i, for one, have no problem how he got the equipment; what does it matter if was free or discounted.  Yuri is the top microstocker and sets the bar for all of us to achieve.  I am proud of him; happy to be trying to achieve some success similar to his; and delighted to see that this industry is not all doom and gloom-there is success for those that work hard.  Judging by his numbers, even if there was no discount, he has sufficient capital to afford all this stuff.

Disclosure:  I have not seen the video; even though I am in Russia-my internet signal comes from China and they block all video sites.

Race Photo

I believe you make some very valid points.  I am sure there are those buyers that price shop from agency to agency.  However, I believe most buyers are creatures of habit or pressured for production: these buyers will generally choose one or two agencies and stick with them.

We are dealing with a truly global market; images are used in every type of publication is all areas of the world.  I am sure there are buyers in Norway/Sweden/Finland that prefer to purchase from a "local agency" just as there are buyers in USA or Germany that want to purchase from their local agency.  Because of the internet; we have the ability to supply these agencies located in different parts of the world.

There are also buyers, for one reason or another, will not deal with a particular agency.  If we are exclusive to one agency, we loose potential sales.

I was exclusive with DT for a bit of time; it had many advantages but also disadvantages.  I did not like the fact that if they declined an image I was not allowed to sell it at any other agency.  To me, it felt like they were the image police; able to tell me what would sell and what would not sell.

I believe our best strategy is to not put images with those agencies that are unfair.  I believe if enough of the major players (those with 3000 plus images) banned together and pulled images from a major agency, you would see some changes.  Sure, there will always be other photographers to fill the spaces but the major players do supply images that are pretty much in demand.  Replacing the image portfolio of Moneybusiness, Elenathewise, Yuri or others with "mom at home with the baby and camera" images is not going to satisfy buyers.  Buyers will go where they can get products they need; the agency will change to get back the images they need.

On the other hand, if we do nothing, the agencies are in the drivers seat and will direct the traffic so they max. profit.

What's really interesting is you have uploaded everything, to pretty much every site and what you see in sales will show what they are currently doing for people, not what history has been. Times change and so do sites.

That is the advantage of lightburner; upload once and it does the dirty work of sending to many sites.  FP, GL, Cutcaster, 123RF, panther, et al go left out of lightburner because of ftp problems, not acceptance in time, etc.

Can you do something with rejection rates on the various sites? I know they will be different pictures from your collection, but it would still be interesting to see, you uploaded 1000 images and X were accepted. These are all previously accepted Dreamstime files, correct?

Acceptance Rates:  IS is at 50%, SS and fotolia about 85%, BigStock at 71% and the rest above 90%.  No, some were accepted by DT and some were rejected; I am reprocessing everything so not worrying about what DT accepted or rejected.  In fact, I am resubmitting some of the reprocessed images to DT

Yes IS you can expect reviews to take about a week. Nothing moves fast. Upload 18 (or whatever it is now) make a next batch and wait. When the timer clicks over, upload the next 18. I've already had files pending review when I was sending in the next batch.

I have a large file folder waiting for IS; every Wednesday night at 9 pm they get uploaded.

I doubt this will be helpful to most but maybe a few newcomers will find this helpful.  I was exclusive with Dreamstime until last week; Since the 15th, I have been uploading to sites and the following table indicates the number of images that were reviewed or accepted and the number pending.  Because every site uses different terms I will define my terms.

Online:  Reviewed and published on the site
To Be Reviewed:  Accepted into the pending review queue; some sites only allow a certain number of images into pending que
Pending:  Uploaded and waiting to go in "to be reviewed" que
Unfinished:  Needing my attention to transfer into some type of pending que.
Sales:  Sales; for Dreamstime, I only included sales since last week.

                              Online           To Be Rev          Pending             Unfinished          Sales

BigStock                          126                   50                  399                       0                     0
CanStockPhoto          579                   0                     0                        0                     2
Crestock                     0                   605                    0                       0                      0
Cutcaster                    0                     0                     0                        0                     0
DepositPhotos          (site down, no data)                  
Dreamstime               905                 101                    0                       0                     21
FP                              36                  122                   0                       0                      0
Fotolia                       434                 107                   0                       0                       2
GL                              47                   0                    517                    0                        0
isignstock                    0                   410                   0                       0                       0
IS                               9                    18                    0                      0                        0
Panther                       0                   155                   0                       8                       0
ScanStock                  501                   0                     0                      0                       0
Shutterstock               453                   0                     0                      0                      64
Stockfresh                  548                   0                     0                      0                       0
Veer                            8                   149                  465                    0                       1
Yay                            410                 190                     0                     0                       0

My ability to upload is limited by my connection speed, most times much less than 3G.  I have uploaded approx half of my port.; another 500 to go.  Some sites, such as FP, did not approve my application till later so there are less uploads.  Other sites were a pain to upload so did not receive the initial upload batches, such as Panther.  Still waiting to be accepted at 123 and a few other sites; have uploaded all to Cutcaster but can not find the images.

I am encouraged by the limited sales, especially from CanStockPhoto and DepositPhotos; I expected sales from the big 4.  Shutterstock feels like I am a beggar on the street corner and folks toss in a quarter as they walk by; guess that is the nature of Shutterstock.  Little surprised by IS, I know I only have 9 images online but was hoping for a faster start; their review times suck for a large firm.  Review times at Veer also suck, why a big push and bonus to kick off the site and then not review the current stuff.

Quote from: visceralimage on February 22, 2011, 07:02

I just started with Shutterstock last week, have about 375 images online and 60 sales in past week, 15 today.  Not alot but growing

A lot. I've seen your portfolio on fotolia. Your photos are great! I love them. (Shutterstock' link is broken).

Thanks, no idea how to fix the shutterstock link; computer not my niche.

Most of my images are on Dreamstime, as that is where I was exclusive for past year.

update:  SS link fixed, thanks for the notice

I just started with SS last week, have about 375 images online and 60 sales in past week, 15 today.  Not alot but growing

And Matt has publicly pledged to never lower the royalty rate below 60% for anyone who is currently a seller with us. And our minimum photo price is $2.
[email protected]

I was not aware  you accepted photos, will take a look

Viseral,

I am curious where "here" is. I've lived in places that get -40 much of my adult life. It does tend to weed people out, but living in a hovel eating Chinese noddles doesn't sound like you have struck the lottery either. Of course there are some people who like to live in the high Arctic, I know quite a few.  But if you're trying to cut costs, and be that unique photographer in a cheap and distant land, I would think there are far nicer places then what you describe. Just saying... ;o)

UPDATE: I guess I should read profiles more often, as I answered my own question.  Seems you are just across the pond from me. I've heard of some amazing places over in the Far East. In particular Kamchatka. I knew of a fairly famous Japanese photographer that ventured there many times, before unfortunately falling victim to the very creature he loved. 

Kamchatka is on the agenda but not there yet; working a bit west in Amur Region for a year.  Next year will be Primorski Krai, home of the Snow Leopards (the few that are left), Amur Tigers and Asiatic Bears; after that, Yakutia-the coldest inhabited place on earth to follow the reindeer for a season.  My goal is to photograph these amazing animals in their natural habitat before they are gone  (the habitat and the animals); I stay in each location a year to be with the animals during a full year and all four seasons.  I have been to my share of zoos and nature parks; nothing like living with the beasts you photograph.  For you, -40 may not be extreme, but for me it has been a bit of a shock-my previous home was Florida.  This year, my personal low was -47

i was with PD for many years along with many other RM sites.  the same stuff I am now selling as RF used to sold as RM; how can the quality have dropped just because you exchanged an "M" (RM) for an "F" (RF).

Traditional RM is a dying industry; all photographers with images for sale RM complain about the falling image sales and the inability to make a living at RM; if it was not for teaching workshops to future photographers, most pros in the nature and wildlife fields would be looking for work.

I get a bit of flack as a wildlife microstocker but I am working at the job I want; I don't teach any workshops and I don't go to the same places year after year just to make a dime off students that want to go to the same places year after year.  I'm working in an area that has never had a full-time pro photo. working.  I worked for years in USA, never was recognized as anything but a minor player in a big field; here I am a major player, in fact, pretty much the only player.  Then again, not many photographers are asking to join me at -40 below eating chinese noodles and living in a hovel.

Microstock gives us some of choices.  when I used to supply magazines directly, I needed to be tied to my telephone or internet signal 24/7.  Here, I have not had a phone call in 7 months!

I believe the whole point of this thread was that DT has stupid rejections.  On this point, I agree.  I have had images of Amur Tigers rejected when one had the mouth open wide and the second had the mouth closed.  To my way of thinking, that is two entirely different images.  Granted, it is roughly the same pose and same lighting but one with open mouth wide and one with closed mouth seems like very different images.

Then again, i have seen one guys port. that has about 40 images of the same boy playing in the field with a ball.  Same ball, same park, same grass; seemed a bit overkill for me.  I couple understand 4-5 images; boy with ball in air, boy with ball on ground, boy with ball in hands, etc but 40 images.

Quote from: visceralimage on February 15, 2011, 22:06

i know I am beating a drum we have all heard; but if you drop exclusive, be prepared for a ton of work to get your port. on other sites.  i just drop excl. at Dreamstime and it is a ton of work to get the port. on the other sites.  Even with lightburner, it is still a ton of work.  Yes, some of the sites are a breeze but most are a royal pain, like BigStock and Panther.

This is my full-time job so must suck it up and work the long hours to get the port developed across the entire system.  Excl. is not an option at IS as I am only allowed 18 uploads a week and it would take years to get my port their.

Acceptance is going well, most sites well over 90%

I never found uploading to 5 or 6 sites that much more work than uploading to IS. Most sites have uploaders right on their site (unlike IS, where you have to download extra software). There are a lot of give and takes to both sides. Personally, I always thought spending 10 more minutes uploading to other sites was well worth the piece of mind in knowing that all my eggs weren't in one basket.

Once you get caught up with the uploading, I think you will find that the $$ made from the other sites makes up for your exclusive droppage (is that a word?  )

At this rate, i will not be caught up with uploading for a couple months.  The easy sites will be caught up in the next couple weeks; I will never get caught up with IS because the limited amount of uploads allowed.

I have only been on the multiple sites for 5 days but already seen 34 sales from SS, one from DP, one from Veer,  and two from CanStockPhoto.  This is with only 350 images on SS, 400 on DP, 8 on Veer and 400 on CanStockPhoto.  I have 10 mores sites I am working to get images approved, 9 images approved on IS, Veer is stuck in never-never land with no reviews as is Yay, isignstock, GL.  Can't seem to find my images on Cutcaster, MP was a breeze but fear a waste of time, stockfresh was also a breeze.  Fotolia and Panther are a pain to click all the buttons for each image individually.

Reviewing is FAR too slow, impossible to build up a port before youre dead and when I say a port, I mean at least a couple of thousand files or else its a spit in the ocean.

i agree, it does not make much sense to me for this company to pay for uploads and start strong; then revert to 50 upload a week max and no reviews for 2 weeks or more.