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Messages - stephenkirsh

Pages: [1] 2
1
iStockPhoto.com / Re: No payment from Getty ESP
« on: May 20, 2017, 11:29 »
double post

2
iStockPhoto.com / Re: No payment from Getty ESP
« on: May 20, 2017, 11:28 »
It's my understanding that iStock earnings/payments are now processed/displayed in the Getty ESP, right?

They're saying I should have a payment on April 25th, but I haven't received anything yet.

Am I understanding this system wrong, or are there other issues going on?

They show what you're going to get on the 20th and then we get payed on the 25th. So 5 days to go yet...

April 25th was about 25 days ago.

Or do you mean to say, they show you what you're getting paid for the NEXT month?

3
iStockPhoto.com / No payment from Getty ESP
« on: May 19, 2017, 21:39 »
It's my understanding that iStock earnings/payments are now processed/displayed in the Getty ESP, right?

They're saying I should have a payment on April 25th, but I haven't received anything yet.

Am I understanding this system wrong, or are there other issues going on?

4
I'm getting the "Your account isn't set up for ESP" problem too.

I've gone around and around with customer support and they just keep telling me to do the same thing "Reset your password."  So I do that, and login and then it's the same problem and I contact them and get connected with a DIFFERENT support person who just tells me the same stupid thing.

I'm unaware of an ESP invite from 2 years ago.  I have both photo and videos on iStock.

I got a response from them saying:
"There is currently an issue with your ESP account we are currently looking into. Once we resolve it I will let you know. I apologize for the inconvenience."


A few days later they said it's been resolved and I was able to login with their provided password.  I still can't figure out how to change my password, though.

What is this, amateur hour?  I just don't understand how they can manage to screw something up so massively.  Once I can get in and out of my account I'll be shutting it down and deleting my portfolio.  They used to be my #1 or #2 every year, but they've dropped down to the bottom of the pack. 

5
I'm getting the "Your account isn't set up for ESP" problem too.

I've gone around and around with customer support and they just keep telling me to do the same thing "Reset your password."  So I do that, and login and then it's the same problem and I contact them and get connected with a DIFFERENT support person who just tells me the same stupid thing.

I'm unaware of an ESP invite from 2 years ago.  I have both photo and videos on iStock.

6
ok thanks guys!

7
Need to replace some AA rechargeable.  Are Eneloops still the go-to ones?

8
General Stock Discussion / Best slideshow software
« on: March 05, 2016, 00:10 »
Mods, please move this if there's a better spot.

I'm shooting a softball tournament in which the client has requested that players/families be able to view images on location.  I won't have internet access.  I'm running a handful of computers out in the middle of the field.

I'm looking for software for OSX, but possibly windows.  My goal is to run this off a few macs, but can improvise with windows machines if needed.

What slideshow software do you guys use for clients?

9
Pond5 / Re: Pond 5 review changes
« on: March 04, 2016, 22:28 »
Maybe write to them directly?
https://www.facebook.com/groups/720805501262878/?fref=ts

Interesting... looks like they're based in Czech.

10
Pond5 / Re: Pond 5 review changes
« on: March 04, 2016, 22:27 »
I got most of my last uploads accepted, but the notice with some of the rejections was interesting.
"At this point, the clips with this topic that have a greater chance of acceptance on the site are both unusual and high-quality. The best way to tell whether or not your clip has a good chance of getting rejected would be to do a search on our site for what you're thinking of creating before you put in the time to make it, and see how many results come up. If it's something that has 100+ very similar results, then chances are we're not currently looking for more unless they're something we haven't seen before or something that will make us say "wow"."

On one hand I can see how more than 100 clips of a subject wouldn't be of much use to them. But most topics do need to be updated to stay fresh and up to date. Also this means that they wouldn't be accepting anything that isn't a niche.

What a strange rejection reason...

I didn't upload 100 files of the same subject, it was from 3 different shoots, and one was travel oriented, so very few "similar" were uploaded.

11
Pond5 / Pond 5 review changes
« on: March 03, 2016, 22:02 »
Pond 5 always used to be my highest approval rating... 95%+.  I always thought it was a bit odd that they just accepted most everything, but ok. 

Now, the last 3 times I've submitted, I've got 90% REJECTED.  I don't expect them to just keep accepting everything, but these same ~100 images/videos got acceptance ratios ranging from 35-75% on the other stock sites.

What gives?  They have an easy upload process, and I make decent money from all my old content, but it's not wroth the time if they're rejecting everything everybody else is accepting.

12
Microstock News / Re: Has Yuri shut down his site?
« on: January 06, 2016, 21:31 »
looks like Yuri's site is back up.

13
Microstock News / Re: Has Yuri shut down his site?
« on: January 05, 2016, 23:58 »
That's really not good at all. I've been using his keywording site for ages and it was very very convenient.

There are lots of alternatives. One example, http://microstockgroup.com/tools/keyword.php


Thanks! :) I know this one. But Yuri website had this huge advantage that he showed how popular are given keywords and also how much searched. This was very useful.


Yea I liked Yuri's better, but the MSG one is close enough that I'll manage.

I just wish it would put the key words in alphabetical order.



The order of the words isn't by chance.  They are ordered by how often they are used in the set of images you chose... so supposedly the most important ones are first.  Some sites want the most important words first.  If you want to sort the chosen keywords alphabetically you can press the little A button on the right side.


I press the little A button and don't get good results.  See my screen shots for the two options it gives me.

The first one is sorted with "Fiat" at the front.  The second one sorts "Italy" to the front.  Definitely not alphabetical.  So it's broken, at best. 




You may have noticed that it was sorting correctly but sorting capital words first.  The second example is with the alphabetic sorting turned off.  In which case it first prioritizes the words you added manually, then adds the words that you select from the left side - this isn't broken and is working like it should.

I have fixed the bias given to capitals so not it sorts correctly irregardless of capital letter or not.


"working as it should" and "working as helpful to the users" are two different things.

I do appreciate the update to the tool, though.  Thanks!

14
Microstock News / Re: Has Yuri shut down his site?
« on: January 05, 2016, 00:26 »
That's really not good at all. I've been using his keywording site for ages and it was very very convenient.

There are lots of alternatives. One example, http://microstockgroup.com/tools/keyword.php


Thanks! :) I know this one. But Yuri website had this huge advantage that he showed how popular are given keywords and also how much searched. This was very useful.


Yea I liked Yuri's better, but the MSG one is close enough that I'll manage.

I just wish it would put the key words in alphabetical order.



The order of the words isn't by chance.  They are ordered by how often they are used in the set of images you chose... so supposedly the most important ones are first.  Some sites want the most important words first.  If you want to sort the chosen keywords alphabetically you can press the little A button on the right side.


I press the little A button and don't get good results.  See my screen shots for the two options it gives me.

The first one is sorted with "Fiat" at the front.  The second one sorts "Italy" to the front.  Definitely not alphabetical.  So it's broken, at best. 


15
Microstock News / Re: Has Yuri shut down his site?
« on: January 03, 2016, 21:12 »
That's really not good at all. I've been using his keywording site for ages and it was very very convenient.

There are lots of alternatives. One example, http://microstockgroup.com/tools/keyword.php


Thanks! :) I know this one. But Yuri website had this huge advantage that he showed how popular are given keywords and also how much searched. This was very useful.


Yea I liked Yuri's better, but the MSG one is close enough that I'll manage.

I just wish it would put the key words in alphabetical order.

16
General Stock Discussion / Re: Yuri Arcurs keywording tool gone?
« on: January 03, 2016, 21:12 »
http://www.microstockgroup.com/microstock-news/has-yuri-shut-down-his-site/msg440202/#msg440202

It's not a totally bad thing.
Several keyword spammers claimed to be using his tool.


ok thanks; I'll use that thread.

17
General Stock Discussion / Yuri Arcurs keywording tool gone?
« on: January 03, 2016, 20:29 »
I've been out of stock for a bit.  Went to go keyword some images and found my ol' Yuri Arcurs tool won't load.  His whole personal website won't load.

Just bad timing, or did he shut the site down?

18
I'm effectively giving up uploading content to iStock unless I'm really bored.

iStock's upload process is the longest and most difficult of all microstock sites, which already made me put it at the bottom of the list for which site got my uploads.  Lately I've had many difficulties regarding model releases, which I've not had ONE problem elsewhere (which includes most microstock agencies and one RM-only agency).  I believed I finally got it all settled when I got this rejection notice:

"Note that model releases cannot be reused and a new one should be completed for each new photo session."

This model release happened to be for my girlfriend.  Using iStock's guidelines, I would have to make a new release every week.  So iStock wants me to manage up to 52 model releases per year per model?

I know my earnings are peanuts compared to some contributors, but this site is no longer welcoming to me.  I get the feeling iStock moderators will delete this thread (which I posted on their forums hoping for feedback.  Don't laugh!) because they do not want feedback from their contributors.

Bottom line:  The model release policy is ridiuclous and needs to be updated.  I can't be the only one encountering problems like this?

19
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Shoot description rejections...
« on: June 06, 2013, 22:13 »
since ever (at least from 2009)

I've been contributing since 2008 and never had any problems before.



ah ditto, have had MR rejections too, although oddly a few images got through :o and a few were flagged.

* missing postcode, seriously!
* and missing shootdate/description, which it was not. hmm, are they just getting a bit trigger happy?


See that's my problem with situation!  The inconsistency!

20
iStockPhoto.com / Re: Shoot description rejections...
« on: June 05, 2013, 18:17 »
They must have made a change recently.  I've been getting rejections.  I inquired about it on the forums and they said I was missing the "shoot description" part.  So now I have to make a release for the same person every time I shoot?

They're also inconsistent; sometimes images went through with the "old" release and sometimes they were rejected saying "incomplete release info."

It's honestly very frustrating and discouraging, as if iStock didn't need any other complaints against them.

21
iStockPhoto.com / Re: istock sales for new contributors
« on: May 07, 2013, 20:41 »
iStock has historically been my slowest selling site since I started doing microstock in early 2009, however, it's been my highest earner.

22
Pond5 / Re: Sales drop lately @ pond5
« on: May 07, 2013, 20:40 »
It's gotta be something else causing the issue.  For a 50% drop in sales, I would assume there would have to be a doubling of the content on the site to evenly distribute total file demand.  But there's no way they could have doubled the total files in just 3 months.

23
Pond5 / Sales drop lately @ pond5
« on: May 07, 2013, 16:13 »
For the last 3 years I've had at least 1-2 sales a month on a portfolio of ~150 720p files.  I haven't had a sale since January of this month, my longest dry streak ever.  Since they started accepting images, I've also added ~150 images, and only 1 sale so far (which was also in January).

Bad luck for me, or has anybody else seen a change?

24
123RF / Re: Buyout Request for Image
« on: May 03, 2013, 17:39 »
Try and get an idea of who the client is, if you can.  It'll give you a clue of how deep their pockets are.   Healthcare, pharma, financials all pay a lot for images.  $25k for an image, as mlwinphoto said, is more common than people think.

25
123RF / Re: What's the best uploading method for 123RF?
« on: May 03, 2013, 17:36 »
I never said Foap was good, or that I like it, or that I even actively upload to it any more.  Simply that it exists and I've uploaded in the past.  Foap's a toy, basically, but since there's SO many different forums on this site, I thought there might be interest and helpful to the group to add a forum.  It's interesting to see how the community has handled the suggestion, though.

For iStock, I use DeepMeta which makes iStock's process just as fast or slow as the others.

iStock, SS, Fotolia, DP, Pond5, etc have a much more sophisticated uploading process with many more options, such as categories.  123RF made me feel like I was doing something wrong because of the reasons I listed above.  I came here to ask for some guidance and got a little bit, but it was mixed in with ridicule. 



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