MicrostockGroup

Well, my "vacation snaps", as you and Sean would call them, from Canada have paid for the trip, including airfares from Scotland, so don't knock it.
Pity the market isn't so interested in Uganda and Botswana  , but there you have it.

@Sean: while I respect your knowledge and experience (in your own highly successful genre) and your willingness to share readily though testily, I really have to wonder about your attitude towards genres other than your own. What in the OP's port at iStock, for example, would lead you to think he'd be submitting 'snapshots'?
Many people travel specifically with the intention of shooting many images, not to 'vacation'. Long before I submitted for stock, I always considered my trips as 'working at a different job'.
Also, people who have full-time jobs and photograph on trips probably don't need to earn as much as those who are full time stock photographers, therefore can 'afford' to photograph the more interesting and enjoyable stuff, even though the other stuff often sells much better, especially on the micros.

Surpasspro, I send you a PM 

The person I'm considering is family related so there is a level of trust there.  I have a meeting setup with him and will gauge his interest with all the pros/cons/risks laid out.  I might have to hire someone full time, but I'm trying this route first.

In the last 3 years, I've traveled to close to 30 countries and all the continents.  Most of it with my day time job photographing most major cities and photo shoots with models in those cities.  Also, throw in photos from personal vacation trips.  So, I haven't submitted much in a couple of years, due to traveling and time constraints.  I've also been focusing more on stock video production to diversify my port, (which is time consuming), so that's why I'm sitting on a back log of images.

The number of shots taken in Antarctica was extreme, but if you've been there you would know why. I also managed to shoot close to 450 HD video clips on that trip as well.  As ShadySue mentioned, I've paid for many of vacations with my "photo/video snaps".

? what if the risk, work, etc isnt split 50-50 -- similarly, a blanket statement that an agency rate is unfair makes little sense without knowing what's involved.  by your method, exclsives should be paid the same % as freelancers, since 50-50 is 'always' fair

when agencies offer 60-70% do you insist on taking only 50% because that's the only split that's fair?


steve

"Family...trust" isn't necessarily a sequitur. Lawyers make their  money out of family trust being broken. Or as my late mother-in-law's lawyer said, "... family's all well and good until the bawbees hit the bucket".

Many people try to sell "travel snapshots" (SP has hundreds), but calling any photo taken in a travel trip as "snapshots" is ridiculous. 

I my own case, I normally travel on my own, rarely taking a tour, so I have my own time.  I plan my day ahead, and I often return to an interesting place at different time if I can.  So it's not  This is the Big Ben, click, click, Westminster Abbey, click, click.  My travemates are normally people who like photography, even if not so passionate as I am. 

In the film days, I could easily spend a roll in one day (on occasions even more).  Now with digital it's much more, I experiment more, shoot vertical and horizontal, extra details of architecture, bracketing (what I rarely do).  Not unusually I take over 100 images a day - surely not all keepers. 

Oh, yes, I sold many as RM - could sell more if I had the time and the patience of editing and keywording all of them.

Why not give this person say, 100 images to start out with and then discuss a price after he analyzes how much work is involved. I do contract photoshop work and prefer to charge a per-project price after I analyze the time it takes to finish the job. Upload those 100 and see if they pass review and how they sell, then proceed from there. If he is a really good photoshop artist and you are a really good photographer with images that don't need much editing letting him set a price will satisfy you both. I would worry more about turning over the keywording to him.

Hi there - to chip in from the "other side" so to speak.

I started my own photo agency over 10 years ago after 10 years with two larger agencies, specializing in travel photographs. I never actually travelled anywhere, I simply had a look at photographers with large collections of pictures on the internet of marketable material.

They were all gathering dust on the hard drives, and the photographers had no idea how to sell them. My arragement was simple. The photographer sent me all the pics on CD's with the files named to I could identify where they were from. I did all the photoshop work (I'm a one man band 80 hrs a week), and captioned the pics for sale. They were then syndicated to all my outlets - 20 or so macro agencies in different countries, and directly to the UK press.

I then kept track of sales, got cuttings where possible, and paid 50:50 to the photographer reported every three months. This I did for 20 or so photographers, however as time has gone on the editorial market wasn't as lucrative, so some have given up or gone their own way. I never sent any to Alamy, as I did't deal with them at the time.

Most agencies I sell with have a 60:40 split, so the snapper was getting 30%. With UK media, they were getting 50%

It was worthwhile, and would probably be more so nowadays as Alamy sell's a huge volume of travel pics.

Over the last three years I diversified with my own images into micro as well, which is again lucrative.

I would not take on any more images just for Alamy, but would if the deal was going to beneficial for all concerned. As an example, I' would photoshop and upload all your images to Alamy, and you can keep 100% of sales with no fee's invloved for the work. The same photographs you would then allow me to syndicate to oversea's agents and or micro for a share of the profit's.

That's an issue to outside of this site, and I'd be happy to discuss it with you. Alternatively when my esteemed colleagues have finished debating wether they are holiday pictures or not they may be able to point you in an alternative direction.

I'll check in on this thread later, off to vote in the UK election now!

Rgds

Oldhand

^^

That was as precise and pointed as I have heard so far . . .  well done.

Have you thought about getting a student intern?  You can trade your skills (and have an assistant on hand!) for their time.  I know when I was a student I did lots of this kind of work for photographers, both paid and for knowledge.

That sounds about right from my experience, although his payback is perhaps a little longer than it might be. He's talking about taking advantage of "found" images, not doing pre-arranged (model) shoots - a pretty a good plan for a working vacation that suits the microstock marketplace quite well.

surpasspro, why don't you try to go with production agencies which submit images not only to Alamy, but to many partner macrostock agencies (including Corbis, Getty) simultaneously. As far as I know they take your RAW files, postprocess them, keyword (you supply only captions) and submit. But, of course, you pay them more than 40%. That is the way many photographers work.
Alamy alone is very time consuming...