I was wondering whether any one has general, big picture advice about stock photography as a way to supplement income.
I was wondering whether any one has general, big picture advice about stock photography as a way to supplement income.
Don't. You're 10 years too late.
What Vinny said.
Sad but true I think.
Thanks,
Kirk
at age 73:
"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep"
I am a 1/3 owner in fogstock.com. Things ain't what they used to be.
10 Years seems about right though I know some folks who are still making a living, much less than the salad days, shooting Landscapes. These folks have a brand and large collections. If there is a type, subject or concept that isn't represented by thousands of images in the various large agencies, I sure couldn't name it.
www.williamsmitheyjr.com
What everyone else said. Sad to say, but I think it would largely be a lot of effort for very, very little return.
I wouldn't bother. Weddings or selling stuff on ebay would be a better way to supplement your income. Free/cheap internet sources of stock photos which are basically legalized photo-thefting, free images from wikipedia, people with digi-cams and an Internet connection looking to stroke their egos by being published and receiving a token payment, and sources like flickr make it a weak and uncertain business for a photographer. If you know any pro photographers doing stock photography, they are either unusually uniquely blessed with business, or their wives have good jobs.
In the "good old days", professional photographers figured they could earn $1 per photo per year. So if you had 100,000 really good photos, you could have enough money left over after paying all of your production expenses to pay some bills.
These days, it might be $.01 per photo per year.
The best way to make money in stock now is to have images that no-one else has. Everybody thinks that's them, but the reality is you have to be extremely good, extremely creative, and work extremely hard. Every image has to have metadata with the location, key words, and with model/property releases.
I kind of agree unless you already have a large archive of high-quality, model-released (or historic and newsworthy) photographs.
I signed with a stock agency after I left my newspaper job. Trouble is, most of the photos I took during the first ten years of my career belonged to the newspaper so I was starting from scratch. Also, my work has changed and I'm something of a low-volume photographer now. I shoot 4x5 and produce maybe 1-200 photos a year, which is what I used to do in a week at the newspaper.
I have about 1000 images in my archive, and in fact I have averaged a bit over $1/image/year. But with the way I'm shooting, it'll take a LONG time to start making any real money.
On top of that, my agency is changing the contract. I can't go into the terms but it's worse than my old deal in a few ways. So I'm leaning towards leaving the agency. I won't miss the small amount of income and I'll sleep better at night knowing I'm not contributing to the commoditization of photography.
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