Busines Is Great!

Photography businesses, like most businesses are marathons and succeed as a result of the continuous execution numerous, and endless, small tasks.

How Is Business?

People often ask me, as small talk of course, how business is, or if I am staying busy. As a self-employed person I am as busy as I want to be. As someone trying to maintain a successful photography career there is no shortage of work to do! As for how business is, its great! I am certainly not making as much as I was a couple of years ago, but my income appears to be stable and I still believe there is ample opportunity for growth.

The Photography Business Is A Marathon

Achieving growth in a photography business, at least in my photography business isn’t easy. But I keep in mind that my business is a marathon, not a sprint. I need to be the tortoise, not the hare! My goal this year is to do everything just a little bit better. Learn a bit more about social media (especially Google+ and possibly Tumblr), keep adding content to Cafepress.com, adding content to Imagekind.com, adding content to my website, blogging, and most importantly, creating a wide variety of stock imagery. Ultimately, everything is important and doubly so now when competition in the photography industry has reached such astounding proportions!

Forecasting Winners

As I mentioned, this business is a marathon. A lot of those things that I want to do a little bit better are things that may take years to provide a reasonable payoff, and I understand and accept that many things I do may never pay off. But just like with stock photos, some will payoff, some won’t, and it is very hard to forecast which ones will be the winners. It is helpful to remember that there are photographers (and others) who are employing pretty much all of these processes successfully, whether it is selling fine art prints online, successfully employing social media to attract new clients, or earning significant revenue through online ads.

Increasing Visibility

I do believe that core to the future of my business is building traffic to my site. As I increase the visibility of my images I increase my revenue from all of my sources…and from sources I have yet to begin participating in. With an increase in visibility and traffic more people license my stock photos, more people buy greeting cards and other photo imprinted merchandise, more people buy fine art prints, and more people click on Google ads. I make more revenue from more sources.

Business Is Great

So, like a tortoise in the fabled race with the hare, I plug along testing the social media waters, adding new sources of revenue, improving and refining my business activities and work flow, making stock photos, and possibly most important of all, enjoying my business. How is business? Business is great!

The Roller Coaster Ride of The Business of Photography

The photography business is one of constant ups and downs, highs and lows, that must be dealt with for long term success.

The Photography Business Is A Roller Coaster Ride
The photography business, whether stock, assignment, editorial or weddings, is a roller coaster ride. It is a continuous series of ups and downs, highs and lows, praise and rejection, adversity and successes. In the long term, to do well in the business of photography one has to recognize that reality and find ways to deal with it.

Low Royalty Reports, Refunded Sales and Negative Forum Comments
The highs and lows of the photo business are myriad. For me, as a stock shooter, a high comes in the form of a great royalty report, a particularly large RM sale, the completion of a creative and well-crafted image or perhaps in winning an award. The lows are rejected submissions, low royalty reports (or the dreaded refund of a previous sale…usually for a large amount), and perhaps from spending too much time reading negative comments on photography forums and photo blogs. When I regularly shot assignments there were the lows of losing bids, difficult clients and the challenges of getting paid.


Psychological Preparation and Having A Plan
Over the years I have learned to deal with these lows in two basic ways: Being psychologically prepared, and having a plan in place to turn to. A third way of dealing with the lows is one I totally believe in, but, until recently,  have never had the discipline to achieve: Investing in alternative income sources (think income property, the stock market, etc.). I do know several photographers who have provided for themselves in that manner…and are they ever glad they did!

Rejections, Income Fluctuations And Maintaining Productivity
You can prepare yourself psychologically by truly accepting that all of the downsides of being a professional photographer are inevitable. There will be rejections, income fluctuations and frustrations. Assignments will go awry, clients will be unreasonable, hard drives will fail. Right now, for me, those lower than expected royalty reports are the most challenging. When I see my royalty reports have come in, I steel myself. If it is indeed a low one I am already prepared and ready to remind myself that I already am moving on plans I have in place to grow my stock photo income. I recognize that a low royalty report has a strong tendency to lower the productivity of most photographers in producing additional stock photos. I try and take that emotional hit and turn it into more energy and determination to be more productive…to take that disappointment, and perhaps even fear, and use it as a motivating force to make more and better images, and to take that little extra step in adding content to my web site.

A Detailed Plan That Is Working
I find such an exercise much easier to accomplish because I already have a detailed plan (a plan that is a work-in-progress with continual fine-tuning) in place (I learned how to create my own business plans and goals via Brian Tracy). It also helps that I can see that the plan is working. Despite royalty reports that fluctuate, my stock photo income is holding and even showing a bit of growth over last year. My web traffic is climbing steadily if not dramatically, and that is resulting in a slow increase in income from everything from imprinted merchandise to my Google Adwords income to print sales. I am licensing more stock directly as well.


Funding Retirement, Income Property and Living To A Hundred
I am actually funding my retirement plans (as if I will ever retire!) too. I have put more into my retirement fund in the last three years than I did in the previous twenty years. I am doing this even though I sense that it is “too late”. At my advanced age it seams unlikely that the type of growth seen by investing in traditional financial investments will ever amount to much while I am still around…but I am doing it anyway. I am also thinking seriously about investing in come income property as well. Who knows, I may surprise myself and live another forty years! I do know that having money is more fun than not…and if I live to a hundred I’d rather do it with!


Smart Investing In Stock Photography
BTW, I still believe that smart investing in photo shoots offers a far better return than investing in traditional investments like stocks and bonds. At least that is my experience even in these difficult times. The key word here is “smart”. I know I can’t just go out and shoot willy nilly anymore and expect great returns. But when I plan my shoots well, determine there is a need for what I am shooting, and shoot in an efficient way, my experience is that I will be well-rewarded for those efforts.


Enjoying The Ride
What is the point of all these ruminations? I’d sum it up this way: Have a plan; understand there will be ups and downs, learn to use the “downs” as emotional energy to further your career and diversify into non-photography streams of income. If you recognize that the photography business is a roller coaster ride, and prepare for it, then it will be a lot easier to enjoy that ride!

Forget about Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is secondary to content for building significant traffic for your photography (or other) business.

SEO, Quality Content, and Search Terms
Am I serious when I suggest to photographers that they forget about (SEO) search engine optimization? Well, yes and no. The point I want to make is that SEO is really about fine tuning your website. It can be important, but it really isn't the most important thing. If you want traffic to your site, and the ensuing benefits (for me that means selling imprinted holiday gifts through cafépress.com, licensing stock images, selling fine art prints and earning revenue through click through ads), then what you really need is content, quality content. Almost invariably the photographers who have substantial amounts of traffic get that traffic through a large number of search terms, not by being number one in any given search.

First Page Ranking And Increased Traffic (or not)
It may seem like being ranked on the first page for a desirable search term is the answer, but there are a couple of reasons that such a goal might not be the best approach. For one thing, getting ranked on the first page for anything other than your own name can be rather a daunting task (and even there I am up against a famous actor named John Lund as well as several other photographers who for some odd reason have my name). If you are just getting started you have a huge disadvantage going up against those who have already secured their positions. You will have to get past those who probably know what they are doing and have a huge leg up in terms of what search engines value: content, links and time. Secondly, ranking highly for a given term doesn't always bring the traffic you think it might. That was driven home to me when, over a two week period of time, I constantly ranked, with Google, between four and six for the term "stock photos". During that period of time I found no detectable increase in my traffic from when I was ranked in the low hundreds, which is where I have fallen back to today for that particular search term.

Traffic Comes From Content
Today, for example, I had over five hundred people get to my site from search engine queries (other traffic comes from those "links" and referring sites). The number one search term that brought visitors to my site was the term "John Lund" with 5 visitors. No surprise there, the surprise is that I only had eight search terms that brought in more than 1 person. 99% of my traffic comes from search terms that are only searched for once in any give period of time. To get truly significant amounts of traffic you need a lot of search terms and you get a lot of search terms by having a lot of content.

Content, Links and SEO
The two things that search engines value most are content and links. You get links by having content that people value enough to link to. So it all comes back to content. In a sense, photographers are fortunate to have content to put up…and yet pictures hardly count. Search engines can’t “see” pictures…so pictures become a kind of excuse for the words, which hopefully entice humans to come see the photos. SEO, or search engine optimization is simply the process of organizing that content to make it most accessible to search engines, and to people. Remember, the "robots" that search engines use to index the Internet (and hopefully your site) are themselves optimized to "think" like humans…because the search engines want to deliver good results to humans. Search engine optimization is something the search engines want you to do well, and Google, with the lion's share of Internet searches, is happy to tell you what to do for SEO. But the most important thing you can do to generate traffic for you web site is to provide quality content. That is why I say to forget about SEO (OK...not entirely), because without the content the SEO isn't going to do you much good.

Quality Content, Links and Time
Quality content will bring links and links will raise you in the rankings increasing both your traffic and, bringing in more links. It all takes time though. Lots of time. I estimate that three to five years are needed to produce the kind of traffic…thousands of visitors a day…that will lead to a significant difference in your photography (or other) business. It can be done. Photographers like Quang-Tuan Luong, Rolf Hicker, and Dan Heller have proven that. Content, links and time comprise the path to traffic. SEO is great, but your priority should be quality content, and lots of it.

Achieving Internet Success In Your Photography Business

Because building significant traffic does take a long time, and loading content is a grueling process (I am thinking here of the process of uploading, keywording and captioning photos),

I think it is best looked at as part of an everyday routine. I try and do a little bit each day. It is that old slow and steady wins the race kind of thing...where one day, maybe three years from now, you stop and think to yourself "Man, I am so glad I did this!". I guess I'll let you know about that in another year or two!

In Vigorous Pursuit of Creativity

To help stimulate your creativity explore opposites, imagine a twist; look at images in a different way. What is, for example, the dark side of social media?

An Ocean of Images, Monetary Gain, and Personal Satisfaction

Few things can be as rewarding for a photographer as the vigorous pursuit of creativity (love that phrase...read it in the latest issue of CA). Creativity is key to creating work that stands apart from the vast ocean of images and subsequently has value both in terms of monetary gain and in terms of personal satisfaction. Creativity is also extremely important in conducting business itself, in finding ways to get your work completed, in finding ways to get your work seen, and even in finding ways to get paid!

Maximizing Creativity

With the importance of creativity, the question arises: How can we increase and maximize our creative propensity? Is there a way to nurture and grow this all-important quality? If you Google that question, the answer is yes; and there are many theories about just how to do that. I have tried a number of approaches and will share the ones that seem to work for me.

Intention: The Most Important Step

The first and most important step to building your creative powers is to have the intent. While I have my doubts about a lot of new age practices, I do believe there is something very powerful about writing things down. For me, the first step towards creative empowerment is writing down my intention to build my creativity.  I go through phases where I will write down an affirmation that "I am a creative powerhouse with an infinite supply of new and potent ideas", or something like that. OK, I know it sounds a bit silly, but I do believe it works! Even better, write down how many ideas you will come up with. The more specific your ideas the better, even to the point of allocating ideas for images and ideas for building your business. I have to admit, I am a little sporadic with this process, but when I find I am running low on ideas, it is my first step to getting back on track.

Creativity, Judgment, and a Master List

Creativity is a muscle. It gets stronger with exercise. So the next step is to start coming up with ideas. Remember, judgment is the enemy of creativity. Don't judge your ideas yet, just come up with them, and write them down. I guarantee you that if you don't write your ideas down they will slip away, just like dreams do. I keep a notepad and pen with me at all times to record my ideas whether they are spontaneous or otherwise. I can't tell you how many times I have learned this lesson over and over again! Keep a master list of ideas that you never throw away. An idea that at first seems great can seem really stupid the next day, yet a week, a month, or even a year later it can rise to the top again, or generate another idea. I have learned to keep even my silliest ideas on paper (or in pixels).  Sometimes ideas that you just can't figure out how to do, or how to do economically, suddenly reveal themselves as simple executions when viewed after a lengthy time period.

Look at the Opposite, or Add a Twist

Another favorite exercise of mine is to view an interesting photo or image, mine or someone else's, it doesn't really matter, and see if I can either do the opposite, or add some twist to it. For the image above I pondered the hot topic of social media. The buzz is about the benefits of connectivity and visibility through social media networks. I made a conscious decision to explore the opposite of the benefits, to look at the dark side if you will. What came to mind was the possibility of having a lot of people pissed off at you. How could I illustrate that? Angry people’s faces, looking out at you from inside the computer, from the social media site; that would not only communicate the downside of social media, but also infuse it with humor as well.  It makes for a great counterpoint to the positive images of social media  that I have already created. It is surprising how often looking at the opposite side of an idea can take you in a new creative direction.

Rising above the Crowd

Creativity is your ticket to rising above the crowd (sourcing). It is something you can strengthen and cultivate. Set the intention to be more creative, practice coming up with ideas, write your ideas down, add a new twist or look for the opposites and give your ideas time to mature. If you make creativity a constant part of your life both your career, and your life as a whole, will improve.

CS5, Fear, Creativity and Success In Stock Photography

I believe that if I create photos that satisfy me creatively and fulfill a need in the market place, there will be buyers that value them enough to provide me with the money I need!

Now Everyone Can Do It....
A few nights ago I attended an Adobe presentation about Photoshop CS5. As I sat there watching them demonstrate new technologies that makes painstaking tasks into a snap I first felt a bit of despair that we are taking one more large stride towards making my hard-earned skills less unique. Each technological advance takes away the advantages that I have over newcomers and amateurs.  Each time the presenter showcased a new or improved tool the audience broke into applause, which I weakly joined, while inside I thought to my self  “Just great…now everyone can do it”. Luckily I managed to get out of that frame of mind before the evening was over.

New Technologies, A level Playing Field, and Fear

The technologies are indeed leveling the playing field of photography, particularly stock photography. They are making time-consuming and laborious tasks much faster and easier. And that really is a good thing.  I love that kind of progress when I am not caught up in fear…fear over increased competition and fear of change.  Getting into this place of fear is easy for most of us to do…and it is a deadly place. It leads us into inaction and a whole host of negative emotions. Negative emotions, among other things, are not particularly fun. I prefer to be an optimist because, if for no other reason, it is a lot more enjoyable! 

Shifted Thinking and Creativity

So rather than giving in to that fear the other night I made a conscious decision to shift my thinking.  I reminded myself that the ability to create images, that is, to do the technical work, has been decreasing in importance for years now as the technology takes over that burden. What is becoming ever more important is creativity. Creativity in everything from how we run our businesses to what ideas we come up with for our imaging projects.

The Importance of the Idea

A good sound grasp of the tools certainly is an advantage over a less disciplined approach, but isn’t the idea or concept that we are creating ultimately far more important? A great idea executed in a mediocre way is stronger than a mediocre idea executed with technical aplomb. At least I am proposing that that is the case in the world of stock photography.

Lost Momentum, Fun, and Productivity

If I get caught up in worrying about the competition I lose momentum, I have far less fun, and I am less productive. So I mentally shifted to thinking about all the cool things I can do with these new Photoshop improvements, how much easier my images will be to make. I reminded myself that the most important on-going project I have is to increase and hone my creativity.  I pictured some of the images I have on my to do list now…and how the new PS advancements will help me accomplish them.

Creatively Satisfying Images and Money

I left the presentation feeling excited and eager to dive into CS5, not because CS5 itself has been improved, but because it will help me create my images. I also left with a clear and strong mandate to work on becoming more creative and more imaginative. And I left with an understanding that more creativity and imagination will not only help my bottom line, but it will make the non-monetary rewards of my career that much more satisfying. I am not in stock photography just to make money, or to make more images like everyone else. Sure, those images will happen, and to some extent need to for cash flow reasons. However, one of the most important reasons I am a stock photographer is to be able to create images that are exciting and interesting for me . There is no doubt in my mind that if I can keep making images that are creatively satisfying for me, the money will take care of itself.

OK, off to install my new CS5 upgrade!

Dealing with the New Reality For Stock Photographers

We all are facing change and challenges in our businesses, contemplating new courses of action. There is one thing that we can all do to help prepare for the future...create great, optimized websites.

Getty Images, iStockphoto, and a Revelation

I did a search on Getty Images today while checking to see the competition that existed for an image idea I am considering creating. Then, just for the heck of it, I did the same search on iStockphoto. It was a bit of a revelation. Not only were there far more images, a couple of thousand rather than a couple of hundred, the iStockphoto images also included ones that were both higher in production value and more creative.

The Problem of Being Found in the Market Place

It makes sense too. You have a far greater supply of photographers contributing. And you have both photographers who are bent on creating images that will sell and earn income, commercially oriented photographers, and those, lets say advanced amateurs, who are more interested in creating their art and would love to see someone publish it.  As time passes more and more images will come into microstock collections that, no matter who has created them, will offer some truly wonderful alternatives to what is in the traditional collections. You just cannot get around the fact that the flood of new images is only going to continue and the problem of being found in the market place is only going to get more challenging.

How to Deal with the New Reality

The question for all of us who depend on photography for our livelihoods is how are we going to deal with that reality?  Among the photographers that I personally know some are turning to, or returning to assignment work, (which of course is also under the same pressures including increased competition from those who are hurting in stock), some are relentlessly pumping out more images (and, I suppose…adding to the problem), some are focusing on higher production value and more unique images (which I think is warranted but still eventually subject to the same pressures as the rest of the images), and some have left the business altogether. As an aside, I know at least three “traditional” stock shooters who have embraced microstock and are actually optimistic about their futures with that business model.

One Thing Every Photographer Can Do

I know I keep harping on this, but I think the one thing that every photographer can undertake to best help them be in a favorable position for whatever happens with photography, and particularly stock photography, is to create websites that are highly optimized for search engines. And now is the time to do it because it takes such an incredibly long time to get significant results (unless of course I am doing something wrong…which is entirely possible).

Being “Found” Makes You The Hero

The number of people out there searching on the Internet is mind-boggling. If you can get them to your site you can monetize that traffic. You can make money off of advertising, selling prints and merchandise, licensing images, getting assignments, offering workshops and probably a few more things I am not aware of at this moment. People who are searching want something…and if you can get them to your site you at least have a chance of supplying them with what they are looking for. You become the hero! Further, those people who end up on your site and who don’t find what they are looking for might see an ad on your site that does offer the chance of solving their problem…so they click on that ad and, in essence, pay you a fee for pointing them in that direction.

Millions of Searches and a Wide Variety of Opportunities

If you ask me, the potential rewards for creating a site that actually works in terms of attracting those millions and millions of people searching the Internet, of a site that opens a wide variety of opportunities, makes all the time, effort and investment that goes into such a site a no-brainer. But hey, more than one person has suggested that I do, indeed, have no brain. Oh well....

Relevant...and Risky Stock Photos

I almost didn't send this image in, but after I did the first sale was for $17,000.00.

Careful What You Wish For
I am sure I am not the only old time stock photographer who has harbored a secret desire to have Tony Stone, the man behind the “Stone” brand and the precursor to Getty Images, come back to stock and save us all.  Well, he is back…and has joined with Vivozoom to help propel that micro stock agency to the forefront (read the article at Microstockdiaries).  Careful what you wish for!

Focus on Quality and Make Relevant Photos
When Tony was asked what advice he would give to us traditional stock shooters he replied, “Focus on quality, and before you fund a shoot examine hundreds of stock images in print and online, and then imagine real uses for your own images. Here’s your mantra: “Relevance, relevance, relevance.”  This approach will focus your shooting, reduce your costs and boost your sales.”

What Is Relevant?
So how the heck do you know what is relevant? There are several questions you need to ask to determine relevance. It is also important to remember that determining the relevance of an image is more of an art than a science.  The first question to ask is who is going to use this image? The second question is why would they use this image rather than another one? The more likely your image is to be used than another, the more relevant it is. So you have to factor in the competition. The more competition there is the less relevant the image. The more relevant the image the greater investment is warranted in creating the image.

An Art, Not a Science
Other factors to take into consideration include the projected lifespan of the image, and distribution variables; is the image better suited for commercial stock photography, blogs, imprinted merchandise or fine art prints…and do you have suitable distribution for its intended categories? Of course, as I mentioned earlier, determining the relevance of an image is as much an art as a science. A great example of the difficulties of determining an image’s relevance can be seen in an image I made of a man with a blue face and shaved head with his head on fire. After making the image I sat on it for quite some time. I just couldn’t figure out who would use it for what. Finally I sent the image in to Getty anyway. My art director/editor at the time told me she didn’t want it. What the heck, I decided, I had nothing to lose so I sent it to Corbis. They loved it! The first sale it made was for $17,000.00! It has sold many, many times since. And I almost didn’t send it in at all!

Compelling Images, Art Directors and Creativity
Sometimes, even if you can’t answer the question of who would use the image and why, if the image is compelling enough, art directors and designers can and will use their creativity to come up with uses. I am guessing, but I think that such images would be better suited to Rights Managed where infrequent uses can be offset by higher licensing fees.

Instincts, Risk, and a Lot of Cents....
Sometimes you have to go with your instincts, but if you can answer who will buy your image, and what for, you certainly have a leg up on succeeding in stock photography. If you take the time to see how much competition there is for your photos, so much the better. But don’t forget to stretch yourself, take the occasional risk, and allow room for those crazy images that don’t always make perfect sense…they may end up making a lot of cents!

The Plus Side of Competition In Stock Photography

The push of competition can be threatening, but can also be the impetus for improvement as well.

Increased Competition and Becoming Better
The world of stock photography has become, shall we say, competitive? Insanely competitive.  I think everyone of us has done our share of moaning and groaning about that fact. But rather then indulge that downer of a past time; perhaps we should look at the positive side of the new competition in stock photography. It brings me back to something that Ed Kashi said in his presentation at the Blend Images creative meeting. He said “To become a better photographer, I have to become a better person”.  The new competition in our industry is definitely making me a better photographer, and I hope in some ways a better person as well.

Mediocre Won’t Cut It Anymore
I know I have to work harder at every aspect of the business. I am working a lot harder at figuring out what to shoot. I am being a lot more efficient in my use of money. And I am stretching and pushing myself at everything from more accurate bookkeeping to asset management (boy do I have a long way to go there) to lighting shoots. Mediocre won’t cut it anymore, and I love what I do too much to risk losing it in this newly fierce arena.

Long Term Success And Being Good
Ellen Boughn drew my attention to a blog post “The Case for Being Disruptively Good”.  In the post Umair Haque makes a case that long-term success requires being good (as opposed to being evil). This is especially true as the world becomes more connected and transparent. It is also true in our profession of photography. The practice of being good helps us establish real connections with the subjects of our lenses whether they are people or landscapes or still life compositions. It helps us forge real relationships with our vendors, our distributors and our clients. Being good, and being real, amplifies all of our efforts whether those efforts are in marketing, creating social and business networks, or seeking support to help deal with the challenges we face.

A Goal To Aspire To
To succeed in the long term in photography we need to strive to be better. I believe that one’s life and one’s business, particularly in such an intimate practice as photography, cannot be separated. To insure our long-term success we need to be better photographers, better business people, and better human beings. Umair Hauqe describes Apple Computer as “disruptively good”. I don’t know that I could ever be “disruptively good”, but it is a goal that I can aspire to. Brian Tracy, my favorite motivational speaker, reports that, “There is never a traffic jam on the extra mile”. Lately I have been getting to know that extra mile pretty well! Taking that extra mile and aspiring to be disruptively good is something we should all be doing anyway, but it is the competition in this new world of stock that has actually lit the fire under me to make it happen.

Photographers That Inspire You
Think about the photographers that inspire you, that are really making a difference and/or are at the peak of their game. In all likelihood they are sharing information, honest in their dealings and being good human beings. All of the photographers that I have personally gotten to know, who are stand out successes, have impressed me as quality people as well. They have high standards and good values, and live up to those standards and values.

Reality as Motivation
The bar has been raised for succeeding in photography, particularly in stock photography. I have the choice to whine about it (which I sometimes do), or to step up to the plate and use that reality as motivation to become better as a photographer and as a person. Sometimes it is two steps forward and one back. But when I look back at the last five years it is clear that the change in our industry has been both difficult and has also made me better.

The Tortoise and the Hare...How to Thrive in Stock Photography

The Tortoise and the hare, a stock photo that certainly applies to success in stock photography!

The Tortoise Mentality.:How To Thrive In The Stock Photography Business
If you want to thrive in the stock photography business I think it is best to take on a tortoise mentality. You need a thick shell to protect you from all the negative press and commentary that is constantly flying around. But perhaps more important, you need to practice a consistent and deliberate production of content maintained over a long period of time, to create a body of work that will support you.


Billions of Images, Recession, Depression and Common Sense
Sometimes even I get mildly depressed at all the negativity out there surrounding my chosen profession of stock photography. On the one hand, with literally billions of images available, and millions more going up online every year, and thousands of contributors happy to give away their images…well, that is pretty bleak! But sometimes it is necessary to keep faith when the voices all around you are yelling otherwise. I try and review the positives when I feel myself getting too weighed down.There is an enormous amount of money spent on stock photography. There are more buyers of stock than ever. I still make excellent money at stock photography, and still have many sales ranging from the hundreds of dollars to the thousands of dollars every month. We are coming out of the recession and common sense says that sales will pick up. I do good work. I have excellent distribution. I am in a great place and have a good start on improving my position through my web site.


A Sense of Control and Hope For the Future
This brings up an interesting point for me. What does all the work I am doing on my site and with SEO provide me? One big thing is hope for the future. Without hope, without a positive outlook, my production would fall and I would become victim to a self-fulfilling prophecy. I know that the web works for some photographers, and I can see progress, albeit slow, in my own efforts. Knowing that I can go beyond just making images, and actually boost sales through my Internet efforts, gives me a sense of control that really helps me stay productive.

Slow and Steady Production and a Large Body of Work
Another important example illustrated by the old fable of the tortoise and the hare is the slow and steady nature of production needed to succeed in the long-term undertaking that stock photography is. Back in the so called glory days of the early 1990s it took me over five years of constantly adding images to get to the point where I could let go of the assignment work. Now it takes a much larger body of work to sustain you. Too, if you are trying, as I am, to provide images that are well thought out, that illustrate concepts and have staying power, and that require a lot of pre and post efforts ranging from market research to intense Photoshop work, then it takes more time to produce a large body of work.  The good news is that it can still be done. I personally know several photographers, who weren't even photographers a few years ago, who are well on their way to being able to totally support themselves through stock photography.

Encouraging Results and a Lot More Work
Then there is the Internet and SEO work. Originally I thought in a year I would have created a huge amount of traffic. After a year-and-a-half I can see encouraging results, but am now thinking it will be another year…or maybe longer, before I see a truly significant return on my efforts. I am licensing images, selling prints and coffee mugs, sending traffic to my stock agencies, and even pulling in a small amount of advertising revenue through Google Adwords. But to offset the effects of the oversupply of images and the recession is going to require a lot more traffic, and a lot more work to get that traffic. The amount of work required means one has no choice but to take a long-term view.

Uncertain Outcomes and the Certainty of Revenue
Some might question the wisdom of putting a large amount into a project with an uncertain outcome. I would answer that if I am making images for stock that I would be proud to have in my portfolio, then should I decide to go after photography assignments, the time and effort will not have been totally wasted no matter what happens in the world of stock. Too, I know that my images will earn me money. There is some question as to how much, but there is no question about whether they will bring in revenue. As I have mentioned before, I have images created twenty years ago that still bring in income. Back in 1990 when I first started using Photoshop to create stock photography (and to do assignments as well), there were those who said it was too soon. In some ways they were right…it took forever to do things. And yet, as most of those images are still earning money, maybe it wasn’t too soon…and I am certainly glad I had a long-term vision for my stock career!


Be a Tortoise and Not a Hare
So be a tortoise in the sense that you need to protect yourself from negativity in order to stay productive and to do the things that need to be done to get or stay successful. If you have to pull your head into your shell from time to time, so be it. But do keep sticking your neck out as well, putting one foot in front of the other, producing images, getting them into the market, and someday you will find that you have crossed that finish line…and ahead of that hare as well!

Photo Credit lines, Copyright Notices, and the Benefits of Big

When it comes time to choose how prominent to make your credit line/copyright notice I suggest that bigger is better!


Credit Lines, Copyrights, and Watermarks
When looking at the image shown at the top of this photo blog, what are the chances someone is going to steal it and use it on their site? I would say not likely, and certainly a lot less likely than if the photo had a less prominent credit line and copyright notice. What are the chances they will know the image is copyright protected? How about the chances of finding my site in order to license the image or see more of my work? I now believe in big watermarks!


My Name In Huge Letters
I am in the process of upgrading all my online images to have a rather prominent credit line. Originally I didn't want to clutter up my images with a watermark, you know, that photographer-ego thing, but having seen the rampant theft of my photography, I have changed my mind. Do a search for "Massage Cats" and there is my image everywhere...but almost none of them have a credit back to me (but now this one does). Besides, when I see my one of my images used somewhere on the Internet without my permission then it at least feels a little to better to have my name in huge letters across the image!


Live and Learn
This has been a gradual process for me, starting with a very tiny and unobtrusive credit line, then progressing to a larger one, and at this point really big to where it is essentially a watermark (in this case I believe bigger really is better). It is a huge task too! I have probably 3000 images left to go, and that doesn't count the over 3,000 images I have yet to migrate to my site. Too bad I didn't start off with this mentality. Oh well, live and learn.


Advertising, Promotion and Education
If someone does steal the image they will either have to put some time, effort, and skill into removing the credit line, or I will at least get some advertising and promotion out of the deal (yeah I know, on some of the images it would take two seconds to get rid of the credit line.but they still have to put it into Photoshop and at least spend some time). To me, at this point, huge watermarks and/or credit lines are a no-brainer! In a way, putting larger credit lines on your work is also an educational process. The more people see images with big copyright notices and credit lines on them the more it might sink through their skulls that images are not all free!

File Names, Alt Text and Finding Pictures
Of course, at the same time I am upgrading the file names to have more meaning for search engines, I am adding better alt text as well. Alt text is one of the key ways that search engines know what the picture is about. This is a ton of work and slow going. I sit in front of the TV at night with my laptop on my lap and watch Law and Order (or American Idol or.whatever) while I do this work. I have learned not to rush though. I believe it is better to do a good, thorough job on each image. It isn't something a "robot" can do (I know a number of photographers who are having programmers create robots to systematically "harvest" their images off of agency sites.fast, but in the long-run I don't believe it will work as well as giving more individual attention to each image).

Overnight Success and Years of Hard Work
Sometimes it seems totally hopeless to have all this work in front of me. But then I remember how difficult it was to learn and do professional quality work with Photoshop back in 1990, and how much that ended up helping my career. It is hard to get around the fact that overnight success usually requires years of hard work.

Iconic Symbols and the Power To Communicate In Stock Photography

An iconic image of a piggy bank, illustrated in a new and different way, results in an effective and compelling stock photo about the risks and rewards of investment opportunities.

Iconic Symbols and the Power to Communicate
There are images that have become so identified with certain concepts that they not only ubiquitous but have become clichés as well. These “iconic” symbols are ubiquitous and often banal, but even then retain the power to communicate effectively. Such images include the light bulb to demonstrate “ideas”, a life preserver for “rescue”, and a lighthouse for “guidance”. Another such symbol is the piggy bank. We see it everywhere, and we instantly know that the topic is finance of one sort or another.

Images That Serve Your Client
While we can look at such overused images as a liability, if they are portrayed in a new and interesting way they can be extremely powerful in getting a message across. What they have going for them is  instant recognition; what goes against them is the boredom factor. Get rid of that “boredom”, show that symbol in an eye-catching and interest-provoking manner, and you have an image that serves your clients well, and in turn can bring in substantial revenue for you. A another example of a piggy bank image that does that refers to "Stretching Your Savings".


Volatile Financial Markets and Bucking Broncos
In this case I wanted to create a stock photo that could be used to point out the volatility, the ups and downs, and the risks of finance markets, whether they are in savings, capital investment, the equity markets or any other financial instruments. I chose to use a man in business attire to expand the concept beyond that of personal finance and to include corporate entities as well. The cowboy on a bucking bronco is a concept that all Americans, indeed that the whole world is familiar with, and has an inherent drama to it. Success in that rodeo sport is possible, but is hardly a given. I think it is a perfect merger of two familiar and iconic symbols.

Successful Stock Photos and a Piggy Bank
Some of the things that make for successful stock photos are motion, or a sense of it, a positive spin, a clear message with a quick read, and effectiveness at thumbnail sizes. To impart that sense of motion we have dramatic body positioning for both the piggy bank and the executive riding it. Another detail that works to help add to the sense of movement is having the businessman’s tie flying out. We also made sure to have our model smiling to add that positive aspect to the photo. By having the image on white we make it easy for those licensing it to incorporate it into a wide variety of uses…and to expand the image to accommodate headlines and body copy. Generally images sell better when they are in an environment, but in this case my intuition was to use that more generic white background.


From Newsletters to Ads To Editorial Illustrations
This is the kind of image that can be used by a huge portion of the business and finance communities for everything from newsletter embellishment to bank adds to editorial illustrations. With that in mind I put the images into Blend Images Royalty Free collection to get maximum distribution and to avoid eliminating those potential users who avoid using Rights Managed images for real or perceived reasons of expense.


Interesting, Compelling and Iconic Images
Time will tell if the image turns out to be successful or not, but the principle works. If you can take one of those iconic symbols and show it in an interesting and compelling manner, then I bet that you will have, at the very least, one of those bread and butter images that are so important to having a thriving stock photo business.

Top Motion and Still Shooter Stewart Cohen Interviewed

Photo © Stewart Cohen"I love this picture that I shot years ago in South Beach because it is raw, real, and voyeuristic. I feel the mix of lust and alcohol flowing through this guy as he eyes this beautiful women. Do you feel it??". Stewart Cohen

Stewart, I have this impression of you as a very laid back, low-key guy…someone who doesn’t take up a whole lot of space. Yet you are one of the elite of the photography world.  Your client list would make anyone enviable, your promotion efforts insure that you are a household name in the advertising world and you shoot both stills and motion in exotic locations around the world. You are also a founding member of Blend Images stock agency.

I understand that early on you assisted Helmet Newton. I would love to hear how that came about and what was the most important thing you learned from him?

I was lucky enough to work with Helmut Newton after Fred Woodward, who was a friend of a professor of mine, recommended me to him. The most important thing I learned from him is that you can be a nice guy and be a success. No attitude, no entourage, no nada, just do you thing and hope people respond to it.

What quality in you, more than any other, has been responsible for your success?

Tough question but I would have to say perseverance and determination are two of the qualities. Also I regard it as a business, I treat people with respect. I expect the same in return.

I first became aware of you through your CA ads. That has to be one of the more expensive ways to get your name out there. Was it a difficult decision for you to commit to that campaign?

The problem with me is once I realize that something might be a good avenue to take, I have to do it regardless. We are responsible for our own careers. I never want to look back and ask “What if ?” So the year I started advertising on the back of CA, I also did the back of Archive. It was pricey. Who knew if it got me work, but it did circulate my name. I am working on a different but similar strategy now.

What are you doing now to get and keep clients?

Online search engines like Lebook, Wonderful Machine, Alt Pic. We were doing banners on Creativity.com for the last two years as well. Keeping clients is easier than getting them so once I get them I try to move mountains for them.

Do you specifically target certain clients and/or art directors that you want to work for and do custom promotions in addition to your broader efforts?

I do when I can focus long enough; I have learned if you pursue someone long enough in a positive fashion you do get somewhere.

What do you think is more important for success in photography, talent, drive or business acumen?

Combo of all of the above. For long-term success one must have talent. Drive and business acumen are necessary to get you until tomorrow. One has got to love it, especially these days because at times it can be thankless.

For you, what is the key to having a successful shoot?

Answer: Making great pictures, having fun and getting paid extremely well. I walk away from every shoot remembering why I love what I do.

How/why did you move into motion?

Answer: I have always loved motion as well. I actually went back to school in 1991 and studied in the film dept at USC.

How much of your work is motion?

65% right now

Do you think that the ability and experience to shoot both stills and motion for the same client/shoot will become an important selling point?

I have been pushing this concept for ten years and you know I am starting to think it might not be as important as I once thought it was. Ironically I feel that today they are actually merging. But the reality is that it is really hard to tell a good story visually in motion while concentrating on a still job. I think the frenzy will die down and filmmakers will stay filmmakers and still guys will be able to make clips for banners or stock.

Do you have any experiences that might indicate that such a duality could be come advantageous for stock photographers?

Integrated campaigns can offer more uses in multiple formats.

What advice can you give still shooters who want to enter the video arena?

It’s not about the gear. It is about telling a story that can give an emotional tug. Its funny that all the still guys talk about the motion gear and what they want to buy and none of the film guys have ever owned their own gear. It is about the tools for the project that will help tell your story. My advice is to read books about directing and cinematography. Subscribe to American Cinematographer, look at commercial reels, watch movies.

How does stock photography fit into your business?

Stock used to cover my overhead 100% so assignments were gravy. This allowed me to experiment and take big chances considering assignments are 95% of my business. I built a business upon that premise, I like the business model but it is faltering currently so I am developing new ways of building the same structure.

You shoot both still and motion stock.  How do you determine which to do when?

It becomes a feeling although neither are relevant all the time. I sometimes find that what I think would be a good still can tell a story when it is moving and visa versa.
Each shoot has a priority either a Still shoot with a motion component or a motion shoot with a still component. Really hard to do both well at the same time even with second shooters.

Can you share any insights or opinions on RM, RF and Micro?

I am in the business of doing really good work. I expect to be paid for it. The chase to the bottom in the stock photo world makes me kind of sick. The thought that anyone can make it up on volume is insane. I am ignoring it. Micro and I will never meet at this price point. I am not a widget manufacturer. I have more self-respect for my craft and art than that. They keep coming up with new models as a way to develop value or erode it. I do not know exactly where the stock photography model is heading. 3D maybe.

How has the recession impacted your business?

This is the first recession that has ever affected my business. It is more than an economic downturn. It is a technological tornado as well. We need to retool our businesses extremely quickly to become efficient in the new landscape.

Can you share with us some of the downsides and upsides of assignment work?

When assignments are great there is no better. When they are not, they can be tough and tedious but my job is to come bring back the goods for the client regardless of the circumstances. I like that challenge.  The upsides are you never know what you will be doing on what continent next month. I love the mystery. I love the collaboration with other creative’s on the agency side. I love the fact that some of my best friends started out as clients who I would never had met if I hadn’t taken that particular project. I love the fact that one road leads to another and assignment work takes you down the first road that you hadn’t planned on traveling. It can be exciting and thrilling. The downside is that you have to answer to a lot of other people. It can be frustrating as well, endless changes, requests, demands. Unreasonable at times and a lot of times totally unrealistic. It is a crazy business that you need thick skin at times. You are sometimes viewed as a commodity and sometimes as a creative king. That can happen in a span of fifteen minutes. Another downside and a big one is that you are not in control of your own calendar. A client gets to shoot when they want to shoot even if it is an inane reason. When assignments are great there is no better. When they are not, they can be tough and tedious…but my job is to come bring back the goods for the client regardless of the circumstances. I like that challenge.

Stewart, you are a founding member of Blend Images, and are on the board as well. Can you share some of your experience around that?

Blend was an amazing concept back in 2005; it intrigued me so I got involved with it. I like and respect the other members and they have become my friends.
I have been a board member for the group for the last couple of years and it is a role I really enjoy. I understand that the other members put their trust in me and the other board members to make sure the company runs like it was concepted to run. Being of a business mind I have enjoyed going though the trials and tribulations of the industry and the economy and I am honored to be a part of this group. We have weathered it so well; Rick (Rick Becker-Leckrone is the CEO of Blend) and the team really, really do their jobs well. The company is in a place that it can sustain and grow if we continue to add great content to the collection. I like how Rick suggested the quarterly calls so anyone who is interested in knowing what is going on in the biz can know. We are transparent and of like minds. It is a thrive or die world and Blend Images is thriving.

Are you optimistic or pessimistic about photography as a whole and about stock specifically?

Creating great imagery has always been and will always be fun so I am optimistic. Stock has been very good to me. I do not expect the same type of returns in stock going forward. I believe in visual storytelling and I believe in getting well paid to do it. We need to invent the next business model. Who knows what the next “stock” like business model will be. Stock just happened to be, I did not chase it, it was a business model that felt right in regards to the work I was doing. There are others business models out there that will appear on the horizon as we move forward with our careers.

What advice do you have for those just entering the field of professional photography?

Find a niche in our biz that you love and you feel like you need to do. You need to love waking up in the morning to go do it. You need to want it more than having a comfortable lifestyle or a 911. If you are not totally driven to do it, go back to school and get an MBA and find a killer job that you feel this way about. You will thank me for this advice in twenty years.

How about some advice for some of us jaded veterans?

Whatever we have done before was just a warm-up for tomorrow. Be fiscally responsible in your business and take chances with your work. 

Stewart, as we finish up this interview you have just had a book published, IDENTITY: A PHOTOGRAPHIC MEDITATION FROM THE INSIDE OUT.

Can you share with us a little about your book and how it came in to being?

Identity is a project I started in the summer of 1999 on a deck behind a little house on Martha’s Vineyard. I remember the day perfectly--it was sunny and beautiful, and I was hanging out after lunch while our infant Teal was napping. It was the first time I had ever sat around as a child napped, as she was our first. The idle time to think, read and write was awesome…granted it came in blocks of two-hour windows when we weren’t freaking out about how to be parents. Anybody who has children remembers those first surreal months. You are in a different zone, a little sleep deprived and off your self-centered game. New synapses were firing. I had been thinking about how I needed to do more than assignments to create a lasting body of work--I needed to do a book. The concept for “Identity” popped into my head, as I am a big fan of biographies. Meeting new and different people is one of the key reasons I do what I do. I love hearing why people are who they are, what makes them tick, how they got where they are and what drives them to get up every morning.  I thought it would be more interesting to read a little about the subjects as well as seeing beautiful portraits. Personally, I didn’t want to write anything, I wanted them to write about themselves. In a flash of a second I wrote down, “What makes you unique as an individual?” That would be the question posed. Then who to photograph? How would I do it and where? Having the dream and concept was a start.

A producer friend of mine named Judd Allison had just opened a small talent agency called Outcasts in Miami. He was representing the tattooed, pierced, eccentric types. I thought they would be an interesting place to start.  I called Judd on my return from vacation, pitched the concept to him, and we set a date in October of 1999 to go shoot for a few days. He lined up people and his prop storage warehouse on the edge of town as the location. It was going to be awesome. I arrived in Miami on a Friday afternoon, just as hurricane Irene decided to head toward landfall. We were excited for people to start showing up to be photographed. As the winds began to blow, I started shooting a true cross-section of Miami’s fringe crowd. That first night, as the rain came down in sheets and the trees bent horizontally, I met and photographed eight people. “Lucky” Larry Bailey was one of them who made the final cut in the book.

The thought was that the book would be all about outcasts until a few weeks later while sitting at a sidewalk café in Caracas, Venezuela with another producer friend of mine named Jake Mills. I was telling him about the project and by the time we were on our third or fourth Caipirinha, we had borrowed a pen and started a wish list of people to photograph on the back of a napkin. At that moment, the road extended. I knew it would no longer be a book solely about the outcasts.

More stories about the individual portrait sessions to come starting in April 2010

Stewart, I got my copy via Amazon yesterday, and not only do I love it, but my girl friend’s teenaged daughter loves it too.  She even asked me why I don’t do a book like that. Oh well….

Are there any final words you want to leave us with?

Answer: Perseverance sustains your talent.

Carrying the Load: Anatomy of a Stock Photo

One businessman carries more than his fare share of the load in this humorous concept stock photo dealing with management problems, administrative issues and fairness in the work place.

Overworked, Exploding Heads, and Too Much Responsibility
Not too long ago I blogged about feeling overworked. I illustrated the blog with a stock photo of a man’s head exploding. I was mulling that image over in my mind, thinking about whether it would behoove me to create another version. My thoughts morphed from the concept of having too much information, to having too much to do, to carrying to large a load to carrying more than one’s share of the work. Certainly a lot of us, I would guess all of us at some point or another, feel like we have to carry too much of that load. Too much weight, too much responsibility, too much everything! And if all of us feel that way, there must be companies that have products and services that help us deal with those situations. Those companies need to advertise their services and products. So how can we create images that will work for them?

Visually Interesting with a Clear and Compelling Message
I came up with the idea of a businessman with his fellow workers all piled onto his back. It is an image that I haven’t seen before, is visually interesting, and when accompanied by a headline can have a clear and compelling message. It is also tricky enough, and time-consuming enough, that there aren’t going to be a whole lot of people creating the same image. All in all, it sounds like a good stock photo to invest in. Below I will share how i did it with the "before" photos and explanations.


Images with Environments Bring In More Revenue
OK, how to make it? I could shoot it on white…but I have found it to be the case that images with an environment seem to bring in more revenue than those on white. It seems logical that a business environment would be a good one. I don’t really want to go out and find an office just for this one shot. The solution, for me, is to create the environment. The following is how I created this concept stock photo of carrying too much of the load.


Concept Stock Photos
The way I work these days is to come up with a series of concept stock images and shoot the models all in one session, then spend the next week or two doing the composite work. I have a small but serviceable studio (1,100 square fee) in Sausalito, Ca. I have a shooting area, an office, and an extra room for whatever. It was in my studio that I shot a few models in enough poses to create roughly a dozen composite images. You can see that I don’t get real picky about backgrounds…sometimes I end up cursing myself for my cavalier attitude! For this image, as you can see, I had my model stand on the floor (he is standing on a discarded piece of white seamless that I was simply too lazy to move) and pretend to hold the models on his back. They were actually seated on apple crates; except for the one woman who actually was sitting on him piggyback style. I then photographed another model seated on a table. This model is George, a neighbor of mine, who filled-in at the last minute when one of my scheduled models simply failed to show (I hate that!).

I photographed the models as if they were on the primary models back; in reality they were sitting on apple boxes with the exception of the lone woman model who actually was on the man's back.

When one model didn't show, I recruited my neighbor, George, to fill in.


A Cubicle Set and a Quick Test
In that “whatever” room in my studio I have a cubicle set up which I sometimes use for a kind of business set. The corner office area was still “dressed” from a previous shoot, and in fact, even my strobes were still in place. This is actually a pretty small room. I pressed myself against one wall and with a 16mm lens fired off a few frames. My idea was to do a quick test to see if the cubicle set would work for this image. I didn’t bother moving the storage boxes on the left, which are actually full of transparencies that I don’t know what to do with. On the right are some extra cubicle parts piled in the corner.

I have this "set" of a cubicle in a spare room at my studio. This was supposed to be a "test" shot so I didn't bother cleaning it up!

I pulled this shot of tango dancers in an office, shot in Buenos Aires, to use for my "background" behind the office cubicle.

Photoshop, Clipping Paths, and Tango Dancers
I used the pen tool in Photoshop to create a clipping path around the cubicle walls and foreground, and, after converting the path to a selection with a 1-pixel feather; I did the old “Command-J” to create a new layer. This way I could pick a background and paste it behind the cubicle to provide some sort of larger office environment. After trying a few things out I came across this shot of tango dancers in an office setting. I had shot this a couple of years back in Buenos Aires. I pasted it behind the cubicle, and then made two separate files out of it, one for the right hand wall and one for the left hand wall. I next used the Transform>Distort function to give the walls similar angles to those of the cubicle walls.

The Extract Filter and Unwanted Hair
Next I used the pen tool to create a clipping path around the models. I left extra room around their hair. Again I converted the path to a selection and created a new layer out of the selection. I used the extract filter to eliminate the unwanted areas around the hair. I pasted the group of models into the image of the set, and then pasted George in. I used the liquefy filter to adjust his legs a bit so that he fit in as if he had been also seated on my standing model. I used a combination of adjustment layers (Brightness/Contrast), and airbrush layers (painting black with the airbrush) to light and darken appropriate areas and to add shadows.


Debris on the Rug and Cloning
There was a fair amount of cloning and so forth to clean up the right hand corner of the room, eliminate various imperfections, shoe logos, and debris on the rug. I never did re-shoot the room, just got caught up fixing up the shot I had…oh well! I also had to get rid of some color fringing which I had neglected to do in RAW. I used an airbrush set to “Color” with the opacity set to 50% to accomplish that task.

Storage Boxes and an Air of Authenticity
Once complete I have an image that can be cropped vertically for a magazine cover, horizontally for a spread or billboard, or anything in between. There is plenty of room for headlines and body copy. I left the storage boxes in, figuring they lend an air of authenticity to the situation…and can also indicate moving or such; or the end user can easily crop out the boxes.


A Half day, No a Whole Day!
Total imaging time came in at around a half-day, though I keep interrupting the process to check on my web traffic, peruse my e-mail, answer the phone and run to a nearby café for a cup of coffee. The end result is that it takes me a day to do an image like this. Excluding my time, this way of working usually ends up costing me an average of around $100 to $150 per image model fees, props, assistants, shoot food, etc.. In an interesting aside, my most expensive shoots have also tended to return me the most money.

Management Problems and Fairness in the Workplace
This image is great for dealing with management issues, administration problems, fairness in the workplace, overworked employees and workplace perceptions. The image addresses ethnic diversity, gender diversity and age diversity. A creative art director or designer can use an image like this in ways we could never even imagine. I believe that creating useful, versatile stock photos with impact is a way of providing excellent service to the clients that we, as stock photographers, seldom ever get to meet.

Royalty Free and Return On Investment
I submitted the completed image to Blend Images and it was accepted into the Royalty Free collection. I thought briefly about arguing for Rights Managed, but then decided that perhaps my art director was right, and that it might even do better in RF than RM. At any rate, as more of my concept images go into RF I should get a more concrete idea of which model actually gives me the best return on my investment. We will see….

Positive Indicators In Stock Photography

We create our own realities; see the future as bright and then find out how to make it so.

A Less Than Optimistic Interview and Positive Indicators
After Jim Pickerell’s less than optimistic interview I think it might be a good idea to point out what I experience as the more positive indicators out there in this crazy world of stock photography. I agree with many of the “thought leaders” in the image business that our industry is in the midst of profound change, and that making a living at stock photography is not getting any easier. Or is it? In some ways it is easier! But I digress. For the moment, a run-down of what is positive in our industry.


It Is Easier Than Ever To Be a Stock Photographer
First, the use of images is exploding. Second, making great images is becoming easier and easier. Third, distribution options have gone through the roof, including self-distribution. Fourth, information about stock photos, about the stock industry, heck about everything, is available as never before.  I don’t think anyone can deny that it is easier to be a stock photographer than ever…oh yeah, we are talking about making a living at stock.

More Images Are Being Used Than Ever Before
Lets look at that first part, that more images are being used in more ways than ever before (of course, according to most reports 80% of the photos being used on line are purloined images). The very fact that so many images are needed means there is opportunity. I can verify from my own experience with Blend Images, Getty and Corbis that there are some large amounts still being paid for RM photos, and that there are plenty of sales of high-end RF sales as well. I was checking my sales at Blend this morning and was gratified to see dozens of sales over $200.00 (Blend’s share from other distributors), over a dozen for over $300.00, and even one for over $400.00. Of course, then there is something like a hundred Getty sales for $1.82. Oh Well…. But seriously, estimates have placed the stock industry at close to two billion dollars a year. That is a lot of money, and there are still a ton of clients who are willing to pay significant sums to license the images they want and need. If you have never read Dan Heller’s blog you might want to check it out. He makes a case for the industry being far larger in size. Also, I ran across this little tidbit, which seems to confirm the idea that there are still clients willing to pay a reasonable fee: “It was incredibly positive to hear from agencies that are seeing not just their turnover but also their per image sales price holding strong”. This quote is from Pepper Stark who has a stock photography industry consultancy. For the full article click here.

Don't Forget Video
And don’t forget video! While I am only hesitantly dipping my toe in the video scene, and my sources report that the bottom has dropped out of the video market, at least temporarily, video is being used everywhere from on top of the gas pump when I fill my car, to behind the teller at my bank, to popping up everywhere on the internet. In with just under 50 clips on line with Getty, up until a couple of months ago, I was averaging about  $750.00 per month in royalties!

Making Great Images Is Easier Than Ever
The second part is also hard to argue with: Making images, making good images, is easier than ever. Digital cameras give you better quality than film, instant feedback, and no film costs! Those of us who remember having to deal with filtration for film, waiting till long after a shoot to see if we were getting anything, and spending insane amounts of money on film and processing…well, I don’t think anybody can say, with a straight face, that making great images hasn’t gotten a lot easier. And I haven’t even brought Photoshop up!  Digital capture is one of the developments that has helped dismantled the artificial barriers that used to keep stock photography in the hands of the few.

Dismantling The Old Boys Club
The other development that has dismantled the old boys club is microstock. Now, literally, anybody can get their images distributed. Even Getty solicits contributors through flicker now.  Or you can distribute or own images using systems such as Photoshelter to deal with online storage and shopping carts. You can spread the word with Twitter and Facebook, or sell your images on products through CafePress, Zazzle and others. I offer fine art prints through Imagekind…and it sure makes the process easy!

Understanding the Stock Photo Industry
Information about the business of stock photography is available from blogs everywhere. You can watch a video and see exactly how Yuri makes his images, find out the intricacies of RPI from Tom Grill, or bone up on the fine points of using social media in your photography business from Jack Hollingsworth. You can log onto microstock sites and find out which images sell the best. You can utilize services like LookStat to analyze your sales, and/or to efficiently upload your images to multiple distributors. aggregate useful information for everyone. You can use Google Analytics, or programs like Wordtracker to research keywords and improve your SEO.  Forums to share information on the workings and news of the stock industry are coming out of the woodwork ( I just joined Stock Artists Alliance...and don't forget the afore mentioned Jim Pickerells' PhotoLicensingOptions). Sites like Microstockdiaries and StockPhotoTalk aggregate news and information for you. If you want to understand the industry, learn more about photography, or see how successful stock shooters work…the information is right at hand.

Be Very Very Good At What You Do
There is no question that being a stock shooter has never been easier! As for making a living off of stock photography, I believe that option still exists (I am not the only one still doing well in stock), and will always continue to exist. The trick is to provide photos that help companies get their messages across better than the next photographer’s images…better to the degree that you, or your distributor, can collect an a fee worthy of the time, effort and money that goes into those images.  In short, you have to be very, very good at what you do.  You have to create great images within reasonable budgets. You have to be smart about what images you create, and you have to be smart in distributing those images.

Facing Challenges, Competition and Possibilities
Yes, being a stock photographer has never been easier; and yes, making a living at it certainly has its challenges. But what business isn’t facing such challenges? The corner grocer has Costco down the street to deal with.  The neighborhood coffee shop has Starbucks across the way.  We stock photographers just have one hell of a lot of competition, but the possibilities are greater than ever. If we can maintain a positive attitude we are far more likely to find and utilize those possibilities!  As a matter of fact, I think I better wrap this up and go create an image!

Information overload...I Think My Head is About to Explode!

Information overload...I think my head is going to explode!

Facebook, Linked-In, and Google Analytics
I haven’t figured out Facebook yet. I twitter, sort of, I blog, a lot, and spend countless hours entering metadata, reading blogs, trying to understand what the heck is going on in this crazy business, uploading images, consulting with my webmaster on our ongoing SEO efforts, and occasionally taking a look at linked-in. I just learned how to view alt text with my Firefox browser, and to check my Google page ranking. I do keyword research; check my smarterstats reports and Google analytics.

Final Cut Pro, File Maker Pro, and Fetch
I have learned some Final Cut Pro, am struggling with File Maker Pro, need to download numerous firmware updates, can’t ever finish downloading any software updates and can’t get my licensing straight with Fetch. One of my computers is slower than molasses and I can’t for the life of me figure out why. The battery on my UPS needs replacing and beeps at me every fifteen minutes, and costs about the same as replacing the whole unit. Not cheap.  Somehow I only have one card reader, which is always plugged into the wrong machine with a card in it that I don’t remember if I have downloaded.

Monitor Calibration, Microsoft Office, and Bridge
I have two one terabyte RAIDs online, both filled to the brim…and about five one terabyte drives with stuff haphazardly copied onto them…and not much room left to do anything with. I haven’t calibrated any of my six monitors in, well, years! I have three laptops and one works…though the battery last approximately twelve minutes. I can only use Microsoft office on one machine at a time, and, naturally, it never seems to be working on the machine I need it on. On one machine bridge refuses to see all the images on one of the RAIDs, but works fine on everything else. I have no idea what “permissions” are.

Inaccurate Restrictions, Captions and a Human Answering the Phone
I realized the other day that Getty has inaccurate restrictions on at least some of my images, but do I really have time to check on all six thousand? I noticed yesterday that one of my captions at Blend Images refers to a man as a woman. Is that important? Well, at least if I call Blend a human will answer the phone!

Video, Metadata, and Modelreleases
I have two videos waiting to be sent to Getty, but can’t face doing the metadata. My first Canon 5D video is sitting on a couple of cards waiting for me to figure out the Final Cut Pro thing again. The stills from that shoot are on a couple of more cards…I know they are around here somewhere! For that matter, I bet the model release are too…I never through any of that stuff away! That reminds me, my printer is out of ink….

Battery Life, The Genius Bar, and Google Buzz
Should I worry about my battery life when I only pick up my camera once a month? Should I keep them on the charger…or is that for the ProFoto 7b batteries? Why can’t I get my e-mail on my iPhone…I used to be able to! For that matter, how come the guy at the Genius bar couldn’t figure out what the problem was?  Some photographers are creating apps for their promo efforts.  What! Am I supposed to create phone apps now? And what is this I hear about Google Buzz?

I think my head is going to explode!

A Revolution In The Professional Photography World

The photo world is in a revolution, and no one knows where we are going to end up. How do we keep on the road to success?

Shannon Fagan, Ellen Boughn and Yuri Arcurs

In a guest post by Shannon Fagan on Ellen Boughn’s blog , Yuri Arcurs (hey, to start off a sentence with those three names in the first fifteen words---pretty impressive), comments that his rpi has dropped from over $9.00 per image per month two years ago, to half that now, and is possibly on it’s way to $3.00 per image per month, below which he will not longer be able to produce and still earn a profit. That is, to me, a pretty stunning comment…and not a very uplifting one either.  Here is a photographer who is generally acknowledged as the premier microstock shooter in the world, and in my opinion is one of the world’s premier stock shooters of any business model, and he is anticipating his profit dipping to a point where it isn’t worth his time to produce! Yikes!

A Blog Post Worth Reading

BTW, this is a blog post worth reading. Lots of interesting stuff. David Sanger offers some extra-curricular reading that is also fascinating. I am terrible at reporting on what others say…but check out Ellen’s blog its makes for a fascinating and informative read.

We Are In A Revolution

I will say that after reading the material David suggested, it really hit home to me that we are in a revolution where the old ways are dying and the replacement ways aren’t known yet. I suspect that this revolution will continue past my age of productivity, or even my lifetime. What we “professional” photographers are faced with is a career-threatening change that is accelerating rapidly and for which there are no certain answers. On the bright side there is an accelerating need for images. On the downside, image theft is rampant, image supply is infinite, and old distribution models are crumbling.

The Low End and The High End

Popular theory has it that you can thrive both by supplying the low-end of the market, and/or by supplying the high-end. Here we have the premier low-end supplier, Yuri, indicating that he has to make 11,000 images a year to maintain his income, and that soon it might not be worth his time continuing to produce. Oops…there goes half of popular theory. At least if you are supplying the high-end you don’t have to produce 11,000 images a year!  Heck, after twenty years of producing stock imagery I have personally produced somewhere in the neighborhood of 3,000 images. I can’t compete with Yuri (but then it sounds like Yuri might not be able to compete with Yuri…). 

Where to Turn For Hope

Where do I turn to for hope? Well, a couple of areas. I have doubled the number of images I have with Getty in the last two years…and my income is only down 30%. So, if I keep producing at my newer high levels, and the market quits dropping…at least I am still earning enough to live decently. So that’s at least not the end of the world with those afore mentioned caveats. My Blend Images sales are also came down, but not quite as much, and they actually seem to be going up again…so that is hopeful. I am not giving up on agencies yet. I am still making very good money with them.  It may just be that today’s agencies will become the filters that will be required in the coming years in order to deal with and find the images a buyer needs with a reasonable amount of time and effort. I don’t know, and I don’t think anyone else does either.

Images That Stand Out

For me the biggest hope is that I can produce images that stand out enough that there will still be people and companies that are willing to pay a reasonable amount for them…whether they find them through an agency or with internet searches, or through some yet-to-be-determined vehicle. Of course, the challenge of getting buyers to find your images is an immense one, one that I believe (though I may be wrong), can be done through SEO, patience, perseverance, and perspiration (earlier blog post). If you agree you better start implementing that right now, because I suspect it will take years of dedicated work.

The Key: Quality Photos

The key to almost everything for photographers is creating quality photos. Algorithms that reward those with the best-selling work are popping up at agencies everywhere. Quality content is a key to building traffic and attracting buyers for direct sales. And in an Internet world where comparing prices has become so easy, well, you are going to have to have the best looking work in any given price range to make the sale. Quality photography and diversity are our best options for surviving, and even thriving, in this revolution.