advertising agencies for related work.
