I thought macs never crash : )

Quote from: jbarber873 on November 21, 2010, 13:48

Quote from: molka on November 21, 2010, 11:24

Quote from: FD-regular on November 21, 2010, 01:28

Quote from: molka on November 20, 2010, 23:44So apparently I shouldn't be talking about microstock on a dedicated microstock forum. Genius. : )

Where did you talk about microstock? As far as I can read here you are handing out intelligence ratings. 

that wasn't me, look above. I just see a bunch of sour ppl who can't take a joke, a hint, anything.

I'll say it again. This is a thread about great photographers of the past. Can you contribute something positive to the conversation? Karsh was not shooting for microstock- he was shooting for high end fashion. Perhaps all of these photographers would have gotten the same rejections you seem so familiar with, but that is not what this thread is about. It is about inspiration. If no one has inspired you, you don't have to post.

The answer to that is above your comment, you get pissed at that little joke as if you were microstock site owner. Why? Why you seem to side the ones ripping you off, I don't get it. As for inspiration, I love Karsh's portraits, and not just because of the iconic figures. I also have that commonplace admiration for Ansel Adams, but that really came when saw his work on real prints in person at getty, because only there I realized how much it reminds me of my real inspiration, classical engravings (and paintings) Dührer, Rembrandt. Since my father is a painter, and I grew up among artits, my true inspiration is classical paintings, Tiziano, Rembrandt.... Frans Hals might be someone who stockers can have a distant association with : )
There are quite a few photographers that I like, but only Adams stands out that I ave. F.e. anything I ever saw from Henri Cartier-resson left me totally unintrested.

Quote from: ShadySue on November 21, 2010, 00:30
Interesting about the noise issues on the 7D. A couple of people suggested I might like to get a 7D as its focussing and motordrive are allegedly better than my 5D2 (wildlife and I want to try some sport, not necessarily for stock). I was just getting together a list of old kit I might sell, including my 40D, to try to buy one as a backup camera (which the 40D is at the moment, though it gets very little use!). Only this morning I came upon this thread about noise on the 7D in the iStock forums:
http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=264181&page=1

focusing is huge issue with stock imho, since they are overzealous on technical quality. you can correct noise, exposure... but wronged focus? Trashbin. It's especially annoying when sorting your thumbnails, and you have handfull of, lets say model shots, that worked out particularly well. Great gesture, nice facial aexpression, good angle, all the things that takes a certain amount of luck besides skill... then you open and, craaap, some of those are OOF. Canons seems to have that kind of slight unreliability with focus that might get you there more often than you would like.

Quote from: FD-regular on November 21, 2010, 01:28

Quote from: molka on November 20, 2010, 23:44So apparently I shouldn't be talking about microstock on a dedicated microstock forum. Genius. : )

Where did you talk about microstock? As far as I can read here you are handing out intelligence ratings. 

that wasn't me, look above. I just see a bunch of sour ppl who can't take a joke, a hint, anything.

Quote from: jbarber873 on November 20, 2010, 15:55

Quote from: molka on November 20, 2010, 14:25

Quote from: jbarber873 on November 20, 2010, 01:25

Quote from: molka on November 19, 2010, 20:30

Quote from: le_cyclope on November 17, 2010, 00:10
Some of his photos are so famous that we sometimes forget the photographer...

Yousuf Karsh

Have a look:
http://www.karsh.org/#/the_work/portraits/

Claude

Poor Lighting -- Poor or uneven lighting, or shadows. Focus -- Your image is not in focus or focus is not located where someone raised in barn feels it works best. Please visit the dummies for photoshop page. : )

  Don't you ever have anything intelligent to say?

I'm truly sorry that I'm not at your level of intelligence, so we can' really communicate. I can see that it would take a huge effort from me : )

  This thread is about celebrating the great photographers who created the look of photography today. It's about ideas and execution of those ideas to communicate a vision. You seem to be obsessed with the negative aspects of microstock to the point where you can't see anything else. I think it's sad to see such a negative person. If you are so deeply unhappy with everything that has to do with microstock, why are you here? And what has that got to do with this thread, which is about people who are about as opposite from you as a person can get?

So apparently I shouldn't be talking about microstock on a dedicated microstock forum. Genius. : )

Quote from: jbarber873 on November 20, 2010, 01:25

Quote from: molka on November 19, 2010, 20:30

Quote from: le_cyclope on November 17, 2010, 00:10
Some of his photos are so famous that we sometimes forget the photographer...

Yousuf Karsh

Have a look:
http://www.karsh.org/#/the_work/portraits/

Claude

Poor Lighting -- Poor or uneven lighting, or shadows. Focus -- Your image is not in focus or focus is not located where someone raised in barn feels it works best. Please visit the dummies for photoshop page. : )

  Don't you ever have anything intelligent to say?

I'm truly sorry that I'm not at your level of intelligence, so we can' really communicate. I can see that it would take a huge effort from me : )

Quote from: le_cyclope on November 17, 2010, 00:10
Some of his photos are so famous that we sometimes forget the photographer...

Yousuf Karsh

Have a look:
http://www.karsh.org/#/the_work/portraits/

Claude

Poor Lighting -- Poor or uneven lighting, or shadows. Focus -- Your image is not in focus or focus is not located where someone raised in barn feels it works best. Please visit the dummies for photoshop page. : )

Weird, SS seems to accept just about anything. I throw trash at them sometimes and at least 50% of even that gets accepted. You have nice shots, not very microstock oriented in their styling tho, but I can't blame you for that, microstock style is generally a degaradation of photography. If you don't want to seriuosly push towards microstock as money source, I suggest you shoot for fun, do stuff that you would do anyway, maybe insert a few moves with stock in mind, and upload whatever is produced that might get downloads, thats what I did to have a peek inside. Don't let it get you into some microcrap achievemnt stress which might riun the fun, and still not produce good results as the whole thing is kinda falling apart.  You have a really attractive model in that brunette girl, she looks to be an ideal stock model with that warm friendly expression.

Quote from: andresr on August 19, 2010, 17:05

Quote from: lefty on August 19, 2010, 16:59

Quote from: andresr on August 19, 2010, 16:43

Quote from: sjlocke on August 19, 2010, 16:25

Quote from: andresr on August 19, 2010, 16:09
I have been slowly stopping to shoot for micro and looking for more avenues as there is no sign of possibilities to grow sales within the agencies we used to so submit images to. My income has grown but it has grown because I have more distributors, and I will be shooting for the traditional market, at least 80% of my work will go there. It has been a very frustrating year in microstock, but yet exciting in the rest of the stock industry.

Maybe because you're cannibalizing your own sales.  Looking at your latest in IS, it looks like you're just reshooting groups on white, girls with phones, business people.  So, people buy the newer one, or the older one, but they don't need both.

What are you doing differently for the "traditional" market, and where?  My Getty sales are less than encouraging, as well, the contributor side of the workflow (stats, sales data) is very unhelpful.

Yeah that's partly true ..... I'm leaving the different stuff for traditional places or premium collections. I have tried uploading different topics in micro and there is simply too much supply and not enough demand anymore so I am just shooting to mantain sales while I try to make the other avenues as profitable as micro once was for me.
A really good image even if it's "Different" will sell 12 times at the most on a day in shutterstock just after uploading, I use to see 48 dls in a day for a good image.

Good point by sjlocke. Also I remember sjlocke say somewhere too it is not Shutterstock not growing over time, it is seller's piece ofpie is smaller
because more supply by new contributors with better idea. Or maybe another Istock quote , the drop of sales for specific contributor is not
indication that agency sales is bad , only the contributor share of commission is in decrease.

Yeah all true, and it could be easily mended by making adjustments but all the agencies are scared of making the first step  as they think they will loose market share ..... I think it will benefit everyone, higher prices = higher budgets = better quality images.

They all fail miserably at their insepction policy, that's the absolute biggest problem. The mostly maltrained granpas who are told to freak out and push the big red button at seeing weird and wonderfull things like shadows, surely won't go around selecting anything by easthetical or style standards. : ) That's a scary alien world to those ppl. So all the images with horribly inapt models, crap and-or dull lighting, just visually and contentwise repulsive litter that makes a real creative's eyes bleed gets thru if it happens to have no noise or smthng like that... and that's most of the images, probably 70%. The guys at certain places would have hard time raising prices for the more artsypantsy in such a junkyard enviroment : )

Most Professional photographers, musicians, merchants, ect are kinda seriuos businesman too, generally in a tough stance protecting their turf as mauch as the world allows them. The people how 'let you in' on this business see you as clueless amaterus who don't know sh*t about sh*t, and stare dumfounded when violated, and they are kinda right about that. In short: expect to be raped in every orifice possible.

Don't worry 'bout it, you have no security whatsoever anyways, thanks to broswer usage terms and crawler bots. They are probably crawling into your ass and out your nose right now as we type. Just go ahead it's too late alerady to cocoon.

Quote from: VB inc on November 14, 2010, 20:12

Quote from: cclapper on November 14, 2010, 19:28

Quote from: gostwyck on November 14, 2010, 17:59
Do you think that Istock should never have gone above selling Large images for $1 then, other than perhaps adjustments for inflation? Was it 'immoral' or 'deceitful' for them to have done so? After all they were making plenty of profit even at that price.

To me, you are comparing apples to oranges. Of course I think all of the sites should try to move the prices up, both for their own sake and for contributor's sake. But having so many different prices points on the same site (IS), to me, is smoke and mirrors. Companies that produce a product often times market it in Walmart or Target for one price, but if they market it at Neiman Marcus, they can mark it up hundreds of percent more, because of the clientele. I get that. But IS is doing it all under one roof, and the result is just confusion and the appearance of deceitful practices. Just IMHO.

But hey, it's all about getting away with whatever one can, right?

I think istock is trying to capitalise on the major corporate buyers they now have with deep pockets. Placing  Agency and Vetta files in front of the searches probably annoys buyers with smaller budgets. Istock has to do it all under one roof since the traffic and money is there. istock created the microstock market. i think getty is trying to kill it.

if deep pockets is their prominent feature, why do they hang around istock?

sure, as if a real designer at an ad agency f.e. working asap mode 12h/day has fukn time for this crap

Quote from: cclapper on November 12, 2010, 23:41
I particularly enjoyed the comment about MS Office at $100 being too expensive. That's one of the cheaper softwares to buy! You should show him the Adobe site and the Creative Suite software. I wish the Creative Suite was $100. But it just shows that no matter how inexpensive, some people still think things cost too much and use it to justify their stealing.

Congrats on the controlling yourself...

MS office cots only $100 because there's no reason to buy it. Almost any other software that is a necessity is terribly overpriced out of simple greed, and the answer to that is frugality. Just look at photoshop: I have an old comp, a 600 mhz celeron that surfaced recently in a moving operation, and I tried it out. I edited the same 12 mp psd files, and PS 6 is a LOT faster on a comp with 192 mb than cs4 on a comp with 3 gigs + 3+ghz. That's more 10 times the memory. It has 99.9% of all the features I need, and I would guess 80% of all the features in general... but is sure isn't supported by camera raw... I wonder why    So what the f*k are people paying for again and again? Apparently, the huge performance decreases. No joking, that's what you have to pay for. Nice : )

Quote from: rubyroo on November 13, 2010, 07:02
I had to laugh at the comment that 'wealth should be shared' coming from someone who seeks to destroy wealth by taking everything for free.

Where exactly would that wealth come from to share among the poor if no-one paid for products and services in the first place?

When anyone tells me that my life as a microstocker is easy, I tell them "OK... here are some agencies I use.  Try it yourself, come back to me in a year, and then tell me how easy it is".  Same applies to making a living as a musician.  

You guys sure did you make it really hard for yourself to earn a living thru stock photo, by infalting it into microstock, I agree on that, but I'm not really sure if that's something to be that proud of.

Quote from: lisafx on November 12, 2010, 21:42
The only way I have found to get isolations accepted is to shoot them that way in studio.   

...and you can still get rejections for bad isolation. I got pic rejected at istock for bad isolation, that had no isolation. : D very professional : )

Quote from: louoates on November 12, 2010, 21:29
I  have no idea what some reviewers are smoking when they reject a perfectly cut out image. Poor lighting, incorrect white balance, even "stray" pixels with perfectly clean white areas. Maybe some dead pixels on their monitors? And you are right about too much work for too little return. How about a buyer's request button that offers the photographer an extra $20-$50 to cut out an image to order?

most of the inspectors are dilettants. I remeber pagin' thru some 'guidance' pages just to get a laugh, and on the one dealing with isolations even the example pic was at fault.... amateurs...

You don't need to integrate anything, the newer versions of 3dmax come with mental ray that does great renders if handled properly, but rendering does takes a lot of time. ( a lot more than shooting and editing a photograph )

Quote from: FD-regular on November 12, 2010, 09:16

Quote from: jbarber873 on November 11, 2010, 13:26I'm getting lost again. Am I the oligopolistic capitalist, or is that someone else? Because I wouldn't mind being the oligopolistic capitalist for a while. It sounds like fun. Can I buy some $6000 shower curtains? Just imagine

Only if you are the only curtain producer in the world.
To Molka: the free market isn't nice at all, but everybody gets the same chance. The US (in general not fond of regulation) has one of the toughest anti-oligopolistic sets of laws in the world.
As to Rockefeller, wasn't that the guy that co-invented private banking money-printing in that conspiracy on Jekyll Island in 1910? 
Ah well, here is my ZeitGeist again... A gift from the little prick 

Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't really think you, or me have the same chance as someone born into the Rockefeller or Warburg family, or even just one of the richer families in the small rural town I came from. We are also born with different abilities and talent, there's absolutely no chance for the practical realisation of egality in the real world. What you can do is, try to be fair to others. It rarely works.

Zeitgeist is the jerry springfield show of social documentaries, appealing to the same 'level of audience'. Who of course, think they are incredibly smart
thru falling falling for all of the (sometimes painfully obvious) nonsense in it.

Get educated:
http://conspiracyscience.com/articles/zeitgeist/part-three/#income_tax

(just a particularly funny part, you'll find the rest)

Quote from: helix7 on November 11, 2010, 19:58
Not sure how useful the map is. I think the novelty of seeing where the last few downloads came from will wear out.

If someone, unlike me, is a heavy duty stocker who likes to follow trends, it might just be more usefull than you first think.

Quote from: stockastic on November 11, 2010, 20:42
It's fun.  It shows me exactly where in the world I'm currently getting ripped off by 25 cent sales of my images.

especially nice to see that it's not exactly the poorer part of the world either... *insult removed* : )

Quote from: caressati on November 11, 2010, 16:23
Nah, it's cool. I don't intend to let you ruin my day just because somebody pissed in your corn flakes and you don't know the difference between critique and rudeness. I'm glad your comment wasn't the first though; at least now I know the entire forum doesn't consist of assholes.

Sorry to spoil your evil keyboard ninja pleasures. Have a nice day!

leaf and molka: Thanks for your comments!

nice of you despite me being kinda un-infromative, but I don't consider myself on the level of giving out photography instrucions (maybe in 10 years, unless somebody particularly asks me for it), and I also doubt that kinda thing can be done thru the net, message boards etc...

Quote from: FD-regular on November 10, 2010, 12:14

Quote from: caressati on November 10, 2010, 06:40About animal images in general - what type do sell?

Just look. Why are you asking for the obvious? Don't you know how to handle search engines?
Look at this dog shot (378 downloads on DT alone). Can you match it?
Check Eric Isselée. He only shoots animals: 36K sales. Can you match him?

Quote from: caressati on November 10, 2010, 06:40I could imagine shots such as this: http://stirredreality.com/stock/1.jpg (I know - poor lighting, obstructed background, focus is off by 5 mm and there's dust in the foreground)

If you know it (that goes for your first 5 shots too) why ask?

Quote from: caressati on November 10, 2010, 06:40Do more exotic animals help?

Can you match this lion?

Quote from: caressati on November 10, 2010, 06:40For instance, I have taken plenty of close-up shots of snow leopard kittens and peregrines (all at too bad ISO but otherwise fine).

Otherwise fine? If your ISO is off and the image is noisy, just upload them to Flickr or FB.

Quote from: caressati on November 10, 2010, 06:40Do you have any general ideas here? I've looked through what sells on the sites but I honestly can't seem to find a consistent theme to it.

Keep looking. If you think any of us found the holy grail, do you think we would spill the location to our (future) competitors and educate them?

Honestly, I didn't want to mingle in this thread since I would sound rude. I thought it was a joke. If you seriously ask if this shot has fringe (the fringe is an elephant in the room but the image is totally flawed on every other aspect: commercial usability and especially lighting) and "you're not good enough to tell", I suggest you search another hobby. Judging from those 5 snapshots, you just have no talent. Sorry but it will save you time and needless frustrations.

You may block and curse me now.

the puppy is cute, you need patience and luck for the 'expression' but 'photographically' there's nothing special about it. The shot if the lion is poor and dull, as for funny part of it seemingly holding a sign, that's just low. you really got yo brain stuck in this microcap, setting semi crap like that as an example, how about linking tim flach or something respectable?

Quote from: pet_chia on November 10, 2010, 15:35
I wouldn't presume to tell anyone what to do or think, but I support the assertion that capitalism works.

By "capitalism" I mean a completely free market.  Nobody can "corner the marker" in a free market (without government intervention) because of competition.  Any company which abuses its suppliers and customers will lose them to another company that treats people with more fairness and respect.  The only antidote against inordinate corporate or individual greed is competition and freedom of choice.

What?? Ever heard about monopolies?? Forget those fairytales, if you want to know about how capitalism works, look at the actual history of some of the greatest capitalists... I suggest you start with John D. Rockefeller, Mr. Capitalism himself. His great saying? "Competiton is sin" There you go. He cornered the market so bad, that in a price war he forced the railroad companies to work for fees that didn't even cover their expenses. It ended in labor unrest because workers were afraid they would starve. There was no competition to step in, nothing. I personally don't get it how people can be fooled into beleive this vague theory about free market leading to some kind of equilibrium favorable to most people. Why yould it? It doesn't make the slightest little bit of sense at all. You may try to portrait the market as an organic entity, but it's still just a bunch of greedy people competing, and a competition can end up only one way basically: someone winning, likely the smartest, most agressive, and usually the most ruthless and shameless.... and having a monopoly. You'd better hope there is some state regulation on the so called market or you or your kids will be working simply not starve to death.

Quote from: m@m on November 10, 2010, 22:39
Hey guys, I got this warning from a reliable source this morning...
Sorry, I should have post it on the Off Topic area, anyhow I hope it helps someone.

Passing along this information to you.

READ IMMEDIATELY

VERY IMPORTANT! PLEASE READ THIS--
These E-mails are floating around currently.  Anyone using Internet mail such as Yahoo, Hotmail, AOL and so on.  This information arrived this morning, direct from both Microsoft and Norton.  Please send it to everybody you know who has Access to the Internet.  You may receive an apparently harmless e-mail titled "Here you have it" or "Just for you."   If you open either file, a message will appear on your screen saying:  'It is too late now, your life is no longer beautiful....'  Subsequently you will LOSE EVERYTHING IN YOUR PC, and the person who sent it to you will gain access to your Name, e-mail and password.  This is a new virus which started to circulate on Saturday afternoon.  AOL has already confirmed the severity, and the anti virus software's are not capable of destroying it.  The virus has been created by a hacker who calls himself 'life owner'.   PLEASE SEND A COPY OF THIS E-MAIL TO ALL YOUR FRIENDS and ask them to PASS IT ON IMMEDIATELY!

THIS HAS BEEN CONFIRMED BY SNOPES:
http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/hereyouhave.asp

or maybe that email was the virus : )