Blackbox for me is the way to go. Upload to 5 agencies with one easy upload. A good support system on facebook with over 10,000 members. You should look into it.

Quote from: Pablito on January 16, 2019, 05:41

Before uploading your material to every agent under the sun - read their contract!

It's very easy to upload to one agent who then uploads it to another sub-agent who then does the same again. You'll see your footage popping up on sites you didn't even know existed.
Apart from diluting your % earnings big time (and possibly never having the money filter through the various companies back to you) you can end up with one of your agents competing with your own pictures in another agent at a much reduced %. In other words, it's possible to lose control of your work - and just as important, control of your income stream. It's not happening much so far with the footage agents but it will..... when things get tighter; just as it did with the stills market. I could write a book on that.

I've seen it (and unfortunately experienced it) all before - I've been full-time non-exclusive, multi-agent for over 30 years.
So my advice is - stick to the big four and read their contract. So no surprises in the future - well at least you'll cut down on the surprises 
Oh and that suggestion of exclusivity - there is not an agent right now that can justify image exclusivity never mind photographer exclusivity, but it is a great way to put all your eggs in one little precarious basket and cross your fingers.

Thanks Pablito, i hadn't considered what you said... terrible, as a matter of principle one would think that uploading to 20 agencies would have more potencial than 4 or 5... you give a different insight... by big for, you mean (i suppose), SS, P5, AS, IS?

Yes, those 4 I think are the most important. And for stills too, maybe changing P5 for some other 2 or 3 like BS, DT or 123RF.

[\quote]Thanks Pablito, i hadn't considered what you said... terrible, as a matter of principle one would think that uploading to 20 agencies would have more potencial than 4 or 5... you give a different insight... by big for, you mean (i suppose), SS, P5, AS, IS?
[/quote]

Everyone has their own version of the "big four"    It's SS and P5 and any permutation of three or four others 

Quote from: Photo London UK on January 14, 2019, 13:56

I have been selling stock footage for 4 years now. Here is my top earners from best to low :

1. Shutterstock ( always no.1 )
2. Pond 5 ( even though decreased sales in the last year still no.2 )
3-4. Adobe Stock and Istock - Getty ( interesting too see how good adobe performs after rebranded from fotolia and yes Istock still sells and it's not far from Pond5 )
5-6. Dissolve - Storyblocks ( you can try Dissolve if you have time, sad to see storyblocks has dropped sales dramatically after videoblocks shut down ) 

I tried motion element, deposit and 123rf. I am afraid they have no potential to sell footage at all. So I deleted my portfolio on them. Videohive still too complicated to upload so doesn't worth the time. Hope that helps. Good luck !

thanks for the list of top earners.. that seems to be a very solid choice of agencies. I registered in Dissolve, but haven't yet uploaded anything... I will give it a try, i actually like to website although i don't know how the workflow goes with them...

by the way you have an amazing portfolio Photo London UK! really enjoyed it..

Thank you RRPT! Hope all goes well with your stock footage experience. Best luck!

Quote from: Clair Voyant on January 14, 2019, 13:38

Quote from: ShadySue on January 13, 2019, 17:47

Quote from: Kokkoros on January 13, 2019, 17:20

Simplify your life and go exclusive at Getty / iStock.

For video? That's a very unusual suggestion!!!

Depends how much you value your time.

That's what I mean. I've just read the January stats thread over there. Looks like video is really scraping the barrel price wise, almost as bad as photos.
Not worth the time to shoot, process and upload at iStock; hardly for stills, not for video at all.

Totally agree with you Shady, I stopped submitting video to iStock a few years ago - they dropped well out of my big 4 when they dropped their pricing.