So I just upload all of my content to istock and am happy to let them reject any of the editorial clips that they want, usually named in the SS format.
But curiously they did not reject any of my Cambodian or Vietnam clips that featured people, groups or people / recognisable faces (some in a mid shot) but they rejected all of my Sydney Australia wide street time lapses as 'maybe' some faces at traffic lights are kind of visible (no logos).
Curiously it does go to show that double standards do exist..
Maybe they think that someone for a poorer country is less likely to sue?

You have to group videos and catalog them in a certain way + you have to submit a demo video featuring the clips. They sent me an invite and I told them that if they auto generated the demo, accepted csv files and offered higher commission rates (I think any new site should offer commission rates greater then 55% getting into the game at this late stage) then maybe. But to ask for more of contributors and not deliver with royalties then why would anyone bother. But to be fair I will paste their email reply below as I was impressed with it and they may be a site to watch.
-------
First, you are not coming off as rude at all. We appreciate your honesty and candidness. I have take the time to answer your questions in order below...

1) Making a demo is a big ask for only 70% for 2 years.

We encourage 15-20 second demos of the packages to facilitate a better experience for our customers and generate more income for you. Since it's a package, rather than individual clips, we're selling the best way to easily showcase the package content is with a demo (trailer). We know that customers enjoy getting a brief summary of the package. Once the demo has generated their interest they will watch each clip and in the end buy the package. We know that production schedules can be grueling so we also have an Auto Demo Generating Service on the site to make the package creating process a little easier for our contributors.

2) 55% commission is low for a new stock company to offer especially when other new sites are offering 70% or 100% like Videoblocks (which in the last 3 months has added an additional 1million videos due to this high contributor royalty rate)

We feel that 55% is a fair percentage considering we are still in beta. Our funds are currently being allocated in to building the best platform possible and amassing a library. As it stands, nothing is set in stone and things may change in the future regarding royalty fees. Videoblocks has been around for way longer than us and sell individual clips. They also have paid subscriptions which help them pay at 100%.

3) $49 for 4K clips (in a batch of 6) is not adequate, the average range is between $299 and $89 per 4K clip, Videoblocks has been giving me $199 for a 4K sale.

We are not selling individual clips. This concept is what separates us from other agencies. We sell b-roll packages of 4-7 clips each. You can easily increase the amount of money you make per clip by simply decreasing the amount of clips in your 4K package. Maybe for 4K packages you can have 4 clips in each to increase the amount to $74 per clip. Keep in mind that our prices are at a promotional stage right now to encourage customers to buy.


We are eager to engage contributors like you to set a high level of produced footage in our b-roll library and give our customers an idea of the quality and diverse footage they can get. We are looking for video experts who can deliver multiple video clips on particular subjects such as aerials, time lapses, or specific locations, countries or activities and it is obvious that you are an expert in many topics. We would love it if you became part of the B-RollStock.com team!

We understand that at this point it may seem that our rates aren't reasonable, but they are for the time and stage we are in. We comprehend where you're coming from. We are filmmakers ourselves and are completely empathetic to the production struggle. It's hard work and we love it. Know that we are not in this business to take advantage of anyone. We have a mission to corner the market with a great idea that production houses will gravitate to as soon as they realize that we have "every angle covered".

Off topic to the ft post but in reply to the deposit topic I have found that they are one of the only companies that reply within a day or two to an email and helped me out a bunch when I uploaded content mid last year. They even keyword ed a massive bunch of videos for me before i got around to applying a csv. No other site has ever done that.

I gave up uploading to 123rf as I could not the the csv to work. I wrote to them 5 times to check what the issue was and finally got this random very unhelpful reply.
"We've checked your CSV and notice that your Oldfilename did not match your Orifilename.
Kindly check your both filename and try to upload your CSV again."

It is a shame that adobe stock is not separate from fotolia. You should really get your csv/xml batch meta import feature worked out instead of building new website under different names.

Hi,
I understand that Fotolia does not accept CSV or XML files but are now accepting meta data embedding in video files.
Does any one have any tips on batch editing files on Fotolia, I uploaded a heap of videos before I realised that I could not batch edit them using a csv and I really don't want to have to delete them, re-edit the meta data for each individual video and re-upload them.

Anyone come up with a workaround? Is there a workaround to batch apply meta info? 

Any other software recommendations for converting files to Photo-Jpeg .MOVs?

I started in stock shooting macro insect footage (as it was a hobby different to my commercial video work) and had some direct sales with Natgeo + a few funded docos.
I then decided to upload the clips to Pond5 (about 300+ nature macros) and really only had a few sales (none in the last 3 years) I think I may have lost a sale to Natgeo after pointing them to the site apon request as they may have felt that anyone could use it instead of selling it directly as I had done.
Nature footage is best sold on YouTube, a short sequence with some nice music + a view count brought in the sales from requests to use footage.
Hard to shoot nature is worth more then what you get from iS or SS.

Quote from: click_click on January 29, 2016, 19:24
Apparently it's a secret because I've asked for render settings for h.264 export before (Premiere or AE) and nobody responded.

I try again now, if anyone would like to share their settings? I understand that file size of Photo-JPG is not favorable but for the life of me I cannot achieve artifact-free renderings of my CG clips (TIFF sequences) with h.264.

Photo-JPG is as easy as can be using 95% quality and every single frame is tack sharp without any artifacts.

Kindly note that I'm talking about 3D renders and not large gradient ares such as skies etc.

I've been toying around with ProRes on PC but Fotolia seems to have encoding issues (at least for the preview) and it's propably not the preferred way for (buyers/editors to use PC encoded ProRes copmpared to Mac generated files?

Thanks in advance.

The h.264 setting I use are as follows for HD videos, I will just go through the main things to look at. I take it you know how to set the frame size, aspect ratio and frame rate based on your original footage.

h.264 render setting Media Encoder or AE:
Format: H.264
Profile: High
Level: 5
Bitrate Encoding: VBR, 2 Pass
Target Bitrate: 70
Maximum Bitrate: 101
(You can set this to what you like, I would not go below 50 and above 200 [Mbps] for HD
Use Maximum Render Quality 'Check box'

Then save it as a preset

When I buy stock video I will go for the prores or .h264 however I only upload .mov due to this 'misconseption'.
From my own tests on the photo jpeg mov I find that you get greater artifact's with gradients. For example if you shoot a landscape at 12pm (not that you should) with a cloudless blue sky, I found that the mov had terrible square block artifact's when the mp4 edited export did not. Even when rate is at 95%. As for it being more 'grade' friendly well personally
you buy clips that fit your edit colour wise and grade over the top. You are a fool to think you could bring back a highlight or brighten a shadow in either the mp4 or mov.

Hi,
Has anyone had any conversion issues like jittery videos from mpeg streamclip, mp4 to photo - jpeg .mov?   
I have been using it for years to convert my dslr shot video to .mov for the likes of pain in bum istock but now use it for all HD footage I upload.
My pc I do not think it is the issue.
It seams to only occur on footage shot at 24p from the Lumix gh4 but does not happen to all clips. I can shoot a batch of 24p videos and 1 or 2 will be jittery. I can repeat the conversion a few times but still same issue. The mp4 plays fine and even when I send it to my other 8core pc it does the same thing..
It does it occasionally with 4K shot at 24p converted to .mov
Anyone had this issue and found the reason?
I only notice it when tagging video once uploaded as I only check the mp4 as that is what was edited and output pre mov conversion so has been causing me some frustration of late.