What is stock photography?

[caribou]

Selling your pictures through image libraries. Many people now only shoot stock and have stopped doing commissions.

Its big business. www.gettyimages and www.corbis.com dominate the market. Getty turnover is over $1 billion.

There are lots of smaller libraries which are worth checking out. www.alamy.com is very popular with photographers.

Good luck

[AlbertP]

I was told early on in my photographic career, which is not very old, to get involved in stock, but the preliminary investigations I made suggested that the pay was measly, bad, horrible. So it's not?

I'm not interested in working for $1 per picture. On the other hand, that's more than I make now sometimes.

:

[caribou]

No this is not true.

1) You can make between $1 and $2000 per a picture.
2) Some stock photographers easily make $1million plus.
3) One picture sold for $250,000 at Getty.

[d2creative]

How does the biz work?

[photosbymorgan2]

Originally Posted by caribou

No this is not true.

1) You can make between $1 and $2000 per a picture.
2) Some stock photographers easily make $1million plus.
3) One picture sold for $250,000 at Getty.

I have not heard good things about alamy and I have heard that you must pay them a storage fee.

I have heard that the other services you have to pay them to show your work on top of a commission.

Please enlighten us on how it truly may work. I have been just selling my work on my own all these years.

[caribou]

You don't have to pay Alamy a fee. Its not the best agency but it is easy to join and make extra money.

You produce high quality work and libraries sell them for you. Check out the above websites??

[caribou]

Here is some good info from Alamy:

http://www.alamy.com/contributors/


Corbis and Getty are not really looking for new photographers. Its very very hard to join them.

[bevilaquafoto]

Corbis, and Getty are two of the biggest stock agencies, and have on file some of the worlds greatest pictures along with Time, Inc, and others. Corbis is, or was owned by Bill Gates. There are better ways and more accessible agencies to start out with. There is a book called The Photographers Market (see link) http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...books&n=507846
You may find it helpful in deciding which agencies, greeting card companies, etc. to go to. Stock can be extremely lucrative if you work at it, and if you keep on submitting work. I am putting together a preview CD of some of my travel and stock work for submission to agencies, card companies, textbook comapnies, etc. You should not have to pay anyone to look at your work. An agency is either interested or they are not. They generally will not return your samples, so don't send originals. I would strongly recommend looking at the Photographer's Market book as an entry-level introduction to the stock world. I am very new to stock as well, although have worked as an assistant for a number of stock photographers when i was starting out, and am famliiar with the landscape to a certain extent. Be advised that it can be time-consuming getting your work together, captioning photos, etc.

[Darryl Cox]

Copyright them?

[Antonio]

I intend to invest energies and time into the stock market. I am no expert by any means, but I have read so much on the subject.
The best website is probably: http://www.stockphoto.net/. The best book has been already suggested. Those will give you all the info you are looking for.

Guys just a comment: Please don't sell yourself short and don't ruin the photographic market: do avoid micropayment stock agencies that sell your work for fees like $1 or $5.

Here is an interesting presentation on the topic:
http://www.tssphoto.com/photovalue/

Ciao!
Antonio

[metalstorm]

I had some work on a micropayment site. I think I will try your suggestion and build a portfolio on the sites that pay better.

[JDArt]

This thread may be worth resurrecting in light of the other discussion going about photographers' salaries and the outlook for photographers. Is anyone here shooting stock?