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Topics - gnirtS
1
« on: April 10, 2025, 22:53 »
OK let's be honest here. I hate keywording. I loathe it with every fibre of my being. It takes me far longer than editing photos of videos. I often leave edited stuff sat for weeks in a folder purely because i can't stand the prospect of keywording it for upload (just as im doing now for example).
Recently it seems to be a massive influx of heavily marketed (lots are spammed everywhere) AI keywording tools. Often these have dubious to no privacy or data security policies and so on.
Are any of these actually any good? Will they produce useful metadata i can use with only minor tweaking then upload? Or are they all producing as the old ones did overly generic results?
Are any worth using? Specifically, i want something to JUST generate keywords (and descriptions maybe). I don't want to use it to upload content. I just want the keywords to stuff into LR or a CSV.
I've had a little play using Google Gemini (not ChatGPT as you can only upload about 3 images a day) and "fed" it on the various submission guides. It produces OK results that still need tweaking but OK as a starting point. Its not capable of searching for similar images on stock sites and scraping keywords to start with though. The main issue i have is amnesia. It'll occasionally forget i told it base verbs, no plurals or return 80 or 20 keywords instead of 30-40 ish and so on. I cant get consistency out of it.
Is it worth me trying to tweak my current Gemini model or trying one of the other services? If so, which one? I want one that isnt spammed with referral codes to every FB group in the world.
2
« on: April 09, 2025, 22:20 »
Just been looking at fees and realised how much extra is paid on top generally for non US contributors via Paypal and its pretty galling long term.
What options are people using here to minimise the really terrible exchange rates and a % fee slapped on top?
Paypal it seems charge a really terrible rate then 3% on top of that (and 5% for SWIFT).
Payoneer maybe the same?
Revolut no longer offer a domestic US dollar account for personal users but WISE do. BUT Paypal wont allow domestic bank transfers to any bank that isnt your own country (so a UK paypal will only send to a UK bank so must go through its conversion rate and fee).
Nobody appears to offer a Wise payment option. Alamy offer bank transfer but its SWIFT so large fees.
To me a useful system would be to get a payment provider to pay in USD to Wise which could then be transferred out at the market rate and no fee from there but i cant see any way of doing it.
Its more galling since AS switched to USD resulting in an effective 5% paycut (but still charge contributors in GBP for the products...).
So how are people doing it or realistically do we just have to stomach the bad rates and fees and accept we'll earn a percentage less than US contributors as a result?
3
« on: March 20, 2025, 23:36 »
With todays 19.1.4 release of Resolve it now has licensed full native ProRes support.
This means no more using ffmpeg/voukoder based workarounds and comes at a good time since Voukoder is going payware.
Im assuming is Resolve Studio only not free but unsure.
4
« on: March 14, 2025, 00:38 »
Has anyone else here dealing with video noticed a sudden and large crash in RPD for video sales on SS?
January was fine (by SS standards, the normal $8 or so average rpd) but suddenly Feb and March all video sales seem to be for $1 or under, most $0.25. And this is level 3.
RPD has gone down to $0.8 as a result so a drop of 10x relative to previous. It did it throughout Feb and March looks the same.
Its almost as if all videos now are low price subscription and absolutely nothing else. I havent had a single "normal" sale this month or last.
5
« on: January 14, 2025, 12:18 »
After a bit of advice on Blackbox here.
Finally signed up last month due to how time consuming submitting to SS/AS/P5 manually was getting combined with the SS levels resets.
The question ive got, is once approved by the reviewer there, typically how long does it take for them to submit it to the remote sites and is it done in random batches?
The reason being is I can find only some of my approved content on the actual sites, even searching very specifically. For example one batch of videos i have 12 out of 12 on P5 and AS but only 2 on SS some 3 weeks after approval from BB. This is the same for pretty much all my approved batches now, often some weeks on.
This seems to be happening on all my approved batches - even weeks after only some appear on some sites. I doubt its agency rejections as i also submit directly still and get pretty much zero rejections for the same stuff. So is there a different or staggered submit and review queue for BB in some places ? How long do i realistically wait before deciding that particular video is never going to go live on that particular stock site and simply send it up manually ?
I tried to ask on the BB FB group but that appears to be heavily policed to people looking for collabs and nothing to do with support type questions. Obviously if as it seems now 80% of my videos for some reason never appear on SS then its not worth continuing with.
6
« on: January 07, 2025, 07:41 »
Not received the email from SS but the other side: Dear Creator/Contributor,
As Getty Images approaches our 30th anniversary, we are excited to share the news that Getty Images and Shutterstock have announced an agreement to merge. The company will operate under Getty Images Holdings, Inc. The official press announcement can be found here.
Its important to note that it will take time for the transaction to close. The merger is subject to the satisfaction of customary closing conditions, including receipt of required regulatory approvals and the approval of Getty Images and Shutterstock stockholders. As a result, the merger is not closed, and each company will continue to operate independently in the interim, and it will be business as usual with respect to your relationship with Getty Images.
We are undertaking this merger in large part because we expect it to provide expanded reach for your content, support for new asset types and formats and enhanced support and tools to manage your work.
We believe in creativity. We believe in the power of imagery. We believe pre‑shot solutions represent an efficient and powerful tool for our customers. We believe in the opportunity of AI, but the need to compensate creators for the use of their work. These beliefs will not change with the transaction.
Over the coming months, as we move to close, we are committed to sharing updates.
We thank you for sharing your talent, content and trust with Getty Images and we look forward to providing expanded opportunities and capabilities going forward.
Best wishes,
Craig Peters
CEO, Getty Images Regulatory approval may take some time here.
7
« on: November 28, 2024, 07:50 »
Quite a few of us are seeing old, previously accepted assets appear in the rejected queue as "file processing error" with new ID numbers.
Others are seeing their profile size shrink or not display correct.
Anyone else got odd items in their recently reviewed queue?
8
« on: September 12, 2024, 07:44 »
SS is now rejecting all my previous EasyRelease forms its been happy with for a decade so ive decided to use their own.
Ive found a blog post and other notes from 2020 saying they now have a digital release with a helpful note saying its on the submit page at the top next to the select all etc. I cant see it. I cant find it anywhere.
All i see is the usual upload JPG release.
So do SS actually support digital releases still and if so, where is it?
(Also, is anyone still successfully using Easyrelease with them?)
9
« on: June 01, 2024, 12:44 »
Does anyone know how to report an AS account for selling entirely stolen content when the reporting person is NOT the copyright holder?
Quite a few have now appeared on the FB group, as usual from Pakistan using videos stolen from iStock Exclusive and others. 10s and in one case, 100s of videos.
How do you go about reporting this account? DMCA isnt going to work as you're required to be the original copyright holder.
SS deal with it via their infringement email but how do you do this on AS?
10
« on: May 28, 2024, 05:28 »
Anyone got any thoughts on what output gamma we should be targeting for Rec.709 4k/HD footage?
I know its "anticipated viewing environment" but in reality on stock and microstock its probably a mix between screens, mobile devices with some for broadcast so not quite that simple. In addition the videos themselves are first shown to a buyer on a web page so likely a 1.96/2.2 gamma sRGB screen so can be brighter/washed out making them less appealing.
My current scenario is my monitor (DCI P3) is calibrated to gamma 2.2 because i do a lot of still photo work. Should i then be outputting my stock video from resolve for 2.4 (or using a CST instead?) or keeping a full 2.2 workflow?
Does it actually matter?
12
« on: November 30, 2023, 23:31 »
Email states the changes come in from Dec 4th.
Looks entirely to align it with Shutterstocks world view/lawyer view.
Editorial videos must now be labelled as such by the contributor and have an editorial caption.
Reminder about trademarks not allowed in keywords.
13
« on: August 11, 2023, 11:18 »
Anyone noticed a slow down in payment processing?
Typically its 7 days near enough every time.
This time my request from July 31st still listed as Pending.
14
« on: August 04, 2023, 11:48 »
The Shutterstock FB group is full of people trying to game the system.
Here's one from today who is a (i) AS contributor and (ii) AS account holder offering openly to buy images of other contributors on request for a fee to boost search rank.
FWIW given his posts elsewhere its likely using stolen account credentials as he's selling LOTS of different things.
There are more and more of these types of post now.
15
« on: August 01, 2023, 09:15 »
https://petapixel.com/2023/07/31/adobe-staff-worry-their-ai-could-kill-the-jobs-of-their-own-customers/Seems relevant to here. According to a report from Insider, Adobe employees are expressing concern that moving forward with AI technologies in the art space will cause companies to downsize graphic design departments, and one senior designer at the company says that is already happening.
The employee cites a billboard and advertising business they are aware of already made the move to reduce the size of such a team because of how effective Fireflys integration into Photoshop has become and that is still in beta.
The situation has gotten to the point that some Adobe employees are experiencing an existential crisis and are calling it depressing in an internal Slack channel seen by Insider.
16
« on: October 05, 2022, 16:38 »
Was looking at the keyword suggestions earlier and got sidetracked when i noticed this.
Many of the top hits for certain phrases contain keywords that are duplicated multiple times in a single keyword.
Things like "waterfalls waterfalls waterfalls waterfalls water" and so on.
Attached image is just from "waterfalls" search showing the most common keywords from the 50 images it displayed.
So is this actually effective algorithm gaming given how many times it seems to appear or just some random artefact? I guess it definitely proves theres no human checking keywords for accurate or content on upload...
17
« on: February 01, 2022, 13:45 »
OK so January is over so the full scale of the SS level reset can be seen. For reference i finished the year on levels 5 images and 4 video to give it context and finished January on levels 4/2.  Firstly the earnings graph (actual figures removed due to T&Cs etc etc). Can see (i) how brutal the reset is and how similar it was to last years as well. Download numbers also near identical. Now for the RPDs:  Actually seeing an even lower image RPD than last year although video is *slightly* better. RPD a mere $0.32 per image (2021 average $0.72) and for video $7.35 (2021 average $12.42) Unexpectedly given the time of year Adobe provided me with a best month ever in earnings and just over double what SS provided. In short as expected the level reset makes for a fairly horrible January. Will see what Feb brings as i slowly crawl back up to where i was before.
18
« on: January 27, 2022, 13:02 »
Just tried to upload a batch of images using my usual method - Bridge to set keywords in priority order then upload.
All of the uploaded images have the order messed up - sometimes its alphabetical, some times it seems completely random so it looks like it's ignored the file settings.
Anyone else experience this?
(They all show in priority order on the jpg themselves locally)
19
« on: December 31, 2021, 11:54 »
Just run through my yearly SS figures so the first 12 months of the level system.
Firstly, January as expected was a huge drop. Over 80% decrease in revenue.
One thing that did surprise me for video in particular is just how random the RPD for video was regardless of level. The graphs are all over the place throughout the year. So many special offers/giveaways and so on the thing varies by a factor of 3 from month to month despite actual volume remaining fairly constant.
Both do show a shallow increase throughout the year which makes the reset even hard to stomach. Somewhat surprising of an increasing average despite constant levels though.
Data set is likely large enough to not have huge fluctuations from individual freak sales.
Overall average for year RPD for video $12.40 and images $0.72
(Contrast with roughly $19 video and $0.98 before the new system).
20
« on: November 01, 2021, 11:37 »
Anyone seeing any video upload problems?
I sent a load last night and they didn't appear, tried again today, those haven't appeared either.
21
« on: April 08, 2021, 09:43 »
Anyone else having login issues on ESP or DeepMeta?
On DM it seems to take an eternity then going to "Login Failed" and ESP website giving "Those details don't match our records. Double-check and try again." instantly.
Yes the details are correct - ive been having this issue for 48hrs now.
22
« on: March 06, 2021, 13:08 »
SS appear to have a new undocumented customer feature. In addition to "Authentic" we now have "AI Predicted Quality".
Seems to be rolling it to images this weekend.
Nothing from contributor support about it, its not showing on all images yet.
I looked at a few of mine and my best sellers are often on 6 or 7 out of 10 whereas others that are out of focus or badly exposed are getting 9s.
Images that sell a lot aren't always high and images that have never sold sometimes are. On my stuff at least it appears totally random.
So, is the same famous SS AI that thinks trees are image noise and clouds need model releases now deciding how good an image is?
...wonder how long before they offer a "Filter quality lower than X" or "Less money for quality lower than X" appears.
24
« on: October 20, 2020, 07:36 »
A thread has appeared on the Shutterstock Contributors Worldwide facebook group. A guy posting saying he's reached the submission limit for videos "again" and asks whats causing it. He includes a screenshot. All the titles have videoblocks in them, a varied range of clips. Suspiciously so in fact. Someone else has done searching and found the original owner of some of those clips on there who confirms its stolen. So this guy is stealing off videoblocks and uploading to SS as his own work. What we cant find is his portfolio on SS as its not in the screenshot and the name is common. Anyone fancy some detective work? ( https://www.facebook.com/groups/1686048705011055/permalink/2835310756751505/?comment_id=2835451206737460&reply_comment_id=2835568046725776 ) Edit:- 2 other videos are taken from an author called "aerocaminua" who has a VB and SS account.
25
« on: September 27, 2020, 06:24 »
First let's start by saying although im fairly OK with colour management workflow in still i am NOT in video so beginner advice level is needed for me.... Basically, im editing videos for stock in Premiere Pro and exporting. On my computer (VLC or windows viewer) the videos themselves play back exactly as wanted. Colour and saturation is as i want. Both prores and h.264 outputs. However, what im finding is when i upload to stock (SS/AS etc) the displayed thumbnails appear very washed out regarding saturation and contrast. When playing back on the sites embedded customer end they look the same - washed out. Im having issues separating if this is a colour management error on my *actual* videos or just an artefact of playback? Some system details:- - Windows 10 with Dell U2720Q monitor - Monitor is running in sRGB and is calibrated using Dispcal - Browser is Chrome (colour managed) and playback via VLC (also colour managed) - Export Prores and h.264 same issues from Premiere - Not trying HDR or anything. Simple rec709. - Reason for running my display in sRGB not the P3 version is because a lot of windows is not colour managed so looks odd in general use outside of managed apps. I've experimented with the Premiere colour management on/off option in the menus but cant decide which, if any, makes any difference. Im aware of the table on https://helpx.adobe.com/uk/premiere-pro/using/color-management.html showing what are and aren't issues with different displays. So basically, is there any reason why my videos all export to be more washed out and in Premiere, do i want colour management on or not? Also "If the destination for your video is an online video channel such as YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo, or played back on an sRGB display, you must not turn on Display Color Management. If the destination for your video is a broadcaster, you can turn on Display Color Management." is mentioned - for stock video im assuming most buyers would be using a non sRGB screen? Or shall i optimise for that?
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