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Messages - Elenathewise
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376
« on: February 13, 2012, 14:11 »
What still confuses me is this:
if you opt out, does that mean that buyers can't use ANY TYPE of your images for sensitive use? Even if there are no faces or people at all in them? Then it could mean fewer sales than previously if the whole portfolio is opted out.
If "no faces or people at all" are in the image then how could it possibly be a 'sensitive use'? Inanimate objects or animals can't really be offended in that way (except for that bloke on SS who dresses his dog up in clothes, obviously).
"Sensitive uses" will be a small fraction of the licenses secured by these high volume buyers, but participation gives you full access to all of the sales opportunities that these buyers provide. What this means to me is that if you opting out of "sensitive use", you opting out of ALL sales opportunities that big volume buyers provide. No sensitive use - no big sales, regardless of what your portfolio content is, faces or no faces. Correct me if I am wrong, I'd like to be.
377
« on: February 13, 2012, 11:51 »
What still confuses me is this:
if you opt out, does that mean that buyers can't use ANY TYPE of your images for sensitive use? Even if there are no faces or people at all in them? Then it could mean fewer sales than previously if the whole portfolio is opted out.
This is my understanding. It looks like if you opt-out, none of your portfolio would be available for the "big" sales. Which is probably their way of convincing you to opt-in. This kinda sucks, but I'd rather have less money than a bunch of law suits on my hands.
378
« on: February 10, 2012, 16:16 »
Too bad Nikon uses a proprietary raw format. This means D800E purchasers will have to wait for Adobe to reverse engineer the format and release a support update.
And about Canon and nikon. I've done a lot of workshops and one on One classes, I always found it quite strange that 99% of women used Canon and the same for men and Nikon. Doesn't matter to me at all , Both great cameras Just an Observation...LOL
Hey I am a Nikon gal... I guess I am that 1% then:) I'll be waiting on their new version of D3X though...
379
« on: February 10, 2012, 12:28 »
I opted out - not worth the risks. I shot many models for my port, the whole range - pros and amateurs, strangers and friends and family members - and there is no way I would want to deal with their complaints even if it's extra money. In the model release, we say the image will not be used in "defamatory" manner - appearing on some sensitive issues ads would definitely qualify as "defamatory" for some people. I am surprised SS doesn't allow decisions on case by case basis - this is what it used to be, and it totally makes sense. Depending on the model and the context the answer could be yes or no, but there is no way I am allowing all my images be used in sensitive ads by default.
380
« on: February 01, 2012, 20:47 »
Well Achilles is pretty stubborn about it. It's a person I personally admire the most over all other agencies but I think he is wrong on this one. I feel (but not sure of course) it has to do with the unbiased search engine, as far as everybody is rotated on front in due time. Over 10M is just not feasible with a linear search engine based on 1, 2 words. It's pure math. With this kind of unbiased search engine only relying on keywords you will find similars in rows on the first pages of the search engine. There are solutions for that but to apply those to a database of 11M+ images is a daunting task.
Yeah could be the search engine, it is a probable cause. That would also explain the choice of files they deleted from my portfolio when they were doing a library "cleanup" - didn't make much sense to me, but if they did searches and those files showed up in a row to their dislike, that would be their reason for expelling them... It does seem silly though to define the content of your library by the way your search engine works.
381
« on: January 28, 2012, 22:11 »
@Karimala and @Lagereek and @FD - thank you guys. But that's exactly the thing I am frustrated about - shouldn't reviewers be able to tell the difference between someone who submits 20 images of a pizza slice on white shot from different angles and someone who submits a series of images that actually tell a story? My expectations were that a reviewer should. I actually had very reasonable reviews when Ellen Boughn was DTs creative director, was sad to see her leave.
I wonder how much of these ridiculous reviews we are seeing is Achilles' original idea and how much of it is just reviewers not understanding what he wants them to do. A guy who founded such successful agency should be able to see that they are shooting themselves in the foot here.
382
« on: January 28, 2012, 12:44 »
I personally welcome that reviewing is getting tougher. One of the reasons why the Micro is in a bit of a mess, is the fact that just about "anybody" can get in. Shouldnt be like that at all.
Too similar or too much, comments, well, it just shows, the reviewers are doing their job, really. Might feel a bit tough but in the loing run it will work for our benefit. 
Be honest, whats the point of doing like IS, accepting every bit of generic rubbish followed by spamming, broken searches, glitches and bugs all over the place.
Trust me, it's not tougher, it's just stupid. When I say a "batch" I don't mean it's all same series. I shoot anything from landscape and food to studio portraits to concepts and still lives. The images I submit are diverse in content and well as style, and they are the highest technical quality. When I submit to macros, most of my stuff is getting accepted (and sells).
383
« on: January 27, 2012, 14:48 »
Holy crap Elena, 6/70 that's not even 10%! I would suspect these same files coming from you would be well over 90% or maybe close to 100% at the other agencies.
Scratching my head....
Me too... and yes those files are accepted everywhere else and selling well. The irony is what DT picks out of a batch to accept are often images with least sales potential.
384
« on: January 27, 2012, 14:34 »
IS isn't friendly any more for independent contributors...
Obviously they shift their customers to Getty, also they are sending many invitations to exclusive contributors to make transfer to Getty...
So probably Getty don't want to have two or more crews on different agencies, that cost much more....
In this transition period they will transfer Istock's market to Getty, some photographers also...
The work of independent photographers will be completely devalued through the Thinkstock...
So this is process, not good for us!
Interesting thought! But it's probably a bit more complicated than that. I don't think they would merge iStock with Getty, the prices are quite different. They are moving more talented exclusives to Getty so they can sell their work for more money, but not all exclusives are going to Getty. Those who shoot mostly what is considered now microstock staples will stay microstock. Getty can not ignore places like SS or FT and they will keep iStock and Thinkstock as competition to those. But higher priced "macro" market is still there - and although it did lose some (considerable) ground when micros emerged, there are still buyers that look for more interesting and more sophisticated images. Something that is hard to find on micros. I talked recently to a friend that works in publishing - they have a subscription to Thinkstock. Only if they don't find what they are looking for there, they'd look somewhere else. So for generic stuff that's easy to produce Thinkstock and such are and will be the places to go. For something more complicated there will be still macros. And Istock itself will be for people that for some reason don't want to buy subscriptions, although most companies prefer them. So whether or not iStock will turn into subscription site depends on how much revenue they get from people who buy images for credits.
385
« on: January 26, 2012, 23:41 »
Aaah, love! That multi-splendorous thing! I feel we shouldn't mix it up with business. As Buddha says : emotions and longings are the source of unhappiness.
true... when DT reviewer takes 6 files out of batch of 70 from one of the best-selling photographers she experiences whole range of emotions and longs for a reasonable review process that would - please! - allow her to make money for that agency and just a little bit for herself. This is not really source of unhappiness for me, just great annoyance . But it is definitely not good business. I work on my own - I am not a production company that churns out thousands images per month, nor do I submit painfully similar images that pollute the library. And yet I am getting this kind of treatment from DT - how is that standing up for photographers?
386
« on: January 25, 2012, 12:59 »
I'm not sure about that, at IS there are numerous diamond, even 100k+ inspectors...
And IS is usually more consistent with inspecting than DT. Of course, there is still an issue of conflict of interest - rejecting files of competition, but I won't even go there... that's been discussed many times before and still most of micro agencies totally ignore the elephant in the room.
387
« on: January 25, 2012, 12:38 »
I have to agree with some people here - limiting choice for customers doesn't help with the sales. After being in this business for 6 years and about 13,000 images in my portfolio I am still surprised sometimes at what becomes a best-selling image. But I am pretty sure I can predict what would be selling and how many "similars" a customer would need better than the average reviewer at DT. They pick a handful of files out of submission seemingly at random and the customers just go elsewhere where they have more choice. I bet one of the reasons SS is so successful is because they have large and diverse library.
Fighting your own contributors is just so stupid. The nature of this business is cooperation. We are as interested to sell as the agency - for a lot of us, it's our only income. And yet they treat us as some dimwits that go around taking random pictures and having no idea of what customers want. That's just insulting.
388
« on: January 12, 2012, 13:36 »
There are lots of things about where Getty thinks it's going with Thinkstock that I don't understand (put more bluntly; I can't see how it could possibly be a good idea).
Case in point is their current free image which is from the Stockbyte collection. It's on Getty Images priced from $10 to $350 and also on TS where you could buy it via an Image Pack for $20. It's even credited with the photographer's name, so it makes it very easy to find elsewhere.
There has to be differences in licensing. They can't sell absolutely same product for 350 and 99 dollars. (let's say I just need a high res of this one image, so I buy the cheapest image pack for 99 dollars and get the image instead of paying 350 on getty site). That would really piss off customers who paid the full price. I doubt that Getty would do that.
389
« on: January 11, 2012, 22:33 »
Hey Lisa, I just went though my last 300 new files accepted on Istock, and you know what just a sad handful of them sold, and most of them for ridiculous money like 12 cents... ! the time spent uploading there is absolutely not worth it, not at this time.
390
« on: January 06, 2012, 14:44 »
Independent:
20% down in Dec 2011 compared to Nov 2011
29% down in Dec 2011 compared to Dec 2010
391
« on: December 21, 2011, 17:39 »
Know what you mean, unfortunately, the quality isnt much better within the macros. They have had no choice but like the micros, accepting quite mediocre stuff, just as "fill-ups", etc. Few years back, if you sent in 50 files to the Getty-RM, you would be lucky to get an acceptance of 5 or six, today, they are far more liberal in accepting.
See, the IS, rule of accepting files as long as they are technically sound, is so detremental its unbelievable and just creates tons of totally irrelevant material in every corner of the search.
Right now, Getty is promoting images from their Flickr-collection? thats how basic its become.
I guess they did become more liberal, I haven't had a single rejection from Getty (yet), RM or RF, doesn't matter. I do try to provide only high quality images (at least from technical point of view, the rest can be subjective). I haven't had a single rejection from Alamy, and I have close to 10,000 images with them. Subject matter, composition, light, etc can be hard to judge sometimes, but technical quality is pretty straightforward. When I get rejections from micros for technical reasons it drives me nuts since reviewers have no clue what they are talking about. One of the big reasons to focus on macros more - the money may not be that instant, but really, I think I've had enough frustration for the rest of my life.
392
« on: December 20, 2011, 21:21 »
I am seriously thinking of moving away from microstock. For some reason I expected micro agencies to become more professional and respectable as they grow, but now I realize that this business model just doesn't allow for that. You can't provide the same level of service to customers spending 10 dollars that you provide to someone spending 500; when your business is volume sales, you can't possibly pay reviewers enough to have consistent reviews; your strength in microstock business is in the size of your library, not in it's quality. I spoke to a friend who works on producing a daily tv show and they always buy images from macros since it's more clear and defined licensing terms and they can be sure of quality. I suspect it is like that with many other organizations. Microstock has its competitive strength in cheap pricing but it also brings limitations.
Not that I would pull completely my port or anything like that; I'd probably be still submitting to micros but my focus is going to be with the macro agencies.
393
« on: December 15, 2011, 13:41 »
Hi All,
I did an R&D test on motion and spent a good deal of money and time with a very professional camera team using the Red system. We shot lifestyle the most popular selling motion we followed everything that we could as far as making content that should sell from our analysis but alas after 600 clips shot for Getty they return less per clip than my stills. Here is a short clip showing some of the stuff we shot. It isn't the best reel but it shows the lighting locations and level of talent we were shooting and on the best camera at the time.
Always good to do research but for me I am sitting on the fence until I see motion sales start to at least double still sales, there is that much more work and money involved. Here is a link to our reel, like I said it isn't edited very well but it gives you an idea of the quality. http://www.andersenross.com/demoreel.mov
Best,
Jonathan
Hi Jonathan, that is excellent work. Always a pleasure to see:) I couldn't shake the feeling though that your videos are your stills in motion. Those are very good videos, and very recognizable as your style, but "awesome" videos bring something that stills can't deliver. Telling a story with motion is different. And for that one has to have special skill and talent. That's the reason I didn't start shooting video when I considered it a few years ago. I knew what I would want from my videos and realized that the learning curve would be too steep. I don't think it's only about good lighting, locations, models, etc., it's about being able to tell a story in completely different way. I agree with Sean here - it's not that easy.
394
« on: December 08, 2011, 10:06 »
...the only issue is to find what you need as they're not properly keyworded but if you have time it can be rewarding and there are excellent images you will never find in RF and RM agencies.
That is a big issue actually. Yes there are people who would go though thousands of images to find what they need for cheap or free, but people who do this for business don't have time for that. They need a good library with precise keywording and excellent search engine to find what they are looking for fast, and they don't mind paying for that convenience. Plus most free image sites are full of stuff that photographers shoot for their enjoyment, not commercially useful images.
395
« on: December 06, 2011, 15:22 »
It wouldn't surprise me if iStock is booming as a business but individuals are seeing falls because of the increase in size of the library. Dilution might provide short term profits but in the long run it'll make full time stock shooting impossible.
The quality of the images will fall since no-one will be able to invest the time or money to create those professional photographs we see now.
This will be a problem for all the agencies in the long run; it may be that iStock - as has been the case from the start of this adventure - is leading the pack.
This is an interesting thought; however, if dilution was the only factor, Shutterstock would lead the pack in terms of decreased earnings since they have no ulpload limits, no exclusivity, very easy submission process, and their library is still growing very fast. What everyone sees though is the opposite: a big increase in earnings on SS. Istock may be booming as a business because of their extra-low payouts, extra-low sub and pp sales and other nasty practices like that.
396
« on: November 28, 2011, 12:34 »
Still broken! So annoying. And sad.
397
« on: November 28, 2011, 12:15 »
:-) Rawr:)
I'm a bit late here but congrats on the achievement Elena!
Thanks:) It feels nice to be a part of Envato community. Very refreshing to have a new agency that not only listens and collaborates honestly with the authors, but is good at selling images, too. I wish you a lot of success:)
398
« on: November 25, 2011, 14:00 »
This is indeed unacceptable. We will hold the uploads until the watermark is fixed.
399
« on: November 25, 2011, 13:42 »
thanks! sigh... makes you wonder what else is broken on the site. Bugs don't just appear out of nowhere, it means they are tinkering with things...
400
« on: November 25, 2011, 13:10 »
Hmmm... for a few days now every time I go to "My uploads" page and try to sort by "Last DL" it shows me the same page ending with 01/11/2011. My total shows there's been many sales since then, but they don't show on the page! Anyone else is seeing this?
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