*** How to sell your pictures online ***

part 3

Table of contents:

Part 1 - Introduction, fine-art prints, self-published books
Part 2 - Stock photography business
Part 3 (this page) - How to start selling stock photos
Part 4 - How to grow your photo business

How to sell stock pictures

Technical quality and copyrights

First of all you have to have a few decent pictures (I would say 15-20 as a very minimum) and you need to be able to produce the pictures that will not be considered a "snapshot". "Snapshots" are typical family pictures, party or touristic ones made with automatic cameras without any thinking behind (about composition, lighting, background, etc). If you only made snapshots so far it's better to go and learn a bit more about photography before submitting anything to photo stock.

Technical quality of your pictures must be good. Most stocks don't require very high resolution (typically the minimum is 3-4 megapixels) but your pictures must be clean, sharp, correctly exposed, not having much noise etc. If you use digital camera always shoot in RAW format and never in JPEG.

Stock pictures must be clear of any trade marks i.e. there must be no logos, company names, etc. on the stock picture. That includes clothes and electronics such as mobile phones (it's ok to have phone in the picture, but there should be no visible logos). Sometimes you can remove the logos digitally, sometimes the picture is simply not suitable for stock. For example you can't make a stock picture of Time Square in New York - there is too much advertising around. Also, copyrighted objects can not be a primary subject of the picture without a property release (such as Sydney Opera) but they can freely be included in a cityscape pictures. Photos of art work (paintings, sculptures, etc) are unacceptable.

Photographs of naked children/babies are generally not accepted by stocks (because of paedophilia fears).

You can learn more about the technical requirements and about copyright issues on the microstock websites, for example at istock web page http://www.istockphoto.com/training_manuals.php

Remark: I plan to explain in details how to edit photographs for stock. This will come as Part 5 of this article.

Right Subject

You must understand that most of the time stock pictures are used as illustrations. Thus the picture with a clear message will sell better than a generic one. For example a fine-art portrait of a pretty girl will not sell as good as a portrait of a smiling girl talking on her mobile phone. Positive messages sells better than negative. People and objects isolated on white background sell very good. Industrial pictures sell good too.

In general it's a good idea to shoot specially for stock. However some people don't like that. There are people who like walking in a park and making nature pictures and not photographing anything else. This is understandable and acceptable and such people can still make some money on stock but they will earn less.

The photographs of your cat, your dog or flowers in your garden are likely to be rejected unless they are of extremely good artistic and technical quality. Landscapes work better although it is not the best selling subject - on one hand there are very many landscapes in photo stocks already, on the other hand the demand for other picture categories is much higher. However if you have good quality picturesque landscapes just use them. Nature details can also be accepted and will sell if they look nice and/or if they have a message or illustrate a concept. I started my stock experience with nature and landscape pictures and several of my best sellers are nature/landscapes. An example of a well selling nature picture is a cobweb with dew drops. It illustrates not only spiders but also a concept of the internet.

When you have recognizable people in your pictures you must supply a signed model release, otherwise stocks will not accept it. You can find a generic model release form at the end of the article.

Where to start

It's harder to get accepted by the leading agencies. They generate best sales so missing them would be a valuable loss for you. Thus it's a good idea to get prepared with "second rank" agenices first before applying to the "top league". I would suggest you to start with Fotolia and Bigstockphoto first. After getting initial experience I would go to Stockxpert followed by Dreamstime. iStock and Shutterstock are better to be entered after having a decent stock experience elsewhere.

Below I will provide additional details about the leading microstock agencies. The links to the agencies contain my referral number. While it is up to you to use it or not during registration I will appreciate you using it in return for my efforts of writing this article and answering your questions. You will not loose a penny if you register with my referral number, but I will get a little commission from the stock if you do so.

Every time you upload a picture to a stock site you have to provide the title, the description, the keywords and category. To save time submitting the same picture to several sites it's better to put that information into EXIF/IPTC fields while editing your picture(menu File, File Information in Adobe Photoshop, or Ctrl+Shift+Alt+I). It's crucial to provide as many as possible correct keywords. That's your only (really useful) marketing tool on the stock sites, so learn to use it effectively. Don't use keyword spamming (adding popular but irrelevant keywords) but do your best to provide as many as possible really accurate keywords. http://thesaurus.com can help you finding words. Searching for similar photos of other authors and checking their keywords helps too (but don't copy all their keywords blatantly).

iStock is an emblem of the micro payment business and is often used aa a synonym of the word "microstock". Canadian based it's basically the first microstock agency in the world. It has grown from a designers picture exchange site and is several years old. Powered by Getty Images these days, iStock remains one of the microstock business leaders both financially and technologically.

The downside of iStock being so famous is very tough competition among photographers. Therefore average amateurs are getting less and less income from iStock now comparing with a year ago. However good photographers are always able to succeed.

iStock is a community-based agency that uses "crowdsourcing" in it's business model more than other agencies. Image inspection, forum administration are done by selected agency contributors who get a little comission for that (unlike other agencies having paid employees); regular international photographers gatherings are organized and sponsored by iStock. The number of sales of every picture and every contributor is transparent for other community members so you can easily see the leaders and their best sellers and learn from them.

Technical requirements for submitted pictures are hardest at iStock; but the inspectors opinion is the most consistent inspector to inspector and day to day.

After becoming an iStock image contributor, and after making 500 sales you will get an option to become exclusive to iStock. This will give you higher comission and better promotion but you will be unable to contribute to other Royalty Free stocks. Financially this is not as good as staying with several agencies (for most photographers) but many people prefer to save time and efforts by working with a single agency. Almost all top iStock contributors (having more than 25,000 sales) are exclusive to iStock with a very few exceptions.

Typically the pictures you submit to iStock are not starting giving you the income immediately, but good pictures will sell again and again even if you stop uploading new ones.

iStock is definitely a site I advise you to be in, but I would advise you to apply to iStock after having initial stock experience with the other agencies (although not a photographer but an illustrator the exam may be not that difficult comparing with photographic one). You need to supply 3 photos for the exam and you can get a couple more attempts if you fail.

referral number 56290

Shutterstock is a private American company. It is the only microstock agency that is 100% subscription based (while other agencies either focus on per-image sales or try to combine the two). It is comparable with iStock on the market in the number of images and sales. For very many contributors Shutterstock is number one in terms of income - but only if you constantly feed it with your new pictures.

Photographer' sales on Shutterstock have a very strong dependency on new uploads. If you have good pictures in your portfolio but don't upload new ones, the sales will be slower and slower. Keeping constantly uploading new pictures will get your sales growing - not only the newly uploaded pictures will sell but the old ones too.

The image inspectors of Shutterstock are company employees. The judgement varies a lot from one inspector to another. Pictures not accepted one day could easily be accepted another time. Shutterstock is very causious about image noise - they prefer more noise reduction even if it harms some image details (but it still shouldn't go to a ridiculous extend).

The entry exam on Shutterstock is one of the most difficult. You must submit 10 pictures, and at least 7 of them must be accepted. If you fail you can only retry after one month.

Shutterstock doesn't have exclusivity in any form. While Shutterstock business isn't community-based, the contributors forum is as active as the one on iStock.

Shutterstock is definitely a site I advise you to be in, but I would advise you to apply to Shutterstock after having initial stock experience with the other agencies.

referral code miklav

Stockxpert was originally a hungarian company that is now owned by Jupiter Media. Stockxpert is growing fast and can generate decent sales (for some photographers Stockxpert has came to the first place, for others it still stays behind Shutterstock - but it depends on the content of the portfolio and it's growth).

5 pictures are required for the exam. Stockxpert is reasonably selective with the content and quality of the pictures, i.e. it accepts pictures a bit easier than iStock but not as easy as Fotolia; and the rejections are reasonable and understandable. No nudity at all, and even non-nude photos with erotic elements often rejected.

Similarly to Shutterstock, photographer' sales on Stockxpert usually depend on the new uploads. Keeping uploading new pictures will get your sales growing - not only the newly uploaded pictures will sell but the old ones too.

If you are not sure about the quality of your work I would advise you to apply to Stockxpert after getting initial experience with Fotolia and Dreamstime.

referral number 5253

Fotolia is younger than market leaders but has grown quite big. European based although has offices in several countries worldwide. Most image sales are european.

Doesn't have an entry exam; accepts supplied images very easily but rejection criteria aren't clear (I have the impression that sometimes rejections are random). The sales usually start slow at Fotolia but more advanced photographers (having portfolios above several hundred pictures) report good and growing sales (comparable with iStock and Shutterstock). My own sales at Fotolia are significantly lower comparing with the leaders.

Fotolia is more open to artistic pictures comparing with the other microstock. Grainy, black and white pictures are accepted without problems.

While Fotolia is open for microstock beginners it does not provide a really good learning. Still it would be a good starting point to "try the water".

referral code res63233

Dreamstime is Romanian-American company. Typically it generates less sales than the top leaders, but it isn't too far behind. There is no entry exam; and the image review criterias are similar to iStock. This combination makes Dreamstime a good place to start learning stock photography.

Dreamstime suggests optional image exclusivity (you will get higher commission if your image will be exclusive to Dreamstime) and photographer exclusivity (similar to iStock when you can't be a contributor to other agencies if you become an exclusive Dreamstime photographer). Taking into account the lower sales at Dreamstime comparing with the market leaders exclusivity doesn't make sense from financial point of view.

It seems that active feeding of Dreamstime with new pictures helps to keep/increase sales. However the dependency is not linear unlike Shutterstock or Stockxpert.

Image acceptance criteria in Dreamstime is similar to those in iStock. Not having any entry exam, this makes Dreamstime a good starting/learning place for a microstock beginner.

referral code src_miklav

123rf used to be in the bottom of my list. However, it has been growing steadily for the last few months and now it can generate decent sales.

123rf has one of the easiest image acceptance criteria among microstocks. It has very convenient system of attaching model releases to images.

referral code lYzAKgVABL

Bigstock is a smaller stock that haven't achieved the same pace of growth as the ones described above. Still a nice site that is able to generate a decent profit for some contributors. No entry exam that makes it easy for beginners; but accepts most submitted pictures thus not providing a good learning opportunity.

[Update Sep-2007] The performance of BigStock has been declining for the last months, so I am not sure if it is worth the effort. May be it's better to put the efforts towards 123rf.

referral code 6620

Crestock is a young but growing Scandinavian photo stock. When they just started they were extremely picky accepting very few photos. They became much more reasonable since then, but their performance isn't that high.
It would probably we worth uploading to Crestock if you have free time, but not if you are busy making photographs or uploading to other stocks.

Snapvillage is a rather late attempt of Corbis to catch the train of microstock. The way they approached it indicates that they aren't sure yet how to deal with microstock, but they finally decided to give it a try.

They first launched their website in beta version (i.e. with many issues) and only accessible for US buyers. However the site has been improved since their start, and international buyers are now welcome.

Interesting thing about snapvillage is that photographers can select the price themselves, and the price can vary between 5 and 50 dollars. That places snapvillage in midstock rather than microstock.

in 2008 Snapvillage has starteg marketing campaign - we shell see where will it bring them.

Alamy is not a microstock site. Alamy is a traditional stock but operating via Internet and open to amateurs unlike the other traditional agencies. Being a traditional stock it generates higher per-picture income from one sale, but the sales are much much less frequent than at microstocks and you have to have at least several hundred pictures in your portfolio in order to get regular sales. Until recently Alamy only accepted TIF files on CD/DVD, however they moved to JPEG recently and enabled upload via internet.

Contributors can select themselves which license should be sold - RF or RM, and various limitations can be set by contributors for RM images.

PhotoShelter Collection

PhotoShelter Collection is a new initiative of PhotoShelter. Photoshelter used to provide paid web hosting and image archiving services for professional photographers. After doing that for a couple of years they decided to start their own stock business. PhotoShelter Collection was launched in the autumn of 2007.

PhotoShelter Collection is a traditional stock but operating via Internet and open to anybody just like Alamy. They are complete beginners in stock but they commited to invest $1 million in advertising in 2008, and they already started active advertising campaign.

Contributors can select one of 3 standard pricing schemes for each of their images.

Other micro stocks

Canstockphoto, Stockphotomedia, geckostock and other - make very low sales and in my opinion are not worth the effort/time to upload pictures, attach model releases, select categories.

Mikhail Lavrenov
Last update: April, 2008

continue to part 4

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