Author Topic: Edited again (Read 7268 times)

HappyBunny · « **on:** December 17, 2021, 12:06 »

May I get some advise please. When I started 5 years ago my editing skills were not very good and I used a different editing software. I just re-edited an image rather a lot. It was a wildflower meadow image with visible dark holes at the base in between the flowers what I didn't like. I filled the gaps, made it more vibrant etc. First it was rejected today for noise which I found strange because it was accepted like that 5 years ago. So I removed more noise and now it is looking even sharper but it got rejected for similar. That similar was uploaded 5 years ago and is first of all not that sharp and the new one is visibly much more beautiful. I am astonished that underneath my old photo is written that it was often bought. As far as I remember it was never bought on SS. Where is the money for it? Why don't they take the obviously much better image and delete the old one or have both? I tried to delete the old version but that's not possible. Is there any point re-editing some old important travel photos that have a very boring sky? I thought about sky replacement. One image doesn't sell. It has competition and the competition has exactly the same image and stood at the same spot but her sky is much better. Will it also just get rejected for similar? I only started uploading to SS after DT accepted each and every image of mine 5 years ago. I hardly ever had rejections. Not for technical reasons. This month I get nothing but rejections. Noise? Every agency has accepted that image. Paying 10 cents but making such a drama as if we are uploading to Offset. They are not selling the images for 300 dollars. How do I delete images if I want to take them away from them. I am thinking of taking the important travel images away from all microstock agencies and uploading them to macrostock. I have written years ago to SS that they can't expect me to make food photos like the ones in Offset when they pay nothing that covers to buy all the necessary props. My husband recently joked and said that they don't even pay what it costs to charge my camera's batteries when he saw me with the charger in my hands. When I checked to see how many strawberry ice cream images they have I decided not to bother taking one at all.

Photobomb · « **Reply #1 on:** December 17, 2021, 12:48 »

To delete images go to Catalog Manager
Mouse over the image you want to delete and click on the pencil (edit) icon

That takes you to the edit page where you just need to click on the Trash Can to delete

Beware that deleting the image will still leave a trace of it in the system for a while (weeks, possibly forever) and you might still get the similar rejection.

My suggestion is don't try to re-edit for SS just make more new better pictures.

Edit: Though on replacing the sky - I think that might be worthwhile - and with that much of a change you may not get the similar rejections.

For Real · « **Reply #2 on:** December 17, 2021, 12:57 »

Quote from: PhotoBomb on December 17, 2021, 12:48

To delete images go to Catalog Manager
Mouse over the image you want to delete and click on the pencil (edit) icon

That takes you to the edit page where you just need to click on the Trash Can to delete

Beware that deleting the image will still leave a trace of it in the system for a while (weeks, possibly forever) and you might still get the similar rejection.

My suggestion is don't try to re-edit for SS just make more new better pictures.

Edit: Though on replacing the sky - I think that might be worthwhile - and with that much of a change you may not get the similar rejections.

+100 Great advice

HappyBunny · « **Reply #3 on:** December 17, 2021, 13:03 »

Quote from: For Real on December 17, 2021, 12:57

Quote from: PhotoBomb on December 17, 2021, 12:48
To delete images go to Catalog Manager
Mouse over the image you want to delete and click on the pencil (edit) icon

That takes you to the edit page where you just need to click on the Trash Can to delete

Beware that deleting the image will still leave a trace of it in the system for a while (weeks, possibly forever) and you might still get the similar rejection.

My suggestion is don't try to re-edit for SS just make more new better pictures.

Edit: Though on replacing the sky - I think that might be worthwhile - and with that much of a change you may not get the similar rejections.

+100 Great advice

Thank you very much for your help. I thought that customers can replace the sky and use what they want but maybe they are simply too lazy to do that. As always I did give the two images to DT first and they accepted them both. Thanks God I gave only one to SS. Good advise to simply shoot new images. However, I can't just fly to Morocco again. :-) I have 2 images from Morocco which could do with a sky replacement. Just not sure if I want to give them to microstock after spending hours on re-editing them just to get 10 cents. Everything increases in price but we get less and less. I am totally against supporting such a treatment of photographers. Guess they don't need any more images. Without the photographers they wouldn't have an image to make money from. They can have a cookie on white but not travel photos.

For Real · « **Reply #4 on:** December 17, 2021, 13:32 »

Quote from: HappyBunny on December 17, 2021, 13:03

Quote from: For Real on December 17, 2021, 12:57
Quote from: PhotoBomb on December 17, 2021, 12:48
To delete images go to Catalog Manager
Mouse over the image you want to delete and click on the pencil (edit) icon

That takes you to the edit page where you just need to click on the Trash Can to delete

Beware that deleting the image will still leave a trace of it in the system for a while (weeks, possibly forever) and you might still get the similar rejection.

My suggestion is don't try to re-edit for SS just make more new better pictures.

Edit: Though on replacing the sky - I think that might be worthwhile - and with that much of a change you may not get the similar rejections.

+100 Great advice

Thank you very much for your help. I thought that customers can replace the sky and use what they want but maybe they are simply too lazy to do that. As always I did give the two images to DT first and they accepted them both. Thanks God I gave only one to SS. Good advise to simply shoot new images. However, I can't just fly to Morocco again. :-) I have 2 images from Morocco which could do with a sky replacement. Just not sure if I want to give them to microstock after spending hours on re-editing them just to get 10 cents. Everything increases in price but we get less and less. I am totally against supporting such a treatment of photographers. Guess they don't need any more images. Without the photographers they wouldn't have an image to make money from. They can have a cookie on white but not travel photos.

Many places, to include my workplace, got rid of our graphics folks. Buyers today can barely cut & paste an image into to their pages thus they want a 'finished' image.

Jo Ann Snover · « **Reply #5 on:** December 17, 2021, 15:42 »

Quote from: HappyBunny on December 17, 2021, 13:03

... However, I can't just fly to Morocco again. :-) I have 2 images from Morocco which could do with a sky replacement. Just not sure if I want to give them to microstock after spending hours on re-editing them just to get 10 cents.... They can have a cookie on white but not travel photos.

Couple of thoughts

-With contributors nearly worldwide, it's no longer relevant that you had to travel to get somewhere in terms of the value a stock photo has. For many locations, they're local to someone (unless there's special access and you have an opportunity others don't)

-Shutterstock has over 340k photos of Morocco; Adobe stock has over 240k. Take a look at what's there, and unless you can really add something that isn't already well represented after you replace a sky, it's just not worth submitting. It could absolutely happen that you have something unusual, but be brutally honest with your image's chances.

-Don't think of the return on time edited on the basis of the royalty for one sale; look at the potential for income overall, over time. For many years, I've read comments along the lines of "SS can't expect top quality for only 25 (38/10/...) cents". If an image sells well and keeps going over time it can earn a lot (especially with the higher value SOD royalties, although obviously since June 2020 trends have been down). Microstock isn't about the royalty per license but the income overall given volume. High royalties x low volume can work, but so can low royalties x high volume (as long as the buyer pool is being expanded; if it's just to line Stan Pavlovsky's and shareholder's pockets, not so much

)

Level6 · « **Reply #6 on:** December 17, 2021, 16:09 »

SSTK pays only 10 cents a photo IF it sells........

HappyBunny · « **Reply #7 on:** December 18, 2021, 03:43 »

Quote from: Jo Ann Snover on December 17, 2021, 15:42

Quote from: HappyBunny on December 17, 2021, 13:03
... However, I can't just fly to Morocco again. :-) I have 2 images from Morocco which could do with a sky replacement. Just not sure if I want to give them to microstock after spending hours on re-editing them just to get 10 cents.... They can have a cookie on white but not travel photos.

Couple of thoughts

-With contributors nearly worldwide, it's no longer relevant that you had to travel to get somewhere in terms of the value a stock photo has. For many locations, they're local to someone (unless there's special access and you have an opportunity others don't)

-Shutterstock has over 340k photos of Morocco; Adobe stock has over 240k. Take a look at what's there, and unless you can really add something that isn't already well represented after you replace a sky, it's just not worth submitting. It could absolutely happen that you have something unusual, but be brutally honest with your image's chances.

-Don't think of the return on time edited on the basis of the royalty for one sale; look at the potential for income overall, over time. For many years, I've read comments along the lines of "SS can't expect top quality for only 25 (38/10/...) cents". If an image sells well and keeps going over time it can earn a lot (especially with the higher value SOD royalties, although obviously since June 2020 trends have been down). Microstock isn't about the royalty per license but the income overall given volume. High royalties x low volume can work, but so can low royalties x high volume (as long as the buyer pool is being expanded; if it's just to line Stan Pavlovsky's and shareholder's pockets, not so much )

Both images have been bought a few times but I recently checked and now there are identical photos from someone else with a much better sky. I have never done sky replacements on my images. I never thought of doing it for microstock. I thought that they customer want to do with the image what they want. Once I uploaded an image of Casablanca and it didn't sell. I re-edited after I had bought another software. Thanks God it was accepted despite them having a similar one. That re-edited version is selling very well. However Adobe rejected that re-edited version. Not because it's similar but they wrote that it is over edited. That I need to let the buyer edit the image as they want. Their loss and my loss because the re-edited version is my bestselling travel image on all other agencies. All others including SS accepted the newly edited version. The old version is still on the websites but doesn't sell at all. So much to the customer doing what they want. I didn't replace the sky on that photo. SS once said that we should take photos locally. Well, nobody seems to care about small towns.