23February2010
Istockphoto / Bigstockphoto Diary 6
Posted by Rob_Nunn under: istockphoto.
I’ve decided to combine the separate Istockphoto and Bigstockphoto diaries I have been writing over the last few months, as any images I think are good enough I upload to both anyway – so let’s look at this batch of flower macro shots which I took with my Canon 350d / Digital Rebel XT and my Lensbaby Composer (with the macro accessory).
For those new to these posts, Istock and Bigstock are micro-stock sites, where you can upload your photographs, and subject to approval, they are included in the galleries for prospective photo buyers to look at, buy a license and purchase. These sites sell Royalty-Free images – you can just buy a photograph (and within limits) use it for whatever you want, and as many times as you want. It’s a very simple way for web and magazine designers to have a huge range of cheap images at their disposal without them having to worry about the complicated licensing agreements of the more traditional photographic stock agencies.
These micro-stock sites also make it relatively simple for the amateur photographer to upload their photographs and make a few bucks from them. The catch to all this is that photographs have become a commodity, you don’t make much per download, and have to have a very large portfolio to make a decent amount of money.
I’m still learning about submitting to micro-stock photo agencies, these are my trials and tribulations as I go through that process, sharing my successes and failures, so that we can all maybe learn a thing or two to become better stock photographers.
Bigstockphoto
Short and sweet this part of the diary – all of the six macro images were accepted, woo-hoo!
Istockphoto
Istock are traditionally a little tougher – first lets look at the rejects, and the reasons given.
Close Up / Macro Of A Yellow Rose Flower – Reject
Reasons:
The subject of the photo is out of focus.
The image is too busy and has no distinct subject to grab viewers attention.
The photo is blurred from camera shake or subject movement. If this is an intentional blur, it should at a minimum have a point of focus, which demonstrates detail.
The depth of field is too shallow, leaving too much of the subject out of focus.
Texture image with focus fall-off to one side or in the corners. Texture shots should generally be in sharp focus across the entire image.
Hmmm. A bit tough this one. OK, it’s a bit soft, but I really like this photo – check out the original in a larger size.
Pink and White Daisy Flower Close Up Macro – Reject
Reasons:
The subject of the photo is out of focus.
The image is too busy and has no distinct subject to grab viewers attention.
The photo is blurred from camera shake or subject movement. If this is an intentional blur, it should at a minimum have a point of focus, which demonstrates detail.
The depth of field is too shallow, leaving too much of the subject out of focus.
Texture image with focus fall-off to one side or in the corners. Texture shots should generally be in sharp focus across the entire image.
I think this is an example of where the extreme blur you get with the Lensbaby Composer, Double Glass Optic, shot at f/4 could have worked against me. Whereas Bigstockphoto liked this shot, it was just too soft for Istockphoto.
Soft Focus Green and White Flower Macro / Close Up – Reject
Reasons:
The subject of the photo is out of focus.
The image is too busy and has no distinct subject to grab viewers attention.
The photo is blurred from camera shake or subject movement. If this is an intentional blur, it should at a minimum have a point of focus, which demonstrates detail.
The depth of field is too shallow, leaving too much of the subject out of focus.
Texture image with focus fall-off to one side or in the corners. Texture shots should generally be in sharp focus across the entire image.
Er.. yes. I think I was taking a bit of a flyer trying to get this one past the Istockphoto moderators…
Close Up / Macro of a Green / Purple Gerbera Flower – Reject
Reasons:
We found the overall composition of this file’s lighting could be improved. Some of the technical aspects that can all limit the usefulness of a file are:
-Flat/dull colors
-Direct on-camera flash and/or flash fall-off (bright subject, dark background)
-Harsh lighting with blown-out highlights that lack details and/or distracting shadows
- Distracting lens flares
-Incorrect white balance
Another photo taken at f/4 with the Lensbaby Composer, but it wasn’t criticised for being out of focus, the attention this time was on the lighting, which looking at the photo big, I’d have to agree with. There are specular (and blown-out) highlights in the centre of the flower that are distracting, so I would have been better off using more diffuse lighting, probably from the side.
And The Winners Are…
Close Up Of A Pink / Red Rose – Accepted!
Soft Focus Yellow Rose Flower Macro Close Up – Accepted! (My favourite)
Learning Points
I shot all of these photographs at ISO 100, the base ISO of my Canon EOS 350d / Digital Rebel XT, and did minimal post processing, so noise wasn’t a problem. I also took a custom white balance, so that helped to keep the colours looking natural.
The problems came with the fact that Istockphoto didn’t like the extreme selective focus macro shots using the Lensbaby Composer at f/4. The shots were just too soft overall, and perhaps the drop-off between the sharpness of the sweet-spot, and the blurred areas, was too extreme.
What I’ll do next time when using the Composer with the Macro Accessory, will be to shoot at a tighter aperture, f/16, and see what happens then.
Cheers, Rob.
27January2010
Istockphoto Diary #4: Kitchen Shots, One From Five
Posted by Rob_Nunn under: istockphoto.
It’s been months and months since I tried to upload any images to Istockphoto or Bigstockphoto, but inspired by an impromptu photo-shoot in the kitchen, I thought I’d dip my toes into the world of micro-stock photography once more.
So, the other day (on one of my rare days off), my wife was preparing a salad in the kitchen. I grabbed my Canon Eos 350d / Digital Rebel XT, snapped the 50mm EF f/1.8 lens on the front, then started shooting. I tried natural light, and some flash, and got some so-so photographs. I then had a look round the kitchen and took some images of some potatoes in a basket(!) and some bananas on a plate.
I decided to upload five images to the two stock sites I’m a member of, then it was just a matter of waiting. A couple of days later the emails started coming through.
First, the bad news. All five had been rejected by Bigstockphoto, for the following reason:
“We have enough of this subject already…sorry. More unique images will help your images stand out from the crowd.”
Ah well. I didn’t hold much hope for Istockphoto accepting any of the shots either, as they’re often pickier than Bigstock, but a few days later I got an email saying that one did, the photo of the potatoes in a basket:
I took this with natural light coming in through the window to the left, with the 50mm set to f/2, at an ISO of 200, which gave a shutter speed of 1/80th of a second, right on the edge of what I can hand-hold before camera-shake becomes an issue. I kept post-processing to the bare minimum, just keeping everything looking as natural as possible.
With hindsight I could have shifted the potatoes around a bit to show them at their best – there’s quite a few “eyes” and nobbly bits on display, not exactly perfect potatoes!
Next lets look at the rejects and Istockphotos reasons, to see what we can learn.
The bananas were rejected, for the following reasons:
-Flat/dull colors
-Direct on-camera flash and/or flash fall-off (bright subject, dark background)
-Harsh lighting with blown-out highlights that lack details and/or distracting shadows
-Distracting lens flares
-Incorrect white balance
Hmmm. Not sure I agree with all of those, but you can make your own mind up. I agree that the lighting could be better, so next time I think I’ll play around with some kind of diffuser, perhaps some netting over the window to soften up the light.
The Cucumber photo was rejected because:
-Flat/dull colors
-Direct on-camera flash and/or flash fall-off (bright subject, dark background)
-Harsh lighting with blown-out highlights that lack details and/or distracting shadows
-Distracting lens flares
-Incorrect white balance
I’d have to agree on this one. The skin tones are way off, and its all a little flat.
This is a bit of a naff photo, but the reasons given were:
-Flat/dull colors
-Direct on-camera flash and/or flash fall-off (bright subject, dark background)
-Harsh lighting with blown-out highlights that lack details and/or distracting shadows
-Distracting lens flares
-Incorrect white balance
Rejection reasons:
“This file contains artifacting when viewed at full size. This technical issue is commonly created by the quality settings in-camera, in post-processing, in RAW settings or scanner settings. Artifacting can also be introduced into an image from the result of other factors such as excessive level adjustments.”
Not surprising really, as I shot this at ISO 800, then used Noise Ninja to try and clean up the image.
Don’t think that all is bad news when you get a rejection, Istockphoto always include some advice, and links to help and articles on their website.
Setting up your own home studio.
Few! So there we have it. Lots of articles to read, I know that I need to do some more research into what my expectation of what a “stock” photo should look like, and plenty of inspiration to keep trying and submitting!
Cheers, Rob.
15June2009
I’m A Pro Photographer At Last! Sold My First Image!
Posted by Rob_Nunn under: istockphoto.
That’s right, I’m quitting my day job, getting a photo-vest and I’ll be wearing a baseball cap backwards. Watch out folks, I’m officially a pro – someone actually paid for one of my photographs!
Seriously though, as I was uploading some shots to BigStockPhoto, I glanced to the left side of the screen and was pleasantly surprised to see that I had earned 50 cents commission, for a Royalty Free sale of Victorian Fort Brockhurst View Along Frozen Moat To Keep.
This might not seem like a big thing, but to me it’s a first, and another step along one of the paths of photography, showing what might be, and actually is, possible. The first hurdle was to get accepted by stock photography sites, but the real question was whether I could actually sell anything, and the answer is YES!
Where one can sell, others can too. The only limit is the amount of photo’s I can upload, so I’m really stoked at this, if I can do it, anyone can.
Thanks, Rob.
ps OK, which one of you guys bought the photo to keep me happy? 
3June2009
BigStockPhoto Diary #5: 29mm M42 Pentacon Lens Gets The Thumbs Up
Posted by Rob_Nunn under: istockphoto.
I have to admit that I’ve been a bit of a “Pixel Peeper” lately. That is to say, I’ve been zooming in to 100% in Photoshop to check the sharpness of the shots with my Canon EOS 350d / Rebel XT, and I’ve got to say that I haven’t been that impressed.
This isn’t what photography is all about. Hell, if you zoom right into any famous photo chances are it will be slightly (or a lot!) blurred. Trying to achieve perfect sharpness is a distraction, and worrying about it is even worse. When you print out your photo’s they’ll look good, and most people look at them on the web quite small, so it really doesn’t matter anyway.
However, it didn’t matter how much I knew the theory, it still bothered me that my lovely new (second-hand) dSLR wasn’t much better than my trusty Fujifilm S5700 / S700, so I went for an independent view and submitted a recent shot of the Spinnaker Tower to stock photography site Bigstockphoto, taken with the 350d using a manual focus m42 Pentacon 29mm lens.
The guys and gals at BigStockPhoto are trying to sell our photo’s to professional users, so they check photo’s for quality, and I was pleasantly surprised when the above image got accepted.
So I’m going to stop worrying about slightly blurred images, and get on with trying to take great photographs that capture the moment.
Cheers, Rob.
27January2009
BigStockPhoto Diary #4 – First Black And White Photo Accepted
Posted by Rob_Nunn under: istockphoto.
Now this is interesting. To be honest I’d never bothered submitting black and white shots from my Fujifilm S5700 / S700 to Istockphoto or Bigstockphoto, I just assumed the extra noise usually created when converting to b&w would lead to automatic rejections.
However, this morning I got an email saying that BigStock had accepted a black and white that I had submitted to test the waters. Let’s take a look at that one, plus a couple of the rejections.
