• Welcome to BirdForum, the internet's largest birding community with thousands of members from all over the world. The forums are dedicated to wild birds, birding, binoculars and equipment and all that goes with it.

    Please register for an account to take part in the discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.
ZEISS DTI thermal imaging cameras. For more discoveries at night, and during the day.

Selling pics (1 Viewer)

Cristian Mihai

Cristian Mihai
I would like to sell some of my pics (mainly with wildlife subjects) on stock photography sites. I don't have any experience in this field, so any advice would be very much appreciated.
 
Hi Cristian.

I am sure some of your stunning Macro images would be marketable. How much time are you willing to put into it and what are you hoping to achieve?

I only ask as you may have more joy creating your own portfolio of high res images and marketing them directly than uploading to a stock agency.

Cheers, Marcus
 
Hi Marcus,

My intention is to sell 100-200 pics with subjects like butterflies/moths, birds, dragonflies and so on. For the moment, I have a very few pics with landscapes.
I don't have an income target. I hope that you can tell me something about this thing...
I would like to make my one site/portofolio, but for the moment, I think I don't have money and time
for this type of investment...maybe I'm wrong...

P.S. To be more specific - I hope that stock photo sites will accept about 100-200 pics taken by me. How many I will sell... God knows...
 
Last edited:
I'm also curious about this.

For the record, I've sold nothing to date, but the two enquires I've had have been £15 for a magazine, and £30 for a book. So not a great deal of money then. If I had bagged both of them, then it may have just about paid for the petrol I used!
 
Stock agencies typically require high res images much larger than the ones you have put together.

Alamy for example is about 5120pixels on the longest side at 300dpi (If I remember correctly)

I would imagine most stock agencies request something similar.
 
Alamy have recently reduced the required image size. It's now 24 MB (uncompressed) - which, at 3 Bytes per Pixel, works out at around 8 smeggypickles.
 
Cristian, just to give you an indication on how much stock photo usage price has dropped.

Not that long years ago we would pay on average £450 - £650 for a single usage of A4. Front covers a lot more.

Now that’s at the top end of the market, but even at the low end £150 was normal.

I would if I was you, market yourself, I would start by producing something visual that you can send to those organisations that have need of wildlife images for Eastern Europe, i.e. Bird holiday, tourism, conservation companies, plus local Governmental departments that need such images. Be proactive.

Send to Hungary, Bulgaria, as well as Romania, etc.

BUT, cover yourself by putting in writing your terms of usage and make it clear.

Cost, well that’s up to you, get yourself a years contract or submitting a group of images for publication and the possibilities of earning a wee bit start to appear.
 
I would contact the following sites:

1. Getty Images - to be considered you need to contact [email protected]
Getty is a higher end (i.e. more expensive image service).

2. iStockPhotos - http://www.istockphoto.com/sell-stock-photos.php

3. fotosearch.com -
Foto search Stock Photography and Stock Footage
Royalty Free Images

Publitek, Inc. dba Fotosearch
21155 Watertown Road
Waukesha, WI 53186-1898 USA

1-800-827-3920
+1 262-717-0740
Fax 262-717-0745
Find the Perfect Photo Fast!™

I was in Web Development and Advertising for quite a while. We went to the above sites on a daily basis looking for images to use on brochures, websites, and ads. There is ALWAYS a need for great photography!
 
I'm in a similar position but don't want to upload to stock sites. I've touted some images around via email and on foot. I'm going to the conclusion you have to take images people want, then sell them to them, rather than trying to sell what you have. If that makes sense.

I've been told the best selling pic from the local tourist info centre is a swan with a cygnet nestled on its back. The fox cub cutely trotting through some wild flowers :clap: is second.

Bring me a bucket.
 
I would say I understand your feeling, Nigel. I've also tried to sell my pics via email and on foot, without noticeable results...Romania is in the middle of a deep economical crises...
 
Do you guys have websites?
Selfhosted?

Than you might wanna check out Fotomoto.
You can install a code on your page and every photo will be available for Sale, download, ecard, whatever you choose.
You can set the Layout and the prizes, do promotions, etc.
It's a free service, well, they get provision for selling, but they still have fair prizes.

You still need to promote your website though.

Another option would be opening up an online shop.
Maybe with zazzle (the link goes to my shop, so you get an idea - I am lagging behind with new products though, most shots are still with from tiny Casio ;) ).
Zazzle is still free, your shop can be as big as you want it to be.
The prizes are not the cheapest, but still alright and in the margin.

There's also RedBubble (recently sold my first Mounted print *grin*)

Well, it all needs time and work to sell something there - or not.
It depends on your products and the tags you use, clever titles and descriptions help (something most of my older stuff is still lacking *sigh*)

If you have any questions regarding those Sites, let me know.
 
Warning! This thread is more than 14 years ago old.
It's likely that no further discussion is required, in which case we recommend starting a new thread. If however you feel your response is required you can still do so.

Users who are viewing this thread

Back
Top