Author Topic: If in 3 years microstock is dead, what is the best alternative (Read 8879 times)

salaahkhayr · « **on:** June 11, 2014, 22:19 »

WHAT COULD BE THE BEST ALTERNATIVES FOR FREELANCERS AND ONLINE GRPHIC DESIGNERS? (LOOKING FOR A SUGGESTION TO KEEP THE PACE OF WORKING ONLINE)

admin edit: changed the subject to not be in all capital letters. Please turn your caps-lock off!

stockmarketer · « **Reply #1 on:** June 11, 2014, 22:38 »

Here's the thing... it won't be dead for buyers, just contributors. People in areas of the world where you can survive on a few dollars a day will be happy to keep cranking out new images for pennies, and buyers will love it, paying less and less.

Those of us who have made a decent living off this for the past few years will slowly pull away from microstock, and there will be plenty of people willing to fill the void for a tiny fraction of what we're used to making at this.

This is already happening. Some of the veterans on this board are already pondering dropping out if and when their income drops below a certain threshold (me included).

But back to your question, what's a good alternative for photographers and designers to make up this lost income? There's portrait and wedding photography (... er... no... everyone's uncle now has a cheap digital camera and thinks he can produce work as good as a pro.) Or there's freelance design work (... er... no... fiverr and similar sites will design your client's next brochure/calendar/logo for five bucks.)

OK, there's always McDonald's.

Goofy · « **Reply #2 on:** June 11, 2014, 22:46 »

with minimum wage being raised to $15 per hour in Seattle pretty soon I can sell all my equipment and go flip burgers and not have to worry about microstock anymore

Ariene · « **Reply #3 on:** June 12, 2014, 02:54 »

Set up your authorial fantastic website, upload the best images, lots of images! Find clients directly and you will forget about micros soon

Case is more complicated if you sell standard micro images like people isolated, backgrounds, etc...

Epsilonth · « **Reply #4 on:** June 12, 2014, 03:12 »

I guess I will go back to wedding gigs

ShadySue · « **Reply #5 on:** June 12, 2014, 05:09 »

Underwater macrame should be coming into style again soon ...

michaeldb · « **Reply #6 on:** June 12, 2014, 22:00 »

A lot of graphics designers seem to be making good money selling designs, fonts, Photoshop stuff and other things to other graphics designers on creativemarket.com

PaulieWalnuts · « **Reply #7 on:** June 12, 2014, 22:09 »

Well you could do like the old California gold rush days where supposedly the people making the most money were the ones selling equipment and advisory services to the miners. So write books, do training, and sell equipment.

KW400 · « **Reply #8 on:** June 13, 2014, 09:10 »

Find a new hobby.

DF_Studios · « **Reply #9 on:** June 13, 2014, 10:56 »

You knew the party was over a few years back when all the books about microstock came on the market. Those who were in on the initial gold rush are now writing books and selling presets.

Selling dreams to dreamers is easier then living the dream.

grsphoto · « **Reply #10 on:** June 13, 2014, 11:59 »

Saw this today... interesting concept.... build a following for your photos then "sell" your following to advertisers...
http://www.vancouversun.com/business/smallbusiness/Digital+agency+helps+brands+snap+social+media/9933510/story.html

ShadySue · « **Reply #11 on:** June 13, 2014, 12:05 »

Quote from: grsphoto on June 13, 2014, 11:59

Saw this today... interesting concept.... build a following for your photos then "sell" your following to advertisers...
http://www.vancouversun.com/business/smallbusiness/Digital+agency+helps+brands+snap+social+media/9933510/story.html

Lord Sugar would call that a "sordid little business".
(Or was it his 'trusted aide' Claude Littner?)

cthoman · « **Reply #12 on:** June 13, 2014, 12:41 »

Quote from: grsphoto on June 13, 2014, 11:59

Saw this today... interesting concept.... build a following for your photos then "sell" your following to advertisers...
http://www.vancouversun.com/business/smallbusiness/Digital+agency+helps+brands+snap+social+media/9933510/story.html

Sorry, Mom. I sold your name to advertisers. Can you tell Grandma to follow me too?

TanyaLittle · « **Reply #13 on:** June 13, 2014, 16:15 »

A disturbing notion.. but what about more macrostock like Getty Images and Corbis? Or video format for that matter? Think they will follow suit?

JohnItalia · « **Reply #14 on:** June 13, 2014, 22:02 »

I highly doubt microstock will be gone in three years, however, that is just my opinion.

I have been a real estate agent for almost 18 years and every year I hear the same things from real estate trainers, brokers and just about any pessimist in the business that the real estate market is changing and in a few years real estate agents will not exist as they do now. It will be only a hand full of agents working on salary and no commissions will be paid anymore. Well, that hasn't happened and I make more every year on commissions. So I have heard it, been there done that kinda thing, only time will tell.

spike · « **Reply #15 on:** June 14, 2014, 07:55 »

It won't be dead.

There will be more people uploading photos.

But the number of (good) illustrators and people who knows how to do 3d renderings will not increase by so much.

So I recommend that you start learning these tools.

borg · « **Reply #16 on:** June 14, 2014, 09:05 »

Quote from: stockmarketer on June 11, 2014, 22:38

Here's the thing... it won't be dead for buyers, just contributors. People in areas of the world where you can survive on a few dollars a day will be happy to keep cranking out new images for pennies, and buyers will love it, paying less and less.

Those of us who have made a decent living off this for the past few years will slowly pull away from microstock, and there will be plenty of people willing to fill the void for a tiny fraction of what we're used to making at this.

This is already happening. Some of the veterans on this board are already pondering dropping out if and when their income drops below a certain threshold (me included).

But back to your question, what's a good alternative for photographers and designers to make up this lost income? There's portrait and wedding photography (... er... no... everyone's uncle now has a cheap digital camera and thinks he can produce work as good as a pro.) Or there's freelance design work (... er... no... fiverr and similar sites will design your client's next brochure/calendar/logo for five bucks.)

OK, there's always McDonald's.

I think there is not such place over the World where you can buy equipment for several thousand dollars and then start your life in "survival mode of living" only with a few bucks a day...

You still need some good equipment!
Microstock won't die, it can evolve but not to die... Microstock as a model of image licensing will survive for sure, because it shows more than ever a true value of photography especiall in modern World...
Microstock shows to all of us that photography business is not reserved only for "pros" with some "secret knowledge", because science of image shooting and retouching is now on every corner of Interent...
So many spoiled "pro" photographs (they earned more money than their effort was), who also swallowed microstock threat earlier, now are talking about new post-apocalyptic era after the fall of microstock!
That era won't come, for sure!
People will need photos for their business, and there has to be someone to make photos and sell them...

Epsilonth · « **Reply #17 on:** June 14, 2014, 09:37 »

Quote from: borg on June 14, 2014, 09:05

Quote from: stockmarketer on June 11, 2014, 22:38
Here's the thing... it won't be dead for buyers, just contributors. People in areas of the world where you can survive on a few dollars a day will be happy to keep cranking out new images for pennies, and buyers will love it, paying less and less.

Those of us who have made a decent living off this for the past few years will slowly pull away from microstock, and there will be plenty of people willing to fill the void for a tiny fraction of what we're used to making at this.

This is already happening. Some of the veterans on this board are already pondering dropping out if and when their income drops below a certain threshold (me included).

But back to your question, what's a good alternative for photographers and designers to make up this lost income? There's portrait and wedding photography (... er... no... everyone's uncle now has a cheap digital camera and thinks he can produce work as good as a pro.) Or there's freelance design work (... er... no... fiverr and similar sites will design your client's next brochure/calendar/logo for five bucks.)

OK, there's always McDonald's.

I think there is not such place over the World where you can buy equipment for several thousand dollars and then start your life in "survival mode of living" only with a few bucks a day...
You still need some good equipment!
Microstock won't die, it can evolve but not to die... Microstock as a model of image licensing will survive for sure, because it shows more than ever a true value of photography especiall in modern World...
Microstock shows to all of us that photography business is not reserved only for "pros" with some "secret knowledge", because science of image shooting and retouching is now on every corner of Interent...
So many spoiled "pro" photographs (they earned more money than their effort was), who also swallowed microstock threat earlier, now are talking about new post-apocalyptic era after the fall of microstock!
That era won't come, for sure!
People will need photos for their business, and there has be someone to make photos and to sell them...

Wow, I think that's really true. Photography used to be only for people with a lot of money. Camera bodies and films used to be really expensive so if you want to learn you gotta pay a lot. Now cameras can be had for just few hundreds dollars and it costs nothing to shoot. I've already seen some older photogs who cannot keep up went out of business. If we don't keep improving I think someday camera phones will kill us.

LoneWolfMuskoka · « **Reply #18 on:** June 17, 2014, 13:58 »

Quote from: cthoman on June 13, 2014, 12:41

Quote from: grsphoto on June 13, 2014, 11:59

Saw this today... interesting concept.... build a following for your photos then "sell" your following to advertisers...
http://www.vancouversun.com/business/smallbusiness/Digital+agency+helps+brands+snap+social+media/9933510/story.html

Sorry, Mom. I sold your name to advertisers. Can you tell Grandma to follow me too?

This is just another form of what forums and blogs (not to mention television, radio, movies, magazines...) have been doing to raise revenue. You have an audience and the advertisers don't want to buy the names, etc. All they're looking for is to get some exposure on your stage. If you can find advertisers that you think your audience would like to hear from, then you should go for it.

The only problem is that there will be those who start putting up "spammy" photos to get the advertising dollars, just like the "thin" web sites that plague the search results.

mojaric · « **Reply #19 on:** June 18, 2014, 13:24 »

i'm not a full microstock full timer but i get quite enough money from microstock, i pay my beers and professional shooting equipment, do do what?
to produce other microstock images that will be paid less and less..! in some time i think i will just look my personal projects and just do what i like....by the way there are great pictures out there, and these are still selling...i shoot mostly isolated on white, and this is becoming like a manual worker in Ford chain factory

As a microstock photographer i always looked on quantity (acceptable quality ok but not much more...no time must upload and sell!) i think good photographers will stand out while the others will be swept away by the market....maybe i'll be swept out! ahahha

Vstudio · « **Reply #20 on:** June 22, 2014, 08:51 »

i think to conpencate on loss of incom you should change your method

i create my stock image trough traveling with family or vacation, i dedicate 2-6 hours every trip only for shooting stock visuals and enjoy the life on the way

another thing i do, is create TFP or TFCD or in the new modern TFLink, i try to shoot models or actors for 2 hours for them and 1 hour for me on the weekends on in spare time

the other option is creating more visuals then sales, like yuri dose, just shoot the whole day and create a huge DB of pictures that even sells for 0.21cents a picture, if u multiply it on multi medias stock it can pay very good

for example i have started my own stock after 6 years selling trough an agent, why? because one of my pictures was sold for 300usd net profet to me, the potential is still out there just manage your time

yuliang11 · « **Reply #21 on:** June 22, 2014, 10:52 »

Microstock will not die as the demand for cheap photos will always be there. Contributors will die if their cost and profit is not managed correctly.

mojaric · « **Reply #22 on:** June 22, 2014, 15:17 »

microstock will not die of coarse, but, for normal contributors, will be impossible to Live just with that.... in civilized countries....sure you can pay beers and food

stealthmode · « **Reply #23 on:** June 23, 2014, 07:10 »

Quote from: mojaric on June 22, 2014, 15:17

microstock will not die of coarse, but, for normal contributors, will be impossible to Live just with that.... in civilized countries....sure you can pay beers and food

Actually, it seems like a reasonable reason for deserving to die.

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Author Topic: If in 3 years microstock is dead, what is the best alternative (Read 8879 times)

salaahkhayr

stockmarketer

Goofy

Ariene

Epsilonth

ShadySue

michaeldb

PaulieWalnuts

KW400

DF_Studios

grsphoto

ShadySue

cthoman

TanyaLittle

JohnItalia

spike

borg

Epsilonth

LoneWolfMuskoka

mojaric

Vstudio

yuliang11

mojaric

stealthmode

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