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Messages - Eyedesign

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76
This really is a major de-railment to this thread. I made my decision to go independent based on the RPIs which have been posted many times in forums by exclusives from istock/fotolia as compared to independents.  Note: I have only been tracking photography numbers, vector artists will have significantly different numbers. What I have determined and the reason why most people who do stock photography are not exclusive (only 14% of istock is exclusive) is that if you submit to the top 9 micro sites (plus alamy) you will earn around twice the RPI (hence twice the overall earnings). for independents with 9 sites plus alamy it seems to be between $1-1.50 RPI (I earn $1.35) if you add up RPIs for all sites. If you are earning in that RPI range as exclusive after recent cuts than there is no reason to go independent, but most aren't. And after the recent cuts I am very happy i did not lock myself into an exclusive contract.  While I feel confident in the numbers I have been working with, as soon as leaf publishes a more complete breakdown of earnings for his 2010 survey we will once and for all have definitive RPI averages....that will be much more scientific than my piecing together of various peoples RPIs posted over the years. I look forward to seeing some real hard data. Perhaps I will just create an RPI poll myself, that might be interesting. I understand there are other reasons than the money to not go independent... some people simply don't want to spend the time to upload to 10 sites which is a totally valid argument.

Out of respect for the original poster I really am not trying to open up pandoras pox here in this thread. We can further this discussion in another thread if needed.

lightscribe you have no idea of what you're talking about, but keep it up it's funny stuff.

77
General Photography Discussion / Re: Food for independants!!
« on: February 10, 2011, 09:48 »
Just tried this search on Shutterstock "Black, Businessman, Standing" with 50 images showing 20 images are of White businessman standing.  To get black Businessmen only would I have to put the words "African Descent or Afro American"?  

78
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Buyers Bailing on Istock
« on: February 08, 2011, 17:31 »
I just don't even understand why it matters and why Lobo cares so much to harass people about their identity.

It doesn't read like harassment. Unless you choose read it like that. It reads like a perfectly reasonable question. So why assume the worst ? I don't think it's a big deal.

That would be so if this was the first time this happened, but Lobo has a history of outing contributors who are also buyers, harassing them, and then discounting their opinions.
In this case it looks like he just paraphrasing Funwithfood, but read into what you want.

79
Im an independant myself and dont really speak for or against exclusivity but I think we have to remember, this is a business, not personal and if we start judging this business on moral grounds, aspects, etc,  we could be entering dangerous grounds.

+ 1  ;D

If your not treating this as a business you're in trouble.

I don't know where this particular admonishment is coming from, Christian and Thomas.  Reading this thread, most of the arguments I am seeing against exclusivity are solid business arguments, not merely moral or emotional ones. 

You guys are certainly free to disagree with the majority and express your own opinions, but please don't denigrate those of us who disagree with you by dismissing our well-reasoned and articulated arguments as unbusinesslike. 
Lisa, no one is being admonished or denigrated. I think me and Christan both see eye to eye on this point,exclusive or independent doesn't much matter. The only thing that matters is that it works in a business sense for the individual. As for solid business arguments and well-reasoned and articulated arguments, yes you also see that sometimes from both sides. As for my statement "If your not treating this as a business you're in trouble" I'll have to stand by that one. I think you'll agree that in the last ten years many contributors have used words like community, family, and friends to describe this thing of ours. For the agencies its always been about business.

80
@ sharpshot, Finding a way to made money outside of microstock with your images is the best bet!

81
It was always baffling to me why Istock thinks their policy on exclusivity brings them any advantage in the market. Anything they gain by representing exclusive work of a few talented photographers they lose by NOT having a huge body of work from non-exclusive photographers that other agencies have (and Istock doesn't).

They do have a huge body of work from independents.  Seriously, do you need 1,000 of the same business images from someone, or will 400 pretty much cover the series?
There's lots of good independents that never bothered with istock or only uploaded a tiny fraction of their portfolio because of the 20% commission.  There will be many more now, especially as istock don't sell new images well any more.  I do think the advantage they had with exclusives is diminished and they will find it harder to get as many good new contributors as their rivals.  That might suit some people but will the buyers like it?

The point is not how many images independents have vs how many are loaded onto istock. The market is over supplied with images. I've said it before I'll said it again, show me an agency with 12 millon image and I'll show you an agency with 10 million crappy images.  

82
Im an independant myself and dont really speak for or against exclusivity but I think we have to remember, this is a business, not personal and if we start judging this business on moral grounds, aspects, etc,  we could be entering dangerous grounds.

+ 1  ;D

If your not treating this as a business you're in trouble.

83
@ J., Last shoot at the old studio planned for Thursday  ;D

84
They do have a huge body of work from independents.  Seriously, do you need 1,000 of the same business images from someone, or will 400 pretty much cover the series?


Too bad that huge body of work from independents can't be found by buyers.


I read that over and over again here and from what I can see that just not true.
Ex.
1. Business: sort best match/View 200  5http://www.istockphoto.com/search/text/business/filetypes/[1]/source/basic/
Counted 50 images from independents in the first 100 images.

2. Senior: sort best match/View 200 http://www.istockphoto.com/search/text/senior_adult/filetypes/[1]/source/basic/
44 out of 200 images from independents.

3. Education: sort best match View 200, http://www.istockphoto.com/search/text/school/filetypes/[1]/textDisambiguation/%7B%22termId%22:%221_1692%22,%22string%22:%22school%22%7D/source/basic/

23 out of 200 images from independents.

85
General - Top Sites / Re: Looking back on one year in Microstock
« on: December 23, 2010, 18:35 »
Very nice work Dan.

86
One week in November my Istock stats show a green bar indicating that I got "143 Partner Program Downloads" and then a month later and I have had none since.

At first I thought "oh cool I will get these sales every week now" but now it just feels dodgy or underhand as if they have just allowed another website to choose 143 of my images to have on their site to sell without giving me royalties....surely that cant be true.... but how come I got 143 one week and then none then after?

Any ideas?

Whats "dodgy" why not go read about the program and when they payout on the istock site?

87
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 11, 2010, 16:32 »

When I was trying to get my portrait business off the ground around 2002 - 2004, the rejection reason I got most often was "why should I pay you a couple of hundred dollars when I can get 100 portraits (prints) at WalMart for $12?"  ::) 

Yep, I call this group the "I buy pictures by the pound".

88
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 11, 2010, 11:24 »

minimum wage for unskilled labour (like say a Walmart ;) portrait photographer) is $10.25 / hr


Really?
Any such deal over here is that the 'tog pays the store a fee (I presume in the above example the tog is a Walmart employee?) than has to drum up all the business for themselves, having paid for all their equipment also. And I often see them chirpily trying to Shanghai every family which comes in with no success all the time I'm in. Must be pretty soul destroying. They seldom last more than a couple of weeks, then there is no photographer for weeks or months, then some other optimistic soul has a go. It seems to be a franchise sort of deal with some photography company which 'trains' you and provides you (for a fee) with the 'boards'. I'm guessing from the rapid turnover that it's a money-losing deal.
I'm guessing that if Walmart actually hires togs at an hourly rate, they're setting them sales targets?
Is it broadly accepted that if you want a photo of your weans you take them to Walmart?
Large market in the U.S. for this type of run and gun family photos. Income levels for people using this service is between 20,000-30,000 US. Yep photographer is a Walmart/ Sears employee with little to no photo skills other then 1-2 hours of training on how the company does business. I've seen in some places where the camera was bolted to the floor!! Sit the Kid down, turn him to the left, say cheeses, hit the shutter, sell them a package for 29,95US, done next!

89
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Buyers Bailing on Istock
« on: December 10, 2010, 15:20 »
Yeah, responses at both places can wear on you. Reality is probably somewhere in between.

Well said!

+ 2

90
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 09, 2010, 05:42 »
On the other hand it looks like Getty/Istock don't think that some people are hard working enough either.

For those of you not able to follow on the closed forum, istock Getty contributors have just received emails either saying
You can continue to contribute to getty and our editors will decide where your images best fit:
or : you can pay 50$ an image and submit through photograher's choice.  

JRRD categorised the recipients of the last email thusly: "Not for people who truely worked hard and made sure to succeed at Getty Images."
Glad I never took up the offer of a contract.

Just to clarify, if I understand it correctly, the easy backdoor for iStockers of the Diamond, Gold and sometimes Silver level is going away, due to the fact that Vetta and Agency images are being ported up automatically (we'll see) to Getty and properties.  So, if people are creating work of that level anyways, they can submit to those two collections to get onto Getty.  However, additionally, each person (afaik) was looked at and offered either an 'outside' house contract at Getty that covers all collections, or just the basic photographer's choice option.  I would assume that in this decision, they evaluated the work of the person, how much they contribute, ie., their 'value' to Getty, and offered based on that.

JJ's somewhat unfortunate comment notwithstanding.
Yep that how I understand it. Works for me reduces the amount of work I need to do, upload to Vetta stuff gets ported over to Getty (we'll see).

91
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 07, 2010, 17:42 »
If you're not within 2000-4000 RC of making the zone I'd bet you won't make it. And the number of Vetta anyone will sell within the 11-14 days won't be making up the those types of numbers.

92
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 07, 2010, 16:52 »

Okay I'll play, can you find the exact quote showing that Mr BaldricksTrousers statement is true?


Sorry, Thomas, if you are going to imply someone is lying, I believe the obligation is on YOU to disprove what he said. 

Isn't that how it works? 


Guess I should've tried that on my university professors for essay assignments.  "Sorry, the obligation is on you to find sources disproving what I said!"  :)


Mr BaldricksTrousers put out mis-information and has no obigation to link to it. I quote RM statement and you're still asking me for a source?


So far, it hasn't been determined that Mr. Baldricks Trousers DID put out misinformation, hence people asking ANYONE to find a link to the original source, so we ALL can reread and understand what exactly was said.

Here you go it took all of about 2 mins to find it http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=253522
Kelly's statement from Fri Sep 10

"As I've said, we will re-examine targets once the year-end numbers are in, especially if our projections prove wrong. In the meantime, we are going to have to wait and see, and we ask you to do the same, if not with understanding, then at least with patience."

Now can someone link to an announcement stating "some people who get near the target but are a bit short will be grandfathered into the next level and your payment" The talk about grandfathering was the plan before the Sep announcement. It has nothing to do with what we'll be dealing with come Jan 2011. 

93
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 07, 2010, 16:31 »

Okay I'll play, can you find the exact quote showing that Mr BaldricksTrousers statement is true?

Sorry, Thomas, if you are going to imply someone is lying, I believe the obligation is on YOU to disprove what he said. 

Isn't that how it works? 

Guess I should've tried that on my university professors for essay assignments.  "Sorry, the obligation is on you to find sources disproving what I said!"  :)

Mr BaldricksTrousers put out mis-information and has no obigation to link to it. I quote RM statement and you're still asking me for a source?

94
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 07, 2010, 15:35 »
From rogermexico "What we said was that we would re-examine the targets and soften them if it looks like more people than we anticipated are going to miss them, and this is still the case."

The other statement is just sillyness from Mr. BaldricksTrousers

Have you found the exact quote from way back when? Because if not, I am not willing to believe what rogermexico says over what baldricks trousers says. When somebody can come up with the exact words that were said way back when and we can all see them in print, then we all can decide who is being silly and who isn't.

Right now, I would lean way more towards baldricks statement being somewhere near the truth as opposed to the company line of rogermexico. However nice a person he is in real life, Andrew still is a company spokesperson and will say what they want him to say...or not say.

wait.. you first say you believe rogermexico over baldricks then you reverse it.  am I reading you wrongly?
I don't have to believe anything I just need to read the statement.

fwiw.. Sean Locke posted in the iS thread that he recalled this statement as well.  that adds a little more credibility to baldricks' statement/quote, in my opinion.
Sean right only about 98 percent of the time. Anything more than that and he would be God!

95
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 07, 2010, 15:18 »

Okay I'll play, can you find the exact quote showing that Mr BaldricksTrousers statement is true?

Sorry, Thomas, if you are going to imply someone is lying, I believe the obligation is on YOU to disprove what he said. 

Isn't that how it works? 

From rogermexico "What we said was that we would re-examine the targets and soften them if it looks like more people than we anticipated are going to miss them, and this is still the case."

nothing other then the above statement was said/written

96
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 07, 2010, 15:08 »
From rogermexico "What we said was that we would re-examine the targets and soften them if it looks like more people than we anticipated are going to miss them, and this is still the case."

The other statement is just sillyness from Mr. BaldricksTrousers

Have you found the exact quote from way back when? Because if not, I am not willing to believe what rogermexico says over what baldricks trousers says. When somebody can come up with the exact words that were said way back when and we can all see them in print, then we all can decide who is being silly and who isn't.

Right now, I would lean way more towards baldricks statement being somewhere near the truth as opposed to the company line of rogermexico. However nice a person he is in real life, Andrew still is a company spokesperson and will say what they want him to say...or not say.

Okay I'll play, can you find the exact quote showing that Mr BaldricksTrousers statement is true?

97
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Vetta Sale at iStock
« on: December 07, 2010, 14:48 »
From rogermexico "What we said was that we would re-examine the targets and soften them if it looks like more people than we anticipated are going to miss them, and this is still the case."

The other statement is just sillyness from Mr. BaldricksTrousers

98
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Agency collection? oh! boy!
« on: December 03, 2010, 17:19 »
@SNP, as I understand it if you take the image down from istock you can sell it as RM.

99
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Another happy buyer at iStock
« on: December 02, 2010, 14:30 »
Wow! looks like Mortons LTD is doing really great business
http://www.mortons.co.uk/dates.html

100
General Photography Discussion / Re: Time Lapse Video
« on: November 30, 2010, 12:56 »
Yep that one by Tom Lowe if you would lie to find out more info check this out.
http://eyedesign9.wordpress.com/

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