Read. Although there are plenty of ways to earn a living from photography 5 Most Lucrative Careers for a Budding Photographer 5 Most Lucrative Careers mohey a Budding Photographer Want to make money with photography? There are a lot of potential career paths before you. Here are a few considerations to help you make the right choice. But it could be a great way to earn some extra cash to cover the cost of your gear without taking up too much of your time. To learn more about what it takes to earn some cash from stock photography, we spoke to istock photo make money photographer James Wheelerwho now routinely makes hundreds of dollars per month doing just. Like many of us, James first played around with photography with a point-and-shoot digital camera. It was mainly a way to document his travels.