Just signed up for a buyers account. I have to say first glance, nothing special. Images that we all could have created. Search for London or kids and see what I mean.

I do get the feel its the same style of images as Stocksy.

I was expecting to be blown away, but I have seen better images on Shutterstock to be honest.

What do you think?

I don't see anything.

Quote from: Poncke v2 on May 30, 2013, 17:26
Just signed up for a buyers account. I have to say first glance, nothing special. Images that we all could have created. Search for London or kids and see what I mean.

I do get the feel its the same style of images as Stocksy.

I was expecting to be blown away, but I have seen better images on Shutterstock to be honest.

What do you think?

I guess it's all about accomplished artists and curated collections just like thay said.

By the hype SS created around it, I was expecting to see another level of photography

gotta admit that most searches (5 or 6) I did Stocksy looked better, not talking about the search engine but the pictures

secondly is that offset is much more expensive (full size - 10 times more (50 to 500$)

You have to "be invited" (sign up) just to LOOK?!

yes I signed up as buyer as well,not impressed by the design of the frontpage. Presentation of search results is better. Some pictures are nice but not outstanding some are coming also from other agencies such as Blend, radius images...

Quote from: ShadySue on May 30, 2013, 18:09
You have to "be invited" (sign up) just to LOOK?!

It's the new business model of psychically buying images. 

I searched "landscapes".  Weird crops of the main subject? Empty flat plain fields?  Dark drab foggy landscapes?
Am I missing something here???  There are tons of landscapes on SS that look way better to me than some of this stuff!

It reminds me of my kids' teenage "designer" phase, when they would pay $50 for a plain t-shirt as long as it had a certain label on it.
Maybe I need a class in "photo appreciation" or something.

Quote from: cthoman on May 30, 2013, 18:16

Quote from: ShadySue on May 30, 2013, 18:09
You have to "be invited" (sign up) just to LOOK?!

It's the new business model of psychically buying images. 

Or psychotically burying images. 
That front banner is extremely offputting. I always want to 'look before I sign up'.
Maybe the name isn't Offset but Offput.
(NB, I am making NO comment about the images, which I could only see through a filter, darkly.)

In my very small town, an art gallery suddenly sprung up, with a nicely rebuilt frontage and indicating painting, sculpture, photographs etc. I never saw it open, and one day I ventured to reaad the little sign on the door (postcard sized) which said "for an appointment to view, phone XXX". Wonder how often that happens?

Well, it's an unusual business strategy. Maybe they have a List of buyers.
Or else they've "heard of buyers but want no truck with them" (adapted from Douglas Adams).

$500 seems a bit steep for Dollar Bin quality...

Did anyone notice the "interested in becoming an offset artist? notice on their invitation?

Quote from: zeamonkey on May 30, 2013, 18:34
Did anyone notice the "interested in becoming an offset artist? notice on their invitation?

I thought the artists they pick were by invitation only?  Or was that just a buyers thing when this first came out?

I'm surprised how stocksyesque it looks.  I would say Stocksy looks a lot like OFFSET but Stocksy opened over a month ago ... so, OFFSET sure looks a lot like stocksy.

Im surprised some photos dont have artist name on them, just an agency name...

They have a very nice selection of images from Germany. And from looking at the other images, the style seems more European to me as well.

There are similarities to stocksy, but I think the stocksy style is still different. This is good, so the buyers get a nice choice on the market.

I tried a few basic keyword combos, and I got a bunch of artsy photos, that could just as well come form regular SS, as some kind of curated collection - like the ones they present on their facebook page, but those are actually waay better / classier. I also got mixed into that lots of very-very average illustrations, which totally crashed the image they try to paint of themselves.

No words, I have just done some searches for material I need for projects and the results are disappointing at best.  I will leave it at that.

The invitation e-mail had a bottom line saying : 

"Interested in becoming an Offset Artist? Email [email protected]"

As far as I know, Stocksy is image-exclusive + no images of the same shoot allowed on other agencies (I think).
But where can we find the rules for becoming an Offset Artist?  I'm not going to send an application e-mail without first knowing if I like to join or not ...

Here is a good portfolio tho. This the kind of stuff I am expecting.

http://www.offset.com/search?artist=Jimmy%20White

The outdoor adventure collection form Aurora is pretty awesome stuff

Quote from: leaf on May 30, 2013, 18:53
I'm surprised how stocksyesque it looks.  I would say Stocksy looks a lot like OFFSET but Stocksy opened over a month ago ... so, OFFSET sure looks a lot like stocksy.

For the searches I have done on both sites Stocksy's images were of better quality and it's search returned more images.

Just do a search for images similar to the one that OFFSET has on its front page, the results do not even fill one page.

Quote from: leaf on May 30, 2013, 18:53
I'm surprised how stocksyesque it looks.  I would say Stocksy looks a lot like OFFSET but Stocksy opened over a month ago ... so, OFFSET sure looks a lot like stocksy.

Looks like moodboard did to me, or veer royale, but hard to compare with limited number of images

I think there is some very nice photography on there. 250 and 500, its premium priced alright.
certain subjects are not that well covered yet, and results are a bit patchy (to be fair its private preview and just starting up!)

coincidentally I did the same search as someone above before I saw this thread, "london". The results at the bottom are better than those at the top. there are one or two ***ing awful images sprinkled in, some nice ones, and a bit of random creative stuff - just not enough of them "57".. yet

some nice food portfolios on there

comparing "relax" between offset and stocksy: it makes stocksy look decidedly "stocky" in comparison - that's the price difference.

I think Stocksy is more offbeat, with trendy editing. Offset reminds of stuff I had to shoot for college (and still very much SS's style), full of colour and 'correct' composition and 'correct' depth of field. 

But I have to stay when I scroll through the stocksy work it is (for the most part) a visual delight. Less so on offset (although i've only spent 5 mins on the site, but hey, if you can't grab a buyer in those first 5 minutes with your best stuff....) the home page photo looks very instagrammy and i can't work out why they aren't showing off a dozen images on that first page? *shrug* their sandbox.

But I do love the concept - it would be a great place to put stuff that isn't quite iS/SS and isn't quite stocksy.

Quote from: gillian on May 31, 2013, 03:59
I think Stocksy is more offbeat, with trendy editing. Offset reminds of stuff I had to shoot for college (and still very much SS's style), full of colour and 'correct' composition and 'correct' depth of field. 

But I have to stay when I scroll through the stocksy work it is (for the most part) a visual delight. Less so on offset (although i've only spent 5 mins on the site, but hey, if you can't grab a buyer in those first 5 minutes with your best stuff....) the home page photo looks very instagrammy and i can't work out why they aren't showing off a dozen images on that first page? *shrug* their sandbox.

But I do love the concept - it would be a great place to put stuff that isn't quite iS/SS and isn't quite stocksy.

but I bet you would rather have joined up with Offset, wouldnt you?  now its too late.