That's one of those "seems like a waste of time" things to me.  Like "today I have nothing better to shoot, so I'm shooting stamps."

That's one of those "seems like a waste of time" things to me.  Like "today I have nothing better to shoot, so I'm shooting stamps."

They might even be scanned (as with coin images). But if there is no market for it, why does the agencies accept them? Stamp collection has also internationally taken a huge dive over the past decade or so. Does not make sense. Is there any one here who has those in their ports who can shed more light?  

Very interesting. Without a top of the range camera I do a lot of boring / non standard things like silhouettes, etc.. If it sells, I will do it.

never thought of their images being acceptable (or valuable) stock images?

valuable: not best sellers, but there's a market

acceptable:
- most sites require stamps to be cancelled;
- most sites accept stamps as commercial; shutterstock accepts stamps as editorial only;
- some sites don't accept stamps with the image of the Queen (sometimes accepted if editorial)

 

Quote from: w7lwi on January 16, 2012, 14:31

SS requires them to be submitted as editorial.

Why?

Stamps are works of art, so I assume without a property release it is like selling a picture of a painting.

Quote from: stockastic on January 16, 2012, 15:23

Quote from: w7lwi on January 16, 2012, 14:31

SS requires them to be submitted as editorial.

Why?

Stamps are works of art, so I assume without a property release it is like selling a picture of a painting.

Public domain for many, and they still don't care. Editorial. As people have pointed out canceled only, even thought that doesn't make a difference, It's Micro Law.

If lawyers get involved, I guess it doesn't need to make sense.

No they don't sell well. It's another example of something easy that far too many people have uploaded. You might as well try selling sliced vegetables. Yes you can get them accepted, no they don't sell well. I did a project a couple of years ago to see how they did, who accepted them and how it worked out. Like someone else pointed out, some strange ones sell a few times a year. I have some that after three years have never sold and I think they are fairly attractive "transportation" shots.

One site says this (after removing many postage stamps) "We cannot license images of canceled stamps IF a US personality appears on the stamp. This is due to descendible personality rights, particularly relating to where in the United States a person became deceased." Never did find the word "descendible" and I still chuckle at the where in the US the person became deceased. It's more about where the person lived, than where they died. Anyway, estates of celebrities have been grabbing for rights, so anyone famous on a stamp might be a liability and guess what stamps sell best? Famous People.

Why do the sites take them? As far as I know FT and DT stopped taking them over a year ago. SS Editorial so get your newsworthy captions ready.  IS will take some but they are picky at this point. They have more than enough postage stamp filler material.

If it's easy to shoot, it's probably over supplied.

I have 5 pictures with stamps on my port  with SS, not even one sale so far.... for now, i loose my interest for submitting more.

Thank you all for your detailed feedback. Really appreciate your trouble in doing so. Think I will select 10 or 20 "landmark" and "historic interesting" ones from my country and a few international ones and see where I can still get them approved. At least it is something new for me and I enjoy having a bit of everything in my port. 

New to SS, so thank you for the tip RacePhoto.