Author Topic: Honest CN request (Read 5003 times)

BaldricksTrousers · « **on:** November 14, 2013, 01:06 »

And the funniest..... I won't give the person's name:

"I am a newbie on stock photography. I find your work very impressive and your sales even more impressive.
Thought I can get inspired by your work and would find a direction as to what to shoot, by looking at your images."

After deep contemplation, I decided to decline

Jo Ann Snover · « **Reply #1 on:** November 14, 2013, 01:11 »

I thought they'd done away with CN to improve site performance - did I remember it wrong or have they just not managed to remove the feature?

Regarding the request, you have to wonder what's in someone's head, but perhaps it's like the old fashioned artist's apprentice who started by copying his master's work? Of course in that case the master got to sell it...

ShadySue · « **Reply #2 on:** November 14, 2013, 07:16 »

Quote from: Jo Ann Snover on November 14, 2013, 01:11

I thought they'd done away with CN to improve site performance - did I remember it wrong or have they just not managed to remove the feature?

The 'friends' list is still there, and presumably the PM system still works for those who aren't banned (I have 23 inaccessible PMs).

tickstock · « **Reply #3 on:** November 14, 2013, 10:22 »

lisafx · « **Reply #4 on:** November 14, 2013, 22:18 »

I had a similar note from one of my CN a while back. He wrote to tell me how much he loved a particular best selling photo of mine and was inspired to create a similar one. Which he included a link to.

Needless to say, since he was so in favor of the idea of "inspired" works, I created some images that were an homage to his best sellers. You know, share and share alike...

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #5 on:** November 15, 2013, 01:35 »

At least people like that have the excuse of being naive but the industry is awash with more cynical copycats, from the top down - I mean, look at the top-selling lifestyle genres, nobody's going to tell me that all the top artists just hit on the idea of doing near identical shots, in which only the models have changed!
I prefer not to look for copies of my work, there's no point in getting a blood pressure problem over something that you really can't do much about. I can't help stumbling over some from time to time, but I try to move on without getting mad.

ShadySue · « **Reply #6 on:** November 15, 2013, 15:23 »

A photo which had never sold before (in 3+ years) sold the other day at iStock. Checking, I found that none of the four versions I made of it have sold. (it was a detail shot of a generic product). I also found a very similar to mine on iS, and wondered why anyone would have bothered to copy my pic, since it hadn't sold - then found their pic was almost a year older than mine! Astonishing that they should have seen the same product and envisioned the same, non-selling cropped composition!
Mind you, a different was looked at yesterday on FAA, and I think it's maybe a bit more 'art-y' than 'stock-y', so I live in hope.

lisafx · « **Reply #7 on:** November 15, 2013, 16:14 »

Quote from: ShadySue on November 15, 2013, 15:23

A photo which had never sold before (in 3+ years) sold the other day at iStock. Checking, I found that none of the four versions I made of it have sold. (it was a detail shot of a generic product). I also found a very similar to mine on iS, and wondered why anyone would have bothered to copy my pic, since it hadn't sold - then found their pic was almost a year older than mine! Astonishing that they should have seen the same product and envisioned the same, non-selling cropped composition!
Mind you, a different was looked at yesterday on FAA, and I think it's maybe a bit more 'art-y' than 'stock-y', so I live in hope.

That's happened to me too. Really knocked me off my high horse

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #8 on:** November 16, 2013, 12:46 »

I had a similar only even more bizarre experience with landscape shots. I found someone had stood in precisely the same spot as me in Sri Lanka, Greece and the UK and taken identical shots to mine, with only slight differences in lighting etc. I can't remember who got where first, but it was obvious that neither of us was copying the other, you don't travel 6,000 miles to copy a stock photo.

pancaketom · « **Reply #9 on:** November 16, 2013, 14:12 »

I find that pretty funny to see a similar or almost identical pic. I took one of an Appalachian Trail sign once, and later found 4 or 5 pics of the same sign in various states of weathering with a dead tree in the background losing it's bark. It is also instructive to see the copycat that came first. I have had a number of ideas only to see others have had the same idea before me.

qwerty · « **Reply #10 on:** November 16, 2013, 17:41 »

alot of the top end contributors, seem to be inspired by other people concepts. Who had them first I don't know. Alot I think people lift from old RM portfolios. They call it "researching" the market.
examples include
gold fish jumping,headsetted call centre,nests with golden eggs etc.

You can tell blantant copy efforts more clearly when its from low selling items as there will be less of them. It looks like there's some unwritten rule once 50 people copy someones elses idea then its free game.

BaldricksTrousers · « **Reply #11 on:** November 16, 2013, 17:49 »

I think you've got the truth of it there qwerty. Of course, they can always argue that the hairstyle is out of date or whatever, making a new version valid. However, I did read a cogent argument from an old timer who claimed that the earliest microstock superstars basically copied stuff straight out of catalogues produced by traditional agencies.