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Messages - MichaelJay
151
« on: March 17, 2009, 06:40 »
It is not new. Please check the forums for new applications. The only way one can post without having photos online is if they buy credits so they are considered buyers.
Yes, you are right. I talked to an admin last night and he confirmed that passing the application test is not sufficient to get posting rights in the forums. Apparently some of the applicants have bought some credits before, that's why I had the impression they could post even before being accepted.
152
« on: March 16, 2009, 05:00 »
I was not able to post even after failed applications. Actually, even after my application was approved I wanted to thank the members on the forum for critiques, I was not able to do it until I uploaded the first picture for sale. This was back in November, I am not sure if things have changed since then.
Yup - same for me.
I can't post either 
Woops... that's new... we have talked through many new applicants in the past. I'll have to check later... I'd propose you send a support ticket to Contributor Relations at iStock and get an explanation yourself. Usually people at HQ are pretty helpful if you ask nicely. 
153
« on: March 16, 2009, 02:35 »
I remember that I could not post on the IS forum before my application was accepted. One can only read the forums. A friend of mine who was a fellow contributor there, posted my images there for me and I got feedback I needed. Nope. To post you have to take the application test first. But as soon as you are allowed to upload sample images, you can also post in the forums. If anyone has problems, please contact Contributor Support.
154
« on: March 16, 2009, 02:10 »
My portfolios are tiny, yet I've made just under 30 DLs in 2 weeks at SS (which I think is pretty good).
Congratulations. Just don't allow someone to fool you. There are sites which give high preference to new images combined with customers paying a fixed amount to download lots of images. So customers tend to get all the images they are allowed to if they can use them immediately or not. The true test of your talent will be with the Pay-Per-Download sites. So now I'm wondering - do you guys have any tips for me?
Yes, definitely. Go to iStock's Critique Request forum, read the "Read This First" entry on the top, figure out how to post samples of your images and get feedback from other contribtuors who made it. iStock is a bit tougher than the other microstock sites but you get as much as help as you need and can handle. And if you are open-minded and willing to learn, you will find out a lot about photography, lighting, post processing etc. that you didn't know. Enjoy the ride.
155
« on: March 13, 2009, 05:22 »
Send an email to artists (at) istockphoto, attach the better version of the image and put "Replacement request for file #xxx" in the subject...
New image will have to be inspected manually, that's why it shouldn't be overused.
Best regards,
Michael
Sidenote: With site specific requests, I'd be sure you would get a faster correct answer in the site forums. Keep cross-site discussions and "blame the best match" threads here, of course. ;-)
156
« on: March 13, 2009, 04:07 »
Underexposed rejections most likely are not based on the concept and setup but on histogram values.
Check the histogram on Luminance, your highest value is slightly below 230 and "white" paper is around 210. You certainly want those in the area of 240 without blowing out the highlight on the pen, of course. Protect the highlight with a mask and play around with levels and curves until you get to a satisfying distribution of tonal valuse.
You aren't using the low end of contrast as well, by the way. So check your post processing how to improve your contrast management.
157
« on: March 12, 2009, 02:39 »
and how does it make life easier?
Copy keywords, categories, model releases across a whole series of images, for example. Doing all the homework stuff before uploading. Generate thumbnail links to other images of the same series in the image description. It's very specific designed to deal with iStock upload process and the very special parts of iStock. Absoute time-saver. I've been using it for more than a year to do most of my uploads. It's free but it's invaluable. If it would cost some money, I would still use it, saves dozens of hours.
158
« on: March 12, 2009, 02:34 »
I see any kind of promotion valuable even if it's aimed on potential new contributors. As you all mention, it's not easy to make decent money, so those with less talent or less patience will give up eventually. But they will all know iStockphoto, microstock in general and the idea that just grabbing an image from the internet is not the right way to go.
So I guess all of those articles that I've seen recently will do some good for the whole market in the long term, even if we will have to deal with a lot of new contributors.
159
« on: March 06, 2009, 04:50 »
Unlimited no. Multiple yes. A website and brochure for the same small business client would be OK under the standard license on most of the sites.
Even website for one client and brochure for a different client would be OK under most RF licenses. What you can't do is pass on the license to multiple clients.
160
« on: March 04, 2009, 03:27 »
2. For _any_ type of phishing attack - how can taking site down help?
That's what I was thinking too.
I'd guess it helps prevent hackers from using the stolen credentials and take the money.
Also apparently the fishing attack was somehow distributed through Forum posts and/or Sitemail, I have no details yet. So closing the site prevented further distribution of the problem. Anyway, recommendation is to a) change your password on iStockphoto if you have doubts and b) check if you are using the same username/password combination of other sites. You might be vulnerable there as well.
161
« on: February 26, 2009, 20:05 »
I'm just a beginner with a very small number of photos suitable for stock. I'd really like to make some money at this, but first I need to learn. And I can't learn anything from IStock other than that half my photos apparently have "artifacts" which no one else sees.
So... the other sites accept your images without rejection... and iStock rejects it for some reason... and that's why you can't learn from iStock how to improve. Strange way of making your case.
162
« on: February 23, 2009, 15:33 »
Well just recieved a payment into my paypal account.So the holiday did not interupt the weekly cycle.
I should be able to request another payment by this friday if things remain the same.........
Seems some people at HQ are better in reading a simple calendar page than you do.
163
« on: February 23, 2009, 06:39 »
Then you may be able to extrapolate some figures to see how well you could potentially do.
I don't think it's so easy because you can't assume to stay at current levels at iStock when dropping exclusivity. It might work or might not work.
164
« on: February 23, 2009, 05:38 »
Stacey, I have been exclusive from the point I was eligible and I have been reconsidering it every few months since then. I have submitted to a mid-price agency before and I had applied to other micro agencies and uploaded to a few as well. Sometimes I really miss splitting my risks as well. I don't like the changes of my income just like you don't.
Though, I keep saying to myself: There are many other markets that don't conflict with my IS exclusivity that I still can explore. I am now invited to upload to Getty through IS. I have a local RM agency I won't to challenge myself to get into this year. I will explore to do contract work locally. As long as I haven't tried those things, I don't think I will be serious about dropping exclusivity.
My main reason for not going to split the same images across agencies: What I really love is photography. I think post processing is okay but I don't like it too much. And I definitely don't like uploading, keywording, optimizing meta data, that's the boring part. I don't want to imagine spending more time doing search checks and keyword optimization for each site (and nobody can tell me that the same keywords work best for all sites). That's why I prefer to look for additional income from other sources where I can focus on shooting more and different images rather than working on the same images again.
165
« on: February 23, 2009, 05:27 »
I think too that you will have to remove all your images that were accepted from IS during your exclusivity period. MichaelJay can correct me if I am wrong on that ...
Totally wrong, distributed information by some people.
166
« on: February 23, 2009, 03:15 »
Stacey, at least you have the luxury of getting advice by the smartest person on the planet whose decades of microstock experience on virtually all sites of the planet he is willing to share with you.
You wouldn't have that on the iStock Forums because he's not allowed to post his crap over there.
167
« on: February 23, 2009, 02:04 »
Whats about that F"#"#%% best match. When someones sales are down, doesnt that mean another persons sales are up? It gotta be constant. Or am I totally off here?
If it would be constant, you wouldn't have any downloads at all since all the image that were up there before yours would still be on page 1. Change is needed to give everybody similar chances over time at least. With some changes you win, with some changes you lose. That's life.
168
« on: February 18, 2009, 11:05 »
It all depends of what you have to offer and the quantity you submit.
Nope, it's a question of quantity you sell, not quantity you submit.
169
« on: February 16, 2009, 09:47 »
commercial value??? do they take that into consideration in the initial test?...I thought that the initial test is to see how good the one is.
It should be a mix of solid technical skills to build up on and an eye for commercial value. It's a stock agency, not a sharing community. The company is investing time and effort into looking pictures and this can only be paid for if the images finally sell. By the way, it's practically impossible to see from small thumbs if the images are technically good, so everybody here's just doing guesswork. If you want real specific feedback, you might want to try iStock's Critique Request forum to get experienced contributors to analyse your images. Judging from the thumbs I would already guess #1 will have technical issues as the dark areas are very likely to have noise or artifacts. Also it doesn't really say anything about your skills, looks more like a snapshot to me. #2 might be worth a try - doesn't have big chances to sell later on but maybe at application it will be sufficient. #3 is nice but the shadow on the right half is very distracting. #4 looks like a good try at a concept shot but it seems it was shot with a wide angle, so the front part of the letters got stretched somehow. Reshoot with 50mm or higher and you should be fine. Check for potential IP issues though (no legible names). From your Flickr stream I like the night shots of Stanley bridge. If you find some with low noise and artifact levels, they might be working great. It's quite a task to get a night shot right, so it will proof some of your photography skills. Overall judging from your online images, you have some skills and certainly could make it. But for iStock application, you need some really solid material, the best you can shoot. Couldn't harm to specifically shoot new images for it. And add at least one people shot to the application just to show you could go beyond landscapes. ;-) Good luck.
170
« on: February 16, 2009, 02:31 »
The only thing I did was pull it from RAW, adjust levels because my exposure was way off Well, this is usually the first thing you should avoid. Adjusting levels introduces computer generated values into the image which degrades the original quality. Same goes for sharpening, if you can't get it sharp in camera, don't try to fix it in Photoshop later on. Go back and re-shoot with right exposure, right focus. You are right, just because stock agencies don't like it, it doesn't have to be a bad or ugly image. But stock is about providing designers the best RAW quality, so they can make their own decision how to make the image work with their design. And here's what I found at the first look doesn't look pretty: You can see a darker line behind the guy's right leg (as well at as the girl's left hand): http://a4.vox.com/6a00e398df66470004011015e98bb4860b-pi(I blew this up to 200% to make it more visible) These are probably caused by long exposure and the motion blur. But they just look ugly if you zoom in to details. Stock agencies will always look at your image at 100% in all details. With millions of images in their archives and tons added each week they can be very selective, allowing only (from a technical point of view) excellent images to be added to their collections. If you want to sell stock, you have to adapt your style. The concept looks like good stock, the execution doesn't. And yes, those three are far too similar. iStock only asks you to submit three images but those three should show a variance of photography styles that you are able to shoot. Try to find two that don't involve "people having fun in front of a nature background".
171
« on: February 12, 2009, 10:08 »
Sorry to be a bit off-topic but looking at your portfolios I am surprised (actually shocked) that other sites are accepting illustrations made up like potential company logos, actually saying so in the illustration. But checking their terms, the license prohibits use in a company logo - as it should be the case for non-exclusive royalty free image license, of course. It looks a lot like offering the customers something that he actually isn't allowed to use this way. So don't expect those images to be accepted at iStock at any time.
However, more back to your original question: Getting abstract feedback here is one thing, not sure if it's really helpful. I'd suggest you get into IS' Critique Request forum, read the sticky post at the top and post some of your sample images BEFORE uploading them for your next application cycle. I guess you will get much more IS-specific support in there.
172
« on: February 03, 2009, 02:59 »
I really don't get why people try to make things more complicated than they actually are... you make your request anytime before Day X and you will get paid on Day X one week later. Sounds simple and straightforward to me.
Now just replace X with the day of the week for your preferred payment method.
173
« on: February 02, 2009, 03:50 »
You should be aware that if you decide to drop your exclusivity with IS, all the images you uploaded as an exclusive will be removed. This is done so that people do not take advantage of the increased upload limits and then switch back to non-exclusive once their portfolio is 'large enough'. (Here's the contract - see Section 12.a.(i))
I am not sure if you are confusing what legally might be possible and what actually is being done. In my opinion, these terms are mainly in case you decide you want to remove your portfolio voluntarily from iStock - in this case iStock has the duty to remove your content within 30 days, so they are giving themselves at least some time to protect themselves from people asking to "immediately remove all images" and later on making claims why it took iStock a week to do so. Contracts are always made to protect parties in the worst case but how you live a business relationship is usually a bit different as long as both parties respect the interest of the others.
174
« on: January 27, 2009, 02:14 »
Stacey
First of all, what many people sometimes confuse (like you in the title, even if you didn't mean it), iStock is not a "state", it's a business. And it has the right to protect its business interest first. And we are not a citizens, we are a suppliers. We have a business relation with this company, and as such we don't have any given rights and both sides always have a choice to define the conditions for our relationship. Actually, most contributors would probably even agree that iStock has the duty to protect its business as all of us are relying on iStock to make good or even better business in the future, right?
Second, I have seen lots of controverse discussions in the iStock forums. There are just very few rules that lead to threads being closed and it has never been "I am opposed to the changes that iStock had made". Some of the rules are pretty obvious like "don't compare us to our competitors in our forums". And some are just "don't ask questions which you know will not get an official answer anyway". iStock's policy has been not to share detailed business secrets with contributors and I am sure they will continue to do so.
And then there are forum-specific rules like "don't insult fellow contributors", "don't start threads as a method of personal promotion" or "don't discuss the same issues in more than one thread at a time". This is to protect the forum culture. If iStock would allow the same topics to be discussed again and again, the whole forum would be full of threads about the same topic and no one could talk about anything else than best match because other threads just would get lost.
I can fully understand your current frustrations if your sales are down or sales patterns are changing. But it simply doesn't make sense trying to keep everyone busy telling you the same over and over again. Eventually it's just a waste of time for many people. If you have that spare time, fine. But don't make everybody else use his to argue with you.
Best regards,
Michael
175
« on: December 23, 2008, 05:14 »
Anything about what istock is doing right is ok, while anything about what istock is doing wrong might be tolerated for a day or two, but ultimately ends up locked in the void.
I don't agree. I have seen quite a few threads where people were stating their disappointments with certain things, such as price raises or best match changes. Those threads usually don't get locked, even if in best match changes about 80% of the comments are negative. Points are: - There should be only one thread about any given current topic, so Rob and Chris are locking all "duplicates" pretty fast. - Try going into any other real-life company and crying out in the entrance hall how bad the company is. You think you will stay in there for long? If you have complaints, the customer service is the right place to go. - People claiming to have a natural given right to something are plain wrong. We are in business with iStock and any other companies. Both parties agree on a deal, both parties can get out of the deal and both parties have the right to propose changes to the deal (as you have the right to take down or add images whenever you want to). Obviously you can point out that I am biased (for those who don't know, I was asked to help moderating the new German iStock forum). But I can tell you that I wouldn't have done the task if my main job would be to lock threads. And from the conversations I had with them I can say that Rob and Chris (Lobo) are pretty easy-going and tend to let things run as long as it's a rational discussion and not about insulting the company that helps many of us to finance a part of our life.
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