Hello All,

Thanks.

We're aware there's an issue and we're working on it.  We'll update as we know more and a solution is put into place.

Thanks,

Scott
VP Content

Hello,

If you are having issues uploading and haven't already done so, please email our support team.

http://submit.shutterstock.com/contact.mhtml

Any details that you can provide will be helpful in having the team reproduce and address the issue (browser version, FTP client, file type, your sequence of actions, etc....).

Thanks, and we apologize for any inconvenience!

Scott
VP of Content
Shutterstock

Hey guys,

I'll ask the team to provide an answer (likely not until tomorrow), but it's also possible that the number represents images that were approved ever.    If an image was subsequently removed by the user, or rejected for a trademark or some other reason during a regular audit, you would have less active images being sold.

I'm speculating; I'll clarify with the developers that built the functionality.  I suspect it could also be the issue mentioned earlier, which is that some images were recently approved, but haven't been indexed for search yet.

Best,

Scott
VP of Content

Hello All,

Upload should be working now.  Please contact Support if you experience any issues.  We apologize for any inconvenience.

Best Regards,

Scott
VP of Content
Shutterstock

Hi All,

Our tech teams are currently working on this.  Thanks for your patience and we hope to have an update soon.

Best,

Scott

VP of Content
Shutterstock

Hi All,

When you receive a high royalty for a single image, it is because the image was sold under a license that offers the option for sensitive use. That does not mean that the use was a sensitive one.  The majority of these images will not be used in a sensitive manner.  However, such use is a possibility. Unlike some competitors, we give you the ability to opt-out.  

High royalties are often the result of a prenegotiated agreement with volume buyers such as large advertising agencies.  These volume buyers may require additional license or workflow features, such as the option for sensitive use, indemnification, multi-user accounts, prenegotiated pricing, and special billing and workflow features.  

By opting-in to sensitive use, you get access to all sales made to these buyers.  By opting out, your images aren't available to buyers who require the option of sensitive use.

Overall, these sales are a great opportunity to drive additional revenue to you and we're excited to make them available.  

Best,

Scott
VP of Content
Shutterstock
 

Hello,

The feed will likely grow to be a mix of specific and broad requests. 

Often, a customer will come to us and say, "you know, I was working on a project on Brazilian travel last month and noticed that you don't have a lot of local culture.  Many of my projects need authentic-looking photos that show Brazilians in business or at leisure.   If you had that in the future, I'm sure I'd be able to download more images." 

Other times, the request might be, "I need six children on a single team in blue shirts." 

And more often than that, the request might be very broad -- but important -- "we need images that show authentic-looking lifestyles...nothing too 'stocky.'"

Our goal is to mix these up to give you not only a sense of what specific items customers will be looking for, but also a sense of broad categories that have a high likelihood of getting downloads in the future. 

We'll mix it up.    As with anything, this should also mature and grow over time and feedback is always helpful.  Our ultimate goal is to create a connection between contributors and customer requests, as well as our own analysis of gaps in the collection.

Best,

Scott

Hello All,

Sorry for the delay.  

Regarding questions that came up about our policy with respect to public domain images:

Public domain images are typically those images for which the copyright has expired. Generally, it is safe to say that any image (published or unpublished) created before 1892 or by a U.S. artist who died prior to 1942 is in the public domain in the United States. It is not however easy to determine if an image fits those criteria and is in fact in the public domain.  As copyright laws vary from country to country, determining the copyright status of images created outside of the United States is more complex.  

Unfortunately, researching and verifying the copyright status of public domain images is not practical as part of the review process. On occasion, our policies have attempted to be more forgiving, but we can no longer accept public domain images.  For the foreseeable future we will be adhering to our existing guidelines, which prominently state "submissions must be wholly owned by the submitter. Found or public domain images or footage cannot be submitted under any circumstances."

http://submit.shutterstock.com/guidelines.mhtml

Thanks for your understanding and we sincerely apologize for any confusion.

There are no plans to remove public domain images that are currently in the collection, but we reserve the right to do so as we perform routine reviews and quality assurance.  

In addition, thank you for the feedback regarding our other review policies and communications.  As always, our goal is to have and maintain the best submission experience and your feedback is helpful.

Best Regards,

Scott
VP of Content
Shutterstock

Hi folks,

I'm looking into this one - I'll post what I find out.

Best,

Scott
VP of Content
Shutterstock

Hello,

As promised, we've posted a brief summary of these license types on our blog:

http://www.shutterstock.com/buzz/individual-image-licenses-update

Best Regards,

Scott

Shutterstock recently sponsored a 24-hour "Hack-A-Thon" for employees.  Everyone in the company was given 24 hours to come up with any idea and execute it.  

The Shutterstock footage team "4:3" created and produced this mixed-media short overnight, in just 24 hours:



Read more about the short here.

Enjoy!  

SITE IMPROVEMENTS:

You'll notice that we've also begun to make some of many expected improvements to the footage site.   We're starting with customer-facing features, such as the footage homepage, pricing page, and sign-up process.  Additional improvements will be released in the coming months.  

http://footage.shutterstock.com/

FEATURED CONTRIBUTOR:

This month, we've also featured contributor Sean Prior at Shutterbuzz:
http://buzz.shutterstock.com/sean-prior

As always, our customers are always looking for new clips and we're looking forward to your submissions.
http://submit.shutterstock.com/

More exciting things to come...

Best Regards,

Scott
GM, Shutterstock Footage

Hi guys,

Once you've opted in, we "de-duplicate" images between Shutterstock and Bigstock.  Essentially, there's an image analysis that measures attributes of the image to determine if the two images are the same within a certain threshold. 

There are a few occasions where there might be false identifications (for example, if someone uploads multiple versions of a basketball on a white background), but those are specific circumstances in which images had very similar attributes.

In terms of differences between review standards - those should go down with time or might simply reflect the specific reviewer you've gotten.  There are different reviewers at each service, but they're under a single umbrella "Content" team and our goal is to have consistent and shared standards for each.

Hi Warren,

We just made the change, so an announcement will be coming soon.

Best,

Scott