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Topics - cobalt
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« on: January 16, 2024, 07:00 »
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« on: September 11, 2023, 07:48 »
I just got this email --- Dear Pond5 Artist, We are thrilled to announce that we are expanding our Exclusive Video Program! Beginning September 25, 2023, all Exclusive artists can also sell their Pond5 content on the Shutterstock marketplace. This gives you the opportunity to expand your reach while still taking advantage of industry-leading royalty rates on all Pond5 sales! Heres a bit more info about what this change means for you: Changes to the Contributor Agreement will take effect on September 25, 2023. Selling your work on Shutterstock is optional. To take advantage of the new extended reach: Existing Pond5 Exclusive Artists can register as Shutterstock contributors and upload their exclusive content directly to Shutterstock, independently of Pond5. Non-exclusive Artists with content only on Pond5 and Shutterstock can now upgrade their Pond5 accounts to Exclusive using this sign-up link. Non-exclusive Artists can join the program by signing up to become Exclusive and removing their content from all other marketplaces (except Pond5 and Shutterstock) during the two-week buffer period. All Exclusive artists earn an industry-leading 60% royalty rate on Pond5 video sales with up to 90% on new customer referrals through our Pond5 Refer & Earn program. Pond5 Exclusive artists still have complete control over their pricing on Pond5. Shutterstock does not have an Exclusive program. Shutterstock contributors will earn royalties for Shutterstock sales according to their regular terms and payout schedules. For more information, visit our Contributor Portal or contact us at [email protected]. Warm Regards, Your Friends at Pond5 --- I think it is fair enough. Nobody is forced to do anything. You can pick and choose which files you send to Shutterstock. Might make more people consider going exclusive with pond5. Especially if you do a lot of editorial. Adobe and istock don't take real editorial video. The thread on pond5 https://www.pond5.com/community?thread=228174033&page=1
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« on: July 31, 2023, 12:37 »
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« on: June 01, 2023, 14:08 »
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« on: March 07, 2023, 16:21 »
Hello everyone, generative ai is transforming our industry more drastically than the invention of the photocamera transformed art. Allover the internet creatives are having very emotional discussions and reassessing their personal and business futures. Is Ai an opportunity, a new tool? Is it the robot overlord that will replace us all? Is there nothing creative left for humanity to explore? Is this the end? etc To give all these very valid questions a better grounding, I would like to suggest that we use this thread to collect links to interesting and well written articles on the subject. The technological background, articles and videos how to use it as a tool, links to ongoing court cases and the devolopment of copyright in relation to prompters and users. And obviously all links or news about how the various agencies are dealing with the issue. Also those in the community who are journalists or in the media, can you please post the blog posts or articles you write here, whenever you do? Those that are lawyers, please add anything you find helpful. Ambassodors of agencies, please add your comments or suggestions or links as well. Here are my current favorites: - The AI companies seem to use content collected by this project: https://laion.ai/blog/laion-5b/They describe in great detail how they literally scraped the entire internet and used the image descriptions and keywords associated with images to create a huge training base for ai software. Might be worth backing up and saving anything on their website, incase they remove it all laterunless the waybackmachine already has it all, I didnt check Interestingly, if you want to have your images removed from this collection, the project threatens to sue you. Robert Kneschke discussed this in a German blog post. Hope he follows in up. (run it through deepl for English) https://www.alltageinesfotoproduzenten.de/2023/02/20/laion-verein-droht-urhebern-die-ihre-daten-aus-ki-trainingssatz-nehmen-wollen-mit-schadensersatzanspruechen/- In an interview, the CEO of Midjourney admits that they were not picky about choosing training content and that he believes it is impossible to find the copyright owners of images visible on the internet. https://www.digitalcameraworld.com/news/midjourney-founder-basically-admits-to-copyright-breaching-and-artists-are-angry- Gettyimages is suing various AI creators for copyright breach. They explicitly state they are not against the technology, but they demand a correct licensing of the training data. Here are a few links https://newsroom.gettyimages.com/en/getty-images/getty-images-statement?]https://newsroom.gettyimages.com/en/getty-images/getty-images-statement?[/url]%20fbclid=IwAR0QZsgm810ysqQaEXGzgCEUDHMGTrj9S1e3S_urdge-SuDrsAKxfF-%20bKbQ https://www.theverge.com/2023/2/6/23587393/ai-art-copyright-lawsuit-getty-images-stable-diffusionhttps://www.forbes.com/sites/mattnovak/2023/02/06/getty-images-sues-ai-company-over-hideous-frankenphotos/?sh=1f775c7640b2- Shutterstock announced they will let customers use dall-e to generate content and that the ai is trained on the ss collection. They announce they will pay artists a small fee whenever their files are somehow used in a recreation. https://www.theverge.com/2022/10/25/23422359/shutterstock-ai-generated-art-openai-dall-e-partnership-contributors-fund-reimbursement- This is a general article about legal risks with ai https://www.siliconrepublic.com/machines/ai-generated-images-legal-risks-copyright- Not related to images, but this article discusses the rpoblems actors face who are asked to sign away voice rights whenever they do a voice job. https://www.vice.com/en/article/5d37za/voice-actors-sign-away-rights-to-artificial-intelligenceI am sure there is a lot more out there. Please add your favorite links. Hope you find this thread useful.
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« on: February 05, 2023, 03:15 »
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« on: September 12, 2022, 16:01 »
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« on: July 14, 2022, 07:36 »
Hi all, how about we collect info together about alternative video stock sites. If I put on my buyers hat for video, with only 30 million clips compared to probably 1 billion stock photos, in my opinion absolutely everything is missing. And yet the video crowd is already complaining as if their party in the market is already over. When this industry had only 30 million RF files, or even 30 million micro RF files, I was making 4-6k a month with less than 3000 photos. I understand that there is a much larger buyer group for photos, but simply by how much of the world is covered with videoit is a wide open planet with literally everything missing. At least from my perspective. Obviously agencies selling our footage for 30 cents doesnt help. And I dont care if it is a special one day social media license.it is simply not enough if it is a professionally produced clip. For my iphone snapshots, I can live with that, but all files are not created equal. Good footage is more expensive and time consuming to produce. But because of that and unlike the photo market making good video clips for fun as a hobby is really not that common. It is a niche hobby and the number of people who become really good at it are unlikely to be ready to give away their files for exposure. High quality video producers have much more control over their market than we do in photography. Although even the photo producers have some control, if an agency offers more money or better workflow over 2-3 years you will see a strong difference in the content they offer. And the customers will always go where the best content is. So, which other platforms are out there? Are there niche video agencies, maybe for exclusive content or specialized content that are interesting to work with? For agency owners - why not come in here and introduce yourselves? Many people are ready to branch out and look around, now that the traditional agencies are buying each other and consolidation usually means less choices and less income for producers. Supplying several agencies with more specialized exclusive work is expensive for us, but I am sure many reading here will be ready to support smaller and new places. If agencies come here and explain clearly what they are looking for, they can build up a larger and more diverse community. It is the right time to come in and pick up good content or new suppliers looking for more balance in the market. On youtube there is someone praising filmsupply and artgrid. He made 10200 dollar in 2021 with 1800 (?) clips and no new uploads in the year. https://youtu.be/6Gvgp6JvMTEAnyone else with experience?
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« on: June 06, 2020, 02:54 »
Hi everyone, 2020 is a really bad year. If you have an account on istock and also on eyeem, then please check your email, including your spam folder. I just received an email, that because I have duplicates between both accounts, my entire port of 2400 files in the eyeem/getty collection will be removed and the connection severed. Relevant part: Getty Images has informed us that they will be deleting your portfolio within the EyeEm Getty collection. Getty have informed us that they will be removing high volume accounts with duplicate assets from the EyeEm Getty collection, where the contributor provides the content directly to Getty (via iStock), as well. As you are one of the comparably few EyeEm users who also holds an iStock account with a significant volume, you are also affected. Eyeem used to be exclusive, then switched to non exclusive content a few years ago. So I now have a non exclusive contract with istock and a non exclusive contract with eyeem. If you do a name search in Gettyimages, you cannot see any files from istock. To now retroactively demand a kind of selective exclusivity is extremly weird, that is saying it politely. Whenever eyeem became aware of the problem, they should have immediately warned all their artists. Who knows how many people after uploading to eyeem, gradually learned about the other agencies and in good faith, because the content is non exclusive, started to explore other agencies including istock. Moreover, why, in 2020, is Gettyimages not able to recognize duplicates and automatically filter them out? Why was eyeem not able to negotiate a delay in the current pandemic and crisis? They know artists lost all income from their dayjobs. Or at least a 90 notice before termination, or 60, 30? Instead the admin suggested the artists should individually write to getty and istock to sort the problem out themselves and then report back to eyeem what they achieved. So a few souls got into a ping pong loop, writing to istock who sent them to getty, who sent them back to eyeem...etc...for a single artist to deal with abhuge agency like getty is beyond intimidating. And many do not speak English. Some artists asked to just have the duplicates removed, but apparently got no answer and their ports just disappeared quickly. A few weeks ago, emails like that were already sent out. But an admin came in and reassured the community that this would only affect very,very few people and only ports that were nearly 100% identical. At the time, artists asked if there was sime kind of guideline - after how many duplicates would they get the letter. What percentage of duplicates. But they got no answer. So, this...is the second round. Imagine if at that stage they had written to all their artists to warn them that this problem might be coming their way. If you look in the eyeem market facebook group https://www.facebook.com/groups/EyeEmMarket/You can read the whole story for yourself. The most striking is a contributor who worked really hard and has 10 000 files on eyeem and 7000 in the eyeem/getty portfolio. He has a very old istock account with 800 files and only a tiny number of duplicates. He also got the same letter that his files will be pulled in a few days. He writes he hasnt uploaded to istock in ten years. Somif even people with maybe less than 10% duplicates (and that would be all his file on istock, which he denies) have their ports deleted, then nobody is safe. So if you prefer eyeem, maybe consider closing the istock account now. But personally I explicitly requested to have my files pulled from getty. I have not really uploaded to istock in years but it is full agency for all types of content and all kinds of styles. I also have no idea what eyeem is going to do in the future. What if to tomorrow they sign a deal with a new agency X and I already have an account and my non exclusive content there? There is absolutely no way for me to anticipate where eyeem is going. They should have just stuck to exclusive content or made it clear in their contract that selective exclusivity is required if you want to have content in the partner program. For years now, I have recommended eyeem left,right and center and to anyone that loves more artsy or quirky images. But I will take a long break now and focus elsewhere. Shutterstock and eyeem, two agencies that I always praised as drama free. How quickly things change. We can trust noone and must protect and help each other. Stay safe,check your emails.
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« on: March 26, 2016, 04:18 »
Is anyone here selling stock direct on vimeo? Commercial only? Or editorial?
What is your experience?
They pay out 90%, but there is a 199 yearly fee.
It could be worth it, if they put us in control and nobody interfers with my webshop.
I would really love to have a place that puts me completly in control.
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« on: September 10, 2014, 05:31 »
Hi everyone, if anyone is coming to Cologne for Photokina, i thought it might be useful to have a thread where we can organize meet ups or share info on interesting events, presentations etc... I will be there most days, but especially on the week-end. On Saturday, at 7:30 pm I have booked a table for 25 people at the following pub: http://www.ex-vertretung.de/unser-polit-kult-lokal/wer-wann-wo-hallo/#woI have been doing it for a few years now, it is open to anyone interested in stock, doesnt matter if you are a newbie or millionaire pro. The table is booked for cobaltstock/ Jasmin Awad It is a self pay event...I didnt organize a sponsor, sorry  They have a good mix of food and drinks and the menue is in English and German It is walking distance from Cologne main train station, so you need to get back to the city from the trade show halls. There are several people in the stock community giving presentations, please post them here as well. We usually get 20-25 people, so we wont dominate the pub completely. But it is a big place and if we get a much larger crowd, they can move us to a different area. If the weather is good, we might even be outside in the beergarden. Hope to see you soon!
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« on: November 07, 2013, 06:55 »
Hi everyone, I am looking for people who are interested in bringing together professionals dedicated to Science and Technology. I am currently training two friends of mine to do stock - a molecular biologist and a physicist. I am a chemist by training, but I mostly worked in engineering before doing stock. I have looked at many agencies, but I cant find one that really has a dedicated, organized collection for these fields. And many images done by photographers might be artistically beautiful, but are not technically correct or usable. We could work with an agency that wants to specialise in technology and maybe has an editing consisting of engineers,biochemists or car mechanics or medical doctors, or just share a large lightbox on pond5 where we can set our own individual prices. The drawback are the visible download numbers, but maybe they will offer a privacy option in the future. Pond5 also takes video and it is good to have both in one place. We would need all kinds of videos and photos of working techniques, analysis methods, conceptual imagery for abstract ideas and concepts, also in software and thousands of images of machine hardware pieces, chemicals, glassware, thousands of screws, tools etc So if anyone is interested in these fields and has an appropriate background, please write to me or post here. I am not thinking of starting a new agency, I believe if we can just combine what we maybe already have and work together and network in the future we can build a really interesting lightbox. A flower free zone, unless the flowers are part of a genetic experiment.  We could also meet up and shoot together, I am ready to travel abroad for a good project. Also we could recommend industry events,conferences, new trends and good blogs to stay up to date. There is so much new stuff happening every day. And we would remain in control of our work, or if you want to create a series also for exclusive content somewhere, it is up to the individual. But I thought if can get a good network together, we will all benefit and make our voices heard between all the people shooting beautiful girls and art What do you think? Anyone who is interested also going to mexpo?
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« on: July 22, 2013, 04:11 »
You will have to run this through google translate, but the numbers speak for themselves: After doing 5 years of microstock Robert has reached an income of over 13 000 dollars a month. The majority of his income is from Fotolia and Shutterstock. He works extremely hard and has a portfolio with over 10 000 files. The article is in German, but the numbers are easy to understand. Fnf Jahre Microstock Meine Umstze und andere Zahlen | Alltag eines Fotoproduzenten http://www.alltageinesfotoproduzenten.de/2013/07/22/fuenf-jahre-microstock-meine-umsaetze-und-andere-zahlen/
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« on: January 09, 2013, 05:00 »
I guess most exclusives already know this, in case you havent, please check out these two threads. http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=350291&page=1And the reply from the istock lawyer today: http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=350397&page=1If you are an istock exclusive, you cannot opt out of this kind of "promotional use". istock also shifts all responsibility in case of image abuse to the artists and we still havent been provided with a list of files that are in this "program". My images have been downloaded over 1.3 Million times. At least those that i have found. they are freely available on the internet, you dont need to log in to Microsoft and register to download the file, my copyright name is nowhere visible, the backlink to my portfolio doesnt work and I was never paid anything for this kind of "free give away to anyone". Worst of all there is no user agreement to click on before downloading these files. And commercial use is apparently allowed by the Microsoft EULA (makes sense of course, Microsoft Office is a commercial product) And going forward there is no opt out for istock exclusives. istock believes they are entitled to do this kind of "promotional use" whenever they like. I have never heard for any agency in the market acting this way. Ever.
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« on: October 28, 2011, 05:04 »
Hi everyone,
I would like to invite you to a discussion about the use and abuse of visible download numbers. I contribute to both istock and Getty and I am very grateful that Getty does not display my download numbers. In all the time I have been there I have never seen anyone trying to copy my files.
This year I didnt have much time to shoot, but next year, I will make a big push for Getty and fill any slots I have, because I really feel like my hard work is much better protected there.
istock has introduced the "fuzzy numbers" to help protect the new files. But because the number of sales have fallen with rising prices, any file that has more than 10 downloads in 6 months is still a very visible bestseller.
And the files with flames, well they just scream to be copied. When you do a best match search for xmas right now you can easily see the blue flames right next to the copies or "creatively inspired" ones. It also forces teh artist with bestsellers to continuosly reshoot them, otherwise all downloads go to the copy cats. This leads to endless duplications and I think is a reason why so many stock sites are boring and bland.
For the istock exclusives there is the additional problem that our bestsellers get copied by independents and are uploaded to other sites. Of course I know anyone active here would never do such a thing ;-). But the visible download numbers on exclusive files are fuelling the competition.
Now of course I do use download numbers when I do my market research on a new subject. Say, I want to create a series on pumpkin pie, with or without people. Of course I will look at the download numbers and analyse the style of the successful files. But I think I could be just as creative if I did a search without the download numbers.
In fact, if the download numbers were NOT visible I think it would then become interesting to shoot something that is different to what is already in the library. It encourages you to stand out and make something new.
Customers can still be offered a search by "popularity", but this doesnt tell them if the top images have been downloaded 100 or 10 000 times.
They are buying RF images at very low prices and they always have the risk that their competition chooses the same file.
It would be wonderful if istock gradually removed the DL numbers and works more like Getty. I think it is one of the reasons the Getty portfolio has so much unique and unusual content (I love their style).
No Download numbers - no incentive to copy.
So what do you think?
Is showing the numbers essential for success, learning or the customers?
Are copy cats a big problem for you and does it affect how you work? Do you have any strategies that help against them?
I would be interested in hearing opinions from all players - contributors, customers, agencies.
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« on: July 15, 2011, 17:02 »
Hi together,
I thought Id start a thread about the future. It wont be long and all the sites will have 100 Million files of all kinds of files types. How can this be organized? What is the best strategy for the buyer, the contributor, the agency?
Different agencies will come up with different strategies, but since we all face the same problem, I wonder if the community can add some brain power and ideas that might be beneficial for everyone.
We all know there is an oversupply of images and a lot of duplicated content (how many red roses on white do you need?). At the same time, contributors who want to offer a "complete" range of files in a certain subject to strengthen their profile and attract loyal buyers, dont like to have their shooting subjects limited because it is already on the site (but I want my red rose on white in my portfolio!). Buyers want an efficient search that is fast and gives results that are adjusted to their personal preferences (ideally search engines learning their taste, not having to turn a lot knobs and dials/buttons and sliders).
It is a difficult challenge.
Gettyimages just announced changes to their contract that will even allow RM content moved to RF if it doesnt sell (something I agree with and have signed the contract). On istock, I can move my slow sellers into the partner program and even deactivate them from istock altogether. Again something I support. We also have a dollar bin, although we cant add to it at the moment.
I dont know what other sites do, maybe someone can explain what their strategies are.
Personally I would propose to just separate the main collection from the personal portfolio. Files that dont sell over a given time frame should be removed from the main collection. Just like the dollar bin files are no longer visible in the search. However they could stay in the artists personal webshop, if he or she wants that. Or offer the possibility to remove and go to a different site.
Allowing the artist the freedom to handle his own portfolio is very motivating and helps to develop your own style and create a loyal following of buyers. The artist can also promote this personal portfolio through social media networks and his website. If the content gets spread around over many different sites, it becomes much harder to create a follwoing as an artist. Especially if some sites dont even show the name of the artist (or even attribute a wrong one).
I think you could easily remove 30% of files from the main collection, if they can stay in the artists portfolio. You could also add "Contributors choice" options for files that the artist thinks have to stay in the main collection. On istock E+ could serve that function.
A system like that can handle very, very large volume of files. If the non sellers are always removed from the main collection every three years, the collection would probably be very trim and up to date. You could even keep it roughly at the same files size. The personal portfolio can keep growing and the non sellers can also be added to another sales outlet if necessary. I mean how many pictures can you shoot over a lifetime? 30 000? Ive seen personal portfolios of that size, for a private portfolio, that isnt a problem. It would be the same like having your own webshop embedded in the agency.
What do you think??
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