Any QC delays recently?

[Dave Colman]

Just checking if there are any delays or if it;s my terrible internet here in China. My images usually go through in between 2 and 5 days but currently I have some from 25th feb uploads still awaiting QC.

[meanderingemu]

40 minutes ago, Steve F said:

 

I try not to be sentimental at all. Any time I get home and find I missed focus or the whole image is too soft - bin. It's annoying, particularly if I can't go and re-shoot whatever I missed, but it's just one of those things and a reminder to shoot a few images of any particular subject, just in case....

 

interesting. So for you if an image is not worthy of stock publication it is automatically binned.  I guess i am sentimental, as i have plenty of images i keep for own personal reasons that i do keep- be it of certain people, rare events or moments, or funny shots.    

[Steve F]

4 minutes ago, meanderingemu said:

 

interesting. So for you if an image is not worthy of stock publication it is automatically binned.  I guess i am sentimental, as i have plenty of images i keep for own personal reasons that i do keep- be it of certain people, rare events or moments, or funny shots.    

Well, if it's family stuff, it rarely goes on Alamy. And I might allow the odd out of focus shot through of family stuff, but Alamy has made me quite 'exacting' about my photo standards these days.

 

I generally find I use my mobile for family stuff these days. The professional camera only gets used occasionally, if I use it with family and friends it feels like I'm working....

Edited March 8, 2021 by Steve F

[meanderingemu]

5 minutes ago, Steve F said:

Well, if it's family stuff, it rarely goes on Alamy. And I might allow the odd out of focus shot through of family stuff, but Alamy has made me quite - 'anal' - for lack of a better word  - about my photo standards these days.

 

I generally find I use my mobile for family stuff these days. The professional camera only gets used occasionally.

 

but still not binned.  i was afraid i was getting sentimental.  I have plenty of pictures that i love that i would never offer for stock sale.  For example my current screensaver is an image of the first kiwi i saw, in extremely low light.  Noise would make it unusable for stock, but i still cherish the image.  

 

i guess many do photography just for business.  i still enjoy the process for myself

Edited March 8, 2021 by meanderingemu

[Steve F]

5 minutes ago, meanderingemu said:

 

but still not binned.  i was afraid i was getting sentimental.  I have plenty of pictures that i love that i would never offer for stock sale.  For example my current screensaver is an image of the first kiwi i saw, in extremely low light.  Noise would make it unusable for stock, but i still cherish the image.  

I'm building up thousands of images anyway - not sure I want an image sin bin as well! 😅  No I get rid of any 'poor' images - it would probably bug me every time I see the non-stock appropriate photo and notice all the errors. Not to say my images are perfect, but I try to cut out all obvious technical errors.

 

Must be a personality thing - my work involves a lot of checking of other people's work and my own work also getting checked and corrected....

Edited March 8, 2021 by Steve F

[meanderingemu]

2 minutes ago, Steve F said:

I'm building up thousand of images anyway - not sure I want an image sin bin as well! 😅  No I get rid of any 'poor' images - it would probably bug me every time I see the non-stock appropriate photo and notice all the errors. Must be a personality thing - my work involves a lot of checking of other people's work and my own work also getting checked and corrected....

 

not sure i call it a sin-bin, to me there is different branches to my photo interest.  I guess if i the image i took were purely for Stock purpose, i would lose interest. 

[Steve F]

6 minutes ago, meanderingemu said:

 

not sure i call it a sin-bin, to me there is different branches to my photo interest.  I guess if i the image i took were purely for Stock purpose, i would lose interest. 

 

I guess it depends on your perspective. I find stock encourages me to do more photography (I do do some commercial photography too sometimes) and to improve my technical skills. I would probably be doing most of my photography on my mobile these days without this incentive.....

[Mo Athar]

On 07/03/2021 at 11:48, Dave Colman said:

Just checking if there are any delays or if it;s my terrible internet here in China. My images usually go through in between 2 and 5 days but currently I have some from 25th feb uploads still awaiting QC.

Same here, my last submission has been in QC for almost 8 days. My previous submissions were cleared in 4-5 days so been wondering what I have done wrong this time. I am fairly new myself, and am on 2 stars so not expecting the speedy treatment but felt a week was a bit excessive. I also imagine that a failed submission shouldn't take any longer? 

[Nigel Kirby]

I have just sent a submission which passed within 15mins of sending, occasionally they take around 24 hours, I asume that this is for an occasional spot check.

 

Nigel

[Mo Athar]

13 minutes ago, Nigel Kirby said:

I have just sent a submission which passed within 15mins of sending, occasionally they take around 24 hours, I asume that this is for an occasional spot check.

 

Nigel

Nigel, looks like your submission kick-started the QC queue, my submission just got accepted 🙂 Hope Dave Colman's submission also gets through.  

[Betty LaRue]

5 hours ago, Steve F said:

 

I try not to be sentimental at all. Any time I get home and find I missed focus or the whole image is too soft - bin. It's annoying, particularly if I can't go and re-shoot whatever I missed, but it's just one of those things and a reminder to shoot a few images of any particular subject, just in case....

So agree with this. My problem was if it was a bird or butterfly rarely seen, and the opportunity lasted a few seconds. I might never see that bird or butterfly again while having a camera in my hand. Those were often the kinds of images I couldn’t bear to give up. And usually the reason they were slightly off was camera shake because I was so excited and didn’t have time to practice good technique.
I can sometimes tremble slightly when excited. I delete them now, and move on with a tear in my eye. Lol.

Speaking of trembling. You should see me when somebody pulls out in front of my car and nearly causes a wreck. My legs get so limp I can barely work the pedals. Those sudden surges of adrenaline must be momentous, and I know they are unhealthy.

[Dave Colman]

Panic over, QC passed and i'm ready to crack on with the tagging. Might have just been a bottle neck and it's all cleared now.
 

[Mo Athar]

15 hours ago, Betty LaRue said:

So agree with this. My problem was if it was a bird or butterfly rarely seen, and the opportunity lasted a few seconds. I might never see that bird or butterfly again while having a camera in my hand. Those were often the kinds of images I couldn’t bear to give up. And usually the reason they were slightly off was camera shake because I was so excited and didn’t have time to practice good technique.
I can sometimes tremble slightly when excited. I delete them now, and move on with a tear in my eye. Lol.

Speaking of trembling. You should see me when somebody pulls out in front of my car and nearly causes a wreck. My legs get so limp I can barely work the pedals. Those sudden surges of adrenaline must be momentous, and I know they are unhealthy.

I wouldn't delete an image which you feel a connection with even when it's soft. Photography is about preserving memories. I am part of a group of artists/photographers where we share anything that we feel is worth sharing . We appreciate our passion for creativity, technical excellence is secondary. Perfection is for machines, not humans 🙂

[Phil Crean]

“Sharpness is a bourgeois concept” Henri Cartier Bresson

😉

Phil

[Betty LaRue]

8 hours ago, Phil Crean said:

“Sharpness is a bourgeois concept” Henri Cartier Bresson

😉

Phil

Please convince Alamy of that, would you?

[Phil Crean]

36 minutes ago, Betty LaRue said:

Please convince Alamy of that, would you?

If only 😅

 

It's incredible to think that so many of the worlds great photographs would fail QC here, but I thought it worth making the point as stock photography isn't the only game in town!

 

Phil

[Cal]

On 08/03/2021 at 03:29, Thiago Trevisan said:

 

Not the original poster, but I think the norm nowadays is to start as 2 stars. Not sure for how long it's been like this, but that was the case when I joined Alamy last February. Regards. 

 

I started in 2019 and was definitely on two stars, going to three soon after and remaining there until present day.

 

To the answer the OP, I have found that mostly my submissions go through within 24 hours, but have recently tended to be longer, anything between 2 days up to 4 in two cases I can recall. 

[MizBrown]

58 minutes ago, Phil Crean said:

If only 😅

 

It's incredible to think that so many of the worlds great photographs would fail QC here, but I thought it worth making the point as stock photography isn't the only game in town!

 

Phil

 

I think if it's obvious you're using blur for effect, that those will pass CC.

 

 

[wiskerke]

QC has often declared that one of the main reasons for failing a borderline image is that it would look differently for clients in the thumbnail or even in the zoom. But deliberate OOF or motion blur for whatever reason can and does pass QC.

For a good example search Alamy for blurred background stadium or blur background stadium.

Strangely enough very few people use OOF or Out of Focus.

For people wondering what these images are about, those are used in composites for (mainly) high school portraits. 

Other categories include background office but almost anything goes, like living room. Those not for high school students probably.

Before you go trawling your images for slightly OOF images: this is very much microstock territory.

 

wim

[Phil Crean]

3 hours ago, MizBrown said:

 

I think if it's obvious you're using blur for effect, that those will pass CC.

 

 

They do... I've got quite a few blurry images on sale here.

However there are also images that are unsharp/blurred which would not be accepted yet they are great photographs.

Phil

[MizBrown]

18 hours ago, Phil Crean said:

However there are also images that are unsharp/blurred which would not be accepted yet they are great photographs.

 

Most of those are not used to grab eyeballs for product promotion or for illustrating a text but are printed to be viewed on walls.  Tastes in photos change -- see the Pictoralists vs. Group f/64.  People were staging photos to look like paintings and then Group f/64 wanted photos to be pure photos.  Use an 8" by 10" view camera with a modern emulsion and viewers can count the twists and plies of the threads used to weave a shirt and can read car license plate numbers several blocks away.  And sometimes, that produces great photos and isn't just a technical trick.   And such a photo might not read well as a thumbnail, either. 

 

 

[Contemporary Dave]

I'm 3/3 stars with 100% pass rate. No real change recently. Mine normally go through within 24-36 hours.

[LutzR2]

Hello,

 

I'm new here. I joined March 4th and uploaded three images. It took eight days to pass QC. I started at 2 stars. Since then I have been uploading images a few at time as I update my file info with more keywords, etc. I'm just chilling as I wait for things to pass QC. I've a lot to contribute to this site but I am taking my time squaring away each description and keywords field. 

 

How does one improve ranking? Is it just through time spent on the site?

[spacecadet]

13 hours ago, LutzR2 said:

How does one improve ranking

By licensing images and appearing in searches because your keywords are relevant.

You should be aware that, if you have a lot of submissions in QC at the same time, they will all be rejected if one image fails. That's why it may be a good idea to wait for each batch to pass.

[LutzR2]

2 hours ago, spacecadet said:

You should be aware that, if you have a lot of submissions in QC at the same time, they will all be rejected if one image fails. That's why it may be a good idea to wait for each batch to pass.

Yoinks. I didn't know that. Since my first test submission of three images I have submitted a few every day. Perhaps  one or two at first then around forty on another day, then down to eight or so at a time. I've been uploading my wildlife images. The first three for the test submissions where picked because I just liked them. Since then I began to upload by file size, sending my largest files first. Thankfully I had already been very keen on QC on my end for a while now. Hopefully I'll pass this site's QC.

 

I've thousands of images from over twenty years of shooting digital SLR in a wide variety of subject matter. None of it available elsewhere, other than my own site. 

 

Thanks for the info.

 

 

[Broad Norfolk]

My turn for a QC delay. Has anyone else had this problem this week?

I made a submission on the morning of Tuesday 23rd March and am still awaiting outcome. My normal response is around 24 hrs. The upload was strange in that it was very slow and after 4 images out of 10 the upload froze. I reconnected and uploaded the remaining 6 and these have stayed in QC ever since. 

Just hanging on now so I can continue with more submissions.

Jim 😏

Edited March 26, 2021 by Broad Norfolk
Spelling!