I received my money two days ago.

Quote from: Pacesetter on June 02, 2022, 20:19

Subberstock is firing on all cylinders so far this month while not a bad month in May - did most of the heavy lifting. Go Subber! Other sites like P5 and iStock did poorly. Adobe did very well in May too though slow start so far in June. ETA Adobe has started to fire up!

Good start of the month on SS, indeed:

Congrats once more!

I'm guessing those were video sales, right?

For me it's the worst start of the month ever for shutterstock. I only have 29 downloads for $4.47. No idea what's going on there.

Quote from: Wilm on May 31, 2022, 01:32

Quote from: Annie on May 30, 2022, 17:05

Thanks Guys!  And yes, I went easy on the cake. 

Hey Wilm! Corfu, wow. Lucky, lucky you. Hope you got lots and lots of fantastic pics :-)

Thank you, Annie! 

It was gorgeous there! A great island.

Unfortunately all my data is gone because of an error on my 128 GB San Disk microSD. I tried two different data recovery software products - nothing helped. Unfortunately, the pictures are no longer recoverable. 

Anja Kaiser suggested that I should just vacation there again. A good idea! 

I'm glad you enjoyed your cake!

Some recovery tools work better than others and can do a deep search. Just interesting that the card went bad. If you never add another file or use it, you have a better chance.

I usually take the photos, plug the card into a Netbook, Laptop or something else and back up... before I even edit one or start culling. Who knows what one wrong click can do? 

https://www.ccleaner.com/recuva/download

Somewhere on one laptop I have a paid recovery software, that while I was plugging and unplugging drives and being organized, the delayed write made a total mess a a big external backup. It took overnight to find everything and another day to deep search and recover everything. What I mean is, unless the card or a drive totally fails, the data is still there. Even formatting or messing up the TOC, it's still there.

There could be hope? Unless the SD card is dead. If it works, your data is still there. You just need to dig deep enough to recover it. Most of the free software, just does a quick check and doesn't deep search. Maybe you know someone with some real recovery tools that they paid for and you can at least run a test and see if anything is there, before you pay for some software, that would be useless.

The paid software that rescued my backup is EaseusDR https://www.easeus.com/?x-clickref=1101ljkCBNaN

The FREE version will recover up to 2GB of data. Mine was a something #T drive so I paid. 

Pete, first of all thank you for your support!

Here's what happened: I wanted to take photos, but suddenly on the display of the camera came the statement: "Photography not possible - no SD card available".
Then I took out the card and plugged it in again. Now appeared on the camera display: "Card not readable" and below it the two buttons
OK
Cancel

Unfortunately, I pressed OK and within 2-3 seconds the card was formatted - without further warning.

Only then did I see that the adapter was out of order at the contacts. (I have already bought a new adapter.)

The information about the card says that now 127.75 GB of 127.85 GB are available.

I have tried it with 2 different software versions so far. Both have found nothing. I would have had to buy the second software to recover data - the scan itself is free.

But thank you for the tip. I'm about to try it with easeus in addition - the scan now takes 1 hour 18 minutes. I am curious if this software can find any data.

I have no idea what it means to start microstock these days.

It's probably very difficult to get started profitably. Also, I do not know the secrets of the algorithm.

But I advise quite subjectively not to upload images of which there are already tons of better images in the database. I firmly believe that this will have a negative impact on the ranking of your own portfolio. No badly lit flowers, no amateur quality pet photos, no photos where the steak on the grill looks dead and unappetizing.

You have to invest time and do research to find the right niches, or provide better images than the ones available in the database.

Some people have aesthetic talent. Those who don't have it have to approach it conceptually and find the issues that are currently touching society. Everyone can find their way to success.

Whether it's too late to start, I don't know. From the point of view of those who have seen better times, probably it is. But if you're up for it and there's a little money in it at the end of the year, maybe so. There can't be a generally valid and correct answer to the question.

Thanks Guys!  And yes, I went easy on the cake. 

Hey Wilm! Corfu, wow. Lucky, lucky you. Hope you got lots and lots of fantastic pics :-)

Thank you, Annie! 

It was gorgeous there! A great island.

Unfortunately all my data is gone because of an error on my 128 GB San Disk microSD. I tried two different data recovery software products - nothing helped. Unfortunately, the pictures are no longer recoverable. 

Anja Kaiser suggested that I should just vacation there again. A good idea! 

I'm glad you enjoyed your cake!

Quote from: SVH on May 30, 2022, 05:11

Quote from: Annie on May 22, 2022, 15:58

My birthday is coming up again - its next Sunday. So, people better watch out!      So this is an advance warning.  lol

Happy birthday! (although a day to late)

Oh, thank you! That's so sweet of you to remember :-)

Oh, crap!

I had written it down so that I wouldn't forget it. But I was on vacation for two weeks on the beautiful island of Corfu in Greece. So it slipped through my fingers - sorry.

So: All the best and happy birthday, Annie! I wish you health, lots of sunshine and many microstock successes!

There is another example of dark clouds.

The inflation.

If you were a contributor in Turkey, for example, you would currently have to contend with an inflation rate of 70%.
The food sellers or supermarkets, furniture stores or construction companies can (have to) increase their prices. But a microstock contributor cannot. And I haven't heard from any agency yet that they want to compensate for inflation for the contributors.

For contributors like me, who do this only as a hobby, this is not an existential problem. But those who have to make a living from it will have to rethink in certain countries.

Quote from: Unamas on May 22, 2022, 13:09

Quote from: Uncle Pete on May 21, 2022, 08:47

Would I make more money? Some people think that more images = more money.

You probably would make a little bit more money, by killing competitors effort. I mean if you upload 10,000 images of fresh tomato and I upload only one, the buyer would not able to find my image and will buy from you.

Yet another way to attack the problem. I think the best answer is, everyone for yourself!  And if 10,000 images is the answer, then go for it. If 1,000 unique images is the game, do that. If a niche and bury the competition so they can't be found, fine with my.

I'd say the only contradiction and what new people seem to be attracted to (I believe flawed thinking) is "shoot what's most popular and sells the most." Oh good, drop a pebble into the ocean and see what changes? A version of that could be, shoot what you love most (or have the best access to) and see what sells best and then shoot more of that.

ps I'm still working on the perfect sliced tomato shot. I thought I had it last December. 

I agree, Pete. Everyone must decide for themselves and find their own personal way.

There is a contributor who has uploaded about 50,000 renderings every year for the past few years. He is not lacking in diligence. Obviously, he also doesn't lack the necessary hardware for all the renderings. And he doesn't need a heater either - the computers take care of that.

However, the success - at least at AS - is extremely modest. Despite the almost 340,000 renderings in the meantime. The contributor you mentioned with his 1,500 images - I know who you mean - is light years more successful. And I personally know very well why. And with shutterstock it should look similar.

But, as I said before: Everyone has to find the right way for himself, which is fun and brings money. And none of us knows the Holy Grail of the microstock business.

Poor Joe. I always smile to myself whenever I see his threads on a forum. There are no half measures with Joe. People either love him or hate him. But he is definitely not forgettable.

When he first started a few years ago, there was a time on the old SS forum, where a lot of newbies would ask for feedback on their portfolios, and there were always a handful of people giving advice who would say to them, 'you only have a dozen photos, how do you expect to compete with millions in the database. You need a lot more photos.'

So along came newbie Joe, and he said he was going to upload 10k photos in his first year. And he got attacked for that. But he stuck to his guns, set his goal, and did a very amazing effort. He travelled a lot, went to a lot of different events and locations, and for someone with some serious health issues, he did quite a valiant job. In the beginning, there were not that many similars in his port. But towards the end of the year, he was running out of time, so he took all these 'selfies' and made a lot of similars - to reach his goal. And of course, he got attacked for that.

Yes, he's controversial, he's a fighter, but he's also a really nice guy when you get to know him. So, hopefully people will just relax and take it all in good humor. There are a lot worse things happening at the moment.

Annie, I'm not going to comment further on this issue in general right now. But I thank you for your peace efforts. Because you are absolutely right: There are certainly much bigger and weightier issues at the moment than microstock!
What you have written has certainly cost you time to find a good and mediating formulation. And that finds my full appreciation!

I am very happy for contributors who succeed. And I know some who even have or had great success. There must be a certain magic emanating from their portfolios, otherwise their images wouldn't be so successful. But none of them have ever formulated a mantra and recommended it to others as the only possible way. They do their own thing and some of them give valuable advice now and then. Remarkable people who deserve my full respect, always appear modest and whom I heartily grudge every success! And from whom I could also learn a lot.

Yes, I have some images that sell well.
Yes, I have too many images in my port that don't sell at all.
NO, I'm not satisfied with how my sales are going.
Sorry, I don't see a contradiction.

Then why on earth are you writing about a "magic port".

What is magic about it?

At least this time - in contrast to the announcement of the new revenue structure at shutterstock - they have saved themselves the trouble of making the contributors believe that this merger could also bring financial advantages. From my point of view, this is a good indication of where the journey is headed.

�forgotten�

�My images sell like hot cakes.�