pancakes

MicrostockGroup Sponsors


Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Messages - gostwyck

Pages: 1 ... 168 169 170 171 172 [173] 174 175 176 177 178 ... 210
4301
Shutterstock.com / Re: 111,655 new photos added in the past week
« on: January 27, 2010, 08:38 »
Yeah, because 2 days for exclusives, 3-5 for independents really makes images less "fresh" at iStock.

Exactly. Do Dnavarrojr's marketing people consider a stock image to be 'so last week' once it's been on-line more than a few days?

4302
i just wish the so called experts on tv would shut up here in the UK they talked us into a recession every time the bbc expert came on tv the stock market collasped we are coming out of it ,they are now being negative again for f***k sake lets be positive and get on with it  they are so doom and gloom .

Talk about 'shooting the messenger' ....

The BBC didn't 'talk us into a recession' at all, they simply reported the facts. The recession occurred because of absurd borrowing, lending and gambling by the banks in a ridiculously unregulated system.

It is laughable that the BBC's reporter Robert Peston is still blamed by some (idiots) for the collapse of Northern Rock. NR collapsed because it fuelled its rapid expansion by borrowing short to fund lending long __ a practice known to be a recipe for disaster for centuries. They inevitably collapsed when the supply of new money dried up, not because of the BBC.

4303
is it allowed though?

I don't think it is expressly forbidden but they probably prefer you not to do it. It came to light that some folk were doing it when one such person complained that others were copying his keywords including his personal moniker.

4304
Shutterstock.com / Re: 111,655 new photos added in the past week
« on: January 26, 2010, 12:34 »
Gotta love those factories, just pumping it out and flooding the market.  Oh, all those guys with their "make money from micro" blogs.  It all comes together, eh?

To be honest it's not all that different to Istock's weekly image intake, especially considering that SS is a high volume, low cost business model. There are currently 66K new images sitting in Istock's in-tray, most of which will be inspected within the week, and exclusive images much faster. IS must be adding new content at something like 50k per week.

4305
Shutterstock.com / Re: 111,655 new photos added in the past week
« on: January 26, 2010, 09:25 »
They'll have ten million images on line next month.  That's a nice marketing hook.  Though, I think they would be wise to weed out the oldest non sellers as they move forward.  If an image hasn't sold in four or five years... it probably never will. 

I think the marketing hook is what it's all about, both in total size of library and new images per week  __ otherwise why go to the considerable expense of reviewing, bandwidth and storage? I guess Jon is just letting it run unrestricted and seeing what happens.

If an image is unpopular it quickly disappears into the depths where it will only ever be seen again if it occupies a niche so I don't see 'too many images' actually becoming a problem. Everything about SS is so simple and uncluttered and yet it works so well for both buyers and contributors. If you're a designer it must be an incredible resource to have access to for such a small amount of money.

Anybody else finding it a real struggle for their new images to get noticed though? I've uploaded about 80 so far this month, with several that I had high hopes for, but it seems like they're all just disappearing into the ether! I get the impression that there may not be as many long-term subscribers nowadays (who I assume would have trawled for the new images) but mainly short-term subscribers who just hoover up the popular stuff that already been sorted for them.

4306
It's possible that Getty wanted them out bad enough to compromise on a non-compete clause.

Hmm. Makes me wonder why Getty wanted to buy them out at all? The shares that Haap still had couldn't have been a controlling interest and, if the site is slowly being wound down, then their value would have been eroding with the company anyway. Maybe Getty intend absorbing StockXpert and it's content (which of course is actually owned by the contributors) into one of their new projects or something?

4307


You'll need to increase your depth of field. What f-stop were you using? Try f16 and f22.

... and use a tripod.

4308
General Stock Discussion / Re: opinions on lights
« on: January 23, 2010, 20:33 »
I was using cheap strobes (really, really bottom end of the market) before I bought continous lights like these in the hope of replacing them. Trust me, the really crappy strobes were still much better. Fortunately, having actually used strobes, I could tell how bad they were. Btw, I only use lights for food/isolations.

4309
General Stock Discussion / Re: opinions on lights
« on: January 23, 2010, 17:22 »
I believe I understand the limitations of these lights but I think they'd work adequately for what I do.  I am wondering more about the quality of the fixtures and stands.  I already have enough stuff that falls over.


Ok __ the stands look very nice.

NB: What's the point in heading the topic 'opinions on lights' if you only want to know about stands?

4310
General Stock Discussion / Re: opinions on lights
« on: January 23, 2010, 17:00 »
Note that each of these holds 8 30W CFL bulbs which should easily be the equivalent of 1000W of incandescent bulbs.



Yep, that's the theory. Go ahead, buy them and discover for yourself how different the reality is.

4311
General Stock Discussion / Re: opinions on lights
« on: January 23, 2010, 15:08 »
Those are probably junk too. I tried some very similar units about 2 years ago and they were completely useless __ nothing like enough light output (unless you want to do 50 sec exposures) and gave out a disgusting palid colour.

Get yourself some decent strobes and learn how to use them.

4312
I'd agree with everything Sharply said.

Image 1 has stock potential but the other two forget it. Your 'Squirrel in Snow' or 'Bald Eagle' headshot, if they are technically good enough, are worth consideration too. You must look at every part of every image at 100% to check for flaws.

The 'light filtering through trees' type of stuff always works well for prints and for submitting to the camera club competitions but they are actually very challenging to get good enough technically for an Istock initial submission (and rarely sell well even if you can get them accepted). All that contrast and relatively low light usually means technical issues. Personally I'd want to be taking that shot with a 20MP+ camera and then have the option of shrinking it down to 5MP to make any issues magically disappear. A 20D or Rebel doesn't leave you much room for manoeuvre.

I suspect this may be harder work for relatively little reward than you anticipate. When you shoot for stock you either have to have the end-use in mind at the time or be very lucky. As I've said many times the hard bit is simply understanding 'stock' __ once you do then the photography is relatively easy (mainly because you only bother to shoot when conditions are virtually perfect).

4313
Yep __ it seems to be happening with greater frequency lately.

4314
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Non-Exclusive Sales?
« on: January 22, 2010, 08:51 »
This is probably going to be my worse January for nearly 12 months.

4315
Off Topic / Re: Help Haitians
« on: January 21, 2010, 20:04 »
The real issue is the lack of infrastructure in Haiti. Despite having a population of 10M they have only one airport and that airport has only one runway. That means that one aircraft can land at a time which then has to be unloaded and take off, a process that usually takes about 90 mins, before the next aircraft can land __ about 18 landings per day is the capacity.

At least the US, as well as giving by far the most in money and in manpower, are taking charge of the situation because nobody else is in a position to do so. They've also anchored an aircraft carrier off Haiti too which can act as a second runway at least for some military aircraft.

4316
StockXpert.com / Re: Stockxpert sales crashed.
« on: January 21, 2010, 13:51 »
It's a matter of dignity: there's no way I'm gonna sell my pictures less than 30 cents... which is already way too low

Well actually they've yet to pay me anything less than 30c __ but over on Istock I still get the occasional 17c sale (presumably from credits bought in the Cretaceous period).

I think you have to make a judgement based more on the average sale price at a particular agency rather than individual sales.

4317
StockXpert.com / Re: Stockxpert sales crashed.
« on: January 21, 2010, 13:38 »

opting out on subs of course.

Unfortunately if you are opted out of subs then your images will almost certainly suffer from a significantly worse sort-order position (because of having fewer sales relative to other images). That'll lead to fewer PPD sales ... so an even worse sort-order position ... and so on.

4318
I hope it sinks in with all the sites that the cheapest prices wont attract buyers.  Canstock and Crestock don't sell much compared to the more expensive sites.  It could be because they have less images or it could be because buyers don't mind paying a bit more at these low price levels.  I hope Getty raise prices with their microstock subs sites and pay us a reasonable commission, I wont use them until they do.

The cheap agencies don't make enough money from sales to undertake effective marketing, usually I think because they were absurdly under-funded from the start. So many seem to think that they can start a 'stock agency' from their bedroom with a few $K's in savings or borrowed from family.

4319
You can either price it acccording to what you think 'the market', presumably the kids' parents, will be happy to pay for their photos (are they to be in presentation wallets, etc?).

Alternatively work out how long you expect the entire job to take, determine an hourly rate that you would be satisfied with, then add on the cost of materials plus an allowance for the overhead of your equipment.

How much you want to do the job and whether there might be further opportunities for similar work will also help you come to a figure. You may well find that this sort of work is much more hassle, takes far longer and is less enjoyable than you anticipate __ but then again you might be a natural and really enjoy it.

4320
The danger from this concept is relatively minor in comparison to the threat to our incomes from static cheap subscription package prices.

4321
As laudable as your efforts are they are a mere drop in the ocean compared to images available the file sharing sites, which have been going since the 90s one way or another.

I'm sure most folks here will have their work freely distributed on them, I know I have, for example there are 5619 pages and counting on just one site, heroturko.org , and nothing seems to have been able to be done about them. :-\

Good point __ but why not? In particular with Istock's exclusive content, like yours and many others, why is the issue not being addressed? Heroturko openly boasts about the sources of many of the images.

4322
If you've gone from f11 to f5.6 then you have significantly reduced the depth of field which gives a smaller margin of error, important with a moving subject.

Were the runners coming towards you at relatively short range when you had the issue? I have found that even in AF Servo mode that lens can struggle to keep up and adding the polarizer would obviously make the problem worse.

Was the IS set to the correct mode for what you were shooting (Set 2 for panning)?

The more light and the higher shutter speed the better for that lens, or any other zoom telephoto. I'd avoid using a polarizer as any gains from reduced glare will be offset by reduced lens performance.

4323
I did not have SJ blocked, on the contrary he has me blocked, I just started blocking his  "posts " because I didn't find them helpful, but not his PM's.


How can you not find SJL's posts helpful? There's only 3 other people in the world that might reasonably claim to know as much as Sean about microstock __ and nobody anywhere near his league offers so much help and advice to others on this and the IS forums. I for one, and I know many others too, really appreciate the input he has here. How f*cking dare you, a puffed-up egocentric microstock nonentity, dismiss him like that?

It's when you make statements like that (as well as all the BS posts about your supposed earnings that are evidently mathematically impossible) that shatters any credibility whatsoever that you might once have had.

I'm with Richard. If it looks like bullsh1t, smells like bullsh1t and sounds like bullsh1t .. then that's most likely what it is. Most times I bite my lip and ignore such posts that obviously contain such painfully obvious inaccuracies, intended by the author to inflate their own ego, but quite frankly it is getting beyond a joke and, as RT has pointed out, is potentially damaging to those who haven't been in this business long enough to detect the difference.

4324
iStockPhoto.com / Re: To go exclusive or not?
« on: January 18, 2010, 14:24 »
I've always believed that exclusivity with any one agency is inherently more risky than remaining independent, especially in a relatively new and developing market such as this, and particularly so if your microstock earnings are a significant part of your income.

However I've no problem in taking a risk, provided that an increased reward is on offer __ which up until now it has not. I never saw the point in taking the risk and losing 20%+ of your potential earnings. That made no sense at all to me. Last year IS averaged 37.6% of my total stock earnings.

I am intrigued by Istocks latest initiative so I ran some numbers to see what the effect might be. Firstly I checked out the sizes that my images sold in. I monitored 120 sales on my own popular images and those worked out as follows;

XS - 44
Sm - 31
Me - 28
Lg - 15
XL - 2

Applied to the new price structure those sales would consume 495 credits for non-exc images or 796 credits for exc images __ that's an increase of 61%.

I then applied that 61% increase to my IS earnings for the last year, as if I'd been a Diamond exclusive, and I found that the new price structure would theoretically have produced an overall increase of 22% in my total earnings.

Of course these figures assume that everything else remains the same. In truth a relatively small change in buyers' habits, such as migrating to other agencies and/or to cheaper non-exc images, could easily wipe out some or all of those gains.

I think it is likely that the new price structure would ensure an increase in overall earnings, for those choosing exclusivity now, but possibly only by about 10-15%. The Exc+ collection, when it is introduced, could mean another huge increase too although how many buyers may get annoyed by another hefty price increase is anyone's guess.

On the other hand I'm pretty sure that some significant independent contributors will choose exclusivity __ and that could actually increase earnings for those of us that remain independent. For example I've got a particularly close competitor in many of my niche subjects and I'd be delighted to see their (excellent) images disappear from most of the agencies.

I'm also hoping that SS will respond to even up the playing field too __ it's two years since we've had an increase there so it is well overdue. FT have demonstrated themselves to be an extremely ambitious and ruthless competitor to IS too and it is not inconceivable to me that they could overtake IS some time in the future.

In my experience the market has a habit of adjusting to maintain the status quo. I suspect that as a Diamond-level contributor you might now make slightly more money than if you remained independent but probably not enough of a difference, at least for me, to make that step.

4325
Adobe Stock / Re: The Mysteries of Fotolia
« on: January 16, 2010, 09:55 »
Istock likes submissions to be noise free and silky smooth.  Shutterstock likes sharpness and bolder saturation.  The nondescript technical rejections at Fotolia have be baffled.  Does anyone know what Fotolia's technical preferences are? 

I'm not sure I recognise your description of SS and IS to be honest. The odd rejects that I get at either place are for the most part somewhat haphazard and unpredictable __ I wouldn't generally upload an image if I assessed it to be technically borderline without addressing the potential issue. But still occasionally they 'find' one.

I get the impression that FT are more commercially oriented and are actually assessing the history and sales of the submitter as much as the image itself. If they consider you to be proven as a time-served stock photographer, say with 5-10K of sales behind you, (and you don't have a tendency to upload multiple similars) then you'll get very few if any rejections for technical reasons.

Pages: 1 ... 168 169 170 171 172 [173] 174 175 176 177 178 ... 210

Sponsors

Mega Bundle of 5,900+ Professional Lightroom Presets

Microstock Poll Results

Sponsors