There are some pretty large changes going on with istock… again.  This afternoon istockphoto dropped the bad news of pay cuts to all contributors.  The parent company, Getty, definitely likes to stir the microstock “pot”.  Your canister level won’t mean a thing anymore (other than how many images you can submit each week) and neither do your all time download totals.  Now they are going to pay us according to how many credit sales we have made/sold from the prior year.

The new royalty rates chart:

More info and discussions here:

http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=251812&page=1

http://www.istockphoto.com/article_view.php?ID=861

http://www.microstockgroup.com/istockphoto-com/istock-changing-royalty-structure/

So basically, another example of frustration to the world community of microstock photographers.  I can’t see how any microstock contributor, whether exclusive or non-exclusive would be happy over this change.  I’m projecting at least a 4 figure loss in income from my istock earnings for next year.  That’s a loss of 3% commission on every single sale.  Like 20% wasn’t low enough (pretty much the industry low) now I am expecting to fall under the 17% range.  Great.  That top tier of earning 20% is just set up there as a tease, I don’t think any one contributor even earns that many annual redeemed credit sales.

Responses are looking terrible across the board.  What a big surprise!  This is just like a slap in the face to every one of the contributors who helped istock and Getty grow over the years.  I feel bad for exclusive contributors who have all of their eggs in one basket.  This is the exact reason why I will never be able to allow myself to go exclusive with any one given company.

If a lot of exclusives jump ship, there’s definitely going to be an influx of new quality work on the remainder of the big 6 agencies.  I feel bad for them though – a lot more work for probably still, less pay.  It takes a while to build steam in a portfolio.  Images that were indexed and ranked in agency search engines from 3-5 years ago are what has helped us long time microstockers stick around through all of the chaos.  It’s not as easy when you just dump a bunch of images into a collection.  Momentum of uploads is key to success in this business.

Here is what I think and hope actually happens.  Established contributors (both exclusives and non-exclusives) should be grandfathered in to the minimum royalty rate they’re already earning. Let these changes go to the new ones that join, if at all. Other agencies have structured it that way, and it doesn’t cause mass chaos or letdown like this ridiculousness has.

Which stock photo agencies are worthwhile?

Trying to see which site sells more images than the next is tricky.  There are a lot of elements involved, and it seems like sales figures fluctuate from month to month amongst the micro sites.  Factors like portfolio size, photo types, site search engines, and even categorization all play a part.  All I can do is give you my best sites – the ones that I personally think are worth my time to upload to. Below are the links to my top-selling sites – sign up, and try them out. Then you can make your own conclusions.    Here are my personal recommendations:

The All-Stars

Shutterstock

iStockPhoto

BigStockPhoto

Dreamstime

Fotolia

123 Royalty Free

CanStockPhoto

Slower Earners

Featurepics

Crestock

PantherMedia

MostPhotos

YAYmicro

ScanStockPhoto

Zazzle

Newer Promising Agencies:

GraphicLeftovers

Stockfresh

Veer Marketplace

DepositPhotos

The3DStudio

Pond5 Stock Footage

The above links are also excellent places to buy stock images.  I also sell images from my own portfolio and other select artists here at ArenaCreative.com at budget prices.  At present, we have thousands of images to choose from, ranging everywhere from graphics, to vector art, to lifestyle photography.

Everyone creates different types of art, and some of it is very marketable.  Some has high commercial value, while a lot does not.  It might look great, and you might want to make a print of it for your grandmother, but that doesn’t mean you’re going to be able to make enough money to make a living.  How do you know how well you’ll do?  You have to try it for yourself.  Then make your own conclusions. This is definitely not a get rich quick scheme.  You will “get back” out of stock photography, what you “put into it”.

Don’t forget to subscribe to the blog at the upper right of this page. I’ve consulted so many for free on how to get started over the years, only to find that I have less and less time for it.  Especially when the majority of people I’ve spent hours helping, never ended up going through with regularly submitting images Like I said, stock is definitely not for everyone.  Lots of people give it a shot and then realize how much work is involved.  My time is  valuable, as is yours, but if you are interested in one-on-one consulting regarding your microstock efforts, feel free to contact me for further info.  I highly recommend the Expanded Microstock Photographer’s guide – a really affordable ebook by Rasmus Rasmussen, a 10 year veteran in the world of microstock photography.

If you’ve just read the Learn the Trade post and are thirsting for more juicy goodness on this stock game, here is something I threw together really quick for someone that just contacted me on another forum.

Is it Difficult to Get Started?

It’s not hard to get started, but it’s a lot to learn when it comes to quality. You basically have to stick to shooting at ISO 100/200 to avoid too much noise, and still have to noise filter all of your images most of the time with noise filtering software.  If you’re fortunate enough to own a full frame sensor, you can sometimes get away with shooting ISO 800 and up, but you will still need to learn how to clean up noise in defocused and darker areas.  Stock standards are way higher than print or wedding/event photography standards.  At this point in the game, it’s getting pretty competitive.  Shutterstock alone adds 10,000+ new images each week to their collection.  Even if 100 of those are yours, you’re doing pretty well if you’re selling any of those in that first week when it comes to the odds you’re up against.

What Kind of Camera Do I Really Need?
I’d recommend definitely using a DSLR at least 6-8mp despite what I’ve stated earlier about only needing a 3mp point and shoot.  Microstock is becoming highly competitive, and as point and shoots have come a long way, they are nothing in comparison to a DSLR with a larger sensor (I’m not talking megapixels, I’m talking the actual sensor size.)  The larger the sensor is, the better the quality of the image is going to be.  Don’t be fooled by the “15 megpixels is better than 10″ line of reasoning that the Best Buy sales kid is going to feed you.  IQ (image quality) all depends on the camera.

How Much Money Will You Make Right Off the Bat?

Some of the more successful photogs make about $1 per approved image per month on average.  Others make much less…it all depends on whether or not what you have is of any value to a designer or ad agency.  Shooting stock is an entirely different mindset than most of standard portrait or glamory stuff, if you know what I mean.  Don’t feel bad if you make peanuts your first month.  We all shoot differently, and all of us are on different skill levels.  Don’t try and compare yourself to others.

What About Shooting Models?
I don’t mess around with charging people for prints or shoot, as everything I do is just TFCD (Time for CD) shoots and the images pay for it in the long run. That’s the cool thing about stock.  You do the work and then you continue to make money off your past work.  It just builds and builds and then later on snowballs into a nice income.  Don’t forget that you need signed model release of all recognizable people in your images in order to legally sell them.  The agencies won’t even look twice at them without this.  Yuri Arcurs has an awesome blog site with some universal model releases that are accepted on every agency.

What Sells the Best?

You really never know what will sell – you just have to experiment.  There are all sorts of subjects, theme, styles that sell like crazy.  Just about anything and everything will eventually sell.  I have a shot of a chicken isolated over white that sells like crazy.  Just get ideas from other people, and then do your own thing – try searching some of the sites and sort by most popular.  Look at magazine ads, even TV commercials or the menus on your video games.  You can get ideas about what a buyer is looking for everywhere you look.  Media is all around us.  Don’t forget to try and research what hasn’t been over-done to death.  Find some nice niches that other contributors haven’t capitalized on yet.

Want to Thank Me?

People thank me a lot in emails and comments for all of the helpful information in a simple and easy to follow format.  I really appreciate that, and I’m glad to help.  I was once in your same shoes!  I believe in sharing helpful information like this with fellow artists, just as many have shared tips and tricks with myself.  If you want to show your appreciation for the time that went into this site, make sure you sign up to the micros through the links on the Learn the Trade page.

Meet some of the CEOs of the micro industry, including Oleg Tscheltzoff, Serban Enache, and Jon Oringer.   This is just testimony to how much money microstock photographers and image contributors are making for these organizations! This is a really cool article – check out the full story here.