Hi Tom, thanks for suggestion! I didn't tried them yet, only registered with stocks from big6 except SS.
Do you have steady income from there or it's rather occasional?

It's not that I don't like shadows - the one in the flower pot only is ok - but here it looks like you had something outside the image (maybe yourself) casting that shadow.  I mean, you have a main shadow from lighting coming from top left, but then the bottom right quarter has another smoother shadow. 

Thanks for explanation, now I see what you mean.
this shadow arise from reflection of my main shadow, the problem is that my camera have broken hotshoe so I'm using slave flash which is activated by built-in flash, so probably I didn't close well my main flash which resulted in such shadow effect.

Thanks for info, Adelaide! I was also wonder if they will look into description field or just use keywords and see if they present in description field and add more value to them(I think something like this was written in their guidelines).

One thing you can do to your images to get them a little bigger without upsizing the image is to add more to them.  This is especially easy for isolation shots, make your canvas a bit bigger to get over the threshold and add some more white.

Thanks for suggestion Waldo4, although I really not sure that extending is way to go, simply because I would feel uncomfortable knowing that I add to picture what wasn't there, for shot you've showed me as example it was ok since it was cropped and it helped to composition. But using same technique to raise size of overall picture isn't something I wish to do even if it bring more more cash.
As for white space I actually cut it on few my shots simply because it would look stupid to have small subject on big pure white background, it think such photo would likely to be ignored as it look weird on thumbnail also.
 

The last way that I know of to make a shot bigger is to take multiple shots and let a panoramic stitching program assemble them.  Some programs can stitch in 2 dimensions automatically (autostitch comes to mind, the free version can only use .jpegs, but it really embarrasses Canon's and Adobe's stitching programs in performance).

Thanks, I've already tried this technique using Hugin for stitching, but resulting photo doesn't look as I was supposed so I didn't submit it, but I don't give up on this technique and will keep on trying to get good result.
(I have few good panorama photos which probably worth to be uploaded.)

iStock will refuse files that have had extra white added to images.  They refuse files that are larger than your camera is able to shoot, unless it's clearly been stitched together or multiple views in one file etc - but you should put a note to the reviewer in that case.

Seren, I've heard few times that it's good to leave comment to editors on IS but I can't see a comment field, can you please tell how it's possible to leave comments for reviewers, should they be written in description field?

If you can't get your images accepted at various agencies just go with the others till you can afford a half decent camera.  Places like Shutterstock accept piddly little files (I shrink all of mine down for there now) and the return is very good.  You'd only need a few good shots somewhere like Shutterstock and you'd have money for a new camera in two or three months, easily.

2-3 months is too good to be true for me I'm ready to wait year or more to get good camera. Just need to learn how to make good pictures which sells and possibly not portraits, as portrait photography isn't really something I'd like to do.

Edit: I have pictures in my portfolio from a Dimage Z1 and I don't think I had any rejected for technical problems - they're a half decent range of P&S cameras.  You shouldn't have too many problems getting pictures from this camera accepted.

Nice to meet another KM user actually Z1 have less problem with noise but more with chromatic aberrations but it's very similar to Z3 in other ways. I'm going to check your portfolio now as didn't have chance to do it before.

EDIT Reason: fixed problem with quotes.

basti, sorry I've somehow missed notification of your reply and spot it only once I've posted reply to topic.
I have no idea why stocks have other regulations as I've also heard the same things you're telling about currencies.
But Europe seems always have not as strict custom and some other rules as xUSSR, so maybe same thing apply to banknotes...
Not sure why stocks are closing eyes for money photographs probably editors may be not well instructed about this matter or it's really legitimate, have no idea

I've got my last submitted images reviewed quickly as well, so maybe it's helping a bit.
Although it could be possible to lower upload maximum to those with small acceptance rate...(or it wouldn't work as it seems that at BigStock everyone had decent ratio )
BTW uploads are accepted again

Quote from: sensovision on March 04, 2008, 01:50

So is price of XSmall image is fluctuating all the time or they simply pay different percentage each time, or maybe there some sort of discounts for customers?

The % is always the same (20%), but prices vary with credits packages.  If I remember it right, one credit can cost from 95c to $1.30, depending on the amount of credits purchased (more credits, cheaper $/credit).  Therefore a XS pays like 19c to 26c.

Thanks, Adelaide, you're 100% right, soon after posting this I've checked IStock forums and saw this thread which confirm your what you just said.
Thanks for response!

Thanks for reply, folks!

That is great that you are getting images into IS and DT.  I will guess FT may be a harbinger of more difficult times ahead for you though.  Eventually the camera will hold you back, especially if it is producing visible noise.  I would not be surprised if soon you ran into similar difficulties at IS...and I doubt you'll get into SS considering their scrutiny over noise.

DanP68, I don't try myself with SS for that reason, will wait till get new camera.

DSLR is obviously an expensive next step, but you could conceivably go with a used Rebel or 30D (if you can find one), then throw on a $70 Plastic Fantastic 50mm 1.4. 

People here don't sell their equipment that frequently(we tend to buy it for life I guess) and if buy it from other place like EBay, I'll pay custom taxes as for new one

Some of the top contributors in microstock rank FT #1 or #2 in overall earnings, likely because of the high EL prices, the ability to effectively double your base image prices, and higher commission percentages.  So you should definitely be interested in making things work there if you plan to be in microstock for the long haul.

I'm not going to leave them yet, although they seems to provide lowest exposure for images from all agencies I use.

Do you really want to say you have more problems with Fotolia? They accept almost anything of mine. On the contrary Istock refuses about half of the pictures I send there and they are really choosy. And I only send them pictures accepted at DT and Crestock.

Hi peep, that's right, I've exactly opposite situation

I've only had a few rejections at fotolia.  One was strange though.  Something about their customers buying for books, magazines and web use so my picture wasn't appropriate for that sort of market.

Hello Seren, several of my rejections have same statement, and my bestseller image on IS was also rejected for same reason

It's not the camera; they reject newer files shot with the Rebel as quickly as the older files.  I've been thinking it might be a European vs American market thing because files they say won't sell do quite nicely elsewhere. 

fullvalue, I also thought that European market have different demands, at least it sound plausible to me. Now I just need to change my thinking from American to European one and get right images (Just for reference I was born and live in Easter Europe all my life).

FT and IS are around the same for me, but at least I can understand IS's rejects

Exactly, IS seems to be more consistent in given reasons and if problems was corrected images get accepted.

After reading these forums and articles on the web I've got feeling that IStock have much strictest rules in images' acceptance, but seems I was wrong, I don't have problems in getting my images to IS, DT and rest but Fotolia is really mean to me for some reason
Most of my images are get rejected in time they are accepted everywhere... (maybe because of my 4mp camera and matter that for other sites I downsize my noisy pictures but for FT my resolution is marginally accepted so submit images as is).
Wonder am I alone in this or I've just got wrong initial impression and Fotolia is more picky to images than others?

(I'm not including SS as doesn't register there and don't have any experience with them).

my pleasure As for rating it's really worth it, I didn't seen many images of flames photographed so nicely.
you've did good job!
Wonder what kind of fuel you've used for photo or it was natural burning?

Great job, Waldo! You're right eyes are really magnified to spray which is the main subject. It's totally change the picture and make it look much better IMHO!
Can you tell if you used only free transform tools for getting more sky above spray or some other tools also?

Thanks once again for example I have to admit that I didn't imagined it this way before I saw it, it's really helped!

I think that GIMP have similar free transform functionality although I'm not sure if picture would look as good as before(in terms of quality) but I'm going to check it out.

As for person I also don't like where it's now but I don't try to make such serious image manipulations as try that photo would look good from beginning and if it don't, I'm trying not to spend too much time for correcting this.