Stock Photography

PaulieC

I know Stock is a dirty word to a lot of photographers, but for the moment it's the only way I'm making any money out of it (albeit a very modest amount).
Anyway, I was at home the other night, watching some godawful, depressing program on TV when I had an idea. There's a church around the corner from me with holly trees hanging over the fence, so I went around a grabbed a few sprigs. Using an extremely makeshift set up (Blue Peter would have been proud), I got this:


Notice the sophisticated holding device and the dirt on some of the leaves

Anyway, onwards and upwards. I fecked around with the pic in Digital Image Suite and came up with several variations of this:



Uploaded about 6 variations to 2 stock sites. One site accepted them pretty quickly (the other is always much slower) and since Wednesday, they have made me about $20.
OK, it's not a lot, but it tooks me all of half an hour to make them and if the downloads continue in the same vein between now and christmas, I should have a few bob to maybe buy a proper light tent thingy setup instead of using old water bottles and selotape

rymus

cambo_gueno wrote: »

between now and christmas,

Mod, ban! ban! He said the 'C' word in October! Someone think of the children!?!

City-Exile

cambo_gueno wrote: »

... they have made me about $20.

You sold your soul for €14?
As if stealing from the church wasn't bad enough!
I'll keep a seat for you in hell...

PaulieC

I know! Selling my soul for 14 quid, exploiting Christmas in October is disgraceful. What can I say, I'm a morally deficient degenerate. I also bet on England in the World Cup.
As for stealing from the church, the branches in question were hanging over the fence onto a public footpath. Ahem....

shepthedog

I admire your entrepreneurship here. Very enterprising. what sites did you use out of interest?? 14 euro isnt to be sniffed at and its gonna continue in the run up to xmas..

I am of the view that if you do certain work for stock sites, eg set aside certain photos you know you are never going to use for anything else then why not let them make you a few dollars. They will only sit on your hard drive or be deleted otherwise..

PaulieC

I use shutterstock and istockphoto. I created these pics specifically for stock, mainly just to see if people would buy it. As I said in the original post, it's not a lot of money, but it adds up - I've been able to buy quite a lot of things in the past from the proceeds of stock.

I'm also doing a favour for the local Brigins/Cygnets that my daughter is a member of. I've to go down before Christmas (damn, said it again) and take pictures of all the girls at their Christmas party, to be used in cards for their parents, so I might use this as a seasonl type frame...

Borderfox

Very nice, I try to see things from a stock company point of view and take a portion of pictures accordingly. I hadnt tried anything manipulated like yourself.

AnCatDubh

maybe a donation of $25 to the church's poor box would absolve you !

I think you are quite right about removing the holly - there is a law somewhere that says if a tree/hedging/etc... is overhanging onto your property then you can rightfully remove the overhanging part. As it was onto a public footpath and you are indeed a member of the public which suggests that you have some element of ownership of the said footpath you were probably legally entirely within your rights. There's just one problem. The same law states that after you remove the tree/hedging/etc... you are obliged to throw it into the person that owns it. So what you have to do is return to the church and feck it in back over the wall. Then claim back your $25 clear conscience money remembering NOT to take any more that the $25 spent! ;o)

PaulieC

AnCatDubh wrote: »

maybe a donation of $25 to the church's poor box would absolve you !

I think you are quite right about removing the holly - there is a law somewhere that says if a tree/hedging/etc... is overhanging onto your property then you can rightfully remove the overhanging part. As it was onto a public footpath and you are indeed a member of the public which suggests that you have some element of ownership of the said footpath you were probably legally entirely within your rights. There's just one problem. The same law states that after you remove the tree/hedging/etc... you are obliged to throw it into the person that owns it. So what you have to do is return to the church and feck it in back over the wall. Then claim back your $25 clear conscience money remembering NOT to take any more that the $25 spent! ;o)

I'll have a look in the bin when I go home and see if I can't return it to the church

PaulieC

Borderfox wrote: »

Very nice, I try to see things from a stock company point of view and take a portion of pictures accordingly. I hadnt tried anything manipulated like yourself.

yeah, you'd be very surprisd at what people would buy. It's handy in that you don't have to leave the house to do it and it's a steady (if small) stream of cash

Borderfox

I have signed up with a stock company called photographers direct and they support fair trade for us with higher fees going to the creator/photographer, some of the requests are very specific but you can upload your own shots into your gallery and people can see them there. You can have any of your gallery or submitted shots on any of the micro stock site though such as Istock or shutterstock...

440Hz

Ive done a good bit, as a private freelancer, product and property stock for a marketing company. Its grand money and can be good fun.

Shiny

Thats it, I'm deleting my Alamy portfolio.

I'm going to get started with shutterstock.

Dont care if i only get 20c per photo.
Its better than the 0c i got with Alamy. :mad:

Fajitas!

Thread closed, 440hz, a new one started for you...