Even is Stocksy isn't a fit for your work why would you purposely shop there later than other sites? Don't you prefer their business model for contributors? wouldn't it be nice to have more sites like that that are a good fit for you? Why not support the model to show it can work, or at least not shun them out of spite.

Quote from: ShadySue on August 04, 2016, 10:36

Quote from: Sean Locke Photography on August 04, 2016, 10:36

He said specifically it's the last place they look because he wasn't accepted as a contributor.

Would you look first at iS?

Bit different don't you think?

Same principle, even if more extreme.

Assuming the problem wasn't just noise in the shadows, Stocksy rejected his aesthetic.  If I were working as a designer and an agency told me they didn't think my photos were good enough, they wouldn't hear from me again unless I were really in a bind.  Call it whatever you want, I guess, but people who put down my work wouldn't be my partners.

That's spiteful

what is missing on nearly all agencies is a sensible way of making niche content visible and giving reliable income to those that produce it. Doesn't matter if it is getty or SS, any agency with 100 million files has the same problem.

stocksy and smaller places are using the walled garden approach, tiny collection, very small group of suppliers.

But would small agencies work if they had 10 000 artists and 100 million files? Even if all files were tightly edited and only had the best quality?

By being a small niche player you probably don't have to deal with that problem for 20 years or more.

However as a customer, does this mean I have to start shopping at 20 different specialized agencies?

And as an artist, do I have to work with many different places and always make a decision into which niche my content fits best?

To me it sounds like the market is going back to the situation before Getty bought up all the small players.

Is there really no solution for a large agency with 100 million + files and a sustainable income?

I think most people want to have one major place that they either supply or buy from. It saves time, like amazon.

I think it had impact on buyers too.
The problem is that they started to think that every image is nothing else than the result of a button click and because of this should cost some cents. Many times i heard from clients that "we want a family on the beach, all beautiful/healthy" and photographed exclusively for their company, but when it comes to costs of models, tickets to Ostend etc , they tell that we cheat, because online images are cheap. Stock which sells many times is an argument to bargain a price for exclusive shooting.

I support agencies that support their contributors. Whether I am one of them or not.

16,439 horizontal "winter sweden" images on SS. Many of them seem to be quite good. What are you looking for exactly? Surely you haven't even scraped the surface of the supply.

Isn't the problem more that there are too MANY images and the good ones get lost?

Quote from: old crow on August 04, 2016, 06:51

Corporate greed is crushing the world and our colleges are teaching the young people how to do it.

""In recent years as buyers we felt in heaven""

I often wonder when reading these threads how much money those who purchase these images make.

It is not so much about the money from a buyers POV. We make money with the end-product: a website, a ad package, a product catalogue etc. We do not care so much about a image price.

I felt in heaven because suddenly there was enough supply to cover almost any subject out there.

This seems to come to an end since we as photographers stop to upload niche material and the Agencies fail to stimulate niche and quality material production.

well said both.
the niche suppliers either go solo like paulie, or gave up giving their hard work for peanuts.
as for paulie, i am sure many buyers do not know he exist independently,
so they would still go to ss,etc to buy the marginal ones.,,

there is a truth in what sharpshot says too.. something like stocksy offset but less elitist
and more in line with ss and is, with the focus on long term contributor interest.
still, those who laugh at the idea knows only too well, it would not last
before they too change their tune.
it's not call one of the 7 deadly sins for nothing...
and yes, it is being taught in business ...short term gain , minimization of loss,
without caring for long term or loyalty.

I think where it all went wrong was when agencies assumed that every image has to be the same price. That made their systems, accounting and IT much simpler.  But I don't think it's really that important to buyers, and it's had a huge impact on contributors.

Yeah, true. I was always favoring the "collections" Model, but later doubted in it due to SSs success.

Nowadays I think sites like SS lose a lot of Money by not marketing specialized material as such and supporting the contributors to fill the gaps.
As said: they open up lots of vulnerabilities to alternative concepts of IP marketing.

With the private equity/ stock market driven financial demands on the main agencies, with the let's pay as little as possible for as much as possible expectations of customers, and the ease of production of images by folk who will accept pennies for their hundreds of images, the industry has quite predictably gone to hell in a handcart. Customers are not winning, contributors are not winning, agency staff are not winning.

I largely gave contributing up 5 years ago after not inconsiderable previous success as I did not want to end up getting into the hamster wheel of more work for diminishing returns, and I guess more and more of the better producers have gotten out of that rat race over recent years, that being the very thing they thought they were getting out of by going into stock in the first place. I hope some of the names I still recognise here can keep at it but I don't envy your predicament.

Quality demanding buyers are going to have to come to the realisation that quality images are actually worth more than microstock prices and new agencies will enter the market one way or another with quality and user experience to the fore-front, it's started and I'm sure it will continue.

Point in case, Beers, after mass international consolidation of brewing companies producing identikit gassy tasteless 'product' there is a return to local, artisan and characterful brewing.

However there are still far too many consumers that utterly undervalue creative arts yet happily pay ridiculous amounts for coffee to tax dodging corporations.

Ho Hum here's to Entropy

Hi Folks,

Just wanted to share some observations as a buyer: Every year our studio does some contracted freelance work for about three fix clients. These are mostly packages of print and web products bundled. We are doing this (or me alone before growing) since about 12 years (before stock already) - because of that I guess I can give some subjective comments on the stock market as a buyer.

In the first years there was nothing on the Micros. Many times I had to switch back to the Macros. The Situation good gradually better every year until about 2 years ago. This year we had to select a key visual photo for print as we do every year and I was quite baffled that we had so much trouble to find something suitable for the client.

In recent years as buyers we felt in heaven. Now it feels rather dry. Best chances still on istock and shutterstock but SO many subjects are not covered or have just trash. In many cases, on sites like Dreamstime, Depositphotos,.... there are just two or three good Microstock contributors left who are able to supply quality products which are good enough for a key element.

I was totally surprised. I expected in that subject to have plenty to chose from.

It looks like the Agencies convert more and more to trash bins of amateur photographers. Or photogs are just supplying the well known seller categories and stopped bothering uploading niche or quality material.

Most subjects I do not want to disclose but just as an example: look for a winter landscape in Sweden. Condition: High resolution and vertical orientation since it is for a high gloss mag print ad: You just get low quality compositions. Trees and uninspired landscapes. Now imagine you have to reduce the search filter to a specific region in Sweden: then you are f+*-e* .

From this Point of view it does not at all look like "oversupply". More like "flooded with trash and cannot find good specific material" lol.

Guess with their low pricing and zero-editing strategy the micros bury their own grave. It is just a matter of time until a reasonable company steps into competition since the USP can consist of something such simple as "Quality".

Welcome to the dollar store man.
Sorry, but we cannot sell you the gold rolex watch you are looking for a dollar, our apologies.
:-)

what is missing on nearly all agencies is a sensible way of making niche content visible ...

There's no problem withe the work being visible. If you submit kleeph images, your file will soon show up when someone searches for a kleeph¹.
The problem is that your kleeph will sell for the same price as an apple on white, so unless you shoot/draw/video kleephs anyway for your business or hobby, it's not worth the effort.

¹Except on iStock, where for 18 months now, if a word isn't in the CV or was previously accepted 'for your own use', it can't be found. And for at least 18 weeks, they seem not to be adding new keywords from the request thread to the CV.