pancakes

MicrostockGroup Sponsors


Show Posts

This section allows you to view all posts made by this member. Note that you can only see posts made in areas you currently have access to.


Messages - unnonimus

Pages: 1 ... 11 12 13 14 15 [16] 17 18
376
Photo Critique / Re: what is my photo/portfolio worth?
« on: December 12, 2016, 13:27 »
please let me explain a bit further...

I have perhaps 30,000 photos. however, processing them and preparing them for sale takes a long time. I sent some test images to SS to determine if it is viable, if it is worth putting the time into putting them up for sale. my first impression is that it will be largely a waste of time considering that it will divert me from my other work.

I have been averaging about 75 cents to $1 per day but to me I am not sure if it is worth it to continue doing so if each photo might only sell 1 time, and only 10% of them sell.

I would rather get some insight now, rather than wait 1 year to see if it was worth it.

377
based on what he said, it being split on the customer invoice, it sounds like VB is keeping the $30 difference as a membership fee.

378
General Photography Discussion / Re: Shooting from a moving car
« on: December 11, 2016, 18:54 »
I used bungee cords to mount tripods around the door frame (either at the rear view mirror side or at the door handle side). sometimes it did damage to the door. I have recorded many hours of video, and have driven full speed on the highway at 75mph filming. when the tripod is mounted by the driver side door and the rear view mirror, it is easy to turn the camera on and off. I usually use at least 3 bungee cords. it takes some practice to make sure the camera is level.

I also mounted tripods to the front grill of the car but it causes some vibration or movement.

I have mounted tripods inside the car on the passenger seat.

I have mounted tripods under the rear bumper, and under the hood to view the engine as the vehicle drives.

some example footage:
http://www.shutterstock.com/video/clip-7624921-stock-footage-syracuse-new-york-june-new-cars-at-chevrolet-dealership-on-june-in-syracuse-new.html?src=gallery/HQMQDZrG0e_VDwu6Iv1_CA:1:11/3p
http://www.shutterstock.com/video/clip-6590729-stock-footage-driving-behind-dump-truck-on-highway.html?src=gallery/HQMQDZrG0e_VDwu6Iv1_CA:1:13/3p
http://www.shutterstock.com/video/clip-6761497-stock-footage-suburban-houses-homes-dwellings-residential-buildings-pov-shot-american-dream-concept.html?src=gallery/HQMQDZrG0e_VDwu6Iv1_CA:1:47/3p

for some tripods, you may have to mount them backwards in order to make them level.

379
this is a perfect example as to how stock agencies are completely clueless as to what copyright law is and as to how it works. demanding a property release for the images has no legal value whatsoever. in fact, you won't find 'property releases' mentioned anywhere in copyright law.

what you need is a copyright transfer agreement. you file a copyright transfer agreement with the government agency in your country (such as the US copyright office) for the entire collection. once you do that, you are the copyright owner, and your rights are recognized by any and all countries that have a copyright treaty with the US, which is going to cover the majority of the world.

once you transfer the copyright to you, you don't have to acknowledge or mention the original copyright owner, ever.

copyrights are not always owned by the person who took the photograph. they can be transferred, sold, done as work for hire, etc.

380
re: "News agency claims painting of prosecutor copies an AP photo"

this sounds like fair use because the new work is a different form, it has been upheld in court many times.

381
QUESTION: "Is it legally possible to buy stock-photos from an individual or company with the rights to resell them in their original or modified form? "

Yes, if you have a mechanical license. A mechanical license would allow you to resell the photo, and for each sale, you would pay a portion of the profits to the original rights owner. However, I doubt you will find a stock photo agency that offers mechanical licenses.

382
what you describe is a classic case of copyright infringement. another person is taking your work and presenting it as his own. clients like the work you did, but they are hiring someone else. this is what copyright laws are designed to prevent.

383
Photo Critique / what is my photo/portfolio worth?
« on: December 11, 2016, 17:27 »
I just started selling photos about 3 weeks ago. I was wondering if you can give me an idea of how much I will make with it, only on shutterstock (other sites have not approved my work yet so they are not for sale)

My best selling photo sold 3 times on shutterstock (in the first 2 days) for 38 cents per sale.
http://www.shutterstock.com/pic.mhtml?id=519838123

How much is this photo going to earn me in the long run?

in 3 weeks, my entire SS portfolio has earned me about $20. every sale was for 38 cents. how much might I expect to earn with my existing portfolio in 1 year, or monthly, or for its lifetime? how many years do images sell for?

thanks

384
General Stock Discussion / how to set IPTC title?
« on: December 08, 2016, 06:16 »
I have been having problems setting the correct IPTC title. most sites are not reading my IPTC data properly for the title. these are the fields I am setting for each file:

Image Description               : Pretty Teen Girl Smiling
User Comment                    : Pretty Teen Girl Smiling
Caption                         : Pretty Teen Girl Smiling
Label                           : Pretty Teen Girl Smiling
Description                     : Pretty Teen Girl Smiling
Title                           : Pretty Teen Girl Smiling
Keywords                        : adolescent, adorable, appearance, attractive, beautiful, beauty, child, childhood, children, cute, female, girl, happiness, happy, joy, joyful, juvenile, kid, kids, minor, people, person, pretty, smile, smiling, teen, teenager, teens, young, youngster, youth
Headline                        : Pretty Teen Girl Smiling
Caption-Abstract                : Pretty Teen Girl Smiling

can you please tell me which field needs to be set for the title to be read by most sites? thanks

385
General Stock Discussion / kozzi out of business??
« on: July 26, 2016, 15:24 »
a few days ago, maybe yesterday, kozzi was working, now they seem to have pulled stock searches and the contributor url is a 404 error.

386
General Stock Discussion / Re: Is a photo of a map legal?
« on: July 26, 2016, 15:22 »
"You can be sued for copyright even for 6 notes, but only if those six notes represent some very recognizable phrase.".

correct.

it isn't dependent on what you copy, but whether it creates confusion.

here is an example:

This would be potentially infringing:

Person A: "I just heard a song on the radio, it was Thriller".

Person B: "No, it sounds like Thriller, but it is a different song by a different group".

This would not be infringing:

A song that sounds like Thriller, is in the same style, uses some of the same riffs, samples some of the original song, but is clearly a different song and does not confuse people into thinking it is the original song, or the original artist.

As long as the new work (in this case a song) does not confuse people into thinking it is the original song, it is usually not infringing. it is written in the US copyright law. it can remind people of the original song, but not confuse people into thinking it is the original song.



387
"It's always been my understanding that you can only sell images containing logos if they're sold on an editorial basis. Otherwise, you're not allowed. "

your understanding is wrong.

logos **cannot** be copyrighted.

logos are only infringing if you use them to pretend to be the owner of the trademark, by selling a competing product.

It has been upheld in a court of law, U of Alabama vs Daniel Moore that it is legal for photographers to sell photos with logos, without the permission of the trademark holder.

I have read the USPTO and the US copyright web site for many many years and the laws are simple, clear, and easy to understand, and the stock media agencies are completely wrong in regards to copyrights and trademarks. they have a rudimentary knowledge and are often wrong about copyrights and trademarks.

it is misinformation to state that you cannot photograph logos and sell them. that act in itself is not infringing.

for example, a news agency wants to do a story about Ford. they need a shot of the Ford logo. they either get it for free somewhere, or they buy it from a photographer. it is 100% legal for the photographer to sell a photo of the logo (for which he retains the copyright) and profit from his work.


388
General Stock Discussion / Re: Is a photo of a map legal?
« on: July 24, 2016, 20:24 »
yes, you can sell photos of small portions of maps.

in order for copyrights to be infringed, there has to be a financial loss for the original copyright owner. for example, if you take a photo of just the area that has Athens, it would not compete with the sale of the entire map from the original copyright holder, because your photo is essentially not a map.

if you took a photo of the entire map, people could buy your photo and then they would not need to buy the original map, which takes revenues away from the original copyright holder. this is clearly infringing.

taking a photo of a small portion of the map would not take sales away from the original copyright holder, and therefor it falls under "Fair Use" as a derivative work.

389
logos are not copyrightable.

logos "identify source". meaning, they identify the provider of a service, or the manufacturer of goods.

infringement of a logo is when a person or business uses the logo to sell a competing service or manufactured goods.

Chrysler selling cars with FORD logo = infringement

you taking photo of FORD logo and selling photo = not infringement



390
General Stock Discussion / Re: PRORES vs H.264 Tested
« on: June 09, 2016, 19:29 »
I am seeing the same thing over and over again, testing various input files.

H.264: substantially smaller file size as compared to prores

H.264 and PRORES modify about the same number of pixels, or often H.264 modifies fewer pixels after rendering

When pixels are changed, PRORES changes each pixel to a smaller degree than H.264, or to a similar degree. But I don't see H.264 modifying each pixel to a lesser degree than PRORES.

PRORES has  less of an impact on pixels, H.264 changes fewer pixels, H.264 has vastly smaller file size.

391
General Stock Discussion / PRORES vs H.264 Tested
« on: June 09, 2016, 01:46 »
I wanted to know which codec is the best, so I wrote a program that does a pixel by pixel comparison of an input video and an output video, converted using various codecs and quality settings.

In this test, I tested H.264, MJPEG, MPEG4, and PRORES.

Results:

QUALITY TEST: H.264 and PRORES are about equal when the original encoder is Lavf56.1.0. About 12.4% of pixels were altered when using the highest quality settings (for H.264 I used the 2nd highest quality setting). The difference in color of each modified pixel was minimal with both codecs.

FILE SIZE: H.264 increased the original file size by a factor of 4.73. PRORES was 81.37 times larger than the original file size.

RESULTS: H.264 and PRORES rendered at similar quality, but H.264 has superior compression, 40x better than PRORES.

I will show results for other encoders and codecs once the testing finishes processing.


ffmpeg -y -loglevel panic -i 'video/2012-01-01-dirt-bike-racing/01225.mp4' -vcodec libx264 -vpre veryslow -crf 1 '/tmp/out2.mov' > /dev/null 2>&1
Lavf56.1.0      libx264  43,013,139     4.73    2       1       tiff    3,526   256,970 0.124

avconv -y -loglevel quiet -i 'video/2012-01-01-dirt-bike-racing/01225.mp4' -c:v mjpeg  -an '/tmp/out2.mov' > /dev/null 2>&1
Lavf56.1.0      mjpeg    63,567,788     6.98    1       1       tiff    36,807  877,614 0.423

avconv -y -loglevel quiet -i 'video/2012-01-01-dirt-bike-racing/01225.mp4' -c:v mpeg4 -qscale 1 -mbd rd -flags +mv4+aic -trellis 2 -cmp 2 -subcmp 2 -g 300 -an '/tmp/out2.mov' > /dev/null 2>&1
Lavf56.1.0      mpeg4    54,680,471     6.01    1       1       tiff    7,078   492,330 0.237

avconv -y -loglevel quiet -i 'video/2012-01-01-dirt-bike-racing/01225.mp4' -c:v prores -qscale 1 -profile:v 3 -an '/tmp/out2.mov' > /dev/null 2>&1
Lavf56.1.0      prores  740,580,696     81.37   3       1       tiff    1,736   257,918 0.124

The columns of the results are: original encoder, output codec, new file size, ratio of file size compared to original, profile, qscale, image frame file format, difference in pixels affected, total number of pixels affected, and ratio of pixels affected.

392
General Stock Discussion / Re: Textile design copyright?
« on: June 08, 2016, 17:04 »
As a photographer, you can legally sell any photo you take, regardless of the content of the photo.

The infringement comes from how the photo is used, not from the person taking the photo. There are no copyright infringement laws regarding photographers taking photos or selling their work.

Copyright infringement can only occur if the work prevents the original copyright owner from earning money by selling a competing work.

It is not logical that a photo of a textile would prevent a textile designer from selling textiles. You are not taking their customers away from them. If you made your own textiles, using the textile design of another company, you would be infringing their copyrights, because you could take customers away from the original designer, who would buy your textiles (with a copied design) instead of the original. A textile buyer cannot buy your photo and used it to replace a purchase of a textile. Therefor, it is not infringing.


University of Alabama vs Daniel Moore. Court upheld that photographer can sell photos that include uniform designs of university athletes, which is similar to your case (textile patterns and designs).


My source for copyright law:

United States Copyright Office


Bad sources for copyright laws:

forums, the media, customer support staff, common knowledge, web pages of stock media companies, etc.


There is 1 case where your photo can infringe on copyright and that is if you take a photo of another photo and resell your photo. otherwise, don't worry.

393
yes, you can sell photos of logos.

logos are trademarks, and trademarks do not receive any copyright protection.

Andy Warhol famously sold paintings which contained logos such as Coca Cola, Campbell's Soup, etc, and he did so legally.

University of Alabama vs Daniel Moore upheld that photographers can sell photos which contain logos.

In fact, as a freelance photographer, you have the legal right to sell any photo that you take.

394
Alamy.com / Re: Any tips on keywording/workflow?
« on: May 30, 2016, 17:21 »
only 15% of my portfolio ever sells, so it is easy to only add the keywords to the best portion of the portfolio, and skip the rest or leave them for later.

the other options is to send them a csv and ask them to add it to your account.

395
Shutterstock.com / Re: Do I Need A Property Release Here?
« on: May 28, 2016, 07:18 »
According to the US copyright office, all buildings before 1990 are not protected by copyright.

Also, windows, doors, and anything that is a necessary structure of a building are not protected by copyrighted.

http://copyright.gov/circs/circ41.pdf

Ineligible Building Designs
The following building designs cannot be registered:
Designs that were constructed, or whose plans or drawings were published,
before December 1, 1990
Designs that were unconstructed and created in unpublished plans or drawings
on December 1, 1990, and were not constructed on or before December
31, 2002
Structures other than buildings, such as bridges, cloverleafs, dams, walkways,
tents, recreational vehicles, mobile homes, and boats


Some buildings not protected by copyright in the US:
Empire State Building
Chrysler Building
all buildings built before 1990

396
The short story as to why Dissolve closed my account is because I discovered that they were penalizing me in the search results. ALL of my videos came up dead last in search results. They removed my videos from search to prevent people from discovering what they were doing, after I publically posted it. Luckily I made screenshots and saved copies.

They penalized me in search results after a long long history of retaliating against me to try and make my videos unsellable. They were claiming that my portfolio was unsellable to try to force me to change my titles, but it was because they were penalizing me in search results. THEY DO THIS TO OTHER CONTRIBUTORS ALSO.

The fact remains that even they they complained about my titles being too short, THEY APPROVED THEM.

1. they complained about me having non-narrative titles

2. I changed the titles that they asked me to

3. they refused to review them

4. I wrote short narrative titles for new footage

5. they refused to review them for 8 months

6. I complained that my videos have been unreviewed for 8 months. they ignored me

7. I complained a second time, 2 weeks later, and they started reviewing some videos

8. 2 months later they claimed my videos don't sell because of my metadata, even though they were only online for 2 months

9. they banded me from uploading new content. they told me they would not review existing uploads until 2017

10. they said they would monitor my sales

11. I noticed I was being penalized in search results. I mentioned this to them

12. they closed my account, citing that I released 'confidential information' about their company. I have no confidential information about their company and released no confidential information about their company.

my sales started out strong. but they plummeted once they started to refuse to review my content.

all this time, they ignored repeated requests to speak to them, or to speak to a manager, or to provide me with more specific information, etc. Aaron and Char both took responsibility for what was going on with my account.

it doesn't bother me that much about them closing my account, because they are refusing to sell my videos. even if they did not close my account, I am never going to have meaningful sales except for the period before they penalized me in search results.

other contributors need to know about what goes on with these types of companies. that is the purpose of the forum.

short titles is no reason to close someone's account, and contributors should not be responsible for Dissolve SEO.

397
"It will definitely benefit SEO to have longer (accurate) descriptions"

no it doesn't. I have been doing web development since 1994. I have done SEO since webcrawler and the first search engines. there is no such thing that all companies can get free traffic from SEO on search engines from potential buyers the majority of organic search engine traffic goes to the big players like amazon, and almost nothing goes to smaller companies like dissolve.

over 2 decades of web design, I have discovered that 95% to 99% of my traffic was search engines crawling my site, and sales for search engines never accounted for more than 10% of my business. SEO is a pipe dream for nave web developers and cannot sustain any business.

only 1 web site can be at the top of search results for any given search, and with 15 stock footage companies, and your videos on all 15 sites with the same metadata, dissolve will not be at that top spot, and their SEO attempt will fail miserably.

398
"No, I would suggest you had your account closed because you are calling out individual people by name and unbelievably  saying they are bad employees on a public forum because they don't agree with you. "

It is clear that this is not a matter of people agreeing or disagreeing, but instead a matter of punishing, penalizing, and retaliating against me because they don't like the fact that I complained, and almost all of their behavior occurred over the course of a year, I am only writing in the forum at the end of the relationship in the final days. My forum posting has nothing to do with their poor behavior over the course of the year.

They chose to not resolve this matter, and I have the right to speak about it to whomever I want to, whenever I want to.

399
Sorry, but you are wrong with these statements:

"They continued to communicate and try to work with you"

No they did not, they ignored me and ignored me and ignored me. Refusing to review my uploads is not "continuing to work with me", and neither is refusing to respond to my emails or my requests to speak to them. and this started from the beginning. in addition, if I inquired about why they did something, they changed their policy to make them more difficult to work with.

Second of all, I never put keywords in the titles. Keywords are words just like anything else. I merely removed prepositions and other useless words, and it only affected a few videos. 75% of my titles were written very well, such as "Hispanic man talking on phone". but they think that is too short, and they want titles that are "short narratives".

here is one of their lousy titles that they require:
"Beach party at sunset with bonfire and roasting marshmellows with friends"
http://dissolve.com/products/001-D18-10-161

no party in video, no marshmallows, no roasting, no 'friends'. no sunset, no sun. just 1 woman and blurred out guy in background. no visual of beach, just water in background. no bonfire, just reflection of light. there is no reason why someone should have his account closed, be banned from uploading, etc beause of nonsense like this. and dissolve is filled with titles like this, I found it immediately.

in fact, not a single word in the title actually appears in the video.



400
iStockPhoto.com / analyzing prores codec - initial results
« on: May 27, 2016, 02:06 »
I have written a program to analyze the Prores codec.

There are 4 profiles for Prores, numerically 0,1,2 and 3. For example, HQ is profile 2.

Contrary to what people may believe, the lower quality profiles are similar in quality, when rendered, to the higher level profiles such as HQ.

I wrote a program that takes a video and converts it to Prores using each profile and each quantizer. I then increment each profile and quantizer, and check the number of pixels that have changed, and the amount of change in each pixel.

Although it is true that the higher level profiles such as HQ do affect less pixels with the lowest quantizer, the difference is actually very small. from 1 to 64 quantizers, the lower quality profile at quantizer 1 has a similar effect on pixel quality as the HQ profile at quantizer 4 (out of 64).

I will post complete results in the coming days or week.

In addition, I am going to do analytical comparisons between various codecs such as Prores, H264, and MPEG4 and will settle once and for all with codec is the best.

In the table below, the first value is profile 0 and the second is profile 2 (HQ). The quantizer is the 3rd column (a value from 1 to 64, 1 being the highest quality).  You can see that each one only affects about 1% of the total pixels in the 4K video. the first column is the file size.

134583819       0       1       968.1   54398   0.01
115283074       2       3       832.9   47968   0.01


Pages: 1 ... 11 12 13 14 15 [16] 17 18

Sponsors

Mega Bundle of 5,900+ Professional Lightroom Presets

Microstock Poll Results

Sponsors