Since posting my tutorial on how to interpolate an image for Alamy submission the minimum image size requirements have been lowered. While Alamy still officially recommends upsizing images to 48mb in order to maximise “sales potential” the minimum that is now required is only 24mb. This effectively removes the need to do any interpolation on files out of most cameras acceptable for Alamy submission. A camera with a resolution of 8.4mp or above will be producing a large enough image. Personally I’m pleased to see this change as I’d never really liked the need to upsize my images. For stock photography I feel it is best to provide the original untinkered with image to agencies, allowing the end user to prep the image to their requirements. Alamy’s move is in line with the wider industry and simply demonstrates that most buyers don’t often need a 48mb file.

So, is it worth continuing to interpolate images to the 48mb standard? Or indeed investing in equipment that will produce higher resolution originals when the trend in much image buying is towards smaller files for use on the web. Well, if you have an automated workflow that is getting your images through QC successfully an ‘if it aint broke, don’t fix it’ approach may be simplest reaction. However if you do have the odd QC problem and/or could simplify your workflow by not interpolating then there is really a need to consider what, if any, potential benefit upsizing will bring.

Alamy have stated both that most customers do not need the larger files created by interpolation and that QC problems have been reduced since the change. This seems to imply, to me at least, that interpolation of an image that is over 24mb at its native size is best avoided. Of course there are still times when a larger file may be wanted by a buyer and you wouldn’t want your shot to miss out because you didn’t upsize it. However, I’m confident Alamy would either contact the photographer to see if a larger version can be supplied or interpolate the image on demand if this was required.

However there are a couple of instances where interpolation may still play a part in your Alamy workflow. Firstly if you contribute Royalty Free images there is still a clear reason for upsizing your pictures to the 48mb standard given the way RF pricing is based on the size of the file a customer buys. Put the biggest file you can (without compromising on quality) on the shelf! You may never sell that size but if it isn’t there you know you definitely won’t.

Secondly, and perhaps more interestingly, is the potential to use interpolation to bring images from older lower megapixel cameras up to the new 24mb minimum size. The reduction in size means many photographers may be able to consider submitting older material that would never have met the 48mb minimum. Initially my assumption was that this wouldn’t be a possibilty as it would seem to invite the submission of images of generally lower technical quality. However this post on the Alamy blog makes it clear upsizing to meet the 24mb minimum is acceptable. This brings into the bounds of possibilty surprisingly small images that could be from older low megapixel DSLRS or crops from larger images. Time to have a trawl through your old folders and see what might be worth submitting?

The rubik cube is an iconic piece of design that instantly conjurs up associations that for the stock photographer can translate into a whole host of great keywords; think problem solving, challenge, difficulty, success, skill, etc! It has great potential for creating images that will readily illustrate these concepts for potential image buyers. However, it is also the copyright of its creator Mr Rubik and closely guarded intellectual property. This means that images of, or featuring, a rubik cube can’t be used for commercial purposes without thier prior agreement. When I made the image above I knew I’d be marketing it as an RM photo with no property release for use in editorial markets. So, no potentially lucrative advertising use, but otherwise no problem. Or so I thought. The shot passed Alamy QC and was on sale for several weeks before I received the following email from member services;

We would like to make you aware of some current issues surrounding copyright and trademark violation, specifically relating to the Rubik. Simply displaying such images on our website is deemed to be an infringement. The legal advice that we have been given is very clear and as a consequence we have had to remove all images on the site which contain this as the main focal point, or a recognizable part of the image.
Alamy sells to editorial and commercial customers alike, currently the website does not have separate areas dedicated to buying images for one sector over another (as with Getty for example). In the absences of such a structure we have taken the decision to remove the images from the site in order to protect our contributors and ourselves from being involved in time consuming, costly and potentially damaging litigation.

While it was good to hear Alamy are looking out for contributors inadvertently getting into legal problems the frank admission of the weaknesses in its site was worrying. Given Alamy have a strong reputation for editorial images I find it particularly concerning they have effectively told me they can’t market my image because their site doesn’t adequately differentiate between images suitable for commercial use and those that aren’t. The open admission of the superiority of the Getty system (of splitting Creative and Editorial content) in this respect is also interesting, though a quick search on Getty currently reveals a couple of images with rubik like cubes in the creative results. The fact Alamy don’t currently feel able to safely market an image like this illusrates an additional less obvious benefit that may follow once the commercial collection is better established and a distinct and seperate editorial collection is effectively created from the remaining content.

Needless to say I was naturally disappointed to have an image I hoped would do well removed. It only took me a few minutes to legally pull the image of  a competitor at the 2009 Rubik’s Cube Italian Open from picapp, so clearly editorial depictions of the cube are possible. To my mind images of the cube in action should be good for Rubik as effectively free publicity. Just to check their position I fired off a quick email to the people who manage the rights to the cube and had a quick response confirming editorial uses are quite acceptable. They are concerned with controlling commercial uses and are therefore happy for images featuring the cube to be made available as long as it is clear commercial use is not permitted. Obviously an image with these kind of issues isn’t appropriate for microstock licensing but Alamy should really be able to handle it.

So in the absence of a willing and able middleman the image can of course be licensed directly!

The answer to this question is neither simple nor straightforward, but it is an important one for any stock photographer to ponder. The first thing to realise is it that a great photo doesn’t necessarily make a great stock photo. For a photo to have potential as a stock image it needs to have the usefulness factor that will mean it can serve a purpose for picture buyers and researchers. This is, in fact, more important than the image being great; it just has to be right. An average image that paints the proverbial thousand words on an in demand topic will probably do better as a stock image than a great creative photo that has no obvious use.

© Maurice Crooks

Some time ago I made an off the cuff remark on the Alamy forums in relation to an image another contributor had posted. When I saw Maurice Crooks’ shot of a Maori performing the Haka I was so I confident it would do well as a stock photo I promised to eat my lens cap if he didn’t get a sale. Well, fortunately for my digestive system, I’m pleased to say Maurice contacted me recently to report the first sale of the image. I say first because I’m equally confident it won’t be the last time his picture sells!

Why do I like this image as a stock photograph? Primarily because it, almost literally, screams New Zealand! Ask anyone with the most superficial knowledge of the land of the long white cloud what they associate with NZ and they’ll quickly come up with Maori’s doing the haka. It is an iconic image that instantly places the viewer in the desired head space, and Maurice’s shot is a great photo too.

His picture is strong as a thumbnail; Search Alamy for Maori Haka and you’ll see the shot at the top of the results and it pops out at you. If I was wanting to illustrate an article on New Zealand or produce promotional material for the country this is exactly the sort of picture I’d have in mind when I started my search. Maurice has caught the subject in the midst of an intimidating display yet somehow he still looks attractive and friendly; it makes for a really positive image. The framing is tight around the subject which while it leaves no space for copy has, I suspect, cropped out distracting elements around the subject. The background is also nicely blurred adding to the clean simplicity of the image. In the search results it is easy to spot Maurice’s other two shots of the same subject which have something sneaking into the background and consequently aren’t quite as strong.

In the longevity stakes I suspect Maurice is onto a winner with this image. The haka and its significance isn’t going to diminish over time and in this photo the subject will retain his youthful vigour even as he ages in real life! So the image shouldn’t date and at present is one of the strongest in a small search of less than 200 results at Alamy. More general searches for Maori and/or New Zealand are a lot more competitive but now the image has sold I suspect Maurice’s image could find itself gaining more prominence, possibly aided by a little keyword tweaking using ‘All of Alamy’ for research.

So the next time you’re browsing the work of another photographer see if you can pick out the winning shots that you’re confident will sell or have sold. It’s a useful exercise to put yourself in the critical mind of a buyer in order to pick out the shots that are great as stock images. In the meantime I’ve kept a spare lens cap in the larder confident Maurice will have more success with this shot!

My thanks to Maurice for his permission to use and chat about his image. Check out his Alamy collection here.

This post has been inspired by some discussion on the Alamy forums and follows on from my previous analysis of the 2009 performance of my portfolios at Alamy and Agefotostock.

As Alamy is a non-exclusive agency it is common for contributors to seek out additional outlets for their images and Agefotostock is one of the agencies that interests many, particularly as they have recently started accepting non-exclusive images. This change makes Age a very viable option for those seeking another agency.

While there are many other non-exclusive agencies what still sets Alamy apart is its unique selling point of accepting pretty much anything you throw at it as long as it meets technical requirements. Don’t expect to dump your whole Alamy portfolio at Age; they state a typical acceptance rate of only 10% of images submitted to them! However I don’t think this should necessarily be seen as a problem.

Having your submissions critically evaluated by picture editors who have a sound understanding of what sells is a valuable service and learning experience. While there is a lot to be said for Alamy’s open editorial policy, and the diversity of material that sells is testament to the suceess of the idea of making everything available, it doesn’t always work in the interest of every individual contributor. In fact the temptation to build your portfolio size by throwing up everything you’ve got could in fact work to the contributors disadvantage.

Alamy’s willingness to accept almost any image can be a double edged sword. On the up side it does give contributors the opportunity to market pictures that would otherwise struggle to find an agency and this in turn creates a uniquely large, diverse and esoterical collection for picture buyers and researchers to explore. However for both contributors and buyers of images there is a potential downside of this open policy.

While the size of Alamy’s collection is touted to buyers the sheer volume of images can potentially make it harder to find the right picture. The effectiveness of the Alamy search engine is therefore essential to sort through this huge haystack of imagery and present just the images a buyer is looking for. Without effective search results the quantity of images to wade through would actually start to be a deterrent to potential users. For contributors the implications of this manifest themselves as Alamy Rank; part of the mix of sorting that determines the order in which images are shown for searches. In the best traditions of search engines Alamy doesn’t, of course, entirely disclose how your rank is calculated but we do know enough to understand that if images are consistently failing to interest buyers all the images of the applicable pseudonym will gradually start to drop down the order in search results. This is obviously meant to prioritise the better images and in essence it does a pretty good job of this. However there can be reasons a contributor with good images is penalised by Alamy Rank.

Sadly for photographers, who for the most part just like making pictures, the business of photography involves a great deal more than creating images and stock photography is no exception. Success selling images on Alamy, or as stock photography generally, is only in part about creating strong marketable images and has a great deal to do with understanding how to market your images. The art of keywording is an obvious example of a skilled task that is essential for any degree of success in selling stock images. This often tedious task is arguably doubly important on Alamy where poor keywording will actively work against your images. If dubious keywords are making your images show up on irrelevant searches this will, over time, impact negatively on the rank assigned to your pseudonym. It means keywording for Alamy needs to be undertaken with the Alamy system in mind and often less keywords may be appropriate for any given image than would generally be deemed suitable at other agencies.

Another, perhaps less obvious, implication is in the number of images a contributor should submit; and herein comes the potential benefit of feedback on your submissions from an experienced editor. As stock is often seen as a numbers game it is natural to assume more images will lead to better returns; that a big portfolio will outgun a similar but smaller collection. Leaving aside the differences in approach between the specialist, with a smaller but highly targeted collection, and generalist, this will usually hold true with one huge caveat; the difference in size needs to be achieved through good quality diversity. Simply put the larger collection needs to be genuinely bigger by virtue of distinctly different images.

Lets look at a couple of examples; Arthur and Bob. Both have decided to get a bit more serious with their stock photography and set themselves the target of a portfolio of 1000 images; often seen as the magical number where reasonable returns can be expected on a sustained basis. Arthur goes for the quick charge and submits multiple versions of many images with uniform keywording and repeats general subjects and topic areas in his collection. Meanwhile Bob is slightly more pedestrian, taking the time to seek out or develop fresh ideas. His editing is tighter meaning he submits fewer images and builds his collection more slowly. Can you see how different their two collections will be when they make it to 1000 images? Arthur will get there first, but I suspect even at that point Bob’s collection could well be outperforming Arthur’s in sales performance. Alamy rank will reward the carefully crafted nature of Bob’s steadily built portfolio and slowly start to penalise Arthur’s effective shortcuts. Portfolios can’t be judged on size alone. Looking into the future Bob is still gradually adding to his strong portfolio of good quality diverse images. Arthur, disappointed with his returns, has lost his enthusiasm and stopped submitting new material.

Bob’s steady considered approach to building a strong stock photography portfolio is easy to appreciate but not necessarily so easy to apply, particularly so for the newer contributor eager to see results. This is where working with an edited agency like Agefotostock can help. Submitting a few batches of images to Age before Alamy could well be an interesting eye opener in how few they deem worth accepting. This can teach two elements of editing; which images are considered potentially saleable and of those how many similars are worth having. This isn’t to say only what Age accept should be submitted to Alamy, that wouldn’t be taking any advantage of Alamy’s open door policy. However, it would, I’d suggest, promote a stricter editing mentality with the long term benefit of building a leaner but meaner Alamy portfolio.

While plenty of microstock photography blogs publish earnings reports there is less publicly available information on returns and trends from photographers relating to images with traditional agencies. I don’t intend to start publishing regular earnings updates because I’m too lazy that is between me, the Missus and the tax man. However, looking over some reports from 2009 I do feel there is some worthwhile information on sales of my images through traditional agencies to share. For the purposes of this post I’m looking at sales during 2009 through two agencies; agefotostock.com and Alamy.com.

On each of these agencies I have both Rights Managed and Royalty Free images available for licensing and the comparison between the performance of these different licensing models makes for some interesting food for thought.

Here’s the breakdown of the performance of my portfolio on each site for 2009;

AGE

Portfolio size of 51o images. On agefotostock my portfolio is split RM 65% – RF 35%.

65% of revenue came from RM sales
35% of revenue came from RF sales

Average return per sale for RM images was $27
Average return per sale for RF images was $79

Alamy

Portfolio size of 1400 images. On Alamy my portfolio is split RM 74% – RF 26%.

56% of revenue came from RM sales
44% of revenue came from RF sales

Average return per sale for RM images was $44
Average return per sale for RF images was $115

The numbers reported are the net returns after the commissions payable to the agencies. Agefotostock report in Euros which I’ve converted at the rate of 1 euro = $1.44 (10/01/10) for ease of comparison.

The total amount earned from each agency was actually almost equal. While this would seem to indicate a great performance from Age the portfolios can’t be compared simply on numbers. The images concerned on Age are represented exclusively  by Agefotostock and are also probably a stronger collection given I have tended to submit what I consider my better / more commercial work and these submissions are then further edited by Age. Images submitted exclusively to Age also benefit from some in house keywording and optimisation which may well contribute to achieving sales.

It can be seen from the figures above that the average return from sales at Age was actually significantly lower than at Alamy. Given the general concerns over low fees at Alamy and in the industry generally this is disappointing. As stated my earnings from each agency were pretty comparable, so it can also be inferred that Age made up for the lower fees with a lot more sales over the course of the year.

As Agefotostock have now started to accept images on a non-exclusive basis my choice in how to interpret and act upon these results is made somewhat easier. While image exclusivity may help Age generate some sales it didn’t translate into any significantly large ones in 2009. Trading in some modest lost sales through Age for the ability to distribute future images through Alamy and other non-exclusive outlets would seem sensible. The ‘risk’, of course, is that a potential big sale through Age in the future is lost, but then it might be gained elsewhere. While I’m talking about significantly large sales I’m sad to report Alamy didn’t scoop me one either! However, it can be seen prices were better at Alamy for both Rights Managed and Royalty Free sales.

The comparison between RM and RF at both sites is also somewhat surprising given the traditional thinking that Rights Managed images command higher fees. While this is certainly still the potential with RM – the elusive ‘significantly large sale’ – the more bankable reality is in low value editorial sales for which an RM image is often cheaper than a Royalty Free shot. The figures above show that on both Age and Alamy I have favoured RM licensing. While this is sometimes dictated by the nature of the image it is also often down to a call on my part on the best licensing model for each image. My 2009 report cards would seem to indicate I may not always have been making the right choice.

On both sites average returns per sale for RF images were higher than for RM images. While on Age the two sides of my portfolio exactly pulled their weight in terms of overall revenue share, on Alamy my RF images outperformed my RM; contributing 44% of total revenue when making up only 26% of my portfolio. In the defense of Rights Managed licensing there is of course the potential of further returns from one of these sales in the form of extensions, further uses etc. RM does also have the uncapped potential to turn these results around; one big sale could make a year’s data look very different. However, given the results above I’d be wasting my time reflecting if it didn’t make me think hard about building my RF stock.

Obviously the results I’ve seen are in a large part reflective of the content of my portfolios in terms of subject, styles and quality. No doubt other contributors may have different stories to tell?

Alamy, in common with many other traditional stock photography agencies, have a minimum file size requirement for submissions. In Alamy’s case this is a 48mb uncompressed file size at 8 bit but it is often 50mb at other agencies. As Alamy is non-exclusive you may sometimes be submitting the same images elsewhere so it makes sense to upsize to 50mb. Where this size came from I’m not entirely sure but I was told once it is because it allows cropping of a horizontal image for use on an A4 vertical page. Whether that is true or not is really academic, 48mb minimum is the rule, and if you don’t play by the rules your images will be rejected!

So, depending on the resolution of the camera you’ve shot with there is likely to be some resizing of your image, i.e. interpolation, required to meet this standard. This sounds simple enough but does cause a lot of confusion for many new contributors. Hopefully this article will help to clear up some misunderstandings and help with preparing images for Alamy submission.

Firstly, Alamy have a comprehensive guide for contributors which anyone submitting, or thinking of submitting to Alamy should obviously read through. I’m not going to reinvent the wheel here, but hopefully add a spoke or two and maybe oil the chain to help your submissions sail through QC smoothly.

The quick guide

1. Resize your longest side to 5120 pixels
2. Ensure resolution is set at 300 pixels/inch
3. Ensure constrain proportions is selected
4. Use Bicubic or bicubic smoother method
5. Save your file as JPEG at between 10-12 quality

The nity gritty

Remember Alamy now only want JPEG files, so what you upload won’t be a 50mb file because JPEG is a lossy file format meaning the file has been compressed. What this means in practice is your upsized file will usually be between 3 – 10mb depending on the subject matter and detail in the image.

How you get this file can vary depending on your original image size, format and the software you’re using. If you’ve shot a RAW file your RAW software will have an option to resize the image before you open it for any further tweaking in an image editing application or save it as a JPEG.

Alternatively you can leave the resizing to be done in Photoshop or whatever editing software you are using. If you have photoshop 7 or above or an equivalent this is perfectly adequate for interpolating your images. Prior to this it was recommended to use specialist applications or plugins such as Genuine Fractals. While I’m sure these still do a great job, you don’t need them now. Another old piece of advice you’ll still stumble across is the idea of step, or stair, interpolation. This basically involved resizing your image in a series of mind numbing increments until you reached the required size. You don’t need to do this anymore, if indeed it ever added any advantage. Trust me, you don’t need the extra excitement; you have keywording for that.

Now some points to keep in mind are that you are aiming to finish with an 8 bit JPEG file that would have an uncompressed image size of 48 – 55mb. However JPEGs are compressed; so your file will not actually be this large. This is a good thing and the whole advantage of using JPEG as a file format. Uploading batches of 48mb+ files would be painful. If you were to save this file as TIFF however you would have it in its uncompressed size; which is what stock agencies expect their clients will do once they have your image.

JPEG as a file format offers huge advantages for file transmission between creators, agencies and clients. However it is not the ideal format for actually working on images. Each time a JPEG is saved it effectively dies a little. Listen carefully and you can hear the scream under the hum of your hard drive every time you save. Ideally you work on your file as a RAW and/or TIFF and then save a JPEG version when finished for uploading. This JPEG is then sent to any purchaser who, hopefully, immediately makes a TIFF out of it and works on that. In the real world of course that doesn’t always happen, but you should never do more than minor tweaks and one save on a JPEG or you’re asking for trouble when interpolation has been thrown into the mix too.

The caveats

Interpolation inherently asks for trouble. To be honest I’m quite amazed how good a job it does. Despite this never forget you’re effectively conjuring more from less. In essence you need a high quality starting point; if your original image in its native resolution isn’t quite up to scratch interpolating it is only going to make matters worse. You can only push things so far. Alamy state a minimum of a 6mp DSLR and I can personally vouch for D70s images managing the stretch, however having more resolution makes the task more reliable.

I hope that is of some help and wish you luck with your Alamy upoads!

Sometimes it can be a struggle to come up with new ideas and concepts to shoot for stock photography. Yes, that’s me scratching my head trying to come up with my next (who am I kidding?) big idea.

Doing a bit of self portrait modelling for yourself can be uncomfortably introspective sometimes. I don’t see the back of my head that often. On this occassion it prompted some unforeseen keywording to take in that worryingly thin area that seems to be developing. Dare I say balding? Well for keywording, at least, I have.

The good news is the photo has sold on Alamy. So at least I can afford to try my luck with whatever magical solution Shane Warne is pushing at the moment. Or I might just thin out gracefully. There could be potential for a series of photos perhaps. Always look on the bright side, silver linings and all that.