MicrostockGroup
Microstock Photography Forum - General => General Stock Discussion => Topic started by: SA on April 14, 2024, 00:09
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Hi! I bet this has been discussed a lot but, i cannot find any threads using the search function. I just want to know your opinion, maybe there is almost a consensus by now. Is AI cutting away a huge portion of the need for stock photos, since many potential costumers can use AI tools to get the photos they need. Have you noticed a down tick in sales corresponding to the use of AI-generated images that have grown a lot the last year or two. How much of the sales on the agencies are from AI-generated content, this would also take away from the old school stock photos. Are many of you all submitting AI-photos now to compensate for this? If so, can you give some rough numbers of how much of your income is from AI sales and compare that to the number of photos uploaded. It also depends on how long they have been up, if they have taken off or not etc. Hard to compare like that, I just wants some broad picture opinions, and numbers if you have any.
Stock photos has been on a down slope for many many years, i stopped uploading 2 years ago. Number of sales was steady for me, but the pay for each sales was dropping drastically each year or two. Now AI is here too, to make matters worse i guess. This is why i want to know where we sit and were we are likely going. Reality is not always what you think and Im asking you to get the reality behind this directly from the source.
Best Regards.
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My sales keep going up now that I started uploading again.
I use ai every day and have a difficult time generating something I specifically need.
In all cases it would be much, much faster to choose from a stocklibrary where millions of files are at my finger tips and don‘t need post processing.
Not saying people are not using ai, but you can only generate 4 files at a time, then need to refine and scale them.
If ai can generate hundreds of perfect and flawless files in 10 seconds, maybe then we need to worry.
Personally I am not worried at all.
But to each his own.
Adding more editorial content is onbiously a good idea.
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0 :)
my sales are increasing,I continue to sell all kind of content,even simple illustrations that can easily be created with AI
adding any kind of content is for sure a good idea! :)
I start work now which in Italy is 12.50 on Sunday and I will finish tonight at midnight or probably even 1 or 2am
AI can't beat me! 8)
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No more opinions on this? I was guessing AI generating services should have been the "talk of the town" in here for the last few months.
Sure it takes more time to generate an AI-image than to go into the good old stock library and pick one. Im not talking about 100% of customers switching from one day to another. Im asking if you have seen any downtick in sales that might have to do with AI starting to take a little bit of the pie. Either from outside(Pure AI-tools, free many of them) of the stock market, or inside the library, from AI-sales.
Some of the AI-services are free and still pretty decent. Thats a huge deal for many, even if it takes a little longer, and might look a bit less customized still at this stage.
About production. I dont think a stock photographer that needs to go out taking photos IRL, or doing illustrations from scratch can match the productivity of a person just sitting there typing in prompts and spitting out AI-photos all day. I mean you could do 1 photo every 10 minutes if you you wanted to, uploaded and ready with titles/keywords and all. It takes 10 minutes to dress, before you even get out of the apartment...
Again im talking about bit picture trends, and if you have seen/heard from multiple sources that might correspond with these things.
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a) Your question is too generic and broad.
b) Most people don't know the answer to the question you are asking, unless you were asking agencies specifically to divulge that information. And if individuals knew - they probably wouldn't share their hard research because you are too lazy to do it yourself.
c) Sounds like you don't really know what "AI" is. The "AI" images are basically massive theft & "blending" of images together (from 'models' created from that theft), and one of the big "problems" "AI" tools have is how to get rid of "copyright notices" (aka watermarks) to try and hide their theft.
d) Answering the very generic/broad question you have... Some sales are up, some are down, and some haven't really changed. Depends on the subject matter, trends, competition numbers, niches, artistic/commercial value, agency cuts/"good news" broad-casts, etc, etc.
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You are asking far too late.
There were huge discussions about this when Adobe introduced the ai collection 15 months ago.
Search the forum for the old threads.
By now everyone has formed their opinions and adapted their workflow. Some do ai, some don‘t, but overall sales don‘t seem to be affected, on the contrary sales on Adobe specifically are going up and some the ai firsttimers, especially those adding a lot of ai people, are making great money with ai.
If you really believe the stock agencies will close down because of ai, it is best to organize your work life accordingly.
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today if you want to do microstock as a hobby and earn 100 usd a month you can do it,it can be a nice hobby.
if you want to earn real money today with microstock,it's very difficult,because you have to do it full time,you have to be efficient and productive and very creative and original,and first of all you must like this job because otherwise it is impossible.
AI doesn't change anything and indeed helps,AI is not an enemy,but a friend because it can help you if you know how to use it in your work.
real content is always useful,the fact is that in my opinion many have used the excuse of AI for give up,because the truth is that today work in the microstock is very difficult and not for everyone,if you want to make real money.
all this regarding the microstock,I'm not talking about the use of AI in other sectors,that's another matter.
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"I am to late, look for threads when AI-content was first introduced". So If I want to know how things turned out i shall look at the speculation 2 years ago, rather than asking you now when months/years have passed. Seems very resonable.
Some say sales are unaffected, but does not distinguish if it is the normal non-AI photos that are unaffected or if its unnafeffcetd sales because you have added AI-stock that is compensating a down-tick. This was one of the two questions i asked.
If AI is great and can be used as a tool, then yes, AI has replaced a little piece of the traditional stock photo sales. Putting together clues about the direction.
You guys dont seem to get what i ask somehow, or are reluctant to give me your qualified guesses....?
Im not stupid, its not black and white, stuff is complex, but by now we should be able to guess the direction if how AI affects the sales of Stockphotos.
But i can see that the trend seem to be "not so much yet". Or "not if you embrace it and upload AI photos". I have not seem any replies that says their sales are down "more than usual/expected" after the intoduction of AI. I would like to hear from those that do not upload AI content and have worked in a similar way the last years. So trends can be spotted in sales. Maybe those people just quit and are not here anymore. Only survivors and those that embrace AI is still active on the forum and positive/neutural about the whole thing.
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looking around various groups, i am not seeinng anyone who does normal photo video reporting less sales or blaming any loss in sales on ai.
if you do quality, needed work and as lonng as there is tons of content missing on all agencies, people seem to be perfectly fine.
what is getting more is a hybrid workflow, shoot with a camera, adapt and expand your own work with ai, create more variations, or just change the format, add some thinsg with ai or remove that would have taken ages in photoshop.
also just look at the ai stuff being uploaded, how much of that is actually targeting freshly needed content?
a lot just looks nice, but is either very similar to what is already there, i.e. "inspired" by sorting by downloads and copying the first 3 pages of a search...or it is endless backgrounds stuff that already exists anyway.
only a small group of people are using ai to really create needed content. but they are usually the ones also doing needed content with camera.
just my 2 cents
ai is a tool, like the camera or photoshop are a tool
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Thanks for a better response Cobalt!
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How much is AI taking away from "normal" stock photo sales? - As much as every other "normal" image uploaded additionally to the Adobe Stock collection.
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How much is AI taking away from "normal" stock photo sales? - As much as every other "normal" image uploaded additionally to the Adobe Stock collection.
Except that any 16 year old with some promt-talent, can sit in front of his computer all day mass producing stock photos. Compare that to old school stock photos where you need to get out and about with expensive gear and have photography+Photoshop skills.
It seems today its not a huge issue, but as these tools get way better every 6 months, and more and more people learn how to use them. You would think that normal stock photographers, that do not use AI in any way, would be in big trouble in say 2-3 years and especially in 5-10 years.
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The mobile phone also brought a new wave of producers.
And anyway there are a lot of options for very affordable stock production in many countries. You would think by now agencies would receive 100 million quality files a week, also because photography is one of the biggest hobbies on the planet.
But the inflow hasn‘t changed much and for ss it has even gone down by half according to their own numbers.
It will be the same with ai.
Lots of people do ai, but the majority will not upload to agencies.
And still there are huge gaps in all agency collections.
Because most producers never do any research.
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How much is AI taking away from "normal" stock photo sales? - As much as every other "normal" image uploaded additionally to the Adobe Stock collection.
Except that any 16 year old with some promt-talent, can sit in front of his computer all day mass producing stock photos. Compare that to old school stock photos where you need to get out and about with expensive gear and have photography+Photoshop skills.
It seems today its not a huge issue, but as these tools get way better every 6 months, and more and more people learn how to use them. You would think that normal stock photographers, that do not use AI in any way, would be in big trouble in say 2-3 years and especially in 5-10 years.
actually have to be at least 18 years old to contribute to a microstock agency.
AIs are not a problem today and will never be,for real photos and videos,for illustrations can be a different matter.
all AI content is labeled as such and nothing will ever replace a real photo or video.
and then there is so much,so much commercial content that AI cannot do :)
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"AIs are not a problem today and will never be,for real photos and videos,for illustrations can be a different matter.
all AI content is labeled as such and nothing will ever replace a real photo or video.
and then there is so much,so much commercial content that AI cannot do :)"
I think you will have to eat those words when we look back maybe 3 and especially 5-7 years from now. Are you guys blind to the development speed of AI? Many tools will cost money but even the free ones will be mind-blowingly good. The whole point of these tools is that they give us what we need, in anything that is digital. It already blows our mind every 6 months, and you think it cant get as good or as "customized" as a stock photo library...?
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I have been doing ai practically every day for 18 months now.
Maybe my prompting skills are useless, but getting something very specific is extremely difficult.
It is the main reason I am not worried about ai competition. If I can‘t get it right with daily use, how will a company have the time to go through endless variations and tests?
It is much faster to find a base file on a stock agency, also all legal stuff is cleared and then…modify that file with ai for your specific purpose.
That is where I personally see the future, a hybrid agency ai workflow.
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"AIs are not a problem today and will never be,for real photos and videos,for illustrations can be a different matter.
all AI content is labeled as such and nothing will ever replace a real photo or video.
and then there is so much,so much commercial content that AI cannot do :)"
I think you will have to eat those words when we look back maybe 3 and especially 5-7 years from now. Are you guys blind to the development speed of AI? Many tools will cost money but even the free ones will be mind-blowingly good. The whole point of these tools is that they give us what we need, in anything that is digital. It already blows our mind every 6 months, and you think it cant get as good or as "customized" as a stock photo library...?
Look,with all due respect,I think you're missing the main point.
It has nothing to do with whether AI images will be perfect in 10 years or whether there will be 100 billion of AI contents for sale,or whether it will be completely free to create AI content or whether it will be enough to simply think of an image without writing anything which will be digitized perfectly in a second! :D
the point is that AI content,however real it may seem,simply isn't,and customers know this,so if AI content is good for their project,they download the AI content,but if they need real content,they download the real content,simply this. :)
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Yeah i think the "legaly cleared" and "real from a real human" arguments are valid. One of the few points as to why use stock photos instead of AI. But when it comes to money and cost, isnt that the biggest deal for most customers in the end? So if AI is just as good and cheaper, will the market share stay good for old school stock photos...
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the point is that AI content,however real it may seem,simply isn't,and customers know this,so if AI content is good for their project,they download the AI content,but if they need real content,they download the real content,simply this. :)
I cannot follow this reasoning.
If AI content cannot be told apart from real content (In the future, though with many photos it is already hard now and some people seem to not even be able to tell the most artificial looking AI image apart from a real photo) , then why should any customer insist on using real photos?
Why would anyone "need" real content if no customer can tell whether the content is "real" or "Ai created"?
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For marketing purposes alone I can see many customers using only real photos and no ai.
If I had a food magazine, I would insist on real food and cooking only.
Medical needs theme - only real people and real situations…etc..
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I have been doing ai practically every day for 18 months now.
Programs for creating pictures using artificial intelligence are paid. How much do you pay per month and how much money do you get from selling pictures created in these programs?
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For marketing purposes alone I can see many customers using only real photos and no ai.
If I had a food magazine, I would insist on real food and cooking only.
Medical needs theme - only real people and real situations…etc..
Doesn't really answer the question - if you cannot distinguish real photos from Ai created images, why should you inists on using real photos? Yes, AI suck at most medical content right now (though I have sold AI images of medical conditions already) and food is hit or miss, but I have sold many AI food photos as well. I even once posted a link here to a site with Asian recipes - all images were AI created. (And most looked very weird. Obviously the creator of that site did not care)
But AI is only going to get better in the future. So why should someone inists of using a real photo "just for the sake of using a real photo", when there is no difference in the end result?
Why use a real photo when, at some point, the people buying and reading the food magazine will not be able to tell whether real photos or AI images were used? Especially if AI images were so much cheaper and faster to create? I don't see the advantage from the publisher's point of view.
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the point is that AI content,however real it may seem,simply isn't,and customers know this,so if AI content is good for their project,they download the AI content,but if they need real content,they download the real content,simply this. :)
I cannot follow this reasoning.
If AI content cannot be told apart from real content (In the future, though with many photos it is already hard now and some people seem to not even be able to tell the most artificial looking AI image apart from a real photo) , then why should any customer insist on using real photos?
Why would anyone "need" real content if no customer can tell whether the content is "real" or "Ai created"?
this is a good question :)
the answer in my opinion is the idea.
you just need to know that something isn't real and for you it just isn't,ideas about something have great power.
it will never be possible for customers not to know whether they are downloading AI or real content,they know because AI content are labeled
furthermore this is also another good reason why AI contents cannot cost less than real contents,because if they start to cost less can increase the competition of real content,I'm talking about costs for the customer,in the library of a microstock agency.
not declaring the origin of content in a context is not exactly legal,I'm sure that many do it,but we're talking about small bloggers who don't have a large following,also because if they act in this way they can't have one.
in any case I believe that it is up to us to understand what should be done and what not in this context in which we live today, and in any case AI technology still has a long way to go.
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I have been doing ai practically every day for 18 months now.
Programs for creating pictures using artificial intelligence are paid. How much do you pay per month and how much money do you get from selling pictures created in these programs?
another good point,cost and time.
just out of curiosity Midjourney monthly pro plan costs 67,82 euros in Italy due to VAT at 22% which is about 72 usd at the moment
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I have been doing ai practically every day for 18 months now.
Programs for creating pictures using artificial intelligence are paid. How much do you pay per month and how much money do you get from selling pictures created in these programs?
this year I pay on average around 60-100 dollars a month. Last year was a lot more. I now use programs on and off, one month this, one month that. I always pay for commercial use.
in total I have paid over 4000 dollars over the last 18 months.
i think of that as a learning investment.
i probably could have saved a lot of money if I had started directly with midjourney. But I tested several different platforms and only started with midjourney this year.
I broke even some time last year and now make a lot more than what I am paying for using the software every month.
It is like paying for any other software or studio or computers.
Longterm I think prices will also come down, because the ai companies are all competing with each other.
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For marketing purposes alone I can see many customers using only real photos and no ai.
If I had a food magazine, I would insist on real food and cooking only.
Medical needs theme - only real people and real situations…etc..
Doesn't really answer the question - if you cannot distinguish real photos from Ai created images, why should you inists on using real photos? Yes, AI suck at most medical content right now (though I have sold AI images of medical conditions already) and food is hit or miss, but I have sold many AI food photos as well. I even once posted a link here to a site with Asian recipes - all images were AI created. (And most looked very weird. Obviously the creator of that site did not care)
But AI is only going to get better in the future. So why should someone inists of using a real photo "just for the sake of using a real photo", when there is no difference in the end result?
Why use a real photo when, at some point, the people buying and reading the food magazine will not be able to tell whether real photos or AI images were used? Especially if AI images were so much cheaper and faster to create? I don't see the advantage from the publisher's point of view.
If it was my food magazine I would make an important point that everything we print or write about is real content. It would be a major point for us.
There will be other magazines that don't care and that is their choice.
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There is always Firefly.
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Sadly today's world is a fake world of fake food, fake textiles, fake movies, false human relationships and so on. Of course as continuation today we have fake photos. I'm positive person, but that is the reality.
The people want a lot, want it fast and cheap and here we go, the cheap fast photos(just like fast food, fast fashion..) are here.
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Doesn't really answer the question - if you cannot distinguish real photos from Ai created images, why should you inists on using real photos? Yes, AI suck at most medical content right now (though I have sold AI images of medical conditions already) and food is hit or miss, but I have sold many AI food photos as well. I even once posted a link here to a site with Asian recipes - all images were AI created. (And most looked very weird. Obviously the creator of that site did not care)
But AI is only going to get better in the future. So why should someone inists of using a real photo "just for the sake of using a real photo", when there is no difference in the end result?
Why use a real photo when, at some point, the people buying and reading the food magazine will not be able to tell whether real photos or AI images were used? Especially if AI images were so much cheaper and faster to create? I don't see the advantage from the publisher's point of view.
if a food article is about a specific recipe, then the final result would hopefully show an actual dish, but it could use ai for individual ingredients, or techniques
or, Scientific American often uses illustrations for quantum, medical, astronomical and other complex articles but no reason AI couldn't help here, especially as a first draft, AS LONG AS there is human review for accuracy.
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There will be other magazines that don't care and that is their choice.
and that's the key problem - it isn't whether digital or AI content is used, but how it is represented. and that becomes increasing difficult in a world of deep fakes at all levels
the discussion should not be whether a tool is ethical or 'real' but how users of that tool are presenting it
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In the case of the company my husband works for, the artificial intelligence has killed all the stock agencies, they have stopped paying the annual subscription with one of the biggest agencies and now pay $30 a month to mid journey where he has also discovered that he can download and use images created by others since none of the images created by mid journey are copyrighted.
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I am working for a large company with more than 80.000 Employs.
Customers and employs gets nearly every week newsletters, loaded with lots of generic microstock images.
Since we are a tech company there are more and more AI images.
In next years contributor maybe can benefit from AI hype. But in long term art department will produce AI images by themselves.
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I remember when Photoshop illustrations were called “not real illustration “ and when digital art was called “not real art” and most traditional artists said they would never use photoshop or digital painting… and look at the reality now!
Photography had a very long run with no competition. Give it 5-10 years and AI photography (and illustration) will be as normal as Photoshop and Lightroom. (+ most of photographers are already using AI to remove something on photos)
AI will not kill traditional photography, just like digital art didn’t kill traditional art. However, the quality level for traditional photography will have to increase.
Microstock might change, but its ability to pull variety of talent from all over the world will stay.
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Glad to see a more balance discussion with some more people and broader opinions popping up.
At least a lot of non-technical customers, the majority i would guess, will just keep bying stock photos as per habit for a few more years. So the demise of traditional stock photos will be long and drawn out, even if AI generators will surpass them pretty quickly. There will be a lot of AI content in the libraries and those customers will pick them too, and maybe those photos will be cheaper to buy in the stock library. It might be quite strict what AI-models can train on, which hinders their development and protects normal photographers a bit.
I agree that the artform will never die at least, good analogy to traditional art and paintings. So some demand will always persist.
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Sadly today's world is a fake world of fake food, fake textiles, fake movies, false human relationships and so on. Of course as continuation today we have fake photos. I'm positive person, but that is the reality.
The people want a lot, want it fast and cheap and here we go, the cheap fast photos(just like fast food, fast fashion..) are here.
Totally agree.
Talent accessible to all, without learning, without effort, immediately and without singularity.
The reward right away, but without all the steps that precede it. False satisfaction, because true satisfaction comes at the end of error and effort.
Skill is no longer necessary, everyone can. We advocate diversity but in the same time kill authenticity.
The reign of the artificial, without truth, without soul.
We even reprogram the values. And most humans with software from another time are silent, the ignorants express themselves so much everywhere.
But machines amalgamate and regurgitate, they do not and will never create anything (except the abyss into which humans collapse with joy). ;)
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If it was my food magazine I would make an important point that everything we print or write about is real content. It would be a major point for us.
There will be other magazines that don't care and that is their choice.
true, but we already have this problem with 'real' images - several instances recently where photos of older protests are presented as taking place now ( sometimes the photos are not even from the same country)
or with deepfakes that use traditional photoshop techniques
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In the case of the company my husband works for, the artificial intelligence has killed all the stock agencies, they have stopped paying the annual subscription with one of the biggest agencies and now pay $30 a month to mid journey where he has also discovered that he can download and use images created by others since none of the images created by mid journey are copyrighted.
This is something that would seem to make sense, and should worry us as Microstock artists, more than how much someone sees various formats on stock sites. When someone starts making their own, or has access along with their AI subscription, they don't need us as suppliers anymore.
Glad to see a more balance discussion with some more people and broader opinions popping up.
I agree that the artform will never die at least, good analogy to traditional art and paintings. So some demand will always persist.
Yes, open minds and broader views, are more interesting than, just shouting from one extreme side of the issue.
As for the art form dying, true, but the demand for oil paintings is hardly enough for anyone to want to go into that for a living. As a side interest of hobby, sure. Some demand for stock images, won't support anyone's life or equipment investment in the future. Also that won't keep the stock photo agencies in business as they would be selling an obsolete product.
Think of being a blacksmith as a trade? There's still a need, but hardly enough commercial demand. All that's left are specialists and the last trade artisans.
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As for the art form dying, true, but the demand for oil paintings is hardly enough for anyone to want to go into that for a living. As a side interest of hobby, sure. Some demand for stock images, won't support anyone's life or equipment investment in the future. Also that won't keep the stock photo agencies in business as they would be selling an obsolete product.
Think of being a blacksmith as a trade? There's still a need, but hardly enough commercial demand. All that's left are specialists and the last trade artisans.
He-he, try to find a good blacksmith! Huge demand! Horses need shoes every 8 weeks. Best have 2 people working for them and do several horses at the same time. 200-250 horses per week in rain, freeze, or heat.
Friend of mine in her 50s decided to take art classes from Stanford, started to paint and now has several exhibitions and galleries rep her. She is an amazing salesman. My guess she makes $20k per year from oil paintings.
Sorry Pete to debunk your post, to each their own, Stock is fast, but painting is slow. I painted for many years, it’s the same principle as in Stock: only 20% of what you produce sells, where to store other 80% of large paintings? Not for me anymore, but it was fun and there are still droves of people who would love to make extra cash with art. Art will never die, it’s therapeutic and romantic. It weathered centuries 😉
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As for the art form dying, true, but the demand for oil paintings is hardly enough for anyone to want to go into that for a living. As a side interest of hobby, sure. Some demand for stock images, won't support anyone's life or equipment investment in the future. Also that won't keep the stock photo agencies in business as they would be selling an obsolete product.
Think of being a blacksmith as a trade? There's still a need, but hardly enough commercial demand. All that's left are specialists and the last trade artisans.
He-he, try to find a good blacksmith! Huge demand! Horses need shoes every 8 weeks. Best have 2 people working for them and do several horses at the same time. 200-250 horses per week in rain, freeze, or heat.
Friend of mine in her 50s decided to take art classes from Stanford, started to paint and now has several exhibitions and galleries rep her. She is an amazing salesman. My guess she makes $20k per year from oil paintings.
Sorry Pete to debunk your post, to each their own, Stock is fast, but painting is slow. I painted for many years, it’s the same principle as in Stock: only 20% of what you produce sells, where to store other 80% of large paintings? Not for me anymore, but it was fun and there are still droves of people who would love to make extra cash with art. Art will never die, it’s therapeutic and romantic. It weathered centuries 😉
Not debunked at all. We agree. My point was, if there were 20 blacksmiths or 100 people, locally, making oil paintings, none would be profitable. These are specialty trades. We have horses around here and a couple of Farriers. One is mobile and makes calls on a schedule, the other covers the SE part of the state. I can assume there are others, for different areas.
Yes, they can make a living, but they need demand and they need to be good. Same for oils or any other custom art.
BUT... I wouldn't say that there's a great potential for making a living at either, since the demand and market is limited.
Simple example. I worked as a volunteer at the natural history museum. Archaeological Rescue. In fact, we paid to be volunteers to pay for some of the expenses. I had mentioned to the lead, who had created the group, how archaeology was interesting, I could have added that when I was in college. He's a department head at the local Univ. as well. "You could murder every employed archaeologist in the country, and this years graduation class would fill all the open positions." :D
Yeah, cool. What do you want to do when you grow up? "I want to be a marine biologist." Lets see, 4-5 years of college, there are 1,000 job openings in the US and they will make around $60,000 a year.
There are maybe 700 blacksmiths, professionally, in the US and they make $35,000 a year. I don't know anything about people who paint, for a living. My Sister is retired, she makes and sells pottery. My Brother is retired, he works on pipe organs and building pipes, on contract.
All that's left of many jobs, are specialists and the last of the trade artisans. Microstock is headed the same direction.
Stock images are an over produced, over abundant commodity. AI will be making that even more common and easy for consumers to produce their own images.