Hello from Toronto

[ravphotographix]

Hello,

 

Rav here. Fairly new contributor. Just stopping by to say hello. Hoping to make new friends here 

 

I finished uploading few initial batches, around 55 images. If you can look at my portfolio, that'd be great too. 

 

Thanks

[NYCat]

Very nice images. For wildlife you need to research the name of the animal or bird and include the scientific name. I can't help you with the bird with a long beak but maybe someone here can. It won't be found by buyers unless you can be more specific.

 

Paulette

[Allan Bell]

Hello Rav,

 

Agree with Paulette. Image of bird has a keyword "seagull". We know it is not a seagull and there is no obvious gull in the image. If you wish to get to top rankings remove inappropriate keywords that do not relate to image.

 

Hope you have many sales here.

 

Allan

 

 

Edit: Just noticed I spelt your name wrong, sorry Rav.

 

ITMA

[pazmander]

The bird with a long beak is a pelican. California brown?

 

Best

 

Gareth

[ravphotographix]

Nice to meet you all - Paulette, Allan, and pazmander. 

 

I agree, I was struggling with the bird name so used The bird with a long beak. I guess I have to stop assuming (seagull) and do some research. 

 

pazmander, it could be California brown as the shot was taken in Santa Barbara, CA. 

 

Thanks,

Rav

[Joseph Clemson]

You do need to be a lot more specific with your captions and keywords. The captions are vital in Alamy's search engine and in some cases you've still got the caption as 'Olympus Digital Camera'. Specific locations sell on Alamy as editorial - this isn't a microstock site where you find more generic images of anonymous places which are used for illustrating general concepts. Invest even more time in researching and keywording your images than you do in getting them into the camera.

 

Have fun Rav, but success in this game is hard going.

[ravphotographix]

Thank you, Joseph. I may have missed captions on few images but I agree with you completely. So far I have been captioning and keywording on microstock sites. I guess it will take a bit of transition to align my keywording and captioning habits. Is there a resource you can recommend I can look at on how to keyword for Alamy? 

 

Thanks again. 

Rav

[Joseph Clemson]

Thank you, Joseph. I may have missed captions on few images but I agree with you completely. So far I have been captioning and keywording on microstock sites. I guess it will take a bit of transition to align my keywording and captioning habits. Is there a resource you can recommend I can look at on how to keyword for Alamy? 

 

Thanks again. 

Rav

 

Far and away the best place to start is Alamy's own resources on using the Alamy Image Manager http://discussion.alamy.com/index.php?/topic/7028-instructions-help-video-and-links-for-new-alamy-image-manager/

 

You will find much discussion and lots of valuable advice on keywording on the Alamy forums. In reality it boils down to being accurate, detailed and concise in your keywording. Put yourself in the buyer's shoes, what words would they search with if they wanted to find a picture like mine? Conversely, if one of my keywords brought up this picture, would it really fit the bill for what the buyer would be looking for?  One of the tendencies on microstock is for images to be keyworded with every possible reference the image might conceivably support, along with a stack of synonyms. On Alamy this approach would work against the contributor.

 

The new Alamy Image Manager has a 'discoverability' gauge which turns green when the number of keywords on an image passes 45 and other fields are filled in. The consensus view here is that this is misleading, especially  to new contributors, as it suggests that the sheer quantity of keywords matters. This is not the case - it is the quality which counts.

 

It really helps to know a bit about what you are shooting or being prepared to do some research to find out about it. For this reason I never upload shots of plants and flowers as i have no idea about the differences between the many varieties and i would rather upload nothing than upload a shot that I had wrongly described and keyworded.

 

Advice on keywording could fill an article or two (or more) in itself. Start with  the Alamy stuff and read the forums. Have fun.

[ravphotographix]

This is really great, Joseph. Thank you for taking the time for such detailed explanation. You are so right about misleading 'discoverability' gauge. I was trying to fill in with quantity for it to turn green but in vein. However, it seems like it turning it green won't matter than the quality of keywords. Thanks again! 

[John Mitchell]

Rav, I think that a lot of people coming from microstock tend to confuse "captions" with "titles." Most of your images have tiles. On Alamy you will need captions , which are longer and more descriptive -- i.e. they describe accurately what is actually in the photo, give location, etc. Think what, where, when, and how.

 

Regarding the "discoverability" bar, most of us are confused by this new feature since it encourages new (and old) contributors to add irrelevant keywords. Hopefully, Alamy will clarify what they had in mind at some point

 

Good luck from Vancouver.

[Robert M Estall]

your key words seem to mostly start with Amazing & Awesome.  Sorry, but just about nobody will ever search using those words. FACTS!  that's the way to go. No flowery descriptions needed

[John Mitchell]

your key words seem to mostly start with Amazing & Awesome.  Sorry, but just about nobody will ever search using those words. FACTS!  that's the way to go. No flowery descriptions needed

 

Agreed. I'm allergic to "awesome" (generational thing, I guess).

 

But, you know, it does pop up now and then in captions and keywords. Same goes for amazing and fantastic, not to mention great and tremendous, all of which should be swept under the rug IMO. 

[ravphotographix]

@John & @Robert - Hi, thanks  

 

You see my workflow is accustomed to microstock and someone told me to include these generic tags in all the photos. Guess they were wrong, especially for Alamy. I'll rectify in all my pictures. 

 

Also, it is great to learn about Captions because you're right, I was treating it as Title as is the case with other microstock sites. 

 

I'm so glad I started this intro and these subtle tweaks will make a huge difference. I got 10 other pictures accepted today, so will be applying these suggestions 

 

Please feel free to share more of your comments. Cheers

 

John - hope you're enjoying Vancouver weather, eh? We are pounded with snow here today.

[John Mitchell]

@John & @Robert - Hi, thanks

 

You see my workflow is accustomed to microstock and someone told me to include these generic tags in all the photos. Guess they were wrong, especially for Alamy. I'll rectify in all my pictures. 

 

Also, it is great to learn about Captions because you're right, I was treating it as Title as is the case with other microstock sites. 

 

I'm so glad I started this intro and these subtle tweaks will make a huge difference. I got 10 other pictures accepted today, so will be applying these suggestions 

 

Please feel free to share more of your comments. Cheers

 

John - hope you're enjoying Vancouver weather, eh? We are pounded with snow here today.

 

Right. Alamy isn't a microstock site.

 

Spring is really dragging her heels this year. It was a very nasty winter by Vancouver standards, balmy compared to Toronto, of course.

[ravphotographix]

@John - hopefully, it's the last leg. Stay connected..!

[Betty LaRue]

Example: Caption: Brown pelican, Pelecanus occidentalis, perched on a tree trunk by the Pacific Ocean in (town, state). (Birds perch, they don't sit) they perch, stand, nest and fly.

 

Keywords (tags)

 

Brown Pelican,Pelecanus occidentalis,pelican,bird,shorebird,animal,perched,perch,perching,tree trunk,Pacific ocean,water,sea,mountain,mountains, (give name of mountains),day,daytime,nobody,horizontal,outdoors,town,California,U.S.,U.S.A.,US,USA,United States,North America

 

This is how I do it. Some use minimal tags, but every tag listed above is appropriate. If there is a blue sky, that is a tag phrase, blue sky. Believe it or not, buyers like blue sky!

 

If an animal is the subject of a photo, then location is needed. If a buyer is needing images for an article about Birds of San Francisco, they don't want a bird only found in the east U.S.

If you know the common name of a bird or animal, search Wiki. search string: Wiki Brown pelican. You'll get the scientific name.

 

Good luck.

Betty

[ravphotographix]

Thank you, Betty. The real world example has helped a lot. I was curious whether I should tag things like blue sky so your assurance gives me confidence. 

 

I have completed my recent batch with this type of keywording and captioning. I'll change my other images as well. Hopefully, that'll have a good impact in search engines. 

 

Best,

Rav

[Betty LaRue]

Thanks!

I forgot to say you might want to add plurals. pelican,pelicans, etc.

some people want one subject. Maybe a Labrador retriever. But they want to see a lot of pictures of "a" Lab to choose from. So they type in "Labrador retrievers ". Same with people.

 

So I tag woman,women,man,men,people,person,persons,child,children,

 

You might have an image of a woman walking on the beach. You tag woman,walking,beach,woman walking on beach,

And a buyer who wants an image of either sex will search: person walking beach. Your image wont be seen unless you have "person" in your tags.

Betty

[ravphotographix]

Insightful, Betty. I read about adding plurals as keyword in one of the links shared earlier here but buyers also using plural for one subject is new to me. The "person" in tags is also very new to me but makes practical sense from buyer's perspective. 

 

I'm learning from all the experience here. Must say, it is a helpful forum compared to other agencies where I get no reply for god knows what reason. 

 

Thanks again,

Rav