Tuesday, July 10, 2007

How did I start microstock photography and why I keep doing it ?

I have been doing photography since 1991 on and off and started digital in 1998 with a 1MP kodak. After that as the equipment got better and better I decided to stuck to digital and never used my traditionnal SLR again.....
I am relatively new to Microstock since I started contributing in September 2006 at Fotolia by submitting few pictures. Some of them were bought which was quite motivating and encouraged me to continue. After selling few pictures, it is easy to get caught in the game of pictures review and making few pennies. Fotolia is a good place to start with a relatively high acceptance rate and the ability they have to sell pictures in Europe.

Fotolia had a lot of trouble last month with the migration of their server and uploads were down for while . As I was exclusive with them I started looking around to where I could submit pictures. I was surprised to find a quite a lot of agencies out there divided in two groups : the established ones with 1 to 2 millions pictures on line (SS,IS,FT,DT,BSP,SXP) also called the big 6 and the newbies (LO,123RF,CT,SV) with a smaller portfolio.
The interesting thing about microstock is that every company is different and the business is constantly changing. They differs by their interaction with the contributor and the buyers and also in term of how they work (acceptance procedure,uploads,forum,royalties,affiliation,etc...)

But at the end of day what is good about microstock is that it makes you think differently when you take pictures and it is a excellent way to improve his skills. Also the interaction with the microstock community through the forums is quite enjoyable and you always learn new things.
As for the money part, well I fixed myself a target of $ 100 a month by the end of the year!

If you are tempted by the experience you can click on the referral links below to register to different microstocks !



Fotolia stock photos, royalty free stock photography, photo search Stock Photos, Royalty Free Stock Photography, Photo Search View My Portfolio Stock Photos - Instant Downloads for only $1 Royalty Free Images

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