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2401
« on: June 16, 2010, 13:06 »
... Ridiculous! They had better widen their "invitation only" pool, because no self-respecting microstocker is going to give images away for .10 a download.
I wonder who actually did send them their images as they obviously got a few contributors already. Regarding "invitation only" - it appears that anyone can sign up right now directly on their site. This is just a huge clusterf***.
2402
« on: June 16, 2010, 09:28 »
The journalist or photographer judges what essential is. After all, the picture is his or her subjective view of the scene, like it or not. Yes, that is manipulation, but that's why I said it is problem with journalism in general.
I understand what you are saying - however a serious journalist who tries to capture the scene as a whole so the audience can understand the circumstances should also be respected. I mean, that if the entire shot captures critical or journalistic important information it should be included and not cropped out. If some people like it or not is a whole different animal but as a photographer I'd be quite upset if my images get chopped up considering the circumstances they were taken. Furthermore the public does not get "the entire picture" which could lead to a massive misdirected public opinion. In short, IMO it shouldn't have been cropped.
2403
« on: June 16, 2010, 08:21 »
There is nothing wrong with cropping in news pictures...
I'd be careful with that one. If "unnecessary" details are cropped out like too much sky or "fixing" bad composition is one thing. To leave out essential details that actually were captured is falsifying content.
2404
« on: June 16, 2010, 07:39 »
Obviously the copyright owners of the 77,000+ images don't care about the 10 cents sub option.
Perfect example that the agencies' plans to eventually offer content for free will work!
This is regardless whether Dreamstock will survive or not - it just shows that enough newbies will go along with everything the agencies want.
2405
« on: June 15, 2010, 18:17 »
As many of you have noticed, we are currently undergoing some site funkery. We are looking to kickstart the hampsters now.
Hampsters - lol
2406
« on: June 15, 2010, 18:16 »
As many of you have noticed, we are currently undergoing some site funkery. We are looking to kickstart the hampsters now.
2407
« on: June 15, 2010, 07:55 »
The price level system of Dreamstime is one of the reasons that causes rejection for submitted series of similar photos: focusing on the best ones there is a greater probability to drive them to the higher levels of price with an advantage for the agency and the photographer. Translation: We only accept one (the best) shot of a series because then we will build the best library there is on the internet which will make lots of money for DT but less for the individual photographer *cough* did I just say that out loud? Isn't it just terrific that DT is making these hard choices for us instead of simply approving technically correct images? Approving one shot of a series of garden herbs and claiming it's the best shot of a series is just *cough* not right to make an understatement. This is to the sole advantage of DT and not the contributors. DT will claim that this will be all for the greater good but what are the new streams of buyers good for if they want my chive image but DT only approved my cilantro... 
2408
« on: June 15, 2010, 07:20 »
Didn't one of the big shots stop uploading to DT due to "lack of professionalism"? Gee, I wonder why...
2409
« on: June 14, 2010, 21:32 »
Oh come on.
Yeah fine, for the big dogs or the contributors pumping images online by the hundreds every month this "free idea" may work to an extent. But hobbyists and part-timers will just get suffocated along the way.
Sure does free stuff generate a lot of traffic and the agencies will monetize that but that doesn't necessarily mean that we will see a cut of that.
It's already "bad" enough, having to produce like an idiot to stay in the game (as a full timer) - now the agencies wanna start the free thing?
The sickest part is that along the way there will always be enough newbies discovering the microstock world thinking they can make a killing until they realize a couple years down the road that it's just not paying off. In those two years the agencies just milked them dry and leave those burnt out but the agencies will keep going with a continuous flow of decent content.
Although there is still a significant amount of mediocre content being approved it has to be noted that a lot of very good stuff is represented at the micros in the meantime. Lots of 16MP+ with pro lighting and pro models - so the agencies really feel that this is working well for the high rollers?
I guess they all just assume that those contributors already have endorsements with Nikon, Canon or Hasselblad, besides running a studio somewhere also offering portraits or wedding services while contributing to some Macros on the side. Geez - welcome to the world of photography in the 21st century.
2410
« on: June 12, 2010, 07:59 »
LOL - not cool.
2411
« on: June 11, 2010, 20:18 »
... I should have "complained" earlier: I just found out that I had a Fotosearch
Regular XS $ 7.07 today. Not a huge amount but very nice after all those 0.30 sales I had so far!
Somebody sounds spoiled here: XS sale for $7.07 - that's not bad at all. Actually I don't even know any Microstock site that pays over $7 for a XS image.
2412
« on: June 10, 2010, 22:17 »
Maybe it's too late or maybe it's the beer. Maybe it's because my native tongue isn't English.
What does it mean when you speak of licensing images with cash?
As mentioned before, do the buyers literally walk into your office paying in bills and coins for the image they want?
And how did the buyers pay for the images before? In cows or sheep? Sorry for my sarcasm but I just cannot understand what you mean when you speak of paying licenses with cash. I mean buyers use credit cards, wire transfers or Paypal and other forms of electronic payments so how is this such a significant improvement?
I appreciate any clarification.
2413
« on: June 10, 2010, 16:54 »
It's getting better. No idea what the reason was for the slowdown the last 9 months.
2414
« on: June 10, 2010, 11:52 »
I was going to go with talentless hacks, but your explanation is probably better.
Still true though. Just add it to the list.
2415
« on: June 10, 2010, 10:53 »
I just wonder why doing this but ok...!
Easy money. I've found images of mine in someone else's illustrations and they've been doing it for over 3 years at the time. Compared to my earnings over the years I could make a rough estimate of how much they approximately earned which sometimes was over $10.000. So making $10.000 without actually having to produce the images or the source images is just a short-cut "to wealth" - LOL.
2416
« on: June 10, 2010, 10:34 »
Obvious case - OP, please inform any copyright holders about this. They will have to put in a claim.
Fotolia requires now a DMCA notice so you can't even complain on behalf of someone else.
2417
« on: June 09, 2010, 16:45 »
Go to ThinkStock and search for your name in quotes. If your last name is unusual enough, you can just search on that. Then go down to the Collections menu and click on Hemera. Click the white-on-blue Search button to rerun the search on your name, but with just the SX images displayed.
Fantastic. I wonder why I never thought of putting my own name in the search box Thanks!
2418
« on: June 09, 2010, 15:08 »
This month is the first month that I got earnings reported through StockXpert.
How do I find out how many images I have on Thinkstock? I can't click on any identifier on Thinkstock that shows me my Hemera (StockXpert) images.
Thanks in advance for any help regarding this.
2419
« on: June 06, 2010, 08:00 »
it seems to me the first steps to get into some macro stock is camera requirements, like high MP camera. ... I'd be careful with that assessment. Rarely a photographer takes great picture "just" because of a "high MP" camera. Of course the technical requirements will tell you what source material you can upload (or apply with) but in the end the content matters. The content is highly depending on your photographic skills and not just the camera itself. I assume you would like to make a living off of photography judging from your motive of breaking into Macro agencies. I recommend to extensively analyze and prepare for that move before being shot down. Gather all information you can get about every Macro agency that you're interested in. Try to establish some kind of communication that answers all your questions. Some agencies won't even look at your pictures if you don't already have a portfolio of 2000 or more photos (and they surely won't consider your microstock images). Think about it, you want to be taken seriously by the agency. They need to see that you are a motivated, successful photographer that will be an asset to their library. They are running a business as well and they rather accept photographers with larger portfolios than ones with only 50-200 pictures. Naturally, there are exceptions to the rule.
2420
« on: June 06, 2010, 07:46 »
Jaresco, I see nothing wrong with what you are doing, and have no problem with my images being included, since I am opted in to partner programs on DT.
I am concerned about this portion of the response you got from Serban:
"When we have integrated the dynamic fees, all referral fees for buyers should've been added into the equation, as they contribute to generating the sale. We have delayed this moment in order to avoid significant impact over contributors' earnings. But at some point this will be integrated for all buyers. The royalties will be calculated based on all commission fees involved (distributors, contributor's & Dreamstime's). "
Can someone break this down for me? It sounds like at the moment referral fees are paid by DT out of their roughly 2/3 cut of the royalties.
But am I reading correctly that some new "dynamic fees" are in the works where the referral fees and any other fees will be taken out of the sale BEFORE the royalties are paid to contributors, so we will be getting our % of that reduced amount? If so, it is yet another hit to our already dwindling royalties %.
Somebody tell me I am reading this wrong...Please. 
I think you are reading this correctly. It's the same procedure we've seen at Alamy. That's "ok" by me if the sale amount is several hundred $ but if DT's API is selling mostly Level 1, XS sized images, we'll end up with Thinkstock commissions for credit purchases. This shouldn't be happening. This all ends at the same place we talked about before: Is DT dying or is Microstock dying? While DT nor Microstock will be dying as a company/industry it's the individual contributor that cannot afford running their business (if they make a living off of it). This whole development will push away many of the big shooters (except of the best of the best) and open the doors to many hobbyists who do this on the side not relying on that income. Well, by now we all figured that out anyway, so no more complaining. 
2421
« on: June 05, 2010, 06:35 »
I'm just very worried about the millions of images from contributors who are too excited about the exposure of their (rejected) images and offer them there.
I'm also confused about how this will actually benefit SS.
2422
« on: June 04, 2010, 14:41 »
... Frankly, it should be the agency's job to enforce their own licensing terms. This is, theoretically, why they get 60 - 80% of the money from our work....
Absolutely correct, but in this world we live in, it's not going to happen. Only the case, where SS went after a client who was supposed to get only ELs for every single image they got.
2423
« on: June 04, 2010, 11:15 »
Of course, this doesn't mean a photo in a site may be taken as the true person, yet it is strange when they put a real name behind the person shown there, as we've seen in a couple of examples before. I mean, if there is a site "Medical Advice by Dr. Smith" and a photo of a man saying "Hello, I am Dr. Smith", we expect that the person in the photo is indeed Dr. Smith.
I see this all the time with my images. I believe it is a violation of licensing terms, but it happens so much it hardly seems worth the effort pursuing it unless there is some other violation too (like sensitive use).
Isn't exactly this situation the "beginning" of the whole problem. We DO see that there is a problem but we don't act on it as long the model either doesn't know about it or if the model knows about it threatens with a lawsuit. We most likely did get paid for the image so technically "why would we care?". In the end it's the agencies' duty to contain or punish illegal use of the images purchased from them. The agency is making the rules not we. I think only above average smart people and people working in the media industry know that "Dr. Smith" isn't really Dr. Smith. Why would TV commercials explicitly write underneath "Spokesperson is an actor and not a real doctor". It's the same reason why McDonalds had to put the warning label on their coffee cups: Contents are very hot. Duh, who wants lukewarm coffee??? Once more this is a classic example of the problems that come along with Microstock. In the early (earlier) days such an image could only be obtained through the big agencies where they had to pay a chunk of money. Not that the buyer was more aware of the licensing terms but also such violations were much easier to trace. Forget that these days with the micros. Upload and forget is the motto. Sadly.
2424
« on: May 31, 2010, 22:36 »
Thanks Sean for that read. Not very exposing a lot of new facts but I have to comment on the following: ...He had read that the average lifetime return of an accepted microstock image is about $14 for Arcurs, but more like $2 for the average photographer. ... I hope a few full-timers can chime in here but I would have left microstock a long time ago if my average return per image would be $14. I can only imagine that an image factory is "able" to achieve such low results by producing so many images that their downloads are spread out across their entire archive. Across all sites I contribute to (including very low earners like Crestock, Scanstock, 123RF and Canstockphoto) I average at $25 return per image. Why even adjusting colors of an image not to mention retouching it if you are epxecting $2 of lifetime earnings??? These are very funny numbers. I find that hard to believe.
2425
« on: May 30, 2010, 09:14 »
It's DT's prerogative to accept or refuse any file for any reason.
They, we and the buyers may all have different opinions about that.
DT as the middle man SHOULD know best what's good for contributors AND buyers (and therefore for themselves) by accepting and refusing certain images.
Now if we analyze DT's behaviour in terms of acceptance criteria lately (as far as I know of them) it appears that they will not allow series (for whatever reasons) or they are running out of storage space.
To me it makes no sense whatsoever to refuse series (I'm not talking about a model in the same pose looking to the right in one image and looking to the left in another image...). They act like Crestock or a Macro agency who pick the top of the top and everything else goes. This may be a short term success for DT filling their archive with only superior (cough) shots but in the long run they will upset contributors because of the high rejection rates.
On a side note: Assuming that Yuri and Co. stopped uploading because DT doesn't accept series anymore, in the long run it also leads to a flood of mediocre images (that are not series).
So yeah, you can say image factories (who also submit series) are intentionally driven away from the site while the thousands of hobby-photographers get all their stuff accepted because they don't even produce series (in most cases).
I really believe they are making a big mistake.
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