You check your earnings balance first thing in the morning before you even check your email.

Used to do this when there were lots of B's. BDEs, BWEs, BMEs. Been a while since there was a good reason for me to fanatically check stats.

I'd say the train is running out of steam and the tumbleweeds are blowing through.

I used to get 20+ downloads a day. That recently dropped to around 10. I had three today. Two yesterday. And XXXL E+ files that used to get over $30 are now $5-$9.

Yes it's only the first week but sure ain't a good one. Finger is on the Plan B button.

I think you should be looking at Sony.

I'm a landscape/cityscape shooter. I have a 5DMII with a bunch of lenses. I got tired of carrying around a 50lb backpack full of stuff just so I had the right lens for every situation. I saw that Nikon has a compact 28-300mm so I picked up a D800. That combo covers 90% of my shooting and an 18-35mm covers the rest. Great setup but it's still heavy. I do a lot of biking to get shots and it feels like a bowling ball hanging from my neck. Plus you need a pretty heavy duty tripod to hold either of those cameras and that adds to the weight you carry.

I picked up a Sony NEX-7 and 18-200mm. Excellent combo. Compact, light, and image quality at lower ISOs is as good or better than the 5DMII. And theres something about this camera that seems to capture colors, like sunsets, better than the 5D or D800. Most of my best work has come from the NEX-7. I also can now use a small sling bag and ultra compact travel tripod. It makes shooting so much more enjoyable.

So for somebody like you who does both action and landscape take a look at the new Sony A6000. 24MP, 11FPS, $600US body, and is supposed to have a excellent new auto-focus system. Super compact, light, and an 18-200 (SEL18200, not the other two) would cover a lot of your range. I'm considering picking one up to replace my NEX-7 because it's similar but can also handle action.

If you want full frame there's the 36MP A7R but not exactly an action camera. Plus Metabones makes adapters where you can use some of your Canon lenses with it.

Quote from: PaulieWalnuts on September 18, 2014, 05:25

I added Pentax.

As some of us use different cameras maybe you could give the possibility to tick more brands.

It's not allowing me to edit it to select multiple choices.

So vote based on whatever system you will mostly use.

Seems like a lot of people are moving away from Canon and Nikon into Olympus, Fuji and other companies that are offering new and innovative stuff.

I like my Canon and Nikon DSLRs. But I keep going to my Sony NEX-7. I haven't bought a Sony A7R yet because of lack of lenses. But Sony just announced a 24-240mm lens. With that combo I literally would have no need for my Canon or Nikon equipment anymore. In 2015 it's looking like Sony may be my main system and the Canon and Nikon stuff will probably be sold.

What company will your system be in 2015 and is that a change from what you've been using?

ETA: I clarified the wording to say "primarily use". Many people use multiple systems. What's the system you will use most in 2015?

No, it's never too late to work like a sweatshop worker to earn enough for a coffee or two every month. 

As others have said it depends. Mostly on your expectations. Want to earn a coffee a month? Then it's probably never too late.

Want to earn a living? I'd say it's possible but the people that it's possible for probably already know they can do it. They already have sellable images, business accumen, SEO skills, ability to adapt to change, and a bunch of other skills to be successful. The better someone is at those things the more chances they have of meeting their expectations.

For people like you who've been doing this for a while I'd look at other places outside of stock. Micro is constantly changing to try and figure out the right direction and those changes rarely seem to benefit contributors.

The OP is still looking for a camera two years later?

Same thing I've done the past couple of annual September overhauls. Staying for now to see how it affects me.

Big difference now is that after the first major shake-n-bake I started working on Plan B. I optimized all of my images for IPTC/SEO and focused on selling outside of stock. So now if I don't like the results I can make a change.

There is one section there that can be applied equally well to selling stock images:

Joining as Many Sites as Possible

One of the biggest factors that's going to accelerate the switch to 5% commissions is... human nature.
I see this all the time with sellers on FineArtAmerica.com.   A seller will join the site, upload a few images, generate some sales, and then think:
"Hey - if I'm making $500 per month selling on FAA, how much more could I earn if I also joined websites X, Y, and Z?"
The seller then goes and joins X, Y, and Z, without really paying attention to the commission structure on those sites.

Here's a perfect example.   Society6.com only pays out $15 for the sale of a canvas print.   It doesn't matter if the print is 8" x 10" or 40" x 60".   The most that you're going to earn is $15.
So - by joining Society6, you're effectively endorsing $15 as an acceptable payment for the sale of your canvas prints.   You're broadcasting to the entire print-on-demand industry: "I'm OK with $15 payments."
On FAA, you might be selling your canvas prints for $100 and earning a nice income doing so.
However, if you're also selling the same canvas prints for $15 on Society6, here's what's going to happen in the long run.   Buyers will find your prints on both FAA and Society6, and if your prints on Society6 are $85 less than on FAA, buyers are going to buy from you on Society6.

Just like that - you've undercut yourself, lost out on $85, and encouraged the growth of a business model that dictates low prices to you.   Over time, all of the other print-on-demand sites in the industry will realize that $15 is an acceptable price to pay a seller for a canvas print.   Why?   Because you told them that you're OK with it.   Hundreds of thousands of sellers on Society6.com are OK with it, too.
That emboldens the other print-on-demand companies to follow suit and lower their own payments.
Is there anything wrong with selling canvas prints for $15?   Not necessarily.   Just understand that the entire industry will slowly move in that direction as more and more sellers become OK with that price point.
Remember - Cafepress just convinced 20 million sellers to accept 5% commissions.   Cafepress sells 24" x 36" canvas prints for about $150... which means that the sellers will keep $7.50 for each each sale.

Great post. I'm on FAA and was just doing a price review of a few different POD sites to see if I should join them.

A problem with all of this is the level of pricing buyers have gotten used to. Prices at Society6, Art.com, Photos.com, and most of the popular sites are close to the same. An example is a 8x10/8x12 print which is $15-$20 at most sites. On FAA and my personal site I have them priced consistently around $40 and have no problem selling at that price. Unless I can control the prices at a site to make my pricing consistent across all sites I don't join the site. Like you said why would I want to sell something on a couple of sites at $40 and the exact same thing on several other sites for $15? I would be competing against myself for lower pricing. Why would a buyer pay almost 3x as much for the identical product?

And like you said, supporting all of these sites that force low pricing and/or commissions is just continuing the trend that low commissions are okay.

What specifically are you needing a critique of that you didn't get answers on in this post?

http://www.microstockgroup.com/photo-critique/are-these-photos-good-enough/

Funny these are pretty similar to the stuff I was shooting for fun before I decided to start doing stock in 2007.

I'd suggest learning what buyers want. Flowers are difficult to sell as stock because they're readily available in just about everyone's yard. Meaning, you have a billion competitors so they must be spectacular or unique and these three pictures really aren't either. Even though you used a DSLR these could have been taken with an iPhone. If this is the kind of stuff you like to shoot you may want to try POD print sites like Zazzle. Otherwise you're going to need to adjust what you shoot to what's in demand with buyers. I think Istock has/had an area that showed the top sellers by week, month, etc. and also a "needs" list so do a search for it and that should give you an idea of what to shoot if you want to sell.

You asked for a critique so...

• Decent colors but too much empty space. Should have more flowers equally filling in space. I'm immediately drawn to the green leaf with the piece of junk on it. I'd either reshoot without it or Photoshop out the distractions. And these flowers are already dying so there's a bit much dead brown stuff for me. If you're going to do flowers they should be beautiful and the center of attention.
• This one doesn't do anything for me. The main object is too blended in with the rest of the image. I don't think there's anything to fix this except maybe reshooting it without the object and sell it as a background
• Again, flowers are wilted and getting brown edges. I realize coneflowers sag but these are looking shriveled. I'm immediately drawn to the top left flower that's partially covering your main subject which is distracting.

They're not bad but even if you improved them I don't think they would sell well, or at all, as stock. If you reshot them without the problems they may do okay on one of the POD sites. I'd suggest doing a search on some of the sites to see what's there and compare yours to see how they stack up.

The point of the application is to show you know how to use a camera and you also know stock photography. These three show you somewhat know how to use a camera and don't understand stock. Maybe Istock has loosened its requirements but I don't think stuff like this will get you approved.

With that attitude you're not going very far.

I like you. You're funny.

as i mentioned in another thread, i have a handful and legful of images that earn 70% of my income. so really, it can be 20 images that get you a minimum of 100 bucks monthly, or it can be 1000 images , or even 10,000 images. it all depends.
a long time ago, i read in IStock, one of our regular commentors here (Paulie Walnuts) that he made more in IS with very little images in his initial portfolio. from there, i learnt that it has nothing to do with flooding the market or cannibalizing your portfolio .

When I first started in 2007 I was very picky with what I submitted for the first few months and did very well. When I saw the earnings potential I started submitting as much as I could. A lot of it was pretty bad. Embarrassing even. And my income didn't really go up.

So yes, you can have 1000 good images that earn $500 per month or 10,000 bad images that earn $10 per month.