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Messages - topol
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1
« on: February 19, 2019, 15:57 »
The average plebs/prole always has near zero understanding of science, so it (and most other things) will always be a just a new religion to them, with 'scientists' as priests. One difference is that even in christian religion only the Pope was 'infallible', but your average climate fighter will assume that infallibility to basically all/any scientist who ever says anything according to the narrative, so they go way further than any oldschool religious bigot. The icing is on the cake is that these are the people who also tend to bash religions at every opportunity as something dumb and out-of-date. Best example of how pants-on-head dumb their view science is how they jump on to bash and call out anyone who questions the latest 'scientific revelations' as some kind of anti science hillbilly ... which is the exact opposite of the scientific attitude. For them being dogmatic = being scientific and vice versa. Mindblowing. This attitude is why you can sell them terms like "climate change" which makes as much sense as "blowing wind". Or how warming causes both warming and cooling and cold and hot weather and dry and wet... Even a smarter 6th grader should be able to figure out after a couple of times how this is just that well known favorite, amazing logical construct of dictators and alcoholic fathers "everything happens because of what I tell you" 
2
« on: January 16, 2019, 17:44 »
You might also say that people who previously commissioned photoshoots will now start buying microstock as their budget tightens, so who knows. The way they tinker with search on SS for example has far bigger and far more sudden effect than an economic slowdown.
3
« on: January 14, 2019, 05:45 »
If you want to be accepted by Stocksy desaturate a little the colors of your photos and make them a little brownish that's all
+include some transgender santaclaus wearing a plastic horsehead, shot on kodak portra. They like to accumulate unique stuff that's guaranteed to make that 0.1 sale / year.
4
« on: January 11, 2019, 11:35 »
Boy, are buyers going to be pi$$ed when they see these ads, think they are going to a professional site, then on the first search they have to wade through thousands of crap similars. What a waste of shutterstocks money. They should have used the $ to clean up the site.
Its good if they delete the never sold content of over 5+ years. This will really refresh the library and trash all the crappy and spammy images.
The spam does not work in the "relevant" settings, and 5+ years old stuff won't show in the fresh content setting, so deleting or leaving them has nothing to do with the spam.
5
« on: January 11, 2019, 11:32 »
I can't help thinking many customers are "Taking another look" at the reality of what Shutterstock have to offer and taking their custom elsewhere. For those of us in the UK we also know the slogan is a blatant rip off of failing institution Marks and Spencer "It's not just food its M&S food".
Which was a ripoff of a ripoff of a ripoff, as in being a pretty bland generic, un-creative ad campaign, that normally low-budget customers get from ad agencies. Would not be surprised if it was done in-house.
6
« on: December 14, 2018, 07:56 »
Easy money for reviews to accept all, even if theyre a few pennies each.
Ss is broken, and no one seems to care as long as revenues keep on increasing
But I guess they are paid the same money if they reject the files.
I believe these files are reviewed by AI which obviously is far away from perfect.
It shouldn't matter how lame their AI or human review is, they could throw out pics by the tens of thousands with a couple of clicks if they wanted to. The only way this could make sense to me: - They want boast about the numbers in their ads, I find this unlikely at this point, after reaching numbers like 100 million there is no point to this. - They want to split up the collection again similar to select/offset to justify having a go at raising prices, but probably not as high as offest etc...
8
« on: December 06, 2018, 13:35 »
I have a concern with Shutterstock Select and it is a big one. Right now they are saying GEAR UP. Get a RED, and the other gear on the gear list to the tune of $300,000 or more. Rent helicopters at $1000 per hour, plus the pilot (no drones please) and start submitting that quality of images into our regular collection and you MIGHT become the next photographer to get cherry picked to be in our Shutterstock Select collection. THEN THEY WILL DO THE SAME THING TO THE SELECT VIDEOS THAT THEY DID WITH THE REST OF THE VIDEO AND START SELLING THE CLIPS FOR $1.50. They did the same thing to us with video telling us all to gear up and start shooting video and make higher commissions on sales than with stills in a big huge webinar. And they betrayed us.
I believe what SS is up to with Select is an effort to con more of us into gearing up to produce that level of work on that level of gear which is all going into the cheap collection until you become a select contributor as a dishonest method to increase the overall quality of their video library without really paying us fairly once again. That has been operating basis of Shutterstock all along... promise a big pie in the sky, and then take it away once you reach it.
I would like nothing more than to be shooting on that level of gear, and that level of production, but micro stock isn't likely to provide the return on investment necessary to fund the cost of production.
True, although I think they did research and already knew beforehand that they have many contributors at hand who have the equipment/clips, and that their "base" for the collection. First-step of the catch is imho that they talk you into submitting your high-cost fancy clip into the higher price point licence scheme, and you can watch history repeat itself: it sells almost nothing, because microstock wins again over macro- and midstock - duh. Similar as stocksy or alamy: you can watch your stuff doing nuffin' at a higher price point or have some trickle or maybe a torrent at the low price point.
9
« on: December 06, 2018, 13:25 »
The quality of your gear reflects not just your pocketbook but also your love for a truly great image. Both can change over time. I've been happy with a Sony FS7 for years, but lately when I see Red images I do linger and feel an impulse to step up to the next level. There is an undeniable gorgeous quality to the camera, its detail and dynamic range. Buyers may not search for "Red" but they may unknowingly choose footage shot on Red simply because they love the look. Sure, a great DP can get great images out of any camera, but you can consistently get better images out of a Red. I'm feeling the pull of the beauty, may have to buy one.
Can one justify buying a Red as a business expense for shooting stock? I actually think it's a fair gamble. Everything else being equal, if one's image quality is a bit better than competing shots due to using a Red rather than an FS7, I could see that bringing in another couple thousand a year in additional sales, and over the years paying for itself. Plus I think the quality that comes from Red gets you more "looks" from picky high-end buyers who will only use top quality shots. And then there's just the job satisfaction that keeps you motivated and producing. I love my FS7 for documentary and corporate work, but when I've shot on Red it's been like, "Dam*, this is sexy."
Look at the examples, that's what customers see, a below-youtube quality vid. Wait it's not even that, they click further browsing by thumbnail quality - that is their search / selection process. That's why they have to write camera models into the description, because otherwise nobody would even know, and this makes the whole thing look kinda desperate to be honest... there is nothing there that justifies the higher price for the customers. Going by how my bosses related to these things, if you told them "maan I shot this on a 16K redepicgodzilla monstro" they would probably say "who the f**k cares" / "what is red epic" + the first one. To them it's button on the search menu that drops in the same things for higher price, so they likely just tell their employees to turn it off before they accidentally buy from that (actual experience from working at agencies).
10
« on: December 06, 2018, 07:37 »
Which never happens. Impossible.
I think these trashy spam pics never make it to the first page, not even the first 50.
I thought we were talking about the person that literally owns the first page of each of several key search terms. Examples were given (above, I think, unless that was a different thread...) of terms and pages that were 100% all from one person on Shutterstock in particular.
Can you show me those examples?
11
« on: December 05, 2018, 16:25 »
... If one guy controls that entire page...
Which never happens. Impossible. I think these trashy spam pics never make it to the first page, not even the first 50.
12
« on: December 05, 2018, 16:03 »
I would really like to talk to some of thees spammers, how it's working out for them. NO hostility or anything, truly juts curious. My bet is from my experience on how these sites work, they aren't achieving anything at all, it's a complete waste of time.
13
« on: December 05, 2018, 15:57 »
Hey, they're in love with the RED camera. All I'm saying is rent one and compete. Or not.
Yes I understand, but wasn't "selling fewer at a higher price point" the thing that got slaughtered by microstock?
14
« on: December 05, 2018, 15:24 »
Its more the finding of those locations. Thats the hard part.
The guy probably have been using leftovers from paid-for jobs for years directly to amass this library.
Hire some some models, book a location, rent a RED camera for a day, shoot 8 hours of footage, chop it into 30-second bites. One day gives you 960 clips. A month of that gives you tens of thousands. (If you're not picky.)
8 hours of work doesn't even remotely gets you 8 hours of finished apt footage. You won't even nearly have 8 hours of raw footage. That's like thinking if you shoot 250 images of a bunch of models you'll have 250 images worthy of upload.
15
« on: December 05, 2018, 15:00 »
Ye gads, that first guy has 15,000 videos, all beautiful, all amazing locations. This is why I never look at other people's portfolios. Disheartening.
One of their select contributors rents out his RED camera. Maybe find out how much he's charging? Just an idea. 
I tentatively started doping some stock footage but only by hacking my 5D mkIII with magic lantern. The workflow is cumbersome, but image quality is absolutely gorgeous especially if know your lightning. I wonder how many of the customers would tell that was made with an 1200% cheaper camera, my strong guess is: none.
16
« on: December 05, 2018, 14:55 »
Its more the finding of those locations. Thats the hard part.
The guy probably have been using leftovers from paid-for jobs for years directly to amass this library.
17
« on: December 05, 2018, 14:52 »
Probably because that first clip is exclusive to ShutterStock Select and was shot on some high-end camera/gear.
Now, does that make it worth 2x as much? In ShutterStock's eyes, yes. In a buyer's, probably not.
But I bet some high-end clients who have a hot line to a ShutterStock Select "concierge" to search and find clips for them will not think twice about paying those prices.
It's basically all perceived quality.
I think this will be a trend at agencies: exclusive clips with higher price points. I don't think the four top agencies like the same clips selling elsewhere for widely differing prices.
I'll be changing the way I operate in 2019 due to this.
I'v been customer/ licence buyer of stock / microstock for many years as an art director, with many colleagues doing the same next to me. The times when I was checking what equipment that photo/footage was made with or that coming up in discussion with anybody, anytime, is exactly zero. I never ever heard anybody having that concern, even remotely. People were furiously searching for an image / clip with a certain mood and attributes with the clock ticking. Most of us didn't even realize in the midst of the rush that these pictures actually belong to contributors. +I don't really understand what's the point of exclusivity when what the customers will perceive as "basically the same thing" is all over the net on a dozen other sites for less. I remember Oringer saying this is why there is no point in shutterstock offering exclusivity, and he was right. Wasn't this the reason why microstock spread and the reasoning for implementing subscription everywhere later? Once a site has done the cheap deal, you have to offer it too or you are done. There is no mythical mass of customers who have very special needs, because if there were microstock wouldn't have destroyed other stock, and it did. This is dead on arrival.
19
« on: November 12, 2018, 14:41 »
There are at least two different servers used to record earnings and if they get out of sync then the sales tally changes as we view it. We've seen that in practice in the past. So it's quite possible that there are different servers producing the tomato "best match" and they aren't in sync, particularly if there has been a recent change. Which one you hit when you make a search would probably be quite random.
My point is that there could be a lot of factors we don't know about, which makes obsessing about one interpretation/conspiracy theory or another quite pointless.
No its not conspiracy! its a fact! SS do tamper with our earnings! you know this isnt the only forum! there are two private forums and the criteria for joining is that you are a full-time photographer!...at least 70 members joined SS between 2005-2007 and some have giant portfolios and special portfolios and every single one is down at least 60-70%, every one!! so its no coincidence!
Most members here who have only been with SS some 5 years or less havent gone through what we have experienced! hence they find it impossible to believe any capping and controled earnings, theyre of course worried about their own future!
Anyway screw it! who cares? I mean really! remember Gostwyck, Liza, myself, you etc, etc, when we all many years back agreed that everything good will come to en end!....well it has!
You forgot Laurin in your group 
Not really. He just got a $120 sale. Conspiracists will not be able to count on him for a while. He is a happy camper boasting his achievements more than ever.
Do you actually believe anything he says? That guy is literally out of his mind.
20
« on: November 12, 2018, 11:04 »
They are 'churning' the images trying to push previously non/very low-selling/old files on customers. This is why they use the somewhat vague 'popular/relevant' instead of 'downloads', so they can change search to prefer, for example, offering old files on direct search result pages and in the "similars", which seem to be a very heavy preference now, or insert lot's of non/low sellers to make larger part of their stock commercially meaningful.
21
« on: October 17, 2018, 11:52 »
(...in business terms) Quality means "fit for purpose".
"ISO 8402-1986 standard defines quality as "the totality of features and characteristics of a product or service that bears its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs."
Art: Art is a diverse range of human activities in creating, which express the author's imaginative or technical skill, intended to be appreciated for their beauty or emotional power.
Microstock is not really about art, it's about the business of making useful images that buyers want and need to express or convey a message. Something very creative or artistic might never get one download on stock sites because the images need to be about their message.
True however a more artistic version of an image, might get more downloads and make more than a strictly boring factual image. Still the objective here is not about creative ART but the message and the concept.
Unless it's scientific or forensic, a non-high art picture's only real purpose is to be attractive/aesthetically attractive. Since these pics mostly go into uses that either ad or ad-like, with some ultra-rare exceptions, that is their sole purpose.
22
« on: October 17, 2018, 11:45 »
Noticed a pattern when reading about htis os SS forums, ppl who are happy with the changes seems to have very amateurish of not downright questionable content, ppl who's DLs are down seem to have very professional ports.
Seems buyers might not agree.........I'm not sure anyone is actually happy with the way SS have gone recently they just don't take it as if SS have some personal vendetta against them and are deliberately trashing their own profits just to spite them.
- Many if not most of the buyers aren't very refined taste ppl. Few of my super best sellers are downright lame if not some of my worst shots. Whenever they pop up for me on the net somewhere, I still can't get what . they like about them.
- In such a huge system with so many merchandise and customers, you can sneakily 'force' things on ppl quite effectively without them noticing for a long time, like google skewing search results either for marketing or political reasons.
I think often people mistake buyers requirements which is "fit for purpose" with some perceived requirement for technically and artistically brilliant photographs. If two pictures are equally fit for purpose whose to say which one should be ranked higher? The market decides quality not fellow professionals.
No, this is visual arts, even if not high art, qualified people decide what is quality not the plebs. They may prefer to buy whatever they want, but they have no say in what beauty or aesthetic is... or more accurately they simply can't tell at all which is proven every single day as they just find amazing whatever they are told to, otherwise there wouldn't be a fashion rotation in just about everything. Also I have the aesthetic-attractive shots where I already say saving them 'this will be a seller' and they almost always are sellers. So actual real aesthetic does count even here, it is the more reliable part of the system.
You clearly don't understand what "quality" means in commercial/business terms. You make my point for me. Quality means "fit for purpose".
"ISO 8402-1986 standard defines quality as "the totality of features and characteristics of a product or service that bears its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs."
ISO? Yo you have an ISO-like exact standard for what is good stock photo completely away form that it should be aesthetically pleasing? These are pictures not CNC heads. This must be one of the stupidest things I ever read here. 
23
« on: October 17, 2018, 11:36 »
Hello, I am almost one year in microstock, I have near of 2.000 videos in shutter, AS and Pond 5.
I was very happy because the sales started to get steady, more or less 100 $ at month in shutter and AS, this one even more (in september 200 $) and Pond 5 some months sells for good money, so I thought even the sales will be take off finally...
But since 15 days It is not selling anything!! It wasnt happen never to me, sometimes I had some bumps, but 1 week or 2 maximun, and never at the 3 agencies at the same time, I dont belive in the conspiracy plots... but, what is happening? Octuber is (normally) a good month... maybe is because I am not uploading in this last 10 days? but in august i didnt uploaded in the whole month and I sold as "normal (near of 100 $ in each agency) I dont know maybe is just bad luck... I wonder if someone have been there too.
Thanks
I looked your photos over and they are OK
However
"A beautiful woman using her laptop in the bedroom"
I would avoid these cliche titles and go for more description
Example " Young female teenager or student checking her course work on a lap top in her bedroom"
Try and make the descriptions less about how you see the girls (beautiful sexy etc) and more about what the girls are doing and why they are doing it etc.
Ladies are more than beautiful and sexy and buyers will prefer more about what the image is about.
That way it comes over better.
I can tell you as someone who has been 'buyer' working next to many others like me (graphic artist / art director) that the title / description is near meaningless. I don't think I ever bothered to read and/or comprehend any title or description as I was rushing through the pictures to find that special one, and I never met anyone in the business who gave the slightest care about them either. I knew quite a few ppl working like me who after even years of using shutter/similar didn't even realize there is "title", and that the pictures have owners with portfolios.
24
« on: October 09, 2018, 10:52 »
- In such a huge system with so many merchandise and customers, you can sneakily 'force' things on ppl quite effectively without them noticing for a long time, like google skewing search results either for marketing or political reasons.
There are only a hundred places in the first 100 search results and if your file doesn't find its way into one of those then its chances of a sale are slim. It's not really about forcing things on people, just that the search algorithm has to find a way of ordering files and if there are 10,000 returns in a search then the chance of any file making it into the top 1% to get seen are slim. If age is factored in, old files are going to struggle to maintain position.
I was on the other side opf this system as 'buyer' for many years (art director/graphic artist) and I wouldn't say it's actually that severely bad, we usually went through quite a few pages (at least 10+), but there is a tight limit for sure. Imho if you can manipulate the search and put things you want in those first dozen pages, you are kinda forcing them on ppl. The reason is that most workplaces, businesses have subscriptions and some loyalty to sites, and you have limited time. So going to other sites is not an option, and you simply have no time for more than, let's say, 15 pages. You are watching the clock and you have to pick one from those.
25
« on: October 09, 2018, 10:45 »
Noticed a pattern when reading about htis os SS forums, ppl who are happy with the changes seems to have very amateurish of not downright questionable content, ppl who's DLs are down seem to have very professional ports.
Seems buyers might not agree.........I'm not sure anyone is actually happy with the way SS have gone recently they just don't take it as if SS have some personal vendetta against them and are deliberately trashing their own profits just to spite them.
Maybe, but imho there are 2 things more pro contributors often forget:
- Many if not most of the buyers aren't very refined taste ppl. Few of my super best sellers are downright lame if not some of my worst shots. Whenever they pop up for me on the net somewhere, I still can't get what . they like about them.
- In such a huge system with so many merchandise and customers, you can sneakily 'force' things on ppl quite effectively without them noticing for a long time, like google skewing search results either for marketing or political reasons.
I think often people mistake buyers requirements which is "fit for purpose" with some perceived requirement for technically and artistically brilliant photographs. If two pictures are equally fit for purpose whose to say which one should be ranked higher? The market decides quality not fellow professionals.
No, this is visual arts, even if not high art, qualified people decide what is quality not the plebs. They may prefer to buy whatever they want, but they have no say in what beauty or aesthetic is... or more accurately they simply can't tell at all which is proven every single day as they just find amazing whatever they are told to, otherwise there wouldn't be a fashion rotation in just about everything. Also I have the aesthetic-attractive shots where I already say saving them 'this will be a seller' and they almost always are sellers. So actual real aesthetic does count even here, it is the more reliable part of the system.
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