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Microstock - Starting Out
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Jeffdalt on 15 May, 2008 01:15:00
 
Microstock Photography – Starting Out Tutorial
There are plenty of different ways to make money from photography including
weddings, studio portraits, specialist products, food and so on.
Once you enter the microstock photography market you can utilise some or all of
these subjects using any spare or unwanted images to submit as microstock to
make money instead of just sitting idle on your hard drive.
Of course there is nothing to stop you shooting pictures purely for stock and
once you get the idea of what sells and is popular you actually may find that it
is quite lucrative to do just that.
I myself started with microstock just to earn enough to pay for the next bit of
kit that I wanted to buy but could not justify due to the cost. Now that my
stock portfolio is into the hundreds I am getting a regular income from the
various sites, I am by no means earning a fortune but I can honestly say that
the effort to reward is proportional so what you put in you get back. The more
time and effort that you put in the more money you will make.
One of the best things for me apart from the money was actually finding one of
my images being used. It takes time and a lot of luck to find them as the people
who buy them and use them don`t really have to inform you when or where they
will be used. After a couple of thousand sales of various size images I have
managed to find my images being used in about twenty different places including
websites, magazines, software covers and even bible newsletters.
So what kind of images do people want ? basically anything you can think of to
take a picture of has probably been done already. The biggest mistake you can
make is walking around your house taking pictures of things like
screwdrivers,your camera accessories, the remote controls for your electrical
appliances etc etc etc all of these things have been done hundreds if not
thousands of times before. So unless you can come up with a new and original
angle these are things to steer clear of.
This is my best selling picture on Shutterstock and fourth best selling picture
at Istock
People sell – so if you can get yourself a willing model then you have a good
start, one thing to remember is that for every picture that you submit with a
person in you will need a model release form. Every micro stock site will have
their own version of the model release but you can use a generic model release
for all the sites as long as it meets the criteria for all sites.
This is what I use and once you have uploaded a release for a particular model
most stock sites will let you store it so if you use the same model again you
already have the release available.
Before you upload your pictures to any of the sites you will need to give them
a description and some keywords, the keywords are probably just as important as
the image because without good keywords your picture will simply vanish to the
bottom of the pile.
Always keep your keywords relevant and descriptive of what is actually in the
picture, some of the sites will actually reject your pictures for bad keywords
no matter how good your picture is.
The best way to add your keywords is in Photoshop via File>file info where you
can add keywords and descriptions(copyright too if you like) and embed it all
into the itpc of the image, this way you only have to do it once then when you
submit your picture to any of the sites the keywords etc will be filled in
automatically.
There are quite a few different stock sites out there and they all have
different standards and criteria, for example Shutterstock is extremely tough on
noise in your pictures so always check your pictures at 200% before you submit
them. Usually when a picture is rejected you will be given a reason.This can
help you learn what each site is actually looking for and after a short while
you can work out what pictures sell and where.
Some sites have a more rigorous approval process and generally they are the
best financially such as Istock and Shutterstock. I submit to five different
stock sites and they are listed below in the order of how lucrative they are to
me.
Istock
Shutterstock
Dreamstime
Fotolia
Bigstockphoto
Once you are approved and you get your pics online then they sell over and over
again.Its pretty surprising what actually sells too.My best selling pics at the
moment are police pics but it is really hard to judge what sells, I try to
submit things that are not covered in the thousands like flowers. If you are not
sure just browse the most popular section of any of the stock sites this will
give you a bit of an idea what they are looking for.
This is my best selling picture at Istock but was rejected at Shutterstock.
Most of the stock sites will accept files in various formats such as tiff and
jpeg and most sites have a minimum file size, its always best to check the
criteria for any particular site you decide to use before you submit your
pictures.
It is inevitable that in the first few weeks you will get a lot of rejections
until you work out what it is they are looking for. This is when ti is easy to
get despondent but don`t give up and don`t take rejections personally even you
have submitted your best ever picture and had it rejected for “having no
commercial value” Try and think what would this picture be useful for ??
before you submit it and if you cannot think of anything then it will probably
never sell.
Most of my initial rejections were for copyright issues ie if you take a
picture of someone wearing a Nike T-Shirt it will be rejected, check your
pictures for all kinds of emblems and logos and clone them out if need be. The
only time this does not matter is if you are submitting pictures as
“Editorial” but not all the stock sites accept editorial pictures and they
tend to have a limited market so I avoid them if I can.
Now the most important bit “Getting Paid” most of the stock sites pay in
Dollars as they are US based so it is essential to have either a Paypal or
Moneybookers account to accept your payments. Some of the sites will pay you by
cheque but usually the payout threshold is higher and your bank will charge a
fee to change into your local currency.
All of the stock sites will generally have a minimum payment threshold which
varies from site to site, usually it is between $50 - $100 which is surprisingly
easy to obtain if you submit good images and it won`t be long before you are
getting payments regularly.
So to summarise
*No Noise	*No logos	*All people pictures need a model release	*Good keywords =
good sales	*Be original	*Find a niche	*Learn from rejections
Everything here is purely based on my own opinion and experience and I am by no
means an expert so please take the bits that you find useful and disregard the
bits you don`t .
Jeff Dalton