Dreamstime is headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee and Bucharest, Romania but we're pretty much international and employ people globally. Our staff are located in US, Romania, Italy, Portugal, Estonia, Russia, Poland, Australia, Holland, UK, Belgium and we're looking forward to add another location to this map.

https://www.dreamstime.com/careers/

Thanks @Brasilnuts, I am a new one also in photography ... I mean that before, my pictures are taken with a compact ... now I have a mirroless camera and I start classes soon

Thank you for your comments, I will go take a look at your blog...

Bonne chance!

I noticed that the sites that are the most severe in the analysis of the photos are the ones that pay the most ... in my case, Shutterstock and Adobe. Did you notice that?

I welcome this tougher standard, since you can learn from technical mistakes, but I do think that standards have fallen in the past 2-3 years with some images that would have been rejected now being accepted.

I'm open to criticism! I still have a lot of photos from different countries to put online

Ok, how tough do you want me to be from 0-10? I'll be 7.5 harsh but just because you've just started!

The vast majority of your travel images, to me, are snapshots. They carry little consideration about technicals, in particular:
1) Composition: such as crooked horizons, such as 'Indian Landscape', lack of copy space and cutting parts of the image off, and
2) Lighting: harsh lighting (such as 'Machu Picchu, Inca trail, Peru). As another travel photographer, I know that sometimes you're only there for that day and that time so you have to make do with that light. What tip would be to shoot indoor images when there's too harsh of light outside or if you have time wait until 'golden hour'. On a side note, it appears that these images weren't post-processed which would help, if done to a high standard

Just as importantly, the images appear to lack commercial value. That's fine, you're still getting a used to this game, but better you make some adjustments now than a few months/years down the line to save you time. I've written a blog post about which types of images are 'trending': https://brutallyhonestmicrostock.com/2017/06/23/which-types-of-stock-images-are-trending/

I think you're making the same mistake I did when I first started in that I was so focused on capturing commercial images and avoiding any editorials. It's really tough to go to a busy place like India and only take commercial images (it's just too busy), so I would suggest to not worry about it and take lots of street photography and just submit as editorials. Well-executed busy market images do well, as well as those guys with super long mustaches. Just shoot anything that's interesting and exotic! My portfolio consists of about 1/2 editorials and they're some of my best sellers. Check out my blog at www.brutallyhonestmicrostock.com for some tips.

I can't comment on the still lifes as they're not my expertise but i'm sure many here with more knowledge of this would agree that your lighting needs major improvements, and some of the white balance looks nuclear, with purple fringe + noise (fresh orange)...surprised that one was accepted.

One exercise I do whenever I visit a new place is to look at the most popular images on Shutterstock for example, for that destination to benchmark my work. Then your goal is to try to get your images close to that standard. See here the most popular images from Machu Pichu. No point trying to copy those images, make them unique with your own style but executed technically excellent as these:

https://www.shutterstock.com/search?search_source=base_search_form&language=en&searchterm=machu+pichu&image_type=all

Good luck and keep shooting!
Alex

Hey all,

I just put together a blog post about my experiences so far with FAA. Any comments and tips would be appreciated, especially since I haven't got any downloads with them (yet).

https://brutallyhonestmicrostock.com/2017/06/27/opportunities-outside-of-microstock-uploading-to-print-on-demand-agencies/

Thanks

Alex

Oh god, might as well just give them away for free...oh wait....

The perennial question for contributors is whether to submit a "great" image to the midstock agencies (such as Alamy) and make it RM rather than submitting to all agencies (which makes it RF almost by definition) and losing the chance of those high priced RM sales. I decided I really need to analyse that question as best I could with my own sales to see if I could come up with an answer (that works for my sort of portfolio).

The logic and my conclusion is on my blog: http://www.backyardsilver.com/2017/06/decide-whether-submit-macro-sites/

I may, of course, be very wrong, but would welcome counter arguments.

Steve

This is an interesting and useful discussion.

As for newbies, it can be a bit overwhelming to think about licensing (RF v RM / Commercial v Editorial = 4 possible different combination). Obviously if you're just submitting to Micros, as most newbs start out, that choice is limited to 2 combinations RF Commercial or Editorial and the agency will let you know if you made the wrong choice in case there's identifiable people and/or property.

Soon enough all contributors will have to think about where to upload their premium images. The 'safe' choice is to go with RF across the board but that 'leaves money on the table' on some images. I think it all depends on the type of image and contributors must get a feel for how rare or unique a certain image is which takes empirical knowledge.

Interestingly, Robert Harding, gives the choice of "either RF or RM", which I find peculiar. Not exactly sure how that would work in practice (must be some sort of hybrid exclusive license). I'll try to find out more and put together an article - maybe it's the way forward to give buyers greater flexibility / choice...

Alex

But the motion blur issue still stands. Longer shutter speeds looks more professional.

Yes, will look into the ND filter for my 24-70 f2.8 lens. Managed to get it down to 1/80 but probably too fast. Thanks for your tips

By the way, SS accepted the footage but whether it will be licensed is another matter altogether, as always!

https://www.shutterstock.com/video/gallery/1595060?contributor=Alexandre+Rotenberg&editorial=1&page=1&perpage=100&sort=popular&translation_method=service&use_local_boost=0&language=en&lang=en

Put together this time lapse last night, please critique:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYasocP9eSY

I've submitted to SS and still pending.

Thanks

Alex

Anybody here have much luck with photography competitions? I'm trying for the Travel Photographer of the Year 2017: Here's my latest post:

https://brutallyhonestmicrostock.com/2017/06/24/travel-photographer-of-the-year-2017-my-entry-wish-me-luck/

Good luck!

not worth the trouble. let the monkey scramble for the peanuts, and the ruggamuffins fight over the crumbs falling off the table .
no scavenger code for me. the days are gone.

I don't know about you guys but I'm having a good month with 5 extended license downloads, including a $84 one (and my fair share of SOD crap).

I wrote an article about these extended license downloads yesterday, including showing you which images they were and some tips:

https://brutallyhonestmicrostock.com/2017/06/22/extended-license-download-today/

Cheer up and make the best of this game, there's light at the end of the microstock tunnel.

One whole extra penny for a single sale rather than a subscription sale. Yay.

SS continues its sad decline.

Yeah, those are annoying.

But you should know that, as the author of a best seller book about stock photography :-)

I have another best seller coming soon - "Fifty Shades of Microstock"