Quote from: UPLOAD-UPLOAD-UPLOAD on May 10, 2022, 12:38

Most, not all people on the old SS forum as well as here are just habitual cry babies and bitchers with nothing to offer.
I'm not on forums much anymore because they are for the most part useless.
You don't learn anything from people who cry their heart out.
https://www.shutterstock.com/g/Grossinger

�I am the king of images that don�t sell. If you ever come across a category that does sell, let me know. I have 11,000+ images in my port that don�t sell. I just recently traded off all of my DSLR equipment in favor of mirrorless. Cameras and lenses. So far I�ve not taken many pictures with the new Z 7 ii and the Z6 but I love both cameras. I�m just now getting ready to start taking pictures that won�t sell or sell for dimes again.�

Thanks Wilm, I had not found the quote so quickly. There is a certain need for explanation for the contradiction

Oscar, I'm afraid you can't expect a reasonable answer without more information.
Have you just started, how does your port look like, how many pictures do you have and above all how many photos you have sold before?

Everything is running normally for me, so it shouldn't be Shutterstock.

Quote from: RalfLiebhold on April 20, 2022, 14:24

In other forums there is a sandbox where such childish and embarrassing discussions can be held - just a thought.
I don't understand why discussions here so often get out of hand - that goes for both of you.

Are you a school teacher?

No, just someone who can't do anything with simple-minded people who constantly take their simple minds out in public. Did you really understand the word embarrassing ? I don't think so.

But with this I am also out of your kindergarden-sandbox 

Since 8 April 2022 every day two refunds from 2013, 2014, 2016, 2021, 2022.
I wrote them, but they did not reply. So I started deleting my images. Everyday I will remove part of my portfolio.
Enough is enough!

Same here. For me, it also started for the first time on April 8. Three refunds so far from 2020.

Uncle Pete says "It does say ...current events and newsworthy topics. This type of content often features images of real brands and products � like signs on buildings, soda cans, computers, and cars � to convey a story.
It doesn't say, just taking photos of something and calling it Illustrative Editorial."

In my opinion, Uncle Pete hit the nail on the head with this one. Just because you don't have the right to sell an image for commercial use, does not put it into the Illustrative Editorial category. There needs to be a purpose behind the image. The OP posted an image of what in my opinion, appear to be generic homes. Could they be approved for the commercial collection? Possibly. That's up to the moderation team reviewing the file. In my opinion, they homes are generic enough to be accepted for commercial use but that is irrelevant to this conversation. What specifically, would qualify those houses for illustrative editorial? Is there any significance, or mainstream relevance that a potential customer would want to purchase a license to use the image to illustrate their editorial article? Can you imagine someone buying a license to illustrate an article talking about those specific houses? Did something historic happen there? Does someone famous live there? Is it a poorly marked business of some kind? There needs to be a specific story here and I'm not seeing it. No branding, no significant landmark that I can identify. I hear from contributors all the time trying to find a way to submit non-illustrative, editorial content to Adobe Stock. It's not happening any time in the forseeable future so I would encourage you to focus on shooting branded items that specifically meet the Illustrative Editorial requirements.

Thank you,

Mat Hayward

P.S. Take the "Mat" out of the Batman logo and you've got an Illustrative Editorial asset ready to be submitted Uncle Pete.

Thank you Mat, that you have once again given an explanation here.

A little frustrating for us are the borderline cases. The colorful houses above in my example are landmarks of one of the island Murano near Venice, so they meet the Illustrative Editorial requirements in my opinon. But they were rejected.

Quote from: Roscoe on March 30, 2022, 05:45

Fast reviews seem to be back?

and fast rejections

Same for me, faster rejections., real progress 

Quote from: RalfLiebhold on March 21, 2022, 02:54

Thanks for the examples Zeljkok, I find your images all very appealing. With the saturation you have held back but. And against a replacement of a boring sky speaks nothing.

Rightdx, the reality often looks boring and dreary. But I was referring more to the examples in my link, there I can not understand the bestsellers. The images are not only unrealistic, but in my opinion technically poorly implemented.

But sometimes I can't stop myself either:

Ralf - I am big sucker for skies & this looks great


Would need to see at 100% how good are the edges at horizon, specially at right side where highrises touch the sky, as that is the hardest part with sky replacement

But, as someone mentioned, does it help the sales? Not sure it does;  stock photography is not about pretty images, rather illustrating concepts where artistic appeal is usually secondary.

Thanks Zeljkok, now we are two suckers of sky exchange here.
I use Photoshop for this and the sky is perfectly swapped in seconds and there are no problems with the edges you mentioned. The images are also accepted everywhere without any problems.

In principle I agree with you that stock photography is more about themes and concepts. Usually I don't worry so much about the competition either and just do my thing.

In this case, however, I did a little research because I knew that hundreds of other photographers had photographed the same subject from exactly the same spot before me.

I wanted to present the topic a little differently and stumbled across the bestsellers, which I personally do not like at all 

Quote from: RalfLiebhold on March 20, 2022, 16:23

Quote from: Roscoe on March 20, 2022, 16:10

I'm guilty of doing split toning, dramatizing skies (sky replacement when I'm drunk), dodge and burn and using the saturation slider.
At least, for landscapes and travel related stuff, which is quite some part of my portfolio.
I try to not overdo it, but I definitely want to have a highly appealing image, yes. 
I found it out the hard way. Travel related buyers want to sell a dream, not reality.

My editorials are kept to basic editing. Maybe adding a slightly amount of punch with the contrast or saturation slider, and some highlight dimming (I tend to slightly overexpose rather than underexpose) but that's about it.

I don't spend hours of editing on removing brands or people, I feel like it isn't worth my time, as the image might not sell all.
So those shots get uploaded as editorial. But I do try to frame shots avoiding brands or people. Wherever realistically possible.

Edit: the shots of Dinant you showed are not far off of how I would do it by the way.
Maybe I would have warmed them up just a tiny bit while being a bit softer on the blue (seems a bit harsh?), but hey, that's just personal taste.
And if it sells... well, then you did the right thing!

Roscoe, you don't have to feel guilty, my sky is replaced too.
What I'm getting at is that I find the bestsellers on my subject for my taste horribly overworked. But they are selling.

Is that really better:

Yes, I have the same feeling regarding overprocessing.
Sometimes I think: Djeez, I took it too far. This won't even fly through the approval process.
But then it did, and then it sells. So there's that.

I have a sky replacement shot published in Lonely Planet.
Whooops.

You made me curious, do you want to post your picture - if not, just forget it.

Times a topic, which one moves me for a long time.
If you look at landscape pictures for example, the bestsellers are completely oversaturated by the colors and partly overworked beyond recognition - but they are bestsellers.

I noticed this particularly blatantly during my last shoot. I personally don't like the bestsellers, but they seem to sell.

How do you deal with it. Do you all turn your color saturation knob all the way up for better sales chances?

Ok, my shots and the competition bestsellers:

https://stock.adobe.com/de/search?load_type=search&is_recent_search=&search_type=usertyped&k=dinant+belgium&native_visual_search=&similar_content_id=&asset_id=217426858

Don't you love that? Here's an image that could be found all that time and someone did when it's at the right agency at the right time.

I hate to say this but one of the best (highest price license) licensed images at Alamy, was just rejected by Adobe for "exposure". I know that Adobe has people who look and I think they do a great job of doing more than just passing things. I mean seriously, careful evaluation.

While SS is just pretending much of the time, whether it's absurd rejections or sometimes passing things that others will reject.

Latest approved at SSTK have not appeared in my collection or the search, yet.

If it's nice and I'm in the right area, I might go hunt some more fossils. Not because they sell so much, hardly one download that I see, but because I'm working on macro images and using focus stacking. That gives me a good subject to learn more and get the process right.

Pete, I am always very careful with the term love.
But I agree with you. Such surprise sales are for someone like me, who does not have to live from it, the kick to continue with stock photography - despite the adverse conditions.

Macro and focus stacking is also still on my to do list.

Yes Pete, I received the same answer today in terms of content as beanstock. They do indeed have a problem and are trying to solve it.

How the review works, I do not know of course. About 2 years ago, it has actually partly only seconds or minutes until the images were sighted. That has now changed with a significant delay at the weekend. In this respect, I think that people again play a greater role in the review than artificial intelligence. But that's just speculation, of course.

I wish you good luck for your brachipods. I recently sold this image in the three-digit range at Alamy, which has been lying around unused at the agencies for years.

Pete, I don't think I'm special. 

The last time I contacted support was in January. I had complained that recently batches with 40-50 pictures (different cameras, subjects) were rejected several times completely with the same reason. They agreed with me that there was something wrong and that they would take care of it. Since then, the problem has no longer occurred.

Interestingly, I was also told that the review is done by real people who may have different views on the quality and that there is some leeway in the assessment.
 
So I found this contact helpful.

Regarding the disappeared images, I am still waiting for the final answer and will report then. For me, the images actually always appeared after approval within a few hours, 3 days I never had to wait.