Remember he's sponsored by Profoto and Hasselblad and sells his monopod.  Those companies want to get something in return for their investment.  It's just part of his job.  I wouldn't mind setting up a few shots like this if someone is going to give me tens of thousands of dollars in equipment.

But it's a rainy, semi-boring video at best. Look at the kinda stuff gopro or redbull have on youtube, thats what you need to compete with for people's short attention span... next to that this is about as exciting as watching granma' mow the lawn.

It saddens me to see all these artists rip into another artist for completely the wrong reasons. I dont care what he did with SS or IS to still be able to enjoy that video, thats a cool video and a cool shot. I am sure if you make millions of dollars with your photos you know what you are doing. Maybe he was just showing off toys, who cares, we all love to do that.

The value of that photo increased because its the real deal, it has a story, its not a photoshopped image, which has no story.

Is ripping into him going to make you feel better or sell more photos?

Petty.

Jebb Corliss videos are cool, this is just some ppl hanging out on some wet gloomy meadow with strobes.

It's self advertisement for the dumbo type would-be sponsors / clients. Shooting it on the ground + PS would have been lot simpler and most likely lot better quality end product.

Try showing some examples both from you and those bestsellers, otherwise it will be hard figure out how the look is achieved...

Quote from: topol on October 29, 2013, 12:21

No, practice makes it trivially nonsense.

Is this some kind of riddle?

Not above IQ 80. Time (mine) wasting kiddie version: In practice, most agencies have been getting along with only a single model release without any problems for years and years. Which means more is unnecessary - actual practice is the ultima ratio.

Quote from: topol on October 29, 2013, 11:08

Do they still have this dumb policy of requiring a new model release for each shoot?

You should have a model release for each shoot.

No, practice makes it trivially nonsense.

microstock -> nanostock -> below-rounding-error-stock

Quote from: topol on October 23, 2013, 05:58

I don't really see bugs. What I find kinda disappointing is how sales have very little connection with aesthetic value.

Usefulness as stock has very little connection with what would go on people's walls or get into Salons.
Buyers may only want part of an image to composite with other elements, or an image could be chosen because it has copyspace where they need it, or the 'directionality' of the image fits, or the colour fits in with their layout.

I know, and that just shows we are the point where 'the crowd' either has bad taste or no taste. If they still had any culture, when someone produces any visual output, it's supposed to be regarded useless unless aesthetics is among the highest concern.

Quote from: Ron on August 18, 2013, 03:07

Quote from: PZF on August 18, 2013, 01:43

Yesterday typical - a reasonable number of downloads early in the morning - but NOTHING after that. Nothing yet this morning either. Weird, even for a weekend when things usually trundle along, albeit slowly.

I saw the same thing, saturday morning I had more Dls then I would expect, and then for 24 hours nothing.

+3 Nothing yesterday, last night or this morning.

With essentially no communication from SS (nothing new), we are left to guess why we are experiencing these strange sales patterns.

1. They are making more changes to the site and they do not respect contributors enough to let us know our images have been left out of the sales loop.
2. There is something seriously wrong with the site  and they do not respect contributors enough to let us know our images have been left out of the sales loop.
3. There is something seriously wrong, they have no problem with contributors losing money on their hard work and investments and they never plan on addressing these issues.
4. They have made all of these changes on purpose and there are no bugs therefore some contributors can expect regular periods of time where they can expect to receive no sales. Some contributors report daily poor sales during US business hours.

These bugs happen far too often at SS.  I used to respect them as a company, but this has been going on for far too long with no resolution.

There doesn't seem to be any special boost for new images any more, so the new stuff starts really getting sales a lot later if it's good enough - maybe weeks or even a month or so... but when they do, they seem to keep selling forever. I prefer this to having a bump after uploading, than 50% of it sinking into oblivion. This is more reliable. I take it asa sign of more mature business. Besides that I notice signs of having a cycle, with result preference: older - newer - newest - older... etc. But that's justa suspicion nad the effect is not overwhelming, os the 'fav' files keep selling everyday.

I don't really see bugs. What I find kinda disappointing is how sales have very little connection with aesthetic value.

commissioned shot?

Quote from: Sean Locke Photography on October 11, 2013, 09:21

Quote from: Beppe Grillo on October 11, 2013, 08:42

I don't understand how a 3d render (high or low quality) can be easily duplicated.
You must have the model, the material/textures� so?
What do you mean? Can you explain better?

You don't need a certain ethnicity of model or location to shoot an image.  All you need is a computer and software.  So, some teen in India can sit all day creating 3d work on his laptop.

This Russian guy was well known for duplicating the concepts that others did, pretty quickly.  www.istockphoto.com/user_view.php?id=614972

lol

Probably you have not an very precise idea of what means high quality 3d (modeling, texturing and) rendering?�
It means a lot of work, hours, days, sometime months for a single image.
Not only you have to create the model but you have to find/create the materials and the textures and then to apply them in the right way and in the right place.
Then you have to place the lights, and it is a lot more difficult than to move lamps in a photo studio. You have to make tests and tests and tests again, and a lot of adjustments before to reach a satisfying result.

Certainly nothing to do with the example that you gave�

I think that Vinne speaks about works of this level (or better):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bbb3viz/7333048902/#in/photostream/

http :// vimeo. com/7809605

You ppl are really behing the curve here. There are thousands of people doing stuff like that the by dozens. I used to be heavily involved with a small but very advanced 3d anim studio, checking out these things daily to see the trends. Pics like the ones you linked might have been something special a decade ago, not now, when anyone can have i7+GPU power or better at  home. Hey, even near realistic face renders for stills have become boring commonplace more than a decade ago, I remember a russian guy doing an almost perfect gladiator-russel-crowe right after the movie came out. 3D render for stills is a lot easier to get into and imitate than decent photography, you basically just need a room where you and your rig can fit.

I uploaded some files for a test one year ago.
I connected today to the site, and what a surprise!
A download of a vector previously paid �0.35 has been paid today  �0.20 !!!?!? a record in microstock?

No, Istock has .09$ commissions

The don't be evil days are long gone, Google is the internet maffia. If you mess around not liking something about them, they break your arm deindex you. My pal working for a rather large content provider told that when they started 'sponsoring' less keywords, google just deindexed ALL their white labels, pronto. "pay up or we smash your face in"