Yuri Arcurs a blog about selling your photos online

That’s exactly the mindset I have in my daily job (graphics programming for videogames) and it’s great to know that other people have the same idea when it comes to something new I’m trying to learn nowadays.
Thanks for sharing.

Francesco

«Well the case is this: I believe in complete information sharing. I don’t hold anything back and have no problem giving away my secrets to new photographers.»

vs.

«We do not accept applications from competitive microstock photographers that want to learn from us and pursue their own carrier afterwards. »

Hmm.

Guido: Your point is valid. However: There is a difference between hiring someone to shoot for you and paying him a salary and just pure sharing information. If I hire a guy, pay him money, it would be natural of me to want him to work for me and not himself…right?
I am contacted constantly from microstock photographers that want to hang around for a week or two and learn from me. I don’t unfortunately have the time for this right now, but I really hope I will in the future. The job position you are referring to is meant for another kind of individual, a person ready to work for me and get a salary in return. I do not think this contradicts with my opinion on information sharing.

Hi,

I think your keywording tool is the most valuable website / software that I use, thankyou.

IMO most of the stuff that is neglected in microstock is because of low $/image or other probs (some of these areas have high rejection rates because the micros consider them poor sellers)

ie travel and aerial -> needs to be generic or iconic (but better than competition). demand for location specific images for places that dont have thousands of tourists is low and will do better in country specific macro libraries.

Policemen, military and state officials -> copyright issues for badges and some “uniforms” etc- duh! LOL
a number of currencies also copyright.

fotolia says no still life as it is overdone and low demand??

Pans -> I thought would be good for web graphics, but very very low demand and high rejection rate (apparently everyone wants square), cant be produced in high volume easily and often high post production. Far better $/image in macro.

artistic, blurred and edgy -> fine line between art and garbage :) extremely high rejection rate.

If I was good enough and new enough to do contempory fashion at a professional level I wouldn’t put it on micros :)

Rgds
Phil

Thank you so much for sharing your secrets. This has really helped me to understand how to get into the business of microstock. I am a single mother trying to keep food on the table and am desperately hoping to turn my 40,000+ images into some sort of steady income. Your information is invaluable to me. Again, thank you.

Thanks Phil. Great extra info!!

You’ve done all the shoots from the second list as well, though, did you? At least as long as they include people…

Don’t forget composition. In my opinion, its on of the most important aspects of stock photography. There is certainly demand for a rock solid stand alone shot, but there is even more demand for a shot that can be good on its own OR look just as good with text / other design elements integrated into it.

I work primarily as a Cinematographer during the year (microstock is what I shoot between feature films and TV commercials). I think a good stock photo shoot should be approached the same way as a good film shoot:

Lots of planning!

Also, don’t just grab any old model and make them a doctor for example. Ask yourself, “Do they fit the role?” Casting is huge in film, and its the same with stock photography.

My last tidbit: This is a volume based industry. * Get used to it! * There is a reason why Macro agencies expect potential contributers to have already established collections of images well into the thousands. The same thing applies to microstock.

Hello Yuri,
After ten months of microstock experience, I think I am ready to share what I think about this industry:
of course the biggest people like you hav a lot of income from this job, but it happen only working very hard with a great staff and a lot of technical gear and higly specialized hours of work. My opinion is that only a little part of a photographer production sells well, there are a lot of photos that will be rejected for sometimes strange reasons, a very high number with no more than 10 sales per year, and of course a little bit with huge numbers of sales. What was the value of a portfolio like your in the macrostock market? What the number of income from if it was sell in alamy, and getty or corbis? Are you happy with the evolution of the industry or are you tryng to sail in this ocean against your wishes? I am not happy when wonderful shots taked with my imacon flexframe were rejected, or don’t sells, like when a customer don’t want to pay for my job.

TO Bravajulia:

You have not given micro a fair change. You have had rejections, because your digital quality is not up to scratch, have gotten angry and have left micro angry. Any channel where I can hit a return per image of more then 10 USD per month is a valid and good marketing opportunity. Many macro channels are less.
Don’t get angry when getting rejections. Your standards are not the only ones out there so listen to the rejections and make workflow changes and overcome.

# Pictures of currency other than Euros and Dollars

How I have not think this before. I have collected coins and notes almost 8 years (have many hundred items to shoot and coins and notes are in “perfect” mint condition) and have only shoot few dollar and euro images:). Thanks for the tip.

BTW, do you know is there anykind of market/demand for food images in microstocks (or which ones sells best: normal food, gourmet / artistic, healthy or junk food etc..)?

great site and information
thank you for sharing

I think it’s great that you are willing to share your “secrets”. I don’t think it creates unnecessary competition because knowing the secrets and having the ability to finesse and USE those secrets are two different things. As Zig Ziglar says, “You can have anything in this world you want, if you just help enough other people get what THEY want.”

you are the best yuri! its hard to do photos like yours…please teach me!!!!! congretulation for your pictures and i’m sorry for my bad english language!

Greetings from MX.

Some/most sites tell you what they do not want because of overabundance or low value, etc… However, in at least one site, they tell you they do NOT want flowers, while 3 of their top five photo sales are… Flowers (5 out of the top ten are backgrounds). Would you recommend rather “filling the gaps” (subjects that are lacking) instead of following what the clients are searching for?

Thank you for a great informative site.

Hi Yuri,
Great site. Sorry, but I can be a pessimist. I can’t help but notice a certain issues was not addressed. You have not answered the question about the “second list” in fact, a review of your portfolio includes a lot of the “don’t do” list.

I know we all want to hold on to our share of the market place, however, I can’t but help think this is self preservation. Even your assistants use white backgrounds, It only makes sense since the art director will be happly to replace the white / green / blue background with whatever they want.

Am I missing something?
I think also Alberto brings up a good point.

Tks
Karl

Those who dare to share are people who are confident enough and will always be ahead of the game…. You’re one of these obviously: good on you!
Have you hard of the “pay it forward” principle?
Thanks for your keyworder, I use it all the time, along with picniche and my brain!

Ah yes, I forgot to say, Food still sells well, but it works better when it is properly style OR/and homemade.

This is a great site – thanks for sharing all this stuff.
I don’t have a lot of time for shooting, and one technique I’ve found useful is to simply type random ideas or words into the earch engines of the bigger sites. This usually highlights a couple of areas where there is less competition/smaller numbers of images. Several of my best sellers (I’m not in the same league as lots of the peple here) have been inspired this way.
I’m also a bit suspicious of ‘show me’ threads – if you’ve got an novel idea, hang on to it – it’ll be copied/repeated soon enough.

I appreciate yo sharing your tips.
One question: How/where can I find out if my currency is copyrighted?

Thanks for sharing your ideas with us. I confessed you that when I first know you I didn´t agree with
your ideas. Now understanding you better I really became your fan ! Your message is here for who wants to understand ! And it´s absolutely right ! Your keywording tool is great too ! You won´t mind if I lead some people who need trainning on keydording to it , will you ? thanks again ! Warm Regards from Brazil

When i finnish my schooling i am hoping to become a full time stock photography. In the mean time i have been learning as much as possible about photography. What i have found is that you can’t by a “photographic eye” and experiance is invaulable. These kind of articles have helped me a lot
Thanks

Yuri, do you generate your HDR images from a single RAW image?

I have to chime in here again…

Just because some areas of micro stock are “under represented” does NOT mean they will make you money if you choose to supply them. I learned this the hard way. You should be looking for topics that embody all of the following:

1.) A subject matter that is showing growth in SEARCH DATA. In other words, people are increasingly looking for that subject matter.

2.) A subject matter where photos are more preferable than vectors and illustrations. Trust me on this one…

3.) A subject matter that is low in supply. Low in supply would be under 100,000 shots representing it online at one agency, preferably lower though, like 50,000. I derived this number based on the # of shots representing business images on Shutterstock, it’s a staggering 448,592! Business is in decline, so its a good measure in my opinion.

In a nut shell, if as subject is under represented, it could just be that no one cares about the subject. It could be a waste of your time to shoot.

Yuri great site thanks for sharing, your attitude is so refreshing.

Best Regards,
Sue

Thank you for sharing all these information!

Very inspiring!!!

You are a very wise person. Merry Christmas for you and your family!

Greetings from Holland
Mariana

Hi Yuri,

Thank you very much for all your useful information you’re providing. Although I’ve been in business for 15 years, there’s always room to learn.

Happy Holidays!

Walter

I found this site listed in a camera mag last week and you tool for keywording is great, also love how blunt you are when it comes to your monopod

I think Yuri could potentially succeed in anything he would care to do some research in. He seems to be both intelligent and adaptable. My question then is, why stock photography. Why not teaching himself the optimal way (a perfect adaptable stategy) for playing a game like poker and making himself 1000% return on investment (ROI) a year? Does the love for the craft come into play. Whatever the case respect.
M
P.S before giving microstock a try i will read once more Competitive Advantage.

The secret is having an eye that can see what others want. You can develop your eye but you need one to
start with. I put over 1000 images on different agencies with one arm and a 4 mega pixel compact.
due to only having half a body. People like Yuri have developed their eyes to a professional stardard it is that simple. I have two arms today and a 12 Mega Pixel camera and I am little better than I was with one arm.
It isn’t your equiment or schooling but your eye

Thanks for sharing your insight, Yuri. I think that you are spot on. Oftentimes, people entering microstock see images on Istock or elsewhere and say, “I can do that” when in fact many of these images are carefully staged and complicated to get. Herein lies a major problem for entrants into MS. I couldn’t agree more that one must start at an elementary-type level and ease into shooting while learning. I started my second year in MS and am still learning the industry but I’ve been shooting underwater images for 30 years….so there is indeed a transitional component to my skills….nonetheless as long as one recognizes this, I think they have a better chance at making some income in MS.

Thanks again, Yuri.

Joe

I have to disagree with both f you on the travel photography subject. I’ve had every one of my shots from my travels overseas rejected by istock and shutterstock with the comment “we don’t need this type of photo right now”. Or they make up non-existant technical problems to get rid of them. They were 10-15 selected from a pool of about 5000 from Japan, China and Indonesia. So it could be my shots or it could be that nobody wants travel shots that aren’t massively abstract and/or altered. I see many highly processed images around, especially of Japan. They make it through, but real photos don’t. So from my years of travelling with D200 and then 50D, I have no shots to sell! Lucky I enjoyed the travels, so I win anyway, and I enjoy my photos a lot.

Sorry to say I’ll be shooting models on a white background for a while – I think they’ll have a good chance of getting through, where beautifully composed travel shots won’t. Your idea about shooting oldies is a good one. I don’t think my body will reveal the details of all the wrinkles though! Shooting people who aren’t models is a great idea too. There are definately a lot of unique people around who tell a much stronger story on film that your average model. I dig it!

Hey Yuri. Brilliant site! Was introduced through a forum.

I’ve a fairly random question, though I fear I may get lambasted for it. You mentioned that military and/or government officials’ pictures are somewhat neglected. Even if were to submit well taken pictures taken at an event, I’d need a model release ( which you’d probably never ever get ) isn’t it.. So how is that even rectifiable?

Hi Yuri,

thanks for sharing your experience!

I hope you don’t mind a question or two from a total newbie…

Any advise that you would give to newbies on organizing photo shoots?

I think the best way to start would be to:
- select themes attractive for buyers
- brainstorm ideas
- pick the best ideas that require the least in terms of investment and organization

Would you agree?

What seems to be the problem for me is a large investment of time and money you need to put together some shoots.

Radek

Dear Yuri

Your tips helped me alot. Thank you very much. I am a newbi in stock photography and try to learn as much as I can.

As I could see “•Isolated people on white” is still one of the most selling subject even you do not recommend. I am a bit surprised because I still think it is a great tool for designers to copy and paste someones composition directly from a photo instead of shooting it.

Thank you very mucj

Well put guys.

The thing thats really frustating and annoying is these stock websites invite you spend what, an hour and a half faffing around joining there site, uploading and scanning id’s and so-on. Then after the end of it all, you get a flat rejection and some generic response with absolutely no idea on how else to get your images accepted. Is it pure luck, favouritism or what? – if not then why doesn’t their site explicitly describe what constitutes poor lighting, poor composition, poor framing etc etc. and what is required to get accepted and be part of the multitude of pretty dull, generic and predictable (technically correct of course) photos.

It’s so boring.

by the way, the white type on black background is really headache inducing

“Areas in microstock that are saturated and really require fantastic work if you want to stand out”

Dont shoot them cuz Yuri will … Lol … here is a smart ass …

I love this article very much, Yuri! Thank you for sharing, I so love the last paragraph you wrote. It is so true, whatever I learn in photography, I share with my friends too. I’m so happy to have stumble upon your page!

Any opinion on the 135mmL Canon Lens please…camera I use…A Canon 20D
Doug Jansen

I have had numerous times where I’ve seen the perfect pic to take and I know this might sound stupid but I whip out my N97 to do the job. I must admit though it’s taken good quality pics and I can’t believe the result!!! There’s only one thing you forgot to tell your viewers, “Please keep your cameras etc., with you at all times”, trust me that’s my rule of thumb and the finger on the button and you will never go wrong.
You can check out my photos at Fotolia as I just recently joined and I am hoping that they will publish them all, my nickname is picturethiz.

Many Regards Yuri and happy snapping : >

Very good information for stock photographer, thank you!

Two words! Mentor, you. Kudos on the wealth of good advice and direction you’ve offered this aspiring newbie.

Hi Yuri,

Thank you for your information. I just passed the test from Shutterstock. You are my inspiration.
and Thank you for your Keywording tool.
“Lek” from Bangkok Thailand.

Wicked site!!

About rejection. There is a great question about quality of photo. Are my photos good enough for microstock? Yes they are, and no they are not. About “goodness” of photography nobody can give you direct answer, because on microstock websites works too many referees with different knowledge and opinions. At one site they didn’t take my photo for several reasons, but on another 5 sites they take it without any problem. So, my conclusion is that you must have normal colors(not flat or dull) and photo must be sharp, all other things does not have to be important. You must be your own referee.

Thank you very much for sharing.
It’s very helpfull.

I used to shoot pictures in the 70′s and a favorite subject the Sonoran Desert and Native Americans I knwe. That was all in emulsion b/w. I doubt I could locate the people in my photos today for a release. At the time, of course, I was in the ‘decisive moment”school..or an Adams/Curtis wannabee.. I was young. I wonder today however if there is value in photos from this era and if so if there is any statute of limitations on releases.
Thanks for the website, I got here on my first google search..which linked to a general “how to sell your photos” and that site had a link to your name….if I hit back browser I would recall..but then lose this online post.

Lately I purchased a Canon T2I with a 18-135mm used…..18mp – is that considered high enough resolution in today’s markets?

I find so far I must just set the camera to manual and shoot like I remeber SLR photography. And with age my photos have turned to the wilderness in some earnest..and it seems to me that is a saturated market? I live in Arizona and ..well, perhaps an overexposed state?

One other comment/question: If one is still into candid type street photography how are releases handled…do people today expect some compensation for their image? So, I guess that really raises this question… I am apparently more photjournalistically aimed……guess it’s another Google Search!

Thanks again and congratulations for making a living through personal insight.

Great revelations here! I think the name of the game as everywhere is being persistent in learning the tricks of the trade (understanding what sells, creating them and using these ideas creatively to create more images). The forums in the MS sites is the place where we can learn about all the questions we have including rejection reasons. I believe if one likes photography, persistence and patience will eventually fill your coffers. I am just getting into MS, but I just want to be here after discovering that this is the best place to be (as I love photography)

thanks for sharing…

Yuri, I stumbled across some of your images on Fotolia a few months back and only today found this article (and others by you) in an unrelated search. To say I am impressed firstly by your work and also your business success is an understatement. You really do have a talent and deserve to be in the position you are in today. I am relatively new to the microstock scene but really would like to at least make a decent passive income whilst enjoying learning more about photography. I am using a Canon 550D (Kiss X4) with the kit lens at the moment (EF-S 18-55 IS), do you think with practice and using my creativity I will be able to produce some great images that might sell? Thanks for a great article anyway, I have added it to my bookmarks.

“Natural looking people that don’t look like microstock models” ???? Isn’t that pretty much your ENTIRE portfolio?

Thank you for this valuable information. I am enjoying learning about the photography business. I currently take photos for personal enjoyment, but would love for others to enjoy them as well. Thank you again for sharing your knowledge.

Needless to say, one of the best sites available on the net regarding this information.

I have a question for you Yuri, whenever you have time to reply.

When you plan your shoots with models, for instance in an office environment, do you have a list of the different kind of poses, and compositions you want to have shot after the shoot is finished, or do you just go with the flow and come up with ideas as you shoot?

Thank you Yuri, now I see why it has gone so good for you (besides your talent, of course). Sharing gives you always something back!

wow
its been since 2008 that I have checked your site out again

Ill try to visit more often

thanks again for all you do

Mike Ledray

just checking in to see whats new.

Muchas gracias por compartir , nos das muy buenos consejos ++++++++++++++++