Are You in a Rut?

[Chuck Nacke]

Rut, No.  

 

I have thousands of chromes in the basement that I am using my time to start working through and get up on Alamy.

BC (Before COVID) I was doing a lot of assignment work, but I've been turning down location work.  Now that I've had both shots,

Pfizer, I'm thinking of dusting off the NORMANs and starting to work again.  My 13 year-old daughter is back attending school. 

I could also attempt to redo my 20 year old URL?  Too much to do and not enough time in the day.

 

P.S.  Hello Edo, hope you are well.

 

Chuck

Edited May 13, 2021 by Chuck Nacke
addition

[John Morrison]

Being confined - mostly - to a smaller area can be a challenge rather than a problem... in a 'glass half full' kind of way. I'm enjoying the light and colour of the springtime scene... trying to focus on a few photographic themes (as well as just taking a wander... and seeing what happens).

 

Right now I'm revisiting familiar haunts with the 70-210 lens, plus tripod, which offers loads of new opportunities: setting up a shot, 'locking' the composition, and seeing what happens within the picture frame. This gives me the additional opportunity to skive, loaf, dawdle, dally, hang loose, take things easy, stand and stare, and shoot the breeze... sharing these moments - in recent days - with buzzards, kites, kestrels and, best of all, a barn owl hunting for its breakfast. If covid wipes out humanity, the birds won't mourn our passing. I doubt if they would even notice!

[CandyAppleRed Images]

Not so much a rut as a Marianas Trench. I have only put one batch up since all this fun began and my sales have dropped through the floor. I cannot even recall a single view on any in that batch. I am averaging one sale a month when before it was one a week. Not great by some standards, but I was happy with that.

 

Given the diminishing returns, I think I'm done here. We are on holiday soon but the motivation to seek out "Alamy shots" is just not there anymore. 

 

If any future sales pop up, all well and good but I feel my keywording days are done.

[Phil Robinson]

12 hours ago, gvallee said:

Yes, I am in a rut. Here and here. 

I was hoping for pics of red deer stags. Disappointed.

[gvallee]

8 hours ago, Phil Robinson said:

I was hoping for pics of red deer stags. Disappointed.

 

You dirty old man 🤣🤣 I actually have some of a kangaroo not suitable for Alamy...

[kimba]

Over the years I've posted weekly challenges on my blog. They were meant for two things - training eyes that are new to photography or composition, and for when photographers (ie: me) get into a rut.  I posted quite a few of them in 2020 on my image web site:

 

IMAGES@ARTIST-AT-LARGE 

[Johnnie5]

They are talking about lifting all restrictions here in the US on the 15th of next month if you want to take a vacation.  They lifted the mask mandate today for the whole country.  California still has its own mask mandate, but it should be lifted soon.  I wonder if my idea of shooting anti vaxxers with hypodermic darts loaded with vaccine would be socially acceptable.😁

[kimba]

5 minutes ago, Johnnie5 said:

They are talking about lifting all restrictions here in the US on the 15th of next month if you want to take a vacation.  They lifted the mask mandate today for the whole country.  California still has its own mask mandate, but it should be lifted soon.  I wonder if my idea of shooting anti vaxxers with hypodermic darts loaded with vaccine would be socially acceptable.😁

 

They lifted the mask restrictions in the US for those that are double vaxxed and through their waiting period. Not for everyone. Everyone else should still be wearing masks in public in the US.

[Bryan]

Plenty of sales so far this month but fees very poor, which does sap my motivation. 

 

Re rut, there is a huge cruise liner parked in the river Tyne due to Covid, and I can't resist taking photos of it, some nicely framed, but none of which have sold.  Then there are the annual bluebell and wallflower shots, are this year's any better than last year's or the years before that?  

 

However us double jabbed folk are off for a short caravan jaunt next week, the first since lockdowns began - assuming we don't get a further clampdown due to new variants of the disease. So, if the sun shines, there might be some new opportunities out there.........

 

Meanwhile this is peak gardening season, so lots to do at home and at the allotment, tomato worship is my religion - nobody gets hurt.

[Bill Kuta]

On 12/05/2021 at 21:16, wiskerke said:

 

Not even selfies!

Let's try this link once more, I don't know why it keeps messing up.

John Mitchell's link has lots of selfies and older people taking photos.

 

wim

 

OK, I edited those keywords into a few of my images.

 

I see that "older adult active lifestyle" yields 13,451 images. Add "USA" and it goes down to 150! I know Alamy is UK-centric, but c'mon. In our personal defense, I will say that almost all of my such images are of my wife, and occasionally me.

[gvallee]

1 hour ago, Bill Kuta said:

 

OK, I edited those keywords into a few of my images.

 

I see that "older adult active lifestyle" yields 13,451 images. Add "USA" and it goes down to 150! I know Alamy is UK-centric, but c'mon. In our personal defense, I will say that almost all of my such images are of my wife, and occasionally me.

 

"Add "USA" and it goes down to 150!".

There might be another explanation: I very often notice that American contributors do not bother to enter their country in either caption or keywords.

[John Mitchell]

3 hours ago, Bill Kuta said:

 

OK, I edited those keywords into a few of my images.

 

I see that "older adult active lifestyle" yields 13,451 images. Add "USA" and it goes down to 150! I know Alamy is UK-centric, but c'mon. In our personal defense, I will say that almost all of my such images are of my wife, and occasionally me.

 

Toss in "Canada", and it shrinks to 10. Plus some of them don't look very active.

 

Time to do some tag-tinkering...

Edited May 15, 2021 by John Mitchell

[Avpics]

On 12/05/2021 at 11:05, Ed Rooney said:

In this long lockdown, our worlds have shrunk. I find myself covering the same three-mile area again and again. But . . . I have continued shooting.

 

How are things with you?

 

Edo

Same. We have a 'golden mile' of seafront which I daren't guess how many times I've trudged this past year. It paid off at times with live news images of sunrise and sunsets and various first days in/out of lockdown/tiers three,four/local spikes etc but there's only so many the market can take! I've now returned to the old hard drives and am working on padding out from the archives.

[PuffinsPictures]

A different kind of rut beyond creativity: my zooms are way up but I have had only one single $3 sale since the end of December, when things weren't terrible before. I know some agencies will shake up the algorithms or otherwise effectively turn accounts "off" for one reason or other, but this is just weird since, given the increase in zooms, my images are being seen.

Between that and ongoing travel restrictions... very discouraging. Especially since I just bought a new camera! 😩

[Russell Watkins]

I'd love to be out photographing locally but my bloody back is playing up again and I can barely walk 20 yards unladen, let alone carrying my camera gear. 🙁😢😠

Edited June 2, 2021 by Russell Watkins

[IanDavidson]

On 12/05/2021 at 12:31, Colblimp said:

I'm finding it increasingly difficult to find newsy stuff to shoot within an hour to an hour and a half drive from where I live.  Newspapers seem to have all the COVID pics they need so it's a struggle to motivate myself to go out and shoot.  With all that said, I've fishing, court and house shoots tomorrow, so ignore what I just typed lol.  🤣

I am with you on this.   I am shooting much the same news as I always have and it is more difficult to find.  In addition, in my world the newspapers don’t appear to be buying as much and paying less....

 

My issue is do I continue with what I have always done, and until recently judging by sales, quite successfully, or do I push myself into new stuff without knowing it will sell?  I did a gallery shoot today, but so did a lot of other Alamy contributors.  It is about finding a new area, time to get creative I guess...

[Marianne]

I hoped my second vaccine was my ticket to freedom, but instead it's been 6 1/2 weeks of vertigo, so I fear I'll be stuck in the house for ages. It got so bad last week I couldn't even read even for 5-10 minutes. A tad better this week, but I'm still not right.

 

I worked hard to keep myself out of a rut during lockdown, sometimes even succeeded, by exploring new outlets for my fine art work which resulted in a few gallery shows (have missed the openings of two in the past few weeks) and today, news of a large panoramic sale to a hospital through a new agent, so I should be ecstatic, but I'm too dizzy. 

 

Managed a few jaunts to a local park on good days, try to get out in my yard for short bursts when I can manage. Kept my macro lens on my camera, forcing myself to start tooo learn this pretty unfamiliar territory as a motivating challenge.

 

My garden looks forsaken but we have some nice trees and shrubs. I went a bit overboard with ordering organic heirloom seeds shortly before the vertigo hit. Hope they keep until next year since I'll probably have to resort to buying flats to fill in my sad empty garden. I haven't been able to bend over without the world spinning, hence the neglected seed packs. Last year, I devoted half of my expanded garden to a perennial butterfly garden but while the plants grew tall, none of them flowered. This year, it's a mass of weeds with a single bee balm plant (still green leaves), so there's plenty of room to grow something else, but what a disappointment! I remember being introduced to those plants at the Columbus Park of Roses a few years ago and I was so excited to grow my own. 

 

I shot a lot of food, harvest, and garden images late last summer/early fall that I intended to upload this spring for the growing season. Hope to get them online before it's too late, if I don't leave. I was feeling really upbeat about contributing here as Covid eased and sales picked up, but now I'm not sure. I left that other place a year ago when they pulled the rug out.

 

The one bright spot is that, for the past couple of years, fine art has earned me more than stock, a situation I never expected to see, and without any assignments during the pandemic, I had time to explore other markets. A single print sale in May earned me more than all my stock agencies combined, a mere 2 weeks after signing on with an agent, and I've been discussing a huge potential project with another corporate representative. All seemed well, but the legwork required to make it workable will be impossible if this vertigo keeps up. 

 

I expected to be taking twice-weekly trips to the Bronx Botanical Garden with my macro lens last month and this one, enjoying its beauty as I practice my craft, and to be meeting with potential clients as the world opened up, so, yes, Edo, I'm falling into a rut as everyone else is digging their way out. 

 

 

[MizBrown]

Had vertigo.  Have your doctor check blood pressure, hearing, inner ear, and get scanned for any possible sinus or brain involvement.  My first was sinus infection, about three years ago, high blood pressure.  Some varieties are due to inner ear problems and there are exercises for that.

[Marianne]

@MizBrown Thanks. Went to the neurologist & others. Had the tests.  It's a severe autoimmune response to the second Covid vaccine which resulted in labrynthinitis, swelling in the ear, in my case due to inflamation from an autoimmune response. The vaccine threw my RA out of remission too. Apparently I'm far from alone.

I was so healthy during the pandemic! Even my brush with Covid was a mild fever and loss of my sense of smell for a week, no biggie. Score one for the rut. 

[MizBrown]

55 minutes ago, Marianne said:

@MizBrown Thanks. Went to the neurologist & others. Had the tests.  It's a severe autoimmune response to the second Covid vaccine which resulted in labrynthinitis, swelling in the ear, in my case due to inflamation from an autoimmune response. The vaccine threw my RA out of remission too. Apparently I'm far from alone.

I was so healthy during the pandemic! Even my brush with Covid was a mild fever and loss of my sense of smell for a week, no biggie. Score one for the rut. 

 

Which vaccine?   Around the end of June, I'm going back for my second shot, Indian-made Covishield, which is the same as Oxford-AstraZeneca.  The alternative in Nicaragua is either the two dose Sputnik 5 vaccine or the single dose later Sputnik, both of which are being used.   No vaccines from the US which wants to overthrow the current government.

 

Here, you'd probably get a course of some steroid for inflammation, which I've had in the past for allergic reactions.  The US doctors don't seem to give out the steroids quite as often (my cat with the skin infection had them prescribed, and hated the taste). 

 

Hope it resolves soon.

[Colblimp]

12 hours ago, IanDavidson said:

I am with you on this.   I am shooting much the same news as I always have and it is more difficult to find.  In addition, in my world the newspapers don’t appear to be buying as much and paying less....

 

My issue is do I continue with what I have always done, and until recently judging by sales, quite successfully, or do I push myself into new stuff without knowing it will sell?  I did a gallery shoot today, but so did a lot of other Alamy contributors.  It is about finding a new area, time to get creative I guess...

It's comforting to know I'm not the only one having this problem at the moment. I find when there's nothing to shoot, my motivation to go out looking for stories diminishes to the point where I get a serious case of the CBA's. 

 

With all that said, now the country is opening back up I'm going to dust off my event printer and start shooting at events again.  There's a big horsey show on Bank Holiday Monday with loads of kids so I should make more on that day than I do on here in a month!

[spacecadet]

My rut exit has been via photographing in the garden- I put up the results on the nature thread. These aren't for Alamy but OH thought she would like it done.

The other day I even discovered a wildflower I'd missed last year. The flowers only last a day or so. I get out the flashgun (or even studio flash) and the wireless trigger and reflectors and everything and make a meal of it.

That and some still-life indoors- I haven't put the studio kit away and even built a trolley out of a camping kitchen rack and the old castors off the Steenbeck. Now I can get up and running in about 10 minutes.

 

Concept for a piece on microplastic pollution and alternative materials.

 

 

But off the premises, very little. Most of my subs were from trips away and we know what happened to them🙁

Edited June 3, 2021 by spacecadet

[Ed Rooney]

I just got finished clicking on "sell for editorial only" on most of my Alamy collection. (Thanks, Kumar, for reminding me to do that.)

 

That little job took me 4 two-hour sessions over the last 4 days. While combing through my collection, I found two very disturbing things. 1. There are groups of images that I had not finished tagging. 2. I've been revisiting the same subjects again and again and again. It's true of my NYC stuff as well as Liverpool. I'm gonna have to do better. 🤔

[Foreign Export]

yes I am - just posted this on the contract change thread to get out of the photographic rut;

 

Not clear why it is taking so long to amend this contract, as contracts go it isn't one of the most complicated ( contracts generally not stock companies) and could have been amended in a few hours - providing the lawyers were given clear direction as to what Alamy's requirements in the contract were to be- and then the amended contract would typically take just a few days for internal approvals.

 

All of this prevarication has given me time to think, this time has also coincided with one of my best periods for Alamy for the amount of money being paid for sales, which of course only serves to remind me that soon I will be getting 20% less and on one odd distributor sale my return is derisory.

 

Im not in a position to remove 35k plus images from Alamy and I would see that course of action as merely spiting myself, but I do want to register my protest to Alamy and clearly they are also benefiting from my recent run of very respectable sale amounts. I also recognise now that I have become a bit lazy with stock- that is shoot, process, send to Alamy - hope for the best.

 

So I now have a new plan which I will implement so I can positively benefit from Alamy enforced changes:

 

a) will not be uploading to Alamy for the next few months

b) will upload far more RM to my two other agencies that still offer 50% share

c) will start to shoot RF images and test the returns from some mircrostock agencies - berate me if you wish

d) create my own website  and market it locally

e) increase my seascape and landscape fine art images and load onto my own website to establish a local brand where I live on Sydney northern beaches

f) increase number of image provided to the consumer print sites like FAA

g) I live by the ocean so also want to start seriously shooting surf and surfers on the waves - to challenge myself

h) generally diversify what I use my cameras for, use my lenses at all focal lengths,  and increase my enjoyment of photography

 

Alamy may be doing me a favour - not financially- but in satisfaction and fun.

 

Martin

[Marianne]

@Sally R Wish I'd had the Pfizer, I didn't - everyone I know who had the Pfizer had no problems, and some had serious autoimmune issues. Get your doctor's advice. I'm just a statistic. You need to listen to your doctor. I had an issue with vertigo years ago and from what I've read online, and been told by 2 friends who know people who also got vertigo (2 people), the problem seems more likely to effect those who have had vestibular issues in the past. Yes, the fact that my RA is also out of remission is concerning. But you have to weigh the risks and benefits with your doctor. We just sent flowers to a vaccinated friend whose 40-something brother died after being on a ventilator for a month (her sister-in-law and SIL's father died a month earlier - they all refused to get vaccinated and only one of the three was over 60). So, speak to your doctor and weigh the risks and benefits. All my vaccinated friends are flying off to see their kids and/or grandkids. 

 

So sorry for your condition. Glad there is medication and hopefully they will find a cure soon. Speak with that specialist and hopefully he'll put your mind at ease. 

 

Shortly before I had cataract surgery at age 51, two friends told me about friends/their mother who went blind from the shot of anesthetic they got; I had that surgery for one eye and the second one three years later and my vision is 20-20. Everything has risks. Even cataract surgery which is over 90% successful. And the vaccine. Only your doctor should give you advice. I would never tell someone to avoid the vaccine based on my experience. 

Edited June 5, 2021 by Marianne