Making money from your Photographs
Stock Photography
The internet has opened up amazing new opportunities for
photographers to make money from their best efforts and
earn modest (and sometimes not so modest) sums of money.
Before the coming of the internet a photographer would
need to have a very large catalogue of high quality images,
thousands of photos, before being accepted by a stock agency.
Images would be sold for quite high prices but not very
often, and usually on an 'exclusive' basis. Once the rights
to an image were sold the photographer could not sell that
image to anyone else until the end of the contract, which
could be years. Also, because prices were high, customers
would be very careful which images they purchased and, for
the majority of small publishers, purchasing stock photography
was beyond their budget.
Now, every webmaster, and there are millions of them, is
a small publisher and is looking for good photos at a reasonable
price. To keep the price down the buyers have to sacrifice
that 'exclusive' clause but they are not too worried about
that as, with so many websites and small print publications,
the chances of seeing the same image twice are quite slim.
If you are doing an international advertising campaign then
exclusive use of the image is very important but, if you
are doing a website about the best way to look after tropical
fish, budget is going to be the overriding factor.
I've had a look at a few 'stock photography' websites and
here are a couple of links to my favourite ones.
The first good news is that the good ones are all free
to join. There is some sort of quality control on the first
batch of photos that you upload, but after that you can
bang up as many as you like. Typically images sell for $1
for the lowest resolution (web size) up to $5 or $10 for
print quality and you get a percentage of that. This doesn't
sound very exciting until you remember that you can sell
the same image many times over, good images can sell hundreds
of times. Multiply this by the amount of images you have
in your portfolio then by the number of websites you submit
to, they do not have exclusive use either, you can submit
the same pictures to several websites, and it can add up
to some pocket money, enough for that 'must have' new lens
maybe. There are going to be some people who don't sell
anything, or very little, but, so what, it didn't cost you
anything to try. More important than the money (did
I say that?) is the satisfaction and pride you get
from knowing that your photos are useful to someone.
Of the two names above, Shutterstock
is the hardest to get into. They ask you to submit ten images
to start with and if they reject more than three then you're
not accepted and you have to wait a month before you can
apply again. I was rejected the first time I tried, so I
upped my game and re-applied. It was definitely worth the
effort, they sell many more of my pictures than any of the
other sites I have used. Being fussy about what they accept
keeps their database clean and their reputation amongst
buyers high. So buyers trust them to supply good quality
images and keep coming back for more. Other sites will give
you slightly more money per sale but they will not make
nearly as many sales.
My advice then is, try to get into Shutterstock
and the stuff they won't accept you can place with other
sites.
What kind of photos sell?
 The
best selling photographic images seem to be office scenarios,
two or three people round a desk or at a computer. Something
that an office worker can drop into a Powerpoint presentation.
The other big thing seems to be images that can be used
as backgrounds for websites or presentations. Sports photos
are also good but you need to get anyone who is recognizable
in the picture to sign a model release. For us mere mortals,
who may not have access to models and a studio, I would
say landscapes, street scenes, famous landmarks, market
scenes, think of the type of shots you see in magazines,
not the adverts, the photos that illustrate the editorial
stuff. Some of it is commissioned, but a surprising amount
is stock photography. Go through all your shots, pick only
the ones that are well exposed, well composed and in focus,
and think about whether they could be of interest to a complete
stranger. My best selling shots so far have been pictures
of glasses of wine and slices of cheese, it's not often
you get paid for drinking wine. Don't be put off if there
are already thousands of pictures similar to yours, people
are always looking for something new. Obviously it's better
to come up with new ideas but a re-work of an old idea can
sell just as well.
Keywords
Once you have selected your best shots and uploaded them
to the website, you need to make sure that they are seen
by as many people as possible. This means entering the right
keywords for each photo. Make sure you list all possible
keywords that are applicable. Don't put irrelevant keywords,
it won't help you sell any more pictures and it will just
make the searchers' job more difficult, but make sure your
photo appears in every relevant search. I found this quite
difficult at first but, after a while, it gets easier. Have
a look at similar images to yours and see what keywords
they are using.
Have a go at selling some of your pictures, what have you
got to lose? Have a look at the Shutterstock
website.
Semi Pros (Event Photography)
The 'stock photography' model is a very useful one but
basically it's just sitting around waiting for someone to
buy your pictures and there's not much you can do if they
don't.
Although there are a great many
fantastic photographers in the world, how many of them live
in your street or even in your town? As you get better
at photography you will find people start asking you to
photograph all kinds of local events, sports events, festivals,
shows, plays, exhibitions, parties or even weddings and
sell copies to the participants. People ask me to photograph
all sorts of events but in the past I have usually said
no. The reason I declined is because, although I enjoy the
photography, I hate all the paperwork and business hassle
of ordering prints and getting the money in (I won't tell
you the number of times I've ended up with a batch of prints
nobody wants to pay for), then collecting and delivering
the finished work only to find the lab have printed the
wrong size.
I have now rethought my stance on this as I have discovered
a new website called PhotoStockPlus.com.
These guys, as well as selling your snaps as stock photography,
give you your own e-commerce enabled
website. All you need to do is upload your pictures
to your folder, give the potential customers the address
(which you can set up in advance so you can hand out
cards at the event), then sit back and wait for the
money to roll in. They have a vast range of print sizes
that people can order, they can buy downloads, posters,
mugs, t-shirts and just about anything you can print a photo
on. You decide what markup you want, either globally or
on each item, and they do the rest.
Of course they don't do all this out of the kindness of
their hearts, they want to make some money too, there is
a subscription to be paid but the good news is there is
a 30
day free trial period so you can see if it is going
to be worth your while and you can do enough business to
justify the fee. I reckon if I do one event every month
or six weeks I'll be laughing all the way to the bank and
the 'stock photo' side of the business is just an extra
bonus.
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Although I'm not a great fan of the
subscription model on the internet, I think that,
in this instance, it helps to keep the quality of
the site to a 'usable' level, buyers will soon get
fed up if they have to wade through lots of poor quality
pictures. Also it means that you get to keep a bigger
percentage of your sales than would otherwise be possible.
If you want to make some cash out of photography
this could be a great way to do it. People will always
pay for a good picture of themselves or their children
at some special event. |
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