I've been exploring the possibilities offered by the stock libraries, particularly fotolia.com and this is one of the shots that I submitted to them. So far it hasn't done too badly, I've sold a few copies, nearly enough to pay for the wine, ha ha!

No but seriously it can be a fun way to earn a few extra dollars if you have the right kind of material.

White Wine at Sunset

I only have a few pictures with them at the moment, and some with iStockPhoto.com, but some photographers who have loads get a nice check each month. The great thing is that you can sell the same photo over and over again. In the few months I have been doing this some of my photos have been downloaded 12 or 15 times. For more information on selling your photography check out selling your photographs.

Although this shot may look simple it's not quite as straightforward as it looks. A straight shot exposing for the sunset would leave the wine and the glasses looking very dark. So a second shot was necessary at the correct exposure for the wine.

The two shots were then sandwiched together in Photoshop and a layer mask was used to mask around the glasses so we get the wine from one shot and the background from the other. You need a good steady tripod to ensure that both shots have exactly the same viewpoint and framing. For a complete explanation of how this all works see my tutorial on tripods.