Wow ... I can hear the corks popping at Adobe from here!

Quote from: MatHayward on November 05, 2018, 22:48
Regarding purchasing content with your commissions via Adobe Stock, no that is not possible at this time. You will need to create a customer account through stock.adobe.com.

Could this be added to the list of development priorities?  Most other sites enable and encourage it and the current fotolia system is direct and clear (although a discount for contributors would be even better!). A lot of us are contributors, customers and Creative Cloud users and it's helpful when everything works together.

Same as the others: stats, stats, stats. 

Is it really too much to ask these companies to operate with a minimum baseline of common decency?  I'm also getting tired of the drama of deleting files, not uploading to certain agencies and trying to track all of the bad behaviour.  I've stopped uploading at 123. I have clients who use them and I'll be vigorously informing them of the bad behaviour.  If the "great news" is bad enough, I'll delete my port. Ever since they pulled the royalty credit stunt, I've put them in the same category as IS and DP and bad reputations are hard to shake.

In what universe would anyone think this is ok?  Having contributors raise money for staff of a huge (somewhat hostile) corporation to celebrate work that they were paid to do as part of their jobs? WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE?

[/quote]
I don't know whether to laugh or cry!
[/quote]

There is a gofundme page set up to raise money from iStock Exclusives to pay for a party.

https://www.gofundme.com/thank-you-from-istock-exclusives

"The iStock/Getty team has been working hard at the tedious Unification project and are near completion. As iStock Exclusive Contributors, we want to thank them with the gift of a celebration dinner/party. This is to thank them not just for their work on the ESP project but for all they do in our support and advocacy.

There are around 15-25 folks that have touched the project in some way. $750 should be enough for a nice dinner/party (or at least a good start!).

The funds will be disbursed to Brenda Bazylewski/Chris McBurney to arrange for a celebration.

Q: iStock has people working all over the world, not everyone is Calgary.
A: That's true. Not everyone can probably make such a celebration. But hopefully they still feel appreciated.
Help spread the word!"

Yeah, they just removed the ability to delete files.  I was deleting my original stuff and leaving generic files up to keep my foot in the door in case the climate changed, but now I've sent in my request to close my account. Enough is enough. 

They pulled the 'subscription utilization' thing on us years ago when they first tried subs, and those earnings never materialized.  Another shell game.

Hey, let's start a thread listing stock illustrators who also work freelance.  The best clients I've ever had found me through my stock portfolios on the various micros.

Also, you could refer work to others on this thread if you have jobs that don't fit with what you're doing. 

I do lots of freelance work and you can contact me at [email protected] and see my stuff at http://brettlamb.com/illustration.html

Quote from: cthoman on January 08, 2016, 00:03
I'm always available for freelance work.

We should start a thread listing available freelancers ... or maybe I'll do it RIGHT NOW.

Yeah, looks like uploads are back.  I get sales there, I try to use them as much as posssible.

In August, for me, iStock was beat by CanStock. Let me repeat that, iStock was beat by CANSTOCK.   

(i'm illustration, btw)

Quote from: Evty on June 11, 2015, 05:29
I was merely wanting to explore ideas that would minimize immediate financial risk test the waters legally so I can ween myself from iStock exclusivity.

I was also an exclusive vector contributor and I dropped photo exclusivity and submitted raster illustrations to the other sites for a year or two.  They probably changed the rule when they made rasters a more prominent part of the Illustration side, but it's something you should look into.  When I was ready to jump, it really helped because I had a buffer income and it gave me a chance to learn the quirks of the various sites. But, the rule has probably been changed.

Anyhow, I make more as a non-exclusive than I did in those last months as an exclusive.

Hi illustrators,

If you're interested, here are the next two episodes of my silly little cartoon:

Episode 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nUfpntb-5-4

Episode 4: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDWY2YzXAtA

Hi, could a grfx thread be started on the Illustration board?  A few of us missed the original post and it would be good to have an easy reference in an obvious spot.  Thanks.

Quote from: jjneff on April 08, 2015, 00:41
... I am sure something very similar will come to iStock soon.[/url]

Looking at all of the recent changes, I would anticipate iStock being fully rolled into Getty soon.  Search is a big clue. I went to do a search the other day on iStock and I guess I hadn't been in awhile because I no idea that they'd gutted the search tools. It's impossible to find anything with the search limitations ... so I went to Getty to compare and their search tools are now really good.  I don't think it's an accident that they've traded places.       

Thanks!   

The problem with the internet is that it needs to have a 'Henry Ford Moment', because right now it's very difficult for anyone (besides big companies) to make money on it.  If the internet actually recognized the value of work with some reasonable prices for things like stock, ad rates, music, etc., that would give a real boost to the economy.  The race to free has done nothing but make EVERYONE poorer.

Quote from: Maximilian on February 08, 2015, 18:29
Why stockfresh is actually not so successful?

I'd heard that there was no plan for an aggressive push on the site for some reason. The redesign may signal a change.

Illustrator for the artwork, After Effects for animation and Premiere for editing.  And Audacity for sound.

Exciting news!  You're getting punched in the face!

Hey, illustrators ... Here's the first episode of my animated youtube sitcom:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mP8i9bf5uqA

Quote from: Monkeyman on January 09, 2015, 14:44
Shutterstock as a company seems to be doing fine, but how's the situation for contributors? Are they making more money when growing their portfolio?
I wonder if it's really possible to increase your earnings from now on (unless you're now in the business of course...). Seems like the golden days are over.

It's not that great.  For me SS is barely beating Canstock this month -- CANSTOCK! -- and iStock earnings have lapped them already.

I'd say the 'golden days' are done because you cant get a fair return on an image over a number of years now.  Previously, the overall return would justify the work.

I have my buyer hat on this month and I've been running searches for illustrations and the Best Match is a complete disaster right now.  I get the most ridiculous results such as large numbers of new, low quality similars by the same contributor all in a row. Lower quaity work by newer artists is being pushed to the front when I'm expecting and hoping to see higher quality material from established contributors (which seems to have been shoved down some black hole).  From a buyer's perspective, wading through so much garbage is extremely frustrating and tonight I just gave up and went to another site and found what I was looking for.

I don't know if it's the same on the photo side, but on the illustration side I've never seen the search turn in such useless results.  That could account for some lost sales. Or all of the lost sales.   

Anyhow, this issue isn't going anywhere and you're both getting wound up over nothing.