An Aside: A Case Study in How NOT to Shoot

While visiting the threads on the Digital Photography School forum this morning, I found this great discussion on Crestock's archive of "Today's Worst Image." The Norway-based stock photography site doesn't just post these horrendous photos, but their critiques from the infamous Judge Ross explain in great, useful detail why the images were rejected. At the same time, take advantage of the "Today's Best Image" samples and the critiques given of those stellar images to get tips on how to get the job done right as well as insider clues to what stock agencies are looking for. Here is an example:





"The polar opposite of today's best, this photo succeeds in being both boring and lacking the quality we always look for. Washed out colors and a tedious composition has this coffee mug almost looking like it contains tea, and this is not working in anyone's favor. The colors are washed out and even if this photo had a one of a kind item in it, it would still fail to qualify for our collection."





"Obviously when you have an archive with several hundred thousand images you end up with quite a few duplicates; which works because a client might want certain details in their photo, or just variation in the selection they can make. The challenge lies on the photographers and their ability to think of new ways to take a new photo of an old subject. This twist is quite nice; you've got the silhouette working to a degree where this image almost looks like an illustration while still keeping some of the photo feel. The softness of the lines also works really well to set a nice soothing mood, and had me thinking of a delicious cup of warm coffee. Good job!"

Get the Job Done: Event Yields Stock Photography Images

I love mojitos!

I was pleasantly surprised after editing my images from the Denver Food and Wine Classic that the event yielded some great shots for my new stock photography portfolio. Even though I don't feel as if stock photography is something I'm very skilled at, I'm always up for the challenge of learning a new skill. I try to keep the concepts of this particular kind of photography in the back of my head at all times, taking advantage of shots when they present themselves. Here are some of my favorites from the event:


Lemons used for making alcoholic beverages


A tower of wine glasses

I don't think this shot would work as stock because you can clearly see the trade name of the wine bottles these stoppers were taken from. But I still love it for it's color and simplicity.

An Aside: One Man's Stock Trash is Another Man's Stock Treasure

Last week, I couldn't wait to tell everybody that I finally got accepted to iStockphoto.com. I'm not quite as excited to fess up to this next fact, but I think there could be a good lesson learned from it for all of us budding photogs: Shutterstock rejected every photo I submitted to them!

Shutterstock required I submit a batch of 15 images as part of its application process. Of course I used the three that iStockphoto had already accepted and 12 more I culled from my external hard drive where all my photos live. It looks as though they might have accepted the shot of the deer and the clouds reflected on the office building, but they couldn't be approved because they were unable to approve at least 7 out of the first 10 submitted. To add insult to injury, my uploading function was promptly, though temporarily disabled, as I can try uploading again in a month.

I was shocked by the images they turned down, as they have been some of my most popular sellers in other forums. Even the eye contact with this marvelous fox didn't sway them!




What were the reasons you ask? The fox shot was rejected due to:

NOISE--Noise, film grain, over-sharpening, or artifacts at full size.

While this one and others similar to it were axed because of:
COMPOSITION -- Limited commercial value due to framing, cropping, and/or composition.



I posted about this issue on several of the forums I frequented, including Digital Grin and Digital Photography School, and thought you might be interested in hearing other's responses and experiences they've had trying to get into stock photography.

So here's what I plan to do: I will dedicate all of my initial efforts into giving iStock what they want, learning how to deal with noise and artifacting, etc. by studying their guidelines. Once I get a handle on what differentiates stock photography from other types, I will try again to branch out to other agencies, including Web Shots and Shutterstock. I even asked my instructor Efrain Cruz to consider hosting a stock photography class with Illuminate Photography Workshops to get some tips and techniques from the pros about how to be successful at this type of production.

So how do you fix noise or artifacting? And I can't help but to wonder: do all of these stock agencies reject you on your first try just to see how you will respond? Will you try submitting again or will you hang your head in shame and never turn in anything else? I think it could be a good way of separating the folks who really want it from the ones who just dreaming of success. What do you think?