A native German speaker once gave me the tip to always replace the word "machen" with a more precise word.
What verb could I replace "macht" with in this example:
Sie kontaktiert dann einen Fotografen vor Ort, der Fotos von der Veranstaltung für sie gegen Entgelt macht.
Beware of hypercorrection and generalization :)
Your friend is right in the sense that it is often a good idea to do this, because we have a tendency in German to replace any verb we're too lazy to think of with "machen" or "tun"...
But there are several phrases that just contain "machen" - "Fotos machen" is one of them, also "Urlaub machen", "Kopien machen", "Theater machen" (= to make difficulties - oh yes, "Schwierigkeiten machen", too) etc.
I guess it is a bit like "nice" - we're advised not to overuse it in English, but sometimes it is the right word. ("a nice cup of tea" :))
To me, "knipsen" would be the only halfway acceptable one of your examples, but, as you say, it's a bit informal (similar to "Fotos schießen") - the other two just don't go together with pictures imo.
... Or you could verb it altogether: "...der auf der Veranstaltung gegen Bezahlung für sie fotografiert."
schauspielern) und Schwierigkeiten macht man nicht - man geht ihnen aus dem Weg. :)
Commented
Sep 30, 2011 at 2:47
Or you could simply rephrase the sentence and use "fotografieren":
Sie kontaktiert einen Fotografen vor Ort, der für sie gegen Entgelt auf der Veranstaltung fotografiert.
Since it's a professional context, you could use fotografieren, as in:
Sie kontaktiert dann einen Fotografen vor Ort, der die Veranstaltung für sie gegen Entgelt fotografiert.
You could also use aufnehmen, as in
Sie kontaktiert dann einen Fotografen vor Ort, der die Veranstaltung für sie gegen Entgelt aufnimmt.
But aufnehmen without a specific context could also relate to recording something, either audio or video, so fotografieren is probably better. A variation of this would be:
Sie kontaktiert dann einen Fotografen vor Ort, der für sie gegen Entgelt Aufnahmen von der Veranstaltung macht.
There's your machen again, and there's nothing wrong with this one I think. If I had to choose one, I'd actually prefer the first one (fotografieren) or the last one (Aufnahmen machen), aufnehmen sounds a bit clumsy to me due to it's ambiguity. And if you're really concerned about the machen, in this context you could also exchange that for anfertigen.
Sie kontaktiert dann einen Fotografen vor Ort, der Fotos von der Veranstaltung für sie gegen Entgelt macht.
This version of the sentence can be used. There is nothing wrong with using the word “macht”. You probably also want to captialize the second use of “Sie”, too. If you are targeting a group of people the lower case “sie” is correct, but when targeting only a single person, you'd use “Sie” instead.
Regarding your other proposals:
erstellt?
This is a good choice if a professional photographer takes the photos.
produziert?
This does not fit because it refers to the process of putting the picture on paper instead of taking the photo.
knipst? (too informal)
You can imagine this as somebody holding a camera half a meter in front of himself and quickly taking a bunch of photos. Usually you'd use “knipst” for party pictures but not for professionally taken photos.
