I just got this email from Fotolia which essentially provides a bulk editing feature on new upload.

QuoteWe are happy to announce the launch of a new feature that is sure to be appreciated by large content uploaders: the multi-indexing tool.

Imagine you're uploading a series of 50 images via FTP and need to index them all. Thanks to a dedicated interface, this new feature will save you time by letting you index all your images at once.

How does it work?

Once uploaded, all your images will be listed in a new section within your Files Management area: the "Indexing" tab.

To edit several files at the same time, you simply select the contents you wish to edit. These selected contents will appear dark grey and if you edit one by adding a keyword, for example, all the other selected files will also be updated with this keyword.

This works for keywords, but also for all other indexing fields, such as: Title, Type of file, Language, Country, Categories, Price, Release and Licensing Options).

Want to remove a keyword from all your files? Easy! Just select the files you wish to edit, and remove the keyword on one of the contents; all other indexations will automatically be updated.

We hope this feature will save you lots of time!

Team Fotolia

Got it too. FT seems to take a few steps in the right direction. Very good.

very nice.. just saw many pictures not submitted because of this new feature!

http://www.fotolia.com/Contributor/IndexContents

Seems like this encourages someone who has 100 shots from a photo shoot of "older couple holding hands on the beach" or "handshake from 100 angles."   Just more stuff for buyers to sift through, rather than the very best shots from a shoot.

Never thought that I'd defend DT, but it seems like the two agencies are going in completely opposite directions.  As a buyer, I think I prefer DT's approach... that is, if they were actually fair in how they defined "similars."  In my experience, they have been idiotically literal-minded about it... a similar subject but composed in different ways to convey totally different concepts (and thus have totally different keywords and appeal to totally different buyers) all get rejected for being too similar. 

I'll have no use for the FT tool, as I don't submit "similars" in the way I think they should be defined and FT seems to be welcoming... and my DT uploads have been reduced to nearly nothing since their opposite approach is equally flawed.

SS just looks better and better every day.

I just submitted my few designs using this tool and its pretty impressive and time saver. Glad that FT changed its system of uploading.
Still I found few error when checking on Extended license option.

sorry stockmarketer but you aren´t making much sense  

first you say FT wants similars, second that DT is working on the other way, only best shoots, finally you said you love SS, and they are working on the same way as FT no? once they are approving all pictures from a session!

that said I believe that pictures should be approved in terms of quality and sure not 100 of the exact same object or people pose

Quote from: stockmarketer on June 07, 2012, 19:26
Seems like this encourages someone who has 100 shots from a photo shoot of "older couple holding hands on the beach" or "handshake from 100 angles."   Just more stuff for buyers to sift through, rather than the very best shots from a shoot.

Never thought that I'd defend DT, but it seems like the two agencies are going in completely opposite directions.  As a buyer, I think I prefer DT's approach... that is, if they were actually fair in how they defined "similars."  In my experience, they have been idiotically literal-minded about it... a similar subject but composed in different ways to convey totally different concepts (and thus have totally different keywords and appeal to totally different buyers) all get rejected for being too similar. 

I'll have no use for the FT tool, as I don't submit "similars" in the way I think they should be defined and FT seems to be welcoming... and my DT uploads have been reduced to nearly nothing since their opposite approach is equally flawed.

SS just looks better and better every day.

All Fotolia did was to implement almost an identical way to upload to Shutterstock.
Two images from the same shoot from the same model are not necessarily similars. I upload about 40 from a shoot with different concepts and this helps hugely!
And I really really doubt someone would change the approach to what to submit based on an uploading feature from 1 site ....

All they've done is they copied SS batch editor. Still, very welcome of course, submitting to FT was always a dreadful experience.

I haven't tried out their new upload feature, but if it is similar to Shutterstock's, then that is great news.  All my images have keywords, etc. already in IPTC, and are different enough that none share all the same keywords, so that aspect doesn't interest me.  But being able to only do model releases and categories once is very appealing.  Looking forward to trying it out.

I do my keywording in Lightroom which inevitably means they are uploaded in alphabetical order.  Because the search still favors the first seven keywords I find myself re-applying in order of relevance each time.  This will save me a massive amount of time. 

Quote from: lisafx on June 07, 2012, 21:23
I haven't tried out their new upload feature, but if it is similar to Shutterstock's, then that is great news.  All my images have keywords, etc. already in IPTC, and are different enough that none share all the same keywords, so that aspect doesn't interest me.  But being able to only do model releases and categories once is very appealing.  Looking forward to trying it out.

I just noticed that it now alphabetizes model releases.  This in itself is a big time saver for me. 

Quote from: MatHayward on June 07, 2012, 21:44
I just noticed that it now alphabetizes model releases.  This in itself is a big time saver for me. 

Agreed.

Quote from: lisafx on June 07, 2012, 21:23
I haven't tried out their new upload feature, but if it is similar to Shutterstock's, then that is great news.  All my images have keywords, etc. already in IPTC, and are different enough that none share all the same keywords, so that aspect doesn't interest me.  But being able to only do model releases and categories once is very appealing.  Looking forward to trying it out.

just spent some time with it and it's a big step forward.  there're some quirks - like it sometimes uses the desc instead of the title from iptc so you get errors for >64 char, but overall most helpful

This feature is a starting one for many new stock sites. Why took it so long to implement? Students learning php do this in one afternoon...
BTW PD is the same. They need several years to implement a decent upload system, where they are from batch editing?

Quote from: icefront on June 08, 2012, 00:12
This feature is a starting one for many new stock sites. Why took it so long to implement? Students learning php do this in one afternoon...
BTW PD is the same. They need several years to implement a decent upload system, where they are from batch editing?

Well, we can spend a few pages b*tching about how they didn't implement this sooner, or we can just enjoy using it now... I'll choose the latter

Thanks Cascoly for the info about the description being used as the title.  I will look out for that when I upload tomorrow. 

Quote from: lisafx on June 08, 2012, 01:30

Thanks Cascoly for the info about the description being used as the title.  I will look out for that when I upload tomorrow. 

it seems to be a sporatic feature - most of the time it gets the title ok, but then it burps on a batch and produces titles that exceed 64 char - i've reported it to FT

Great, going to check it out in a bit.

It is mixed bag for me. At first I thought it is cool to edit multiple images at once but category selection is more cumbersome that it was in old version. It would be great if you submit large series but I am usually trying to avoid this, I am uploading same batch of files everywhere. Some sites are allergic to series. Right now the best workflow is on CanStockPhoto but I guess they do not care about categories.

I think it's an excellent feature. There are still issues however with the alphabetization of keywords, and the terrible categories in Fotolia. I think all sites should eventually drop categories, or at least make it a simple general description like SS. Many people just pick random categories when uploading to FT.

Quote from: princigalli on June 09, 2012, 13:55
I think it's an excellent feature. There are still issues however with the alphabetization of keywords, and the terrible categories in Fotolia. I think all sites should eventually drop categories, or at least make it a simple general description like SS. Many people just pick random categories when uploading to FT.

+1

Fotolia categories are not proper. I too sometimes pick random category
Also there are many issues in the new indexing system... I have however emailed them informing them about those issues.

I can't make it work...
It says there's some mistake but it won't tell me what... although I don't see what could be wrong...
I upload only vectors... anyone with the same problem?

Seems to work pretty good with my vector illustrations. Maybe a few bugs with saving. Not sure. Just wish they'd dump those silly categories.

It says too many keywords, but not how many too many, or how many in total. So I need to guess how many to delete. And the note to editor box is missing.

like all too many internet sites, it appears this is yet another 'nott ready for prime time' release that treats its users as beta testers - and even beta testing is supposed to occur only AFTER alphas testing - ie, internal testing that everything works as described

here's the latest [all reported to ft more than a week ago] - select 2 or more images, choose the categories, then click to allow extended licenses - it then puts 100 in the price box - submit and it saves, but comes back with an error and wont allow 100 as a value even tho it says 10 - 100

or, worse,

select & edit 2 items

then select & edit 2 or 3 others

when you then select all and submit it erases anything you did to the first set -- you have to either explicitly save, or just submit in small batches;  same problem occurs if  you just try to edit a series of single images - you have to save after each one, which is a small but annoying delay

also, it took awhile to realize this was happening, so you end up repeatedly assigning categories, etc

---
as far as categories - take a look at 'other' - the required subcategories make little sense

Fantastic news.

I tweeted them about this the other day hoping for a speedy response. Nothing yet 

Maybe I triggered this new idea of theirs