Let me answer those questions with some of my own data.

Every image I submit anywhere goes to 123RF first.  It is my “testing ground” – misspellings, keyword errors, really bad issues I don’t pick up on, copyright, etc.  I send everything I’ve ever submitted through 123RF.com  So that means it’s easy to track all of my submissions thanks to their really great stats on uploads.

In 2008 I submitted 1650 new images.  For the year, I earned $216.40.
In 2009 I submitted 1350 new images.  For the year, I earned $298.19 (+88)
In 2010 I submitted 980 new images.  For the year, I earned $425.00 (+127)
In 2011 I submitted 100 new images.  For the year, I earned $587.78 (+162)

Those submission numbers should be consistent to the major agencies.  Let’s see how the income goes:

Shutterstock 2008: 2548.08
Shutterstock 2009: 2205.29
Shutterstock 2010: 2573.89
Shutterstock 2011: 3037.03

Nope.  Shutterstock actually dropped off quite a lot from 2008 to 2009 despite new content.  This past year was my best year ever despite uploading only 100 images.  Strange indeed!

Total income 2008: 4114.07
Total income 2009: 5530.43
Total income 2010: 6896.38
Total income 2011: 8958.12

So a few simple assumptions can be made there.  First, my images stayed fairly strong despite not uploading as much over time.  In fact, 2012 will be the first year I’ve uploaded MORE than the year before.  Second, microstock income is, indeed, passive income.  With the same images online in 2010 and 2011, I made more in 2011 while doing next to zero work.  All 100 of my 2011 uploads were done in January.  I did *not one second* of microstock uploading, editing, or keywording in 2011.  Everything was actually done in 2010 so I made $9,000 doing “nothing” in 2011.  That’s not “bad money.”

The bad news on this front is that $9000 for 3000+ images online is also not “good money.”   It means to be sustainable at this level, I’d need over 10,000 images online to make even $30,000 in one year.  That means the majority of my images are not selling well.  Why?

Well, a quick search of my Shutterstock portfolio can answer that.  360 of my 3300 images on Shutterstock are fractals.  These sell rarely for me.  If I sort by most popular, I can also see that my last few pages of popular (my non sellers) are fractals, duplicates or model images from our trip.  Our trip had its ups and downs but for the most part, was a giant waste of time.  A few of my not-so-popular models are also on my last few pages.   The vast majority of my non-sellers are in one of those few groups.  That means I need to avoid those going forward and my actual return per image would be much higher.  I used to submit 15-20 of one food.  Now I submit 5-8 total.  It makes a huge difference to sales when you can focus on the few microstock type images that sell.

Someone asked me why I continue to blog, shoot and hopefully begin uploading to microstock agencies again.  My SEO business for photographers has *really* taken off and I always have a waiting list.  My wedding photography business should do very well in Melbourne and I’ll have more clients, business and work to do than I’ll have time for as it is.  I think the answer is that microstock really is passive income.  I know that for every image I upload today, I’ll be setting myself up for more income later.  I know that for every mediocre image I submitted in the past, I can submit at least a few decent ones now to make up for it.

Next on my niltomil agenda is updating this website to be current.  I know I’m behind – sorry!  There really is just too much to do and not enough time.  I’m off to work now!

Dreamstime Announces New Feature to Report Imagery Copyright Infringement

First in stock photo industry to automate the offender notification process

Nashville, TN – August 17, 2011 – Today Dreamstime, a leading stock photography community, launched Infringement Reporter, which will enable contributors to notify website owners of Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) violations. Passed more than ten years ago, the DMCA was developed to address copyright challenges that content owners face in an increasingly digital world.

Dreamstime’s new feature is the first in the industry to streamline the DMCA notification process and provide contributors a quick and easy way to notify website owners when they are misusing a photo. This is often an arduous and time-consuming process for photographers and creative professionals to undertake themselves. Dreamstime anticipates this new feature will also educate image-users about copyrights associated with the images they find and download online.

“Though not always intentional, the theft and misuse of images are a constant battle for the photo stock industry,” said Serban Enache, CEO of Dreamstime. “Search engines have made it easier than ever to find and download digital content, but there is very little information about the copyrights associated with images people find online. Dreamstime is committed to helping our contributors identify stolen or misused images so they can focus on taking great photos instead of worrying about the illegal use of their images.”

With Google’s new image-recognition search tool and others, it is easy for photographers to find where their images are being used online. However, these tools fail to provide a way for contributors to notify offenders when they are abusing the license associated with an image. Dreamstime recognized this as an opportunity to help its large and active community protect their images and also educate image-users about image rights and the stock photography industry.

When Dreamstime contributors find an image that is being used without the proper license, they simply populate the form on the Dreamstime website and provide the image identification number and a URL to the website misusing the image. Dedicated to the protection and promotion of images, Dreamstime is taking customer service one step further by making this process more efficient for contributors.

Lookstat

In their words:

Our systems and services cover all aspects of the microstock process including analytics, keywording, uploading, and submission. Our goal is to empower you to understand your portfolio and to let you focus on creating images while we take care of everything else.

Lookstat tracks sales, allows you to analyze your images, shoots and figure out where your income is coming from so you can focus on creating more money makers and fewer money losers.  Analytics in microstock are becoming much more important and Lookstat provides some of the best.  Don’t miss their keyword, upload and submit features, either.

(Disclaimer: Lookstat is a former advertiser on N2M.)

Picniche

In their words:

The Contributors toolbar is built for image creators. It’ll help you find images for research, but it also has a lot of other features too:

• Get notified when you make a sale on each agency
• Quick associative keywording tool
• Built-in global Upcoming Events calendar

I have to admit – I love the contributors toolbar.  I use it everyday to track sales.  I use the Events Calendar weekly and I use so many of the tools. If you aren’t using this toolbar, are you still logging into each agency?  (Please say no.)  Get this!

PicWorkflow Keywording

In their words:

Upload your images, easily set and change their metadata, and sort them into groups for easier management. Distribute them safely to any pre-supported service or stock agency, or add your own custom destinations, then track their status so you’ll always know who is storing, using, or selling your work on your behalf.

You can now purchase keywording services through picWorkflow to keyword your images before distribution.

PicWorkflow offers a lot of tools for you – distribution, keywording, image handling.  Great for non-English speaking microstock photographers, too.

Lightburner

In their words:

LightBurner is a free online microstock and stock photography content distribution service for photographers, illustrators and videographers developed and operated by Pixamba. Pixamba is a software development and media services company providing solutions for the microstock and stock photography market since 2006. Pixamba developed a popular free content distribution desktop software ProStockMaster, used by tens thousands photographers worldwide.

Lightburner is new to me probably because I used CushyStock to do most of my distribution and keywording for a long time.  I have transferred my keywording to ProStockMaster and been learning about Lightburner.  I have a feeling my own distribution will soon be through Lightburner and keywording in PSM.  I love ProStockMaster so far and will be using Lightburner soon.

Microstock Charts

In their words:

The goal is to replace your spreadsheet by being easier and more useful. We’re probably not there yet, but that’s where we’re heading.

This tool is and always will be completely free to use.

Example chart at http://www.microstockcharts.com/leetorrens#earnings

While I wish the chart views were more configurable (imagine 2 yrs of data on this thing?) I love where they’ve started.  I would like to see more of a “wall street stock” approach to charts – sort by 3 day, 5d, 7d, 1 mo, 3 mo, 6 mo. 1 yr, etc. or configurable timelines.  I like it and would love to see more of it, though.  And free is great!

(Microstock Charts was created by Lee Torrens of Microstock Diaries and Amos Struck)

Below is the newest DepositPhotos press release detailing their new Smart Search functionality.

On May 24, 2011 the developers’ team of DepositPhotos introduced changes in the image search engine. Search can now advise and display the most popular inquiries with already entered words and the number of results by each.  The introduced changes allow better potential results, quicker location of the required images, and prevent spelling mistakes.

“Just enter the beginning of the keyword in the search line and the «Smart Search» will complete the word by itself, display the variants and such word combinations you probably never dreamt of! Enter a text in English, and the search will show prompts in English. Wish to try search with keywords in German? Prompts will change at once, and you will not have to switch between the site language versions. Maybe, you are looking for a famous photographer? Authors are covered by prompts, too. Moreover,  you’ll see not only the author’s name but his avatar and the number of photographs available for purchasing,” says the CEO of DepositPhotos.

DepositPhotos grows its collection daily with thousand images and keeps debugging and improving the site interface according to the user needs and wishes. The present standard search is simple and user-friendly, extended search allows assignment of the category, author, color, excluding keywords and much more. All these functions have provided the best search results but introduction of the search prompts supplies user with such feedback that narrows down the search area and makes the search process more effective as well as quicker. All these possibilities, each being a little thing by itself, together compose what amazes by its forethought and concern for users.

Just a couple quick notes about this news:

• I think the functionality is great. Anything that directs image buyers toward the images they want to buy is a win in my eyes.
• The direct link to change your profile photo is http://submit.depositphotos.com/public_profile_seller.php With it being more prominent, you probably want an avatar now.
• People ask me about sales on DepositPhotos and I have had 125 sales.  I’ve hit payout twice.  Sales have increased since I got most of my folio online and I expect that to continue.   Sales are growing at DepositPhotos for me.

* Disclaimer: DepositPhotos is an advertiser on NiltoMil.com, however, all claims, theories and biases about sites are my own.

All that to say that I talk to 1000s of photographers and have watched their businesses in both micro and event for the last 7 years. I have seen businesses go from nothing to something and some from something to “rockstar photographer.”  I see new photographers pop up almost daily and it makes me wonder where our business is going.  I’ve seen them come, I’ve seen them go.  Here’s my take on the next few years:

When I was in law school in 2000-2002, I remember every lawyer telling me “there are too many lawyers, find something else you love to do!”  It was incredibly difficult during that time for lawyers to find jobs.  Now if you search Google for “lawyer shortage” you’ll find that business is cyclical.  Lawyer shortages in NC, MA, and all around the country have prompted the need for more lawyers than ever before.  The foreclosure crisis in the United States has also created new jobs for lawyers.  Bankruptcies are up when mortgages are down.  Nearly every job has an opposing job.  One is up, the other is down.

Right now photography is going through one of those surplus times.  Our industry *clearly* has far, far too many photographers. That’s not a guess. According to Indeed.com’s salary comparisons, average photographer salaries for job postings nationwide are 16% lower than average salaries for all job postings nationwide.

Statistics show that for a photographer, the average annual salary in 2010 was $29,000. The lowest 10% earned less than $16,900, the middle 50% between $20,500 and $43,500 while the highest 10% earned upwards of $62,500.

What does this all mean?  It means if you’re not PASSIONATELY in love with photography – if you don’t think about it day and night, if it doesn’t consume your heart, if you don’t mind taking a paycut to do what you love – then you should get out now.  Things are going to get worse before they get better.

Will they get better?  I think eventually they will.  I think photographer salaries will go so low and require so much work to make a living that people will give up.  Their cameras will break and they’ll have no backups, they’ll get bored with it, their jobs will recover and they’ll be making enough to get by.  Others will get tired of the 60+ hour weeks for min. wage and quit.  The more photographers give up on this dream, the more work will come back to us.

In the meantime, yes, you’re going to have to work harder and longer hours. You’re going to have to learn to work smarter and do more than the competition. If you can’t do it, save your time and find something you can do for now.  Photography is going to be a low paying career for years. Stop expecting that to change.  Make a change in yourself – be better, do more, or decide to walk away for now.  Either way, good luck!  We’re going to need it.

(In good news, if photography is down, something else is up. What is it? Photography workshops? Products?)

Warmpicture sells royalty free stock images with prices starting right around $1.

Why do I like and support a small, new agency?

WarmPicture gives photographers 80% of the royalty cut.  Compare this to iStockPhoto’s 15% (and sometimes lower) or other agency’s royalties and it’s easy to see that buying images from WarmPicture supports the photographers who make them instead of the agencies who sell them. In the words of site founder Dan Padavona:

Our artists are among today’s most popular stock photographers. Because our library is built from only the best photographers, you will be greeted by a much higher percentage of premium quality royalty free images than you find at a large agency.  And by cutting out the agency, we are able to offer our images direct to designers, journalists and bloggers at a substantial discount to the largest stock agencies.

By supporting Warmpicture, you are supporting independent artists working for a fair commission, while at the same time benefitting from the ability to purchase excellent images at affordable prices.

WarmPicture is owned, run and managed by microstock contributors. If there are improvements you’d like to see to the site, leave a comment here and I’ll make sure Dan (the brains and web muscle behind WarmPicture) gets your message.

So what else could go wrong?

How about everything?  Where to begin?  The obvious is iStock.  Just when I started contributing more frequently, it’s all blowing up.

iStock took back a great many sales from January and February in response to fraudulent sales.

A week from today we will be doing another lump removal of royalties attributed to verified fraudulent downloads that occurred in January and February 2011.

Dreamstime has slashed upload limits in response to combating similar images.

Contributors: The upload limithas been decreased to 5 submissions/day (35/week). Such measure was taken in order to limit the massive number of similar and identical uploads. We kindly ask you to be more selective with your uploads.

Shutterstock rejections are causing quite a stir.

quite

a

stir

Pixmac can’t buy a break. Fotolia, Dreamstime, 123RF have all left them in the last month. New sites seem to be performing beyond their historical measures with GraphicLeftovers picking up, DepositPhotos selling at a BME pace for me, and even Yaymicro performing better than ever.

How’s the month been? What do you see as the biggest changes in the last few weeks on stock?

AIGA, the professional association for design, announced an exclusive partnership with Shutterstock, the world’s largest subscription-based provider of royalty-free stock photography, illustrations, and stock footage. Shutterstock will serve as the “Official AIGA Sponsor for Creative Inspiration.”

As AIGA’s first exclusive national partnership with a stock agency, the alliance underscores the growing importance of stock libraries in providing building blocks for creative work.

“Stock image agencies are already part of the day-to-day workflow of a professional designer,” said Shutterstock CEO Jon Oringer. “As we’ve grown and connected with our creative customers, we’ve used our insights to build better search experiences and provide the highest quality imagery. We’re eager to work with AIGA to support its members and the design profession.”

For more information about the partnership, visit www.aiga.org/sponsors-partner-shutterstock or www.shutterstock.com/aiga_sponsor.mhtml.

For the full press release: http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/aiga-partners-with-shutterstock-to-provide-creative-inspiration-to-members-116231129.html

Istock just changed royalties, as we all knew was coming.

GraphicLeftovers are accepting some people photos, not accepting sample text and trying to make the leap from mini-micro to player.

Dreamstime and Fotolia are no longer Pixmac partners (and Dreamstime is talking lawsuit?)

Shutterstock is rolling out the Bridge to Bigstock for high end contributors.

Me, I just keep plugging along. I’m adding new images, increasing sales and trying to make a living at this.  GraphicLeftovers is already at BME, Shutterstock and DT are back on the rise. I expect most of my agencies to start following their typical patterns now that I’m uploading regularly again.

Big changes!  Lots to think about.

The program itself is very straightforward:

Beginning this week, we are inviting select Shutterstock contributors to automatically copy all of their approved Shutterstock images—including current and future images—to Bigstock as well.

The Shutterstock and Bigstock collections will remain separate. We have no plans to mirror their full libraries.

Participation in the Bridge to Bigstock is by invitation only. We are inviting Shutterstock contributors with high performing portfolios. They will receive an e-mail giving them the choice to opt in to the program.

For contributors who participate, all of their images that are accepted by Shutterstock will now automatically be accepted by and uploaded to Bigstock. The artists will earn payouts at standard Bigstock rates. For participants who already upload to both sites, we will filter for duplicates as we move Shutterstock images to Bigstock.

Of course I wanted to know a few things so I went and got some answers from Bigstock.  I hope these questions address some of yours as well.

—

1) Are the invites (and future invites) going to be mostly people who don’t have their collection already on both sites?

Invited contributors may have some, most, or none of their images at Bigstock and there are different benefits for each group. Those contributors either have high-performing portfolios, high submission volume, or content that fills specific needs at Bigstock. Most often, invited contributors have a combination of the above.

2) What are the realistic timelines for an “above average” but not Yuri-like submitter to get moved over?

Once invited, it will take approximately 48 hours to a week for a contributor’s existing portfolio to be moved over, based on collection size, queue size, processing time, etc. The Bridge queue is separate from the normal upload queue and will not affect it.

3) Do you have an actual # of invitees? It would help people to know “50 people” are going (ie. Yuri, Andres, Bobby, not me) or if you say “we’re starting with 300″ at least some of the moderate levels have a chance someday or if it’s really not that open.

There is no exact line of participation or number of invites. The program is initially targeted at a
relatively small number of contributors with the highest sales and submission volume, who would
therefore benefit the most from a single submission process and some submission support. We may also approach a few contributors with high-performing content that fills a specific content gap or need at Bigstock.

4) The people this affects the most are likely never going to get into the program. It seems like big news but it’s really not, right? Let’s say you have 250 images on SS and never submitted anywhere else. Getting those 250 to Bigstock would improve your earnings by say 20%+. For someone like me, my collection is almost completely mirrored already anyways. Moving over would increase me maybe 1%. It would seem to me that in both SS’s world and the contribs, those smaller contributors who aren’t mirrored would make both parties the most money long term. Any idea  how that will be handled?

Low-volume contributors (such as those with a few hundred images) can always upload their images through the normal submission path, and we made a number of batch submission improvements at both sites last year. This program will most benefit contributors with large, high-performing collections who would have a harder time moving their images manually.

Some of Bigstock’s batch submission tools are covered here: http://www.bigstockphoto.com/blog/theupload/2010/03/new-uploading-process/

5) Are there plans to ever go the other way? Bridge from BS back to SS? If not, what would be the main reasons against it? BSP reviews have sometimes been drastically different than SS for me and many contributors. A BSP bridge back to SS would make *more* sense for my sales to increase.

Since Shutterstock has a substantially larger collection than Bigstock (almost 14 million images at this time), there are no current plans to offer a submission process to Shutterstock via Bigstock. The goal of the Bridge program isn’t to duplicate the collections. The goal is to provide Bigstock’s growing customer base with a wider variety of suitable choices in content, based on their needs.

As of 2010, Shutterstock and Bigstock have begun integrating their content review teams and we’ve adopted shared review standards and training. If you’ve experienced differences in the past, those should go down with time.

—-

I want to thank Bigstock for taking the time to answer my most pressing questions about the Bridge to Bigstock program!  If you have questions you can leave them in the comments and I’ll try to get them answered or maybe a representative will answer them for us.

* See the full press release on Bridge to Bigstock.