Shutterstock

[Chris McBee]

Anyone had any experience with this site? A friend sent this to me and thought it might be a good service for weather photos and videos.

http://www.shutterstock.com/

 

[DRMabe]

My advice......avoid microstock sites. They only pay pennies to the photographers to sell unlimitied use royalty free images. If you want to sell stock photography, try a getting accepted at a site like Alamy, Getty Images, etc. I'm on Alamy, they are very picky about quality....so make are you follow their guidelines to the letter.

 

[Robert Keller]

Shutterstock submissions

I sent some of my very best Yosemite images in and they were rejected for white balance and too artsy. I was told not to submit again for 4 to 6 weeks and resubmission of those same images would result in me being banned until Jesus returns.

 

[Dan Robinson]

Microstock is a scam, only the buyer and broker benefits from the photographer's giveaway. I think these days, in anything stock photo and video related, you're better off doing your own web site and listing your images/videos there. SEO and Google are your friends. Then you can charge what you think is a fair rate, and every once in a great while someone will pay it and make you more than years of penny downloads on microstock. This market is essentially dead, so whatever you do, don't put a lot of time or especially money into it.

Smugmug and Zenfolio are nice options for getting your work online and charging what you want.

 

[Warren Faidley]

My advice......avoid microstock sites. They only pay pennies to the photographers to sell unlimitied use royalty free images. If you want to sell stock photography, try a getting accepted at a site like Alamy, Getty Images, etc. I'm on Alamy, they are very picky about quality....so make are you follow their guidelines to the letter.

Very well said.

The microstock agencies are for the most part, a total ripoff. In addition, they deduct so many fees, you do often get pennies for a sale.

After running Weatherstock for over 20 years, I can say the stock photo business is for the most part over. In fact, we no longer accept stock images from photographers. It's not the lack of great images (I see many such posted in ST), the problem is the most "graphic" images are lost in a vast sea of so-so images, and the prices / percentages paid for images today is a joke / insult. Just look at many of the images used in advertising now days and you'll cringe at the poor quality / subject matter. In many instances, low-balling stock agencies constantly scan social networking sites like Facebook and Flickr to find images, then offer the photographer a really stupid deal to represent the image(s).

When photographers contact me about selling images, I generally advise them to try and sell prints from their websites or local galleries instead of going the stock route. Most larger stock agencies (the ones that actually pay something worthy), no longer accept new photographers unless they have an amazing collection of work. Avoid any exclusive contracts, which could limit future options.

W.

 

[Jason Foster]

Real money is not in stock"anything" sales anymore. If you want to make money, gotta think BIGGER. As Warren has said, the general stock business is dying (well, over saturated). Pro photogs are still doing their thing, but you better be damn good, suave on making connections, and have a really good presence.