Quote from: ClaridgeJ on October 01, 2012, 13:03

Quote from: Poncke on October 01, 2012, 12:41

Right, I sort of get the point, and then I would just submit your whole portfolio to all 130 agencies and see what sticks. Your approach doesnt make sense to me.

Why would you submit mine? I only activly work with eight of them, thats enough. No doubt you have your own to submit. Its not my approach, just go to some other forums/discussions etc within the RM or RF agencies and you soon find out what I mean. they fear getting some sort of exodus of photographers fed up with micro, thinking the grass over there is much rosier and greener.

I was talking to Drexxle  I dont understand his test. He just needs to submit his whole portfolio to all 130 agencies on his list.

I'm always interested to hear about a new agency that actually makes some sales at a fair price.   

How smooth is the keyword/title/description process?  If it doesn't  read and accept the IPTC just about as-is, that's a non-starter for me.

I'm going to Sicily & Malta tomorrow. Any hints are appreciated, especiallly photo ideas and tips.

Quote from: ShadySue on September 27, 2012, 15:47

While this is an interesting topic, it is pretty meaningless without all the other relevant details like how long you've been submiting to (different sites), how large your portfolio is at the different sites, how your port has been growing or not, etc.

... or if you've stopped uploading to site X or not.

That said, assuming people are uploading equally to all the sites, it is quite telling when one site had their BME over 1 year ago and all the others had a BME last month

I thought id just let you guys know what i thought of my application process to SS which was denied.  I have 30 days to make a better selection of images.

I put together a very differing range of images, ten different subjects, ten different styles.  I guess that was my mistake.  SS require that 7 out of 10 initial images pass QC.  They also require that the front and back of you ID is scanned, there is nothing on the back of mine, but they asked for a copy of the back anyway.

3 of my images passed no problems.  1 of them was declined altogether and 6 were advised to be re post processed.

2 were suspected TradeMarks, one was a mural on a city wall of aboriginal art, and the other was a vehicle with a persons signature on it.  I understand the signature, i dont understand the artwork, it was not the whole piece, and a shadow was the key subject matter not the mural.

Of the ones that needed to be post processed, they do not like wierd angles, they do not like the edges of objects going out of the frame.  I have a crayon on a pad, and the pad is 45 degrees to the frame and all four corners go off the frame, its not suitable.

And the rest, complained about white balance and underexposed.  I may have to check my monitors and color profiles again, it seems that all my images are a bit dull, otherwise they would have passed.

I would have passed my submission, but im sure that my computer setup has had an impact on my submission failing.

Thats my experience, i fix up my images and try again.

I was actually hoping that my CG illustrations would fit well with macro. When I look at the stuff that they currently have it's usually a bit outdated and just looks bad in purely technical terms. It's like comparing the original Tron with the Tron Legacy CGI On the other hand things that take more time to create (let's say a few days for a single image) are just too risky for micro. I would love to do a couple of scientific illustrations for example, for some very rare subjects. I'm sure buyers would be willing to pay even a couple of hundred dollars for it, but with unusual subjects micro can't make up the low commission with bigger download numbers. I tried that and for some images which I know are the only ones available (so not much competition) I get 10 subs on Shutterstock. Not worth spending even a couple of hours on it.

My guess is that there's at least 200 non-exclusives making more than $2500 a month. Obviously this grows exponentially so the $10k+ group is less than 10 people.

I just got an email this morning saying I had 17 images awaiting keywords. I must have tried out alamy then forgot I had the application process going...

Looking at Alamy, it seems like what a stock photo site would have been if the 1980's had the internet.

That, and I could not find the FTP. I did however find an image that looked like it was taken from a "How did you get rid of the ring around the collar commercial" way back.

So whats the deal? Do they take images like mine? Should I put legwarmers on all of my characters? Are sales ok?