Posts Tagged ‘fotoLibra’
Selling Photographs through Flickr and Getty Images
June 23rd, 2010by Gwyn Headley
Managing Director
There’s been much contention recently over the deal made between the snapshot sharing site Flickr and the behemoth of the picture library stock agency world Getty Images.
A couple of years ago the companies agreed that Getty could have their pick of the millions of images uploaded to Flickr. Of course not all of them are snapshots — some probably approach professional standards. But now Flickr has announced their “Request To License” programme. This is what they said:
“Starting today in the Flickrverse [bleagh!] Flickr members and visitors can work with each other through a new program with Getty Images called “Request to License”. We’ve built this program on the success of our launch of the Flickr Collection on Getty Images just over one year ago.
“So, how does it work? Under the Additional Information heading on your public photo pages you’ll see a “Want to license” link. Only you see this link. Visitors to your photos won’t.”
There is whipped up concern that Flickr members have no idea how to value their images and that Getty will rip them off. This is very, very unlikely.
Our concern at fotoLibra is that it’s Getty who have no idea how to value their images, as this week a Getty spokesperson was quoted by Amateur Photographer as saying:
“Flickr contributors will receive 30% of the fee and the average price for Rights-managed images is around $500 (£335). Royalty-free images are licensed at set prices based upon the file size the customer purchases. Flickr contributors will receive 20% of the fee and the average price for RF is around $200 (£134).”
(Incidentally fotoLibra member photographers get 50% of the sale fee and Platinum members get 60%.)
Well, that’s news to us. Getty’s ‘average’ prices, that is. I have lost count of the number of potential clients who have refused to deal with fotoLibra because “you’re so much more expensive than Getty Images.” Yet our average price for Rights-managed images is around $76 (£51), compared to their quoted $500 (£335). So maybe someone isn’t telling the full, entire, unvarnished truth here. And it’s not me.
If those quoted prices really are true, why hasn’t fotoLibra been swamped with buyers? Our photographers are every bit as good as theirs, and our average price is 15% of their quoted average price. That is a staggering difference.
I very much doubt that Getty Images averages $500 per rights-managed image sale. How I wish that were true! Perhaps it’s all smoke and mirrors, like those famous microstock offers of a dollar for a picture.
Guitar Porn
May 26th, 2010by Gwyn Headley
Managing Director
Three male members wrote in to complain about Jacqui’s “sexist” depiction of male readers in the GUITAR PORN Picture Call (read it here) sent out earlier this week. She was prepared to stand her ground, but on my advice she unreservedly apologises for any upset she may have caused. It was clearly an improbable assertion; the story was meant to be funny, and she is sorry people were unable to read it as such. What amuses some will offend others.
The fault lies with me. I told Jacqui about Guitar Porn, saying there was a sector of the book publishing market which aimed books at people who preferred to look at pictures rather than read too many words. This sector is overwhelmingly male, and subjects they enjoy are big breasts, Harley-Davidsons, guitars, farm machinery and so on. More granular market research reveals that these books are generally bought by women for their menfolk. What Jacqui wrote was based on what I said, and I fully approved it.
Despite some confusion about my name in foreign parts, I am a man, and I know the markets these books reach. I feel it’s perfectly reasonable to poke fun at them — unless we can’t poke fun at anybody ever again for fear they’ll take offence.
Nevertheless my comments as interpreted by Jacqui were seen as sufficiently offensive for three people to complain. That means there were at least thirty who felt the same way but couldn’t be bothered to write in. I’m sorry that I (for it was my doing) upset these people, but it was meant to be light-hearted. A flat announcement for photographs of guitars is too dull for fotoLibra.
That said, another three people wrote in to say how much they enjoyed Jacqui’s sense of humour.
That argues at least another 30 do too.
You, I thank.
Guidance from the Met
May 5th, 2010by Gwyn Headley
Managing Director
Every day hundreds of thousands of innocent fotoLibra photographers are hauled off the streets of London and incarcerated in foul, dank dungeons with no hope of release for simply snapping a cop brutalizing an illegal immigrant, or some other harmless pastime.
OK, that may be a mild exaggeration but it’s nothing to what might happen if [insert name of your most loathed political party here] comes to power.
In the event of this happening — or in any event — fotoLibra members might like to read the Metropolitan Police’s official line on taking photographs in public places.
It is not what the scaremongers would have you believe. In general, you’re allowed to do pretty much what you like. And the police have NO POWER AT ALL to delete your photographs.
All the same, if you’re taking photographs in London, better print it out and keep it in your camera bag.
Picture Perfect
May 1st, 2010by Gwyn Headley
Managing Director
Another politician gets into trouble on the run-up to the UK General Election, to be held next Thursday, May 6.
The Liberal Democrat candidate for Arfon in Wales (that’s Bangor & Caernarfon to you and me) illustrated her campaign leaflet with photographs sourced — let’s be kind — thoughtlessly.
The slogan “Regenerating Welsh Towns” was accompanied by a photograph of a derelict building in the very English city of Bath, Somerset.
Her concern for jobs was illustrated by a Job Centre in Sidmouth, Devon. Another photograph showed a team of builders in Barnet, North London.
We must praise candidate Sarah Green for her international outlook, but when a campaign is fought on local issues, she really ought to source local pictures. There is an excellent picture library based in her county Gwynedd, I believe. We Welsh are particularly sensitive about such matters!
When Labour launched its campaign with an image of sunrise over a cornfield, I contacted them via their website to ask where they sourced the picture. It looked somehow American to me (yes, sunrise is sunrise, and a cornfield is a cornfield, but if you study a lot of images every day, as I do, national differences such as colour preferences become more marked).
Strangely enough, I haven’t had a reply. I would love to know where the British Labour Party purchased the picture. It would be great if it was a British picture library, a British photographer and a British field.
I wonder.
Microstock: why would a reputable company do this to themselves?
April 7th, 2010by Gwyn Headley
Managing Director
The following blog posting was written by Chris Barton, managing director of PhotographersDirect.com. You can read the original post plus the comments it has triggered here.
We’re posting it on the fotoLibra Pro Blog (with his permission) because Chris has articulated the basic flaw in microstock and low value photography, and his blog needs to be read by photographers and picture buyers alike. When people don’t care — as these picture users clearly don’t — then cost becomes the sole criterion. Value means nothing.
Chris writes:
I was looking at a company website today, with the possibility of putting some business their way, when something I saw there made me cringe involuntarily.
They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Well, this one has a lot to say. It says microstock. It says perfect-people perfect-world lowest-common-denominator cookie-cutter pile-them-high sell-them-cheap image.
Why would a reputable company want to be associated with those words?
The problem with this image is that it has that…. ‘Deja Vu’ feeling to it, and for a good reason.
So, do these guys come as a package? Have they moved on from “Best of the Web” to form the Corporate Team at “123 Greetings”?
As you would expect from such a high powered team, they speak fluent German…
… and some oriental language – you could probably find out which one if you bump into them at the:
and of course they come with a:Now, this may all just seem a bit of a joke, just poking fun at the short-sightedness of companies using cheap microstock images to represent their… well, image, but when it gets visibly misleading:
About us? They didn’t do a very good job of spotting this trouble on the horizon…
maybe financeme needs better financing if they don’t have any headshots of their own staff and can only afford microstock images…
I think that should read ‘Company Oversight’
…you end up questioning the credibility of the company itself.
I don’t believe these people really work at Targetti Poulsen…
…so why would I trust anything else that Targetti Poulsen have to say?
And if I am wrong and they do work there, are Targetti Poulsen aware that their ‘people’ moonlight at:
On a side note, ‘Bad Credit Cosmetic Surgery Loans dot co dot uk’ wins this month’s prize for “dodgiest domain name”.
My final example I think rounds off this topic in an appropriate way:
from their track record, getting these ‘good people’ to stay does not look promising…
Okay, so HireView Magazine used the same silly microstock image. But that photo at the top? That’s them. That’s the team at HireView. I am confident about that because it isn’t a perfect-people perfect-world lowest-common-denominator cookie-cutter pile-them-high sell-them-cheap image that has spread across the internet like a nasty virus. It is an honest picture, and because of that, I think I can trust HireView Magazine.
Which is more than I can say for the rest of these companies.
Companies need to think more carefully about the images they use. I suspect many businesses are unaware that the photos their designer has sold them are spread a-dime-a-dozen across the web. There is a good reason that microstock’s original catchphrase was “the designer’s dirty little secret”.
At the very least, reputable companies should look at using rights-managed rather than royalty-free images, so they will KNOW if the image is being used elsewhere and whether a competitor (or sometimes something even worse: “Cosmetic Surgery for mens, Get your Dream Shape like stars”) is using the same ‘team’ to represent their company. Or maybe they should follow HireView Magazine’s lead and actually hire a photographer to take real pictures of real people who work at their company. They may not be perfect, they may cost a bit more, but they will look genuine, and honest. And not just… cheap.
Thank you Chris — firstly for your permission to reproduce your blog here, and secondly for your righteous indignation at the short term, penny-pinching attitude of so many organisations. To mangle John Donne: “Every microstock sale diminishes us, because we are part of the photographic community.”
Standards? What standards?
autoFocus
March 18th, 2010by Gwyn Headley
Managing Director
In her latest Newsletter Jacqui Norman reveals another new fotoLibra feature which is actually still on the drawing board.
It’s called autoFocus, and it’s envisaged as a rolling newsfeed of stories of interest to to picture buyers and photographers. I want it to appear as a tickertape band rolling across the screen but apparently there are technical problems with that which, though surmountable, are too development time intensive to commit to. We will see.
In whatever form it eventually appears it will feature stories drawn from a glittering variety of sources, from our favourite personal blogs to authoritative statements and declamations from industry bodies. Of course it will have to be selective simply because of the sheer volume of information available on the net, but it will not favour money, influence and brand loyalties over iconoclasm, plaudits, discoveries, brickbats and advice, or indeed vice-versa. It will not take sides on Canon vs. Nikon debates (or Exakta vs. Thornton-Pickard for our Heritage members).
But as you will realise these are all fine thoughts during work in progress. What we finally release may be quite different, but whatever happens it will only be as good and as useful as its source material. We want to make this as broad ranging as possible.
If you enjoy a photo blog, forum or website, and better still if you run or write one, please let us know so we can add it to autoFocus. Obviously it must have an RSS or Atom feed enabled, but don’t you worry your pretty little head about that, we’ll check it out.
We very much hope you’ll all enjoy it and find it useful, and we also hope you’ll tell us what you want to see.
Links You May Have Missed
March 17th, 2010by Gwyn Headley
Managing Director
At the end of every year we do a round-up of all the fotoLibra Pro Blog postings throughout the year. Though we say so ourselves, it’s a useful reference to the way fotoLibra works.
Two articles in particular should be read by every fotoLibra member:
GREAT EXPECTATIONS tells you precisely what to expect when you go on line to try and sell your photographs. It’s based on the fotoLibra experience, but we don’t think it’s going to be that much different from any other agency.
THREE HUNDRED PIXELS PER INCH tells you why this is an upload requirement for fotoLibra, and how to achieve it. Yes, we do know resolution is an irrelevance as far as screen-based media goes, but read the piece carefully and you may just comprehend why we demand it.
So we’ve happily been sending links to these and other various blog postings, only to find people complaining they’re always directed to the same (and not necessarily relevant) entry.
The reason appears to be that we used bit.ly to abbreviate the URLs of our blog postings. We never knew it had a restricted shelf life, but certainly on the fotoLibra site all the carefully input bit.ly abbreviations over 6 months old defaulted to the most recent blog post.
So we’ve laboriously rewritten the links coding for the fotoLibra 2009 Pro Blog Index for the whole of 2009.
And now it should work for you. Sorry!