Ed Rooney Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 I've been trying to get up to Central Park this past week to shoot the autumn colors. It doesn't look as if it's going to happen, weather wise. And I have some serious dental work in progress. Anyway, the most recent sale (yesterday) I've had at Alamy is of some mundane items lined up on a shelf at my boring little supermarket. It makes one wonder where to put time and effort when choosing what to shoot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Semmick Photo Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 Ed, thats the golden question. I run into the same issue. I shoot creative images, and the best sellers are most of the time simple stuff, not creative, I didnt put any work in. LOL Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
York Photographer Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 A sale is a sale! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
losdemas Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 Go out and enjoy the colours, when and if you are able. Shoot some beautiful images and have a good time! When you need a break, pop into the local supermarket for a bottle of water and a snack and take some pictures of what you buy. Once you are home, process the photos. Submit the best product shots to Alamy and the autumnal shots to a POD site. Save the most beautiful autumn/fall image for your wall. Enjoy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dov makabaw Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 I've given up trying to guess what sells and what doesn't. All I know is that what I deem to be creative artistic and pleasing doesn't sell while the mundane uninspiring and documentory do. Bottom line I shot what inspires me and hope for the best. Fortunately my stock income is not critical for my survival or sustenance. dov Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 I get asked this question a lot by people just starting out (as I still do some writing for PhotoSource International, I write a number of guides, reports etc) and my answer hasn't changed in the last 15 or so years. Specialize. Find that one thing/area/topic/subject that you love and shoot that. It naturally have to be something with enough depth for many years of shooting, and there should also be room for you to become an expert in whatever specialty you decide on. I ended up deciding on my specialty after doing some photo research for an article I wrote back in 1998, shortly after moving to the United States. The article was for a Swedish magazine and on street gangs. I searched high and low fo suitable photographs but found nothing contemporary. There were lots of photos of bell-bottomed jeans and big afro hair-do's and gangs from the 60's and 70's but nothing current. I then started looking deeper into the matter and found that the same held true for most things law enforcement and for cirtually all things corrections (prisons). I slowly started to learn more as I was shooting and pretty soon had become enough of an expert in my selected area that I could tell the difference between a Remington 870 and a Mossberg and between powder cocaine and crack. I built my archive as I wrote more and ore articles and these days I quite often get lists from photo researchers where they freely admit that they don't know what half ste stuff on their list even looks like. So not only do I become their go-to guy becuse I can help them out and make sure that search warrant photo needed to illustrate and article of a rise in rural meth labs is actually of a meth lab and nothing else, but I gain their trust and in the editorial stock photography business this is hugely important, It even happens that freelance photo researchers run their selections by me just to make sure, even if they're not my images. On more than one occasion have I alerted the freelancer that there was a potentially big mistake on the verge of being done. One example that kind of stands out is a series of articles that were going in an educational manual for new correctional staff in a section on how to properly secure an inmate in leg irons, handcuffs, waist-chain, and black box. The images selected were great. Sharp as tacks, great lighting, good models and props used. Only problem was that the sequence was wrong and they had the waist-chain running from around the leg-irons up to the black-box on the handcuffs instead of where it should be, around the waist. The photographer had done "research" by watching a few prison movies... The freelancer must have passed the story on to the publisher because when my check (for other images selected for the publication) arrived it was double the invoiced amount and the publisher thanked me for saving them from looking like fools. Financially it was no big deal to the publisher since it was probably a heack of a lot cheaper to send me an extra thousand bucks than having to re-print 40,000 copies of a 80 plus page manual... It's all about knowing your subject and it probably doesn't hurt in that particular case that I'm a sergeant in a maximum security prison and put restraints on people pretty much all the time... I know, probably not the answer you were looking for, but the question gets asked often enough that I thought I'd throw it out there...Mike Karlssonwww.arrestingimages.com ~ mike@arrestingimages.comContemporary photographs of law enforcement, corrections, forensics, crime scenes, narcotics and similar topics. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Brooks Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 Images of mundane subjects sell because photo editors have trouble finding them. Photographers take images of spectacular subject matter, so there are too many images of spectacular subject matter, chasing too few buyers. For instance search Alamy for "Bird Banding" - 484 images. Search for "Bird" - 813,110 images. "Tree nursery" -2,103 images. "Maple Tree" - 33,217 images. "Tree" - 1,740,796 images. The "Tree Nursery" and "Bird Banding" images are pretty mundane, but you have a lot less competition if an editor is looking for that particular subject matter. It is very important to photo editors that their primary sources have images of EVERYTHING. One day you are looking for "Grand Canyon" the next day you are looking for an image of shoelace aglets (tips on the end of shoelaces that keep them from unraveling) Alamy search "Grand Canyon" -34,289 images. Search for "aglets" only 1 unique image, and the aglets are not on a shoelace How many bird photography specialists out there have participated in a bird banding, but never taken a picture of same? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Rooney Posted November 10, 2013 Author Share Posted November 10, 2013 Yours is surely a rare specialty, Mike. Not unique perhaps, but rare. I doubt that you'll have a gang of others trying to join in. I guess if I have a plan it's the one that Bill refers to: I don't ignore classic big subjects, but I shoot anything that makes a picture and suggests a caption. (Going now to find my running shoes.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Rooney Posted November 10, 2013 Author Share Posted November 10, 2013 Ed, thats the golden question. I run into the same issue. I shoot creative images, and the best sellers are most of the time simple stuff, not creative, I didnt put any work in. LOL I hear you, Mick. But "creative" is an objective term; it means what the writer thinks it means. I have no idea what Creative means as Alamy uses it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Brooks Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 The important thing is to show your audience something they have never seen before. All of the classic big subjects have been well covered. Therefore when we shoot the classic big subjects make sure we see, and then shoot them, in a way that that audience have never seen before. The role of the real photographer is to have a unique vision of the world, and be able to communicate that unique vision to the rest of humanity through his/her photography. If photographers can do that, they can change minds, and therefore change the world. Shoelaces or images of war are all valid subjects, if shot in a way that the viewer has never seen before. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MMiller Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 One angle on this I suppose is taking a common classic subject, such as fall colors, but then tying it to something more specific or unique. Thus, fall color photos are ubiquitous, yet tying those fall colors to New York City, for instance, showing the the beauty of nature within that city, might help distinguish those photos from the rest. I recently shot some fall colors in Nevada along the Truckee River, with mountains in the background. So there are already a zillion fall colors stock photos to compete with, yet searching Alamy for fall colors in Nevada along the Truckee River, there is only one other. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Brooks Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 Ed: Here is an idea. Set yourself up in Central Park in front of some colorful trees. Enlist the aid of a passerby to collect some leaves and throw them up in the air just in front of you. Click the shutter as the leaves descend. Depending on how selective you are about choosing the passerby, it can be a great way to meet girls !!!! This is the idea done with Cherry Blossoms, although in this case the wind came up and the falling blossoms are natural. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Endicott Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 I haven't been licensing stock as long as many others, but when I started back in 2005 with my first digital camera (Canon 20d), I found that my most licensed image was a roll of toilet paper over black. The second most licensed image was that of a motor home in a campground. The image of toilet paper is too small for Alamy...but here is the image of the motor home - Those two images were licensed consistently - at least once every two months until about 2007...when competitors started to learn what was getting licensed and they went out and got similar images saturating the market. The motor home has been used all over the place from campground websites to auto repair websites. I have an image here at Alamy that has been licensed 3 times since September 2012 which was taken while taking a stroll one afternoon. I won't show the image as it fills a gap in the collection (as well as a second image in the series that has been licensed once as well). It goes to show that anything can be licensed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RedSnapper Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 "It goes to show that anything can be licensed." no it goes to show that good images with a distinct subject and clear purpose can be licensed km Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Craig Yates Posted November 10, 2013 Share Posted November 10, 2013 60% of my sales over the last 3 years have been taken within 3 miles of my home. Regards Craig Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Rooney Posted November 11, 2013 Author Share Posted November 11, 2013 "The important thing is to show your audience something they have never seen before." -- Bill Brooks That's a pretty lofty, ambitious goal, Bill. I wouldn't have much of a collection if I followed that rule. A rule I do follow is: when I see something that looks like a picture, a caption should quickly write itself in my head. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Rooney Posted November 14, 2013 Author Share Posted November 14, 2013 Just had a couple more sales, and the content seems to alter between Big Subject and little details, like the shelf in my supermarket. My last sale was of the Spanish Steps in Rome . . . and the sale before the supermarket was of some famous statues in NYC's Greenwich Village. It used to be that an apt description of a good stock image was "a cliche done perfectly." That category of image is still a valid one, and I don't think it should be ignored even if many subjects have been over done. That is: I still want my version to be part of the mix. Those images account for a third of my sales and tend to pay better. Someone in Japan paid $130 for my cliche shot of the Spanish Steps. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spacecadet Posted November 14, 2013 Share Posted November 14, 2013 I don't think I've yet sold enough to know what sells. How about a game of scale- filed of view of smallest subject versus the largest. I'll start, 6 inches- 5 miles. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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