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Messages - Morphart
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51
« on: April 09, 2020, 09:02 »
From 15-20 downloads a day, to 1 or 0 the last three days, I have even disappeared some downloads from the previous day.
 What an inadequate way to communicate these changes, they have created confusion and unease.
Totally agree... confusion, unease and stress... when your biggest earner drop more than 50%, it's stressful. I surely hope to get clarification before the 10th may (max date where we should see our new sub earnings)...
52
« on: April 08, 2020, 10:55 »
As far as I know, copyright expires 75 years after the death of the artist ? WWII was not THAT long ago ... If the photographer was 30 years old during WWII and died at 70, then you would still need a long wait. On the other hand, if you are the heir of the photographer, you might have inherited copyright ...
Depends on when they were copyrighted if ever.
I just found that quote surprising... Anything original that has been created by anyone is automatically copyrighted to that person and does not give the right to anyone else to use without his permission or license. You don't have to ''copyright an image'', the copyright is effective the day and date you created it (and in law cases that you can prove you created it at that date).
53
« on: April 08, 2020, 09:44 »
Since the announcement yesterday, my sales at Canva is dropping like flies. I got 10x times less download for yesterday. Is the effect of moving buyers to subscription already taking effect? It can't be that fast and effective, right? Now, I am worried about April earning.
Yes I am also experience a 50%+ drop in earning. So NORMALLY we should see that income appear in the SUBSCRIPTION at about the 10th of May for the month of April... Until then we are in the dark. Still waiting on Canva to confirm that it will be our TOTAL earnings that will double (with the guarantee). I'll update here if/when they answer.
54
« on: April 07, 2020, 17:56 »
Thought some of the recent(ish) articles about Canva as a business might be worth a read as those of you with Canva consider this latest offer. I think you should ignore the 6-month bribe and ask what you think their new arrangement will mean for earnings in a year or two years. They must think the need the user supplied content to appeal to corporate subscribers or they wouldn't be offering the "guarantee".
The articles talk about their efforts to build paid subscriptions and corporate users versus just stick with the large base of freemium users. If they're successful at that, and if the monthly earnings don't hold up - with the worst case for contributors being Canva poaching clients from other agencies that pay contributors better - the 6 month bribe won't really mean much.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexkonrad/2019/12/11/inside-canva-profitable-3-billion-startup-phenom/#7db05f514a51
https://www.afr.com/young-rich/is-canva-really-worth-4-7-billion-20191020-p532ih
https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Startups/Australian-unicorn-Canva-targets-China-India-and-Brazil
https://techcrunch.com/2019/12/06/canva-introduces-video-editing-has-big-plans-for-2020/
A separate topic, but the free Canva for Education announcement from January mentions premium photos in Canva Pro. How does the contributor get compensated for those uses?
https://theexcelligent.com/2020/01/25/canva-for-education-launches-to-schools-worldwide/
Hi Jo Ann, I totally understand, that in the long run, like with every agency, I know we'll pay the price for it, but since our options is ''jump in'' or get out, and on my side Canva is my biggest earner (many thousands per month), a little in front of Shutterstock, opting out is not possible. Having double my March earning for 6 months (total earning) would be a good balm, meaning to cash in before the slowdown. Then if/when the earnings drop I will have had the satisfaction to have earned a good amount for some time, amount I can use to invest and create new content to try to maintain revenue while their revenue drops. However if they are playing with words and meant to say ''double of your subscription earning'' which for most illustration contributors is ridiculously low amount, then I'm expecting a loss in the short run. In any case, giving the options, which is lose all now (opt-out and remove the portfolio), or lose some later, in my case I prefer the later. I understand it's not ideal and the subscription model all agencies are moving too one by one is definitely not a winner for us, but on my side I'm ''stuck with the deal'', I will not lose 40% of my revenue to opt-out of Canva when I know there is not another agency offering an image-design platform that can/will earn me as much.
55
« on: April 07, 2020, 14:05 »
I read that it is doubling the total earnings, not just subs - My March income is a little lower than Jan or Feb unless there is a huge bump in subs - at least they are putting some sort of guarantee for 6 months - although sales would probably be at the expense of other sales somewhere else - hopefully from IS/Getty. A little more convincing than 123 saying our sales would double (they went down or were steady as I recall, and income went down even more).
Canva can pretty much turn on or off our sales depending on how they position their free content in the search. They had our stuff pretty low for most of 2019 but have bumped it up a bit - maybe so we don't all just leave when they pull this sort of stunt. If they actually do double $ that would bring them up to SS levels for me - because SS has fallen so far, not because Canva has gone up that much. It would still be lower than my best months at Canva of 2018.
I really hope it's double the EARNING meaning double what we earn in march. The march month was lower than other months, but still for me, Canva is my biggest earner (not sure why as many people here dislike Canva, I might have got the golden ticket), but doubling the earning would be a lot for me... Doubling the subscription would be meaningless and a loss in the long run (when they are taking our non-subscription content and putting it to subscription). I'm still hoping there is some good out there  . When we read the email (and I read it a lot), it clearly says double our march earning, they do not specify only the subscription earning... I just hope they aren't playing with words... And when we read articles on how well they are doing (... Canvas valuation has increased to $3.2 billion, up from its $2.5 billion valuation announced in May...), I wouldn't mind a share of the crumbles bits :p
56
« on: April 07, 2020, 10:34 »
I'll ask them to clarify if it's just subscription or the total of our premium paid content. Since they are moving our Premium paid content to the Subscription content, I would expect it be that they guarantee double of our total earning we had with Paid content, else it's a very sad story... which happened a lot of time before, but I had hope this deal was somewhat different. By how they write it, they mean our total earning.
57
« on: April 06, 2020, 12:56 »
what I am not sure of: is it always the march 2020 earnings they double, or?
Yes from what I read is they count on March earnings and guarantee double. Really a good thing for me... but I'm waiting to see
58
« on: December 13, 2019, 12:45 »
Maybe you could keep your opinion since you ignore the situation at yaymicro... 
Thx Morphart for these informations. My last sale was end of 2017 there.
Right now after pushing they sent me my '''' '' ''' ''''sales report'''' ''' '' '''' end of november... which showed no dollar signs... and 76 sales... I'm giving them an ultimatum to pay me what they owe or having actions taking against them. They were really always in contact and responded quick but there have been a lot of talking since september and next to nothing done. It's not normal for an agency not show the monthly income they owe us and that we make. Will get back here when I get some more news.
59
« on: November 29, 2019, 09:31 »
Why the surprise? You could have known.
One look at their video commission structure made me decide never to sell footage there.
Is that why you did not check the commission structure yourself before uploading when you posted that in 2017? Why are you so patronizing to others, does it make you feel better? I even removed my videos from DT after I found out how little commission they are willing to pay for a sale.
60
« on: November 29, 2019, 09:19 »
How can you put Yayimages in that list? They have stopped reporting our sales since 2018. I recently had a talk with the new owners and they said they were focussing on the contributor area... 3 months ago... when I asked him what was happening and told him that nothing was moving/selling at all on the site, he told he sold 1 500 000 credits... and said I made 31 sales in early october... this means they are making sales with our images, and NOT reporting to us, and since they don't report the sales, we cannot withdraw them, thus it seems they are making money of our back and do not plan to pay us :-/... I hope the situation changes.
Deliberately withholding revenue from contributors is illegal, so I wonder why you just let this continue...
What a useless comment, thanks! I posted this here to let it known and that other contributors put pressure on them to make this move, and I contacted them also, they sent me an excel sheet with my total downloads, but no earnings, so I asked them to send me the earnings or remove my portfolio... after if nothing moves I will have to hire a lawyer. What have YOU done not to let this continue?
61
« on: November 27, 2019, 16:46 »
How can you put Yayimages in that list? They have stopped reporting our sales since 2018. I recently had a talk with the new owners and they said they were focussing on the contributor area... 3 months ago... when I asked him what was happening and told him that nothing was moving/selling at all on the site, he told he sold 1 500 000 credits... and said I made 31 sales in early october... this means they are making sales with our images, and NOT reporting to us, and since they don't report the sales, we cannot withdraw them, thus it seems they are making money of our back and do not plan to pay us :-/... I hope the situation changes.
62
« on: November 15, 2019, 08:14 »
Today I saw one of my photos on a t-shirt being sold on Amazon. I've checked every sale of the photo on every agency I have it listed with. No EL for this one, ever. Isn't an EL required to reprint on t-shirts, etc? I hate to cause anyone trouble, but we get so few peanuts for our work and this company seems to be selling quite a few of them for $25 a pop.
Yes EL is required and anyone can create a Merch account on amazon. Make sure you do not sell on agencies like Colourbox for example as their ''standard license'' allow use on merchandise. Many smaller agency or free agencies or bulk sale websites also gives out this type of license. You can try contacting the person who has listed the item directly and see if he wants to pay the EL license else remove the item, or contact amazon and they may terminate his account.
63
« on: November 14, 2019, 16:03 »
Take that up to Shutterstock so they can do a follow and explain... or hire a lawyer and send a letter to the company hoping they will admit their wrong and settle up with you. I did this with a government (actually a five country coalition) which bought a standard license of my image on Shutterstock and used it as a logo (the license do NOT permit the use as logo, AND for governmental purpose) on their flag, advertise all over the country, on vehicles, on dignitaries gifts, etc... The only leverage I had would be to make it public. After they received the letter they acknowledge their wrong, but it took 2 years and hiring a local lawyer firm of those countries and in the end they paid up. I think it's easier just to contact Shutterstock and they might have more leverage than you alone... but the options are there and payout is also different... chances are too .
64
« on: November 14, 2019, 12:40 »
I live in Canada and average 10k$ USD monthly. To me it's a small gold mine.
Congrats. That's a great result from those cute illustrations.
Thanks! The color illustration are an investment I did over the last years. They are gaining traction but my vintage portfolio is the main bread earner. Videos also did great but lately Pond5 and Shutterstock sales tanked... we'll see how it goes
65
« on: November 14, 2019, 12:19 »
I live in Canada and average 10k$ USD monthly. To me it's a small gold mine. Sure I currently reinvest a lot to keep making the monthly revenue grow, and I also work video/photo contracts for my clients right now. But the day I decide to sit back and relax, I'll just cash in and stack as much as I can. One of the main thing I stopped doing was come to this forum often and read about every collapse people are having and start working hard. Did this for the past 5 years and the results are there, each year is better than the previous one. The forum is great for information and getting a general pulse of what is happening but mostly I hear complaining about what we cannot change. Learn and adapt, there will never be enough of us complaining to an agency as everyone is working to their individual goal and business. Mostly it's a great way to earn passive income when you built it to become interesting enough. Sure there are copyrights thief, low earnings agencies and all that crap, but you live with it and keep going on and try to be innovative and find new avenues. Anyways, was just dropping by to say, it's possible to live with microstock. If you start from scratch right now, I think it will be a lot harder but I am convinced someone who puts the time (maximizing his time) and will into it can gain his piece of the pie. On my side I could easily live with the monthly earnings I have, but I keep investing and trying to find new ways to market my images. Note that I mostly do illustrations and videos (since 2009) and I have hired a lot of help to help me continue to create more stock. I do not do much photography as from what I read everywhere, it seems over saturated and it's hard to get a decent income.
I see this as a business so I reinvest part of the earnings to keep making my portfolio grow... I'm playing the game of making the monthly income grow as much as possible while not waiting too long to sit back and cash in as we never know what the market will be in 5 years or 10 years.
Some do not believe the earnings posted here but there is nothing to prove to others. I just keep working and building and finding new ways to market the images... giving a new try to new agencies here and there, working on merchandising (with no results yet), and keep working on my niche.
To me I see this more as a part of my business I work on and the numbers are encouraging on my side, can't complain for now. Like everyone I need to work 3x more to get the increase I would have had before, but I keep finding ways to increase the income.
In 2016 on Shutterstock only, I was making 2x what I was making last year. I tripled my portfolio size, and I just managed to gain as much or a little less than what I was gaining in 2015-2016... I just think that it's a lot harder to grow, but still possible. Hiring help for me was a good idea, but I still have to make up for the investment but it will pay off over the year.
I'm not a good reference of a ''classic microstocker'' but I found my way and it's been working out for me. What charged said is right. To me these days volume is important to some extent, and you need find a workflow that works for you. The ''working hard artist'' who spends a full day creating THE one shot will likely end up frustrated by the results :
Posted by: charged
on: November 09, 2019, 16:20
1) You do not necessarily need to shoot in niches. Popular themes are popular for a reason. More competition but also more demand.
2) You need to think about how to recycle part of your work some how. Illustrators and motion graphics people can often easily recycle elements of their work to make new stuff. People who do photo composites also recycle part of their work. The recycling creates efficiency.
3) You need to rework your work flow so it moves faster. You may need to think out of the box to do the work flow in an unconventional manner to increase speed.
4) You need to figure out how to produce above average work. High quality work attracts downloads, which pushes the image up in rankings, which attracts more downloads.
5) With so many images already online, volume is sort of key to some extent.
6) Don't produce content that likely no body will want, ie pictures of your socks.
7) Develop some sort of 'style'. Doing the same things over and over again will help you refine your style, which increases speed. With lots of practice, your quality will also go up because you've had more practice. Once you have a style, my guess is that you are also more likely to be booked marked by customers.
so you need to work 24 hour and hire people just to keep business on line with last year...imagine if this is sustainable? no it's not...and the more you get older the more you won't have the strength to do this....sure this is a business that can work for some years but unfortunately the business will be over in less thant we think for 90% of contributor..the only way is go where cost of life is cheap and production cost are non existent...maybe there will be possible...it's not a case that every time i browse image in some agency a new serbian or urssian house if production pop up with the same model used and the same kind of shooting...in country where salary lower is 500 600 dollar you can live out of micro stock for long time...in country where is 2000 3000 i doubt many could do this
66
« on: November 11, 2019, 11:40 »
On my side I could easily live with the monthly earnings I have, but I keep investing and trying to find new ways to market my images. Note that I mostly do illustrations and videos (since 2009) and I have hired a lot of help to help me continue to create more stock. I do not do much photography as from what I read everywhere, it seems over saturated and it's hard to get a decent income. I see this as a business so I reinvest part of the earnings to keep making my portfolio grow... I'm playing the game of making the monthly income grow as much as possible while not waiting too long to sit back and cash in as we never know what the market will be in 5 years or 10 years. Some do not believe the earnings posted here but there is nothing to prove to others. I just keep working and building and finding new ways to market the images... giving a new try to new agencies here and there, working on merchandising (with no results yet), and keep working on my niche. To me I see this more as a part of my business I work on and the numbers are encouraging on my side, can't complain for now. Like everyone I need to work 3x more to get the increase I would have had before, but I keep finding ways to increase the income. In 2016 on Shutterstock only, I was making 2x what I was making last year. I tripled my portfolio size, and I just managed to gain as much or a little less than what I was gaining in 2015-2016... I just think that it's a lot harder to grow, but still possible. Hiring help for me was a good idea, but I still have to make up for the investment but it will pay off over the year. I'm not a good reference of a ''classic microstocker'' but I found my way and it's been working out for me. What charged said is right. To me these days volume is important to some extent, and you need find a workflow that works for you. The ''working hard artist'' who spends a full day creating THE one shot will likely end up frustrated by the results : Posted by: charged
on: November 09, 2019, 16:20
1) You do not necessarily need to shoot in niches. Popular themes are popular for a reason. More competition but also more demand.
2) You need to think about how to recycle part of your work some how. Illustrators and motion graphics people can often easily recycle elements of their work to make new stuff. People who do photo composites also recycle part of their work. The recycling creates efficiency.
3) You need to rework your work flow so it moves faster. You may need to think out of the box to do the work flow in an unconventional manner to increase speed.
4) You need to figure out how to produce above average work. High quality work attracts downloads, which pushes the image up in rankings, which attracts more downloads.
5) With so many images already online, volume is sort of key to some extent.
6) Don't produce content that likely no body will want, ie pictures of your socks.
7) Develop some sort of 'style'. Doing the same things over and over again will help you refine your style, which increases speed. With lots of practice, your quality will also go up because you've had more practice. Once you have a style, my guess is that you are also more likely to be booked marked by customers.
67
« on: July 10, 2019, 10:09 »
Basically 4 megapixels = 2000px x 2000px, or 4000px x 1000px.
In any case, I worked for a time testing and paying a Illustrator script programmer to devellop a custom script to open the EPS files, change it to the desired megapixels (and added options like UNLOCK ALL LAYERS, CONVERT ALL PATHS TO OUTLINE, REMOVE ALL RASTER OBJECTS, ADD A WHITE BORDER AROUND THE IMAGE).
The script will then open the source EPS folder, and save as EPS 10 in the destination folder and do all the resizing and other ticked open.
---------------------------------------------
I have also worked for years with another script I paid to devellop to open the EPS file in photoshop at the desired size and add a white border (or not) and save as JPG.
Both script completely automates the process. I never really talked about it since it's a good secret of the trade, but since the 4mp I had issues on my side and won't mind giving people a hand.
If I would offer those 2 scripts for a reasonably low price (ex: 9-10$) would anyone be interested? If so I will check to find a site that sells software and share a link here. To share it I would like at least to get my investment back in what I paid to devellop those 2 scripts and do all the add-ons and customization.
Thanks!
69
« on: May 03, 2019, 12:53 »
It seems they don't let us upload anymore, not sure if anyone makes revenue there.
70
« on: May 03, 2019, 10:05 »
Hi!
I just decided to put my portfolio on iStock, I check qHero and it simplify so much the submission. This said, I had thousands of images reviewed/accepted, but it's been a few days and I do not see the images yes in my portfolio... How much time does it actually take to see our images online after they have been reviewed/accepted?
Thanks!
71
« on: May 02, 2019, 06:47 »
Same as you Sean  How much will we be paid per download for this free buffet subscription?
The subscription will be $12.95/month, and we'll be sharing revenue 50-50 with contributors. We'll be monitoring usage to ensure no one is abusing this subscription.
Can we opt-out of that?
Of course you may. Opting-out of the subscription will also unfortunately opt you out of the regular library too, which is why I would suggest hanging in there until you see how the first month or so goes. You can opt-out at any stage Patrick.
I hope this helps!
Cheers,
Elle
P.S. We've launched a new blog to share the latest ideas and case studies from our team. Check it out here: product.canva.com.
72
« on: April 26, 2019, 04:45 »
This is really scary... good thing I do not offer photos yet on this site. They give me very good sales with vectors but...: Important Update to the Canva Contributor Agreement
Dear contributor,
Were making some changes to the Canva Contributor Agreement, to reflect the new image subscription product that we'll be launching soon.
For contributors, this new product offers the following benefits:
A second revenue stream, in addition to regular sales made within Canva
Access to a massive customer base
Potential for more revenue per customer thanks to the recurring subscription model
While users will be able to use all the images they like just like a Spotify or Netflix subscription (and at a similar price point), we will be actively monitoring and blocking any abuse of the service. Please note that at this stage the subscription will only include photos (not vectors).
Feel free to contact us with any further questions: [email protected].
Cheers,
The Canva Content Team Basically they seem to become a ''Free site'' wtih a 10$ paid subscription... I wonder what the contributors will get out of that...
73
« on: April 18, 2019, 19:07 »
Hi!
I started uploading back to Canva since early March and I got 0 images reviewed... Anyone had anything approved since they stopped reviewing in early December? In november I started developping illustrations I thought would do well on Canva but since then I haven't even been able to put one online, nothing gets reviewed...?
74
« on: April 17, 2019, 09:29 »
Sigh. I listened to them and their last email: On April 15th 2019, all EPS files will need to be at least 4 MP with a new maximum MB size. We are currently working to determine the optimal limit, but it will be greater than 50MB. Our goal is to ensure contributors can continue uploading vectors of various complexity.
On April 17th 2019, a JPG will automatically be created for your vectors when you upload.
I prepared a full batch of a thousand vector like they wanted. Then I upload the EPS only. Guess what...: Batch8-Christmas_Angel_01.eps
All vector images must be accompanied by JPG images with the same name. You uploaded the vector image but did not upload a corresponding JPG file named .jpg. Maybe Shutterstock living on another dimension but ain't we the 17th? Why do they take the time to send us and email with specific dates so we can adapt and they do not stick to it :-/
75
« on: March 16, 2019, 11:57 »
Yes my bad, nevermind this thread. It's just that the last time that I only had 1 sale when I woke up in the morning was in... 2010 when I just started microstock and only have 100 images online. It was surprising not to see any sales in 5h00, but I just had another one so it must not be a bug... just a surprising slow Saturday ;p
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