The concensus is similar, the industry is at saturation point. 

Hope you find your niche, ive managed to start on a project aimed at a specific market. 

I had a look at REX, it seems to be all the hollywood stuff, glam news.

I have a unique archive of photos of me taking my Mini across the real Australian Desert, 6000km's of dirt in a small car.  Some really cool photos, but none of them have been published online before. 

Getty & Corbis seemed to be the ones, i would love to get a story in Nat Geo.

Give you some more info

http://www.google.com.au/trends/explore#q=microstock&cmpt=q

Google trend on the word "microstock".  But you can do this on a bunch of keywords and the results are the same.  There is a dive since 2006 and if you click the forecast button it sort of stays level for the next year or two.

The interesting thing i find is if you click further down in regional interest and then choose by city.  you get Milan, New York, London, Madrid.  No LA, no Sydney, no Hong Kong.

Its all come down to fashion, models, the handshake and so on.  General stock is flooded.

I am working on a social media platform that is tied directly to a stock agency, share a photo and click to buy, contribute direct from social media.  Testing is being done for many reasons.  Complicated, but necessary for our research long term. 

Its a long story, but hopefully worth it in the end.

Appreciate solid feedback.  I think age has alot to do with it to, alot of the people in the journalist field are aging, this will open a new door for alot of future journalists when a gap widens. Not the same in micro, ten years in and saturation is starting to show, prices dropping.

I dont think you can walk a photographer through, i was impressed by SS feedback in their upload portal.  They actually give you solid feedback you can use  to improve and resubmit the same images.  It was the only agency that has done this so far.

Like Getty, which i have applied to for my special collection, you just wont hear back if your not good enough.  I dont think thats unreasonable.  How many people would ask to contribute.

Quote from: Poncke on September 30, 2012, 23:04
What I still dont is that the OP asks what agency would take his flicker photos. But when you say the flickr photos do not make the cut, he says those are not the photos he wants to submit.

As you can work out, i am working on something in the tourism sector.  Hence if there are other agencies that are in this area i dont have on my list, i will add them.

The point, is to see who to deal with or not.  The point is to see who performs as an agency properly or not.  the point is to see what terms & conditions they have, how they operate, how they scrutinise images and how they treat contributors.  Its a dead market.  I see that chatting in here.  Incomes are dropping, interest is waning.

I have images that should pass, and some that should pass but may need some work. 

I dont think im wasting an agencies time if they come up higher on my list.  It shows they are doing their jobs.  So far out of 9 agencies, i can complain about three. six of them have performed as expected from a new customer.

I also for my own reasons need to know what they "wont" accept, and the only way to do that is to test them.

Heh, nah thats not me.  You altready know who I am.  You could find out enough to work out who i have worked with and more. And just to quash argument, i work in the tourism industry my research is for a site in tourism..

heh, not exactly, im exploring two things, building software to run a stock agency, and how users interact from social media so they can sell images from social media, instead of stealing them and sharing them.

Micros are going to die, at least for photographers.  Tradition will come back and a saturated market will get stagnant.  I have some ideas to change that a bit by giving creators a bit more power in social networking.  I am aiming at one specific market place though that isnt that saturated and has been bought out.

actually dont want anything.  Not trying to sell my photos, not trying to become a stock photographer.  I have a collection i will eventually place in one agency RME, but other than that, i am just seeing the reaction to every agency out of 130 i have on a list. I linked you to some photos on Alamy show you kind of images im using and you see from flickr that im not out of a studio.

Thought id share some of them with you guys.  Just pointing out what they are looking for. When im not so busy, ill end up putting it on a blog along with heaps of other stuff on social networking.

Just came across this

Interesting and reasonably in depth account and decent coverage of why, and what the law is.

http://www.roniloren.com/blog/2012/7/20/bloggers-beware-you-can-get-sued-for-using-pics-on-your-blog.html

Not sure if its a first, but hey, know your rights, and know you can use them.

None of those photos on flickr were used.  I understand the difference between advermarketing and editorial.  I have a library of both styles of images, i just take alot more editorial stuff in that style.

I posted the link as an example of "style", to demonstrate.  I have some 30 pictures on Alamy which i have been testing with.  And another 20 i havent put online.  50 images selected for the specific job of submissions.

Ok, this is not a micro, but i wanted to give some perspective on what im doing. mods can move this if its not in the right place (sorry)

I applied to a common traditional agency which i had never heard of till i started looking around a few months ago.  We just say some of you can guess im sure, but im not going to say.

So, they have a dedicated portal for uploading your test submission.  You upload five images in total.  They ask you for a range of styles.  This makes it a little tougher to decide how to test them.

I select five images, one of which i know will pass, and three i know may, and one i know wont. 

I also note that one of the micros is owned by this company via emails back and forth during my submissions they have listed their company names at the footers.

Coming from the background i'm in, which is mostly working with journalists, i am not surprised by the results, and can make some obvious conclusions.

This agency likes the "handshake", models sell very well in photos, so having model releases and the like, having fresh models with big smiles is where advertising is at.

Again as with SS brighter, snappier images that pop are key, ala naturale seems to be left for editorial work.

I wasnt criticised for my work, but key points to my rejection were,

firstly they dont take editorial work, for which many of my photos show that style, but i know thats my style.  you can see that here http://www.flickr.com/photos/drexxle/

secondly, they didnt see any commercial value in my images.  which is a fair description given the agency and the styles of work that seem to be most popular in general searches.

and lastly, just to have a digg, which i didnt think necessary, was they hit me with poor quality.  I agree with the first two statements, but this is the just like a nail in that coffin.  They were right on the money, respectful and just, then they through this one in. I had touched some images after SS would have passed but were underexposed.

So, all in all, fair, correct, and turn around of about 72 hours from submission to reply, and as with SS they give you another 30 days to reapply.  Obviously i wont be, this is not my "style", so i know i wont fit in.  If anyone can suggest a busy agency that takes the stuff in my flickr, then shoot me a PM, i have thousands of photos like that.

Cheers

i think the negative is in the levelling of models all to RF, which in essence has taken value out of the market.  A flood of images, probably hundreds of millions across agencies has also caused massive impact.

I dont believe its all bad.  I think now is a time to be a middle tier agency.  If you can keep customers happy, cull crap, keep standards high.  Then your on a winner.  They have learnt alot from the early sweep of micro sites, and also whilst watching getty gobble all the half decent agencies up.

My thought, we are on that turning point.  Getty just got bought for 3.3Billion by the Carlyle Group and they reckon that it was severely overvalued.  They had an interest in upsetting a marketplace, contributors didnt matter, they wanted higher value for resale.

Lets hope when we get to the top Getty doesnt run over everybody on the way down the next hill.

You dont have to delete that stuff either, just relocate it to a mirrored system so that its always available (in case of editorial stuff, or if a submitter makes a request)

It is obvious as a business model, if images that sell from old cameras still sell, then an executive decision would be made to keep those images.  There's nothing stopping a smart programmer from automating this on a tri-monthly basis.

Warn users, image has x issues with it, click here to complain, or it will die.

They have a range of settings to start a cull.  It is the best thing for the industry at this stage.  Millions is getting larger at tens of thousands a day across many sites.

G12, 350D and a scan all are acceptable cameras from a tech point of view.  The g12 is fully manual with a ASPC sensor in it.  I have g11 to side kit my 5d love the little thing.

They can also use data in the database (input by both staff and users) to help refine this cull, any ignore any image uploaded as editorial. 

Who wants to look at bad color rendition, jaggy edges, blocky old looking early digital images. Compare that g12 with an a95 for instance.  I can only see a benefit, this is where fresh and active agencies will win into the future.  This is why i gather Yuri would have created his own agency, finer control of whats in the catalog. That and he would have had hundreds of thousands of images in his name.

Im happy to delete things that go against any  contract that i may have inadvertently signed.  To be honest, i have never like the RF model, going back before micro, i never liked this model.  And look what it did, saturated the market with the mediocre.

Im going to be going down my list from RME, RM, RF, CC and ill look into other models offered.  I likely will delete some images i pass first tests, and i may not use the image agency again after the initial test.

http://imagery.gettyimages.com/AboutGettyImages/contributors/index.en-us.html

i submitted, they were kind enough to inform me to go to a different category.  i have stuff suitable for archive.  Not sure if theytll accept it, but i have a unique story noboy else in the world has done.

From a developer.

FTP is one part, this is a file to folder action nothing more.

Once the files are on the server at the other end, they sit in a folder, nothing more.  A script will need to run to pull all EXIF data out to store into a dbase, as it does this it will either move the file or store its location in the dbase.

When you click the front end, the front end reads the dbase, looks for file data, and then loads it into the web site.

This is two specific and different actions, FTP your files, then migrate the files into the dbase.  If there are shitloads of files in queue, then the script to migrate into the dbase might take a while to get to you.

the migration script would likely run on a CRON causing it to be triggered probably every hour.

ill let you guys know the results. 

Alamy did take 48 hours, and QC on each batch has been about 48 hours.

My experience is in IT, i have been influenced of course by the photographers around me, i take a good photo, but i like reportage, so its a bit difficult to say im experienced, ive worked with journalists, not studio photographers.  Different game.

Saying that though, if i were to "brighten" my images, SS would have accepted first go.  I thought they did the right thing, i dont think they were too harsh at all.

just goes to show the free for all image grab of the last decade isnt a proven business model. Its either penalise new submissions, or cull the crap.  Ive noticed a trend starting to happen.

im going to try them one by one, i have a list of 130 agencies.

Alamy was first go no probs, even got a nice comment.  But they do editorial stuff, so they have a more open door policy when it comes to submissions.  I put everything on there as RM, im not here to make the top 200.

Click the link above theres 19 on Alamy.  I have another 11 in QC.  I will use a selection of those thirty to register with each one as i go.

I am in 100% agreeance with SS process, their web form is nice, there web site is easy to understand, i give it a thumbs up, i know why i was declined, and i know what to look out for, they have done more than i expected, or could have asked  for.

Try an FTP Program called Cyberduck

http://cyberduck.ch/

Its free and supports clouds and other offsite storage as well.  MUCH better than Filezilla.

That would make

Emmy, repeats that you thought wouldn't get airtime

Cheers 

I have edited for other photographers, so selection and post processing ive already experienced. 

And clicking my search link on Alamy, hah apprently im a Muskateer.

thanks for the offer of critique, i am actually researching alot of the social media industry, the stock industry is a part of that research.  Being rejected goes along with that research, id like to see for myself.  My main interest is not in selling my work (thats a side thing), its in how people interact and sell, and images is a big part of social media.

I have worked amongst some really great photographers, I am a little annoyed at myself for editing on a brighter monitor, i have to double check things now.

I dont know how to link directly to my gallery on Alamy.http://www.alamy.com/search/imageresults.aspx?pname=Steven%2BSpiers#BHM=foo%3Dbar%26st%3D0%26pn%3D1%26ps%3D10%26qt%3DSteven%2520Spiers%26lic%3D3%26mr%3D0%26pr%3D0%26aoa%3D1%26creative%3D%26videos%3D%26nu%3D%26ccc%3D%26bespoke%3D%26apalib%3D%26ag%3D0%26hc%3D%26et%3D0x000000000000000000000%26vp%3D0%26loc%3D0%26ot%3D15%26imgt%3D0%26dtfr%3D%26dtto%3D%26size%3D0xFF%26archive%3D1%26name%3D%26groupid%3D58685%26pseudoid%3D%7B7D7B1E15-082F-4589-AD9C-EA5A62C1F98E%7D%26userid%3D%26id%3D%26a%3D-1%26cdid%3D%26cdsrt%3D%26cc%3DGBP%26xstx%3D0%26saveQry%3D%26editorial%3D%26nasty%3D%26t%3D0%26edoptin%3D%26customgeoip%3D