I'm sure there will continue to be higher priced content, it'll probably just be the more niche type stuff, and any content being used for serious advertising.

I don't know of any large national/international companies that would risk identifying itself with an image they had no controls over - and thats one reason why RM exists in the first place: control.

I don't get the question really, but if I did, I'd say that no matter what you shoot, only artists with a decent grasp of business ever make a living off photography or filmmaking (I work in both industries). Once you start hitting them over the head about things like "cash flow", "market saturation", "diminishing returns", etc... I bet you'd probably destroy their dreams. Oh well, they'll learn one way or another, might as well hear it all up front while they still have a shirt on their back.

Has anyone sold newly submitted images or only stuff transferred from Snapvillage?

I have 198 (newly submitted) pics online, no sales and the number of views looks quite poor, too. This is of course a very small sample but to me it looks like Veer marketplace is far away from flying.

Will postpone further uploading until I see more traffic.

All my images are new, I was never at snap village.

A GREAT exercise is to actively try and use your photos in designs. You'll get a first hand feel for the usefulness of your work - and I guarantee you'll find issues somewhere with your work that you can improve on. One thing I discovered was the quality of copyspace for colored backgrounds - it doesn't always work very well for multi-color backgrounds, even if they are out of focus. It is true there are ways around it from a design perspective, but you'll find that just plain old bold black or white text do NOT always stand out very well. Again, its not an absolute, as they may be dropping in a multi colored logo with a bold drop shadow type border, and in that case, it wouldn't matter as much.

I've actually thought about doing this later on when my collection size hits some kind of critical mass. I think the real trick to success with a photo site is:

Searching Options

If you look at all the top agencies, you'll notice that as you go from number 1 on down, the search engines become less and less sophisticated in control. For starters, you might wanna try emulating shutterstocks take on it with a keyword elimination box, that alone is very powerful in narrowing results accurately. I'd also look into search or categorizing by "feeling" and "concepts" rather than just subjects, that seems to be one of Getty Images techniques, and they have some very interesting ways of searching their collection.

How did you setup that site? Was it a template or something?

Good luck with it!

Quote from: hoi ha on August 22, 2009, 23:10

As a buyer, if the option is vertical, horizontal or square, we would almost always buy square unless the specific execution required is otherwise - the image is easier to crop IMHO - second favourite is vertical and least favourite is horizontal - but we are in print media so that might make some difference.

What do you mean "easier to crop"?

If everyone is making these square images from rectangular images, wouldn't you rather have all the information available to be able to make your own crop, or are you not able to visualize the end result you want?

A square shot has more size as a thumbnail right off the bat, so it basically "pops out" more at you. Less thinking = better, this is the web, and attention span online can be horribly short. Thats one reason why I crop for it a lot of the time, but I'm also consciously shooting for this type of cropping, so I adjust accordingly on set.

Interesting.  I think 'free' is where microstock really wants to be.  When buyers see millions of images available for pennies - from multiple sources - they realize that  there's basically an enormous oversupply.

Eventually some big microstock is going to throw in the towel and start giving away the images,  and run ads on the search pages. Contributors will get nothing - but of course, we'll make it up on the increased volume of sales...  

Oversupply of what? Images no one needs? That I CAN SEE. Markets change - so does stock photography, collections always have a shortage of images that customers are actually looking for. As for giving stuff away for free, somehow, someway, they have to make money or they will close. Simple as that.

I have a rather simple method: play with the model! LOL I'll have someone cracking jokes behind me while I shoot, or if its just me and the model I'll be the one joking. Let's face it, models are models, not actors. I have to deal with women and men that have the "look" I need, but all too often zero acting skills. Because of this, I find it extremely helpful to make them comfy and then purposefully stimulate the model emotionally on set. Every reaction is now genuine. Works great for positive emotions. I've been taking this to a new level this month, and the results are looking great, can't wait upload these babies!

One thing I explain right off the bat to models now is how important their eyes are. Anyone can smile with their mouth, but a genuine smile uses the eyes and forehead. Nailing real looking genuine emotions will get you noticed by buyers - weather it's happy, tired, or whatever else emotion you are going for.

From Alamy's upload page:

Quote

Uncompressed file sizes of more than 48MB, we recommend that you do not interpolate your files to more than 55MB. This means you should make your JPEG file from an 8 bit TIFF file that is at least 48MB.

What part is unclear?

They did not dive into the details of file size on disk VS when its opened in say photoshop. This is what has thrown so many people off with submitting to them it seems. Actual disk size could be 9MB but it has to uncompress out to more than 48MB.

Hey Guys,

I'm looking for some help on preparing files for Alamy Submission. I'm a bit perplexed by the whole thing, especially this whole upsizing fetish RM agencies seem to have with file size. I have quite a few finished JPEGs for this year. How are you supposed to upsize them? I suppose I could double the resolution to increase the file size, but that seems kinda stupid since the image will become softer.

Any help would be appreciated!

Thanks!

I'm sure some freebie hunters do end up buying but I'm guessing most of them go to all of the sites so they can build up their free image inventory and rarely buy.

I dunno man. I've taken a look around at the freebie stuff. It's really not that great. Keep in mind, that not only are they offering essentially "rejects", but the search engines for these sites BLOW. The first reaction everyone has to them is "WHAT! FREE IMAGES!?", but they always fail to really investigate the buyer experience. They are getting more than just low cost images when they pay, but also search engine creature comforts.

Is it only me but it seem like there is higher rejection rate if batch is big. Sometimes I feel that 5 a day is most optimal size.

As a volume submitter, I think I'm qualified enough to debunk this myth:

NO, big batches do not create more rejections. What does, are large batches with similar images, or just plain old bad work.

I submit once a month, and my bathes are anywhere from the mid 200's to the low 300's and I only ever have about 5% rejected, at most maybe 8%.

Generally speaking, I make more off the models I pay than those that work for free. The ones that work for free, far too often often, mess up a shoot with ideas of their own, and since they are working for free, it's harder to tell them what to do. The TFP types are less likely to participate in a multi person shoot and are harder to coordinate. Plus far too often, just plain don't show up. I rarely get no shows from paid models. All that said I still use both paid and unpaid, but am much pickier these days with the free models.

I know exactly how you feel! It's one more set of reasons I went the paid model route as soon as I could do it.