Hi click_click,
While 55MP is certainly a big image and I can naturally appreciate your point, the reality is that it's 5x larger than our average size images. We base our pricing & sizing on the assumption that the images submitted will be a standard 10-20mp file. Panoramas of course are much bigger files and are exceptions. Perhaps we'll look at adding a larger JPG size to accommodate unusually large images, but that's not something that we have in the works at the moment.
We periodically review our pricing and make adjustments when they're supported and responsible. I'm sure everyone in the business aspect of microstock would like to see prices trend upwards, but we also need to balance other market demands and realities. In the mean time I hope that our contributors can appreciate the high commissions that you noted we pay, vs. the much lower percentages paid by many others (also noted earlier).
Cheers,
Duncan
Duncan, thank you for discussing this here on the forum. I really appreciate an open talk about this.
I understand that this is not the place and we contributors are not the people to tell you how you have to price our images.
50% commission is absolutely fine don't get me wrong.
However I feel we (or I) can rise my opinion about contradicting image pricing and/or the lowest payout amounts for XL priced images.
Let me reiterate the contradicting pricing issue:
This image from Yuri is shot at 23MP (unless he downsized it, no idea):
http://www.canstockphoto.com/couple-with-three-kids-6765227.htmlIt costs $5 or 5 credits as I understand for the XL size.
Also, Canstock upsizes that image to 51MP for $10
Duncan, I really do understand that the vast majority of the image buyers don't need a 50MP+ image. However, Canstock does offer the service and charges accordingly for XXL images. That is a good thing, technically.
I use the term technically, because Canstock charges for my panoramas at 55MP (native) $5 or 5 credits.
As a buyer I would be confused how a 51MP image could cost $10 (or 10 credits) while another one at a higher resolution is sold for half the price. This doesn't make sense.
I think Canstock is the only agency where this phenomenon is happening that a smaller size costs more than a larger (native resolution) one.
I'm sure you got the point Duncan, English is just not my native tongue so I want to make sure I get my point across.
Now, the $5 or 5 credits price for XL images (23MP out of the camera) is, like I mentioned before, a steal. This might be one of the strong points of Canstock to undercut other agencies prices but nonetheless the royalty amount (not percentage) is the lowest I've encountered.
Even at iStock non-exclusives get more than that even at 15% commission. Looking at credit sales non-exclusives get in fact more than twice as much in royalties at 15%.
So the statement of paying out 50% commission is absolutely meaningless as long as image prices are fractions of the ones at the competition.
I mean, looking at this from a business standpoint (which some of us have to do), on average I make $5 to $10 per full resolution sale (credit sales!) at other agencies.
At Canstock $1.25 for a credit sale is not a big incentive and I have to admit that I have to make a decision of whether I don't bother uploading at all anymore to Canstock or taking additional time to downsize my images to Large size and that's it. At least that way I can get $10 or 10 credit sales for resolutions I would have offered for $5.
It's a bit inconvenient to say the least.
