Independent photography is the name of the game as a result of the digital revolution in photography and the power of the computer as a visual tool both of which change the whole notion of what a photograph could be. Photographers are no longer confined to producing photographs that fit a 19th Century definition of what a photograph is or should be.

The concept of the 'independent photographer' connotes a lone individual following a personal agenda and not obligated to any paymaster took shape during these the 1950s and 1960s. It recalls the private odysseys undertaken by Robert Frank, albeit under a Guggenheim fellowship; or a Diane Arbus, after turning her back on commercial commissions. It is anti-commercial.

This interpretation suggests that photography, as opposed to painting or writing, is different from a freelance writer or photographer as the connotation is more about art than journalism.

The reference to the art institution suggests that the concept of 'independent photographer' is to be understood in terms of the exhibiting artist-photographer or photographic artist.

However, this common understanding is too narrow, given both the emergence, and takeup by photographers of the weblog as an online publishing platform, and their use of online galleries to "exhibit" their work.