I have applied to SS twice and both failed. 10 out of 10  first time, 4 out of 10 rejects
second time. I got to IS on the first try.

vphoto

I was accepted at my third time. One month waiting is long, but since I'm accepted, they accept about everything I submitted to them. But the best thing, it's the huge amount of downloads.

I like them even if there's just 0.25$ for each download...so keep submitting. Your effort will be rewarded.

After months of almost 100% acceptance, I hit the "crazy reviewer" too, and a batch of 5 was discarded as non-commercial. Funny, since it sells OK at DT. I don't get rejections for noise any more. I did 2 years ago.

You just have to learn the "trick" what SS likes. I don't use NR over all the image, just where noise is visible. SS still likes crisp images, but no noise in skies, skin folds, hair, dark areas. I routinely do NR on a second layer and then selectively erase those areas, with a 50% soft brush, keeping the well-lit parts crisp as they are.

That's what SS likes ;-)

Every site has a different approach, you have to change your products according to it at your very start, it's normal procedure like with every job.

Correct. But if you keep it crisp where it needs to be, you can upload to all other MS sites without any special treatment. As I do it now, I postproduce the shot for the toughest agent (SS) and then I'm sure that same shot will be accepted anywhere else - technically spoken. Of course, the second hurdle is to make the reviewer believe the shots is sellable, and opinions may vary in that respect...

I was rejected the first time using all photos that had been accepted at BigStock or DT. I am currently awaiting the 30 day period before resubmitting ...
Any advice?

If the rejection was for noise (I bet it was since your landscape portfolio at DT is very impressive), do an additional noise reduction on the noisy parts of the shots (especially the skies). Or resize to 4MP. Then resubmit.

I'm very lucky to don't get this crazy reviewer. Since I submit to Shutterstock, my approximative approval ratio is simply the highest from all. For Istock and Dreamstime, it's always seem like the guy is checking my approval ratio and reject or approve to keep me at the same place.
Do I paranoid??

Hello all,

Since this thread is opened I have a question about submissions in SS.
Browsing some portfolios, I came across different variations of the same picture : for example a picture of a door where color was red on one and yellow on the other.Is it ok to do that on SS, I though it was not ?

Thanks
L

Thanks Tom I was a bit afraid of the flagging for that it is good to know 
Cheers
L

Thanks for the tips Sharply Done
I looked into the horizontal-vertical thing already here:
http://microstockexperiment.blogspot.com/2007/11/experiment-4-horizontal-versus-vertical.html
Panoramic is a lot of work !

Thanks Pixart:) It is true all of this takes an awful lot of time !
yes it will interesting to follow the trend of v/h. I plan to do the same with the same photo with different colors now.
I will post tomorrow my earnings so stay tuned:)
and please call me Laurent 
L

Interesting exchange of views about picture formats.  Not something I have considered before.

Ditto!!  I was just rejected 10 for 10 and 8 were noise and 2 were lighting.  9 have already been accepted at other sites.  Although I'm sorry for those who were also rejected, I'm glad I'm not alone.

Do they look at these in a way I can't?  I looked at each one at 100% before submitting and trust me I wouldn't have submitted photos with noticable noise for my 1st 10!!

Smiles,
Connie

Connie, there's no rhyme or reason.... I'll give you a perfect example.... just now before I came here I checked my mail only to find my last batch at SS  was totally rejected.
Here's why I just sit back and laugh about it.   One of the pictures rejected was for  "focus... not where we think the focus should be"
Okay....your opinion.    However,  that picture is already on IS where it has sold 65 times in the last 8-9 weeks.  And it has sold in XL..... evidently the focus was where those 65 buyers thought it should be...  as do those that buy it on 5 other sites......

A second picture was rejected for noise.  The exact same picture is already on SS  AND it's sells.  All I did was flip it horizontal and cropped it for a bit different look.  It's the same file!!  Even though it sells there already.... now it has noise....  guess it was sitting around on the hard drive too long and collected dust or something...maybe it mildewed... maybe the mice were walking around on it... i don't know....

Personally,  I think the rejection  "not focused where we think it should be "  is .......lame.    I know exactly where I wanted the focus. Why would I post a picture that I thought wasn't focused?

But.... in the end... I really don't care that they were rejeceted.  I don't own SS.... It's their site, and they make the calls. And that's fine with me.... not a problem... no sweat, their reviewer called it.... it's out of focus....

 I suppose IS will just keep selling the heck out of it!! As will the other 5.   

That's why there's so many micro sites....   if one doesn't want to sell it,   another one will....     LOL
               =tom

Thannks guys (too funny Tom!) I'm so glad I found this site to help with my confidence.. at least a little.    Now off to submit to IS and FT.

Connie