Hastings pier reborn:

Vast new space on Hastings pier

Wednesday 27th April 2016 saw a great day here in Hastings when our much loved Victorian pier re-opened to the public. Though the finishing touches were still being added ahead of the official opening in May, things were advanced enough to allow the public back on for the first time in some eight years.

I have written about our pier several times and have been documenting it in photographs since moving to Hastings in 2009. Designed and built by Eugenius Birch (responsible for a number of British seaside piers) it first opened in 1872. 2008 saw it closed for structural safety reasons and October 2010 brought a disastrous fire which destroyed most of the wooden decking and buildings.

However, that was not the end of the pier as after being awarded over 11 million pounds in Lottery Heritage

People enjoying the reborn Hastings pier

Funds rebuilding work has been ongoing for several years. What we now have is a very modern pier with large amounts of open space. It's a far cry from the traditional Victorian style pier with a ballroom at the end.


I must admit I did have my doubts about how it would look and, certainly from the shore, it still looks like something is missing with the Pavilion restaurant at the start of the pier and the new visitor centre in the middle and then nothing till the end.

Looking west from Hastings pier

That impression changed for me as soon as I paid my first visit on the Saturday after opening. The massive areas of uncluttered wooden decking make for an impressive space (who realised it was so wide?). The visitor centre with its roof top terrace makes for a great place to sit and watch the many visitors anxious to walk on the pier again.

The one thing that struck me was that everyone on it was smiling and enjoying this new space. And hardly a scrap of litter to be seen. I have already visited four times and look forward to enjoying the reborn pier for many years to come.

It's also great to have so many new photographic opportunities -both of the pier itself and the views of Hastings town that you get from it. It's been a pleasure to document the process and it's great to finally have it open again. Regards, David.

Hastings pier rises again:

Hastings pier in 2009, before the fire

I have written before about our historic Victorian pier here in Hastings in East Sussex, England. Opened in 1872, the pier was closed some years ago due to safety concerns and later devasted by fire in October 2010.


The sense of loss that I and many others felt on the day was profound as this elegant landmark was feared gone forever. The fire received major news coverage from both the press and television -both in the UK and around the World.

Hastings pier in October 2010 -devastated by fire

However, with funding from the Lottery Heritage Fund and money raised from the public, rebuilding work has been taking place over the last few years with the grand re-opening now hopefully taking place in April 2016.


Much work has been carried out to strengthen the iron sub structure. Wooden decking has been replaced. The burnt out ballroom has been demolished and a new visitor centre built. The fire ravaged pavilion at the entrance to the pier has been restored and turned into a new restaurant.

Hastings pier taking shape in July 2015 

The pier intends to be a hub for all sorts of activities once re-opened with a range of live performances and
events being planned and even an open air cinema in good weather.


Above all, of course, it will be great to simply walk along the pier and enjoy (and photograph) the view back to Hastings -a perspective that I have never experienced as the pier was already closed when I first moved here in 2009.


Seaside piers hold a great place in my heart and for many others and I am excited to see the work nearing completion. Regards, David.

Have a great Christmas!

Wishing all readers of ShootingStock a great Christmas and a brilliant 2016! I hope you will continue to enjoy my blog in the coming year. Kind regards, David.


A red car in the snow at St.Leonards-on-Sea in England

August Sales Updates:

Prevelis ferry docked at Halki island

As with every other month there are no prizes for guessing that Shutterstock took top place in August. Sales were slightly down from recent months and this is one instance in which I would have narrowly missed payout under the old payout limit. Luckily I had changed mine to the new $35 level in my account settings. On Demand sales were good but I only received a couple of small Single Downloads which brought the total down.

Istock came in second with 5 credit sales and 36 sub/PP downloads.

In third place were Picfair with, at last, my second sale there! An image of the Red Arrows was purchased by a design agency to use in a clients project. They had originally gone to Istock but found the editorial restrictions prevented the use they needed. Picfairs license (which allows for some commercial uses) fitted the bill. I know this because the purchaser contacted me directly and, pleasingly, said they would certainly look at Picfair for future projects.

Photogenic pile of stones on Ftenegia beach, Halki

123RF achieved fourth place with 13 downloads. I am still awaiting review of all my editorial images uploaded in August although two commercial images were reviewed and accepted. This is strange as 123
used to have lightning fast reviews for editorial (often within minutes) so I am not sure what has changed.

Dreamstime disappointed with 9 downloads all of which were subs. Especially frustrating as I am only a fraction off payout level :(

Bigstock ranked sixth with 10 downloads (mainly subs). Once again, six of those images were related to my local area of Hastings.

Kent Air Ambulance at St.Leonards-on-Sea

Bringing up the rear in seventh place were Fotolia with 5 downloads. However, the good news there is that all 5 were in the last few days of the month suggesting an uptick in activity on my small portfolio there. This may well be due to parent company Adobe launching their new Adobe Stock site which mirrors Fotolia images. That will certainly be one to watch in coming months.

Shooting and uploading in August included further images from my June trip to Halki island in Greece as well as the awful events at Shoreham detailed in my last post. An unexpected photo opportunity arose when the Kent Air Ambulance landed in the public park in front of my flat. This was the second time this has happened but what made it especially strange was that I had literally just edited and uploaded my image from Shoreham -with the same Kent Air Ambulance pictured landing at the tragedy. Weird or what? Regards, David.

May Sales Updates:

Anti Austerity march, Hastings

Straight into the May sales to bring me up to date before the end of June is upon us :)

May proved a fairly weak month with even my first place agency Shutterstock down from last month and a much lower number of the higher paying On Demand sales and three modest SOD sales.

Istock leapt to second place with 8 credit downloads and an astonishing 42 subscription and PP sales. PP sales came back strongly after their crash last month.

Straight in at third place came Redbubble with a T shirt sale becoming my first sale on the site.

123RF came in fourth with 11 downloads though without the boost from LEL sales that I had last month. They also updated their uploader which from my perspective didn't seem to have any advantages over the old version. On the contrary, the first seven images I uploaded proved tricky as there just seems no way to include punctuation in the caption field. This is important because they require a specific format for editorial captions (which include comma and dash signs). I have put these in dozens of times but when clicking to save they just disappear. I'm fully expecting them to be rejected for this -that is if they ever get around to reviewing them (been three weeks now).

Protest against zero hour contracts at Sports Direct, Hastings

In fifth place were Bigstock with 14 downloads -pretty much all subs again.

Sixth place went to FineArtAmerica with a sale of two greetings cards. These were of the local island bus on the Greek island of Paxos which I visited last year. Not a fortune but a pleasing sale all the same as it is one of my favourite Greek islands.

Now for the big disappointment of the month. In Seventh place were Dreamstime with just 6 downloads. These were all 35c subscription sales bringing a total for the month of just $2.10 -my worst month ever on DT (even my first month there in September 2009 produced nearly £6 in sales). What happened there? Thankfully June is showing improvements but I am at a loss to account for that May dive.

Finally in Eighth place I got one of my irregular sales on Canstock photo - a 30c subscription. If they ever start taking Editorial images this could become a much better seller for me but meanwhile I'll just add non editorials as and when I have them.

Greetings from Paxos: card sales at FineArtAmerica

Much of May was dominated by my signing up to Redbubble.com and learning all about how that works. I'll be posting an article on that soon -but early results are encouraging :)

The other event in May was, of course, a General Election here in Britain when to a lot of peoples surprise the Conservative party won a (small) outright majority. None of the opinion polls had predicted anything of the kind so the result was unexpected. This led to a number of protests and anti austerity marches across the UK, including here in Hastings. I photographed the march and have already had several sales on Shutterstock as a result. Regards, David.

April Sales Updates:

Rum tum at Pirates Day, Hastings

A tad late I know with my April updates but on the principle of better late than never I'm getting this posted now.

Inevitably, in first place were Shutterstock with a very strong month of downloads with a good number of On Demand sales and one good Single Sale (nothing on the scale of last month, sadly).

Jumping into second place this month were 123RF with 10 downloads -several higher paying LEL licences pushed the dollar value up here.

Closed down Phones 4 U, Hastings

Dreamstime ranked third with 10 downloads.

Istock were in fourth place with 5 credit downloads and 18 subscription/PP sales. The PP sales were very low this month with just three sales showing up. New uploads brought my Istock portfolio up to 966 images.

Bigstock brought up the rear in fifth place with 9 downloads (virtually all subsciption sales).

Copperfield Clog morris at Jack In The Green, Hastings

Fotolia and the rest didn't produce any sales in April and I am still awaiting the elusive second sale at Picfair.

Uploading in April included a set of a Phones 4 U branch in Hastings. This mobile phone chain closed down a while back so the images have some historic relevance. I also worked on some more images from last year's Jack In The Green festival (ahead of this years event in May). Finally, backtracking to 2012, I uploaded another fun image from the Pirates Day event -with a heavily pregnant young woman getting into the spirit of the occasion :) Regards, David.

February Sales Updates:

Agios Ioannis beach, Meganissi island

A rather late posting for my February updates I know, but other events intervened.
As every month, Shutterstock came out on top by a long, long way. Three modest Single Downloads and a good crop of On Demand downloads helped to make a solid month here.

Second place fell to Istock with 5 regular credit sales and a further 16 sub/PP downloads. What is interesting to see is the decline in PP (Thinkstock.com) sales as the new Istock subscriptions build up. It seems fairly clear where they are pushing the marketing now.

Traditional beach huts, Glyne Gap

Dreamstime came in third with 9 downloads. February saw the long awaited payout on the Google Adwords deal with many contributors reporting floods of $2 sales from the deal. I was full of anticipation but received just a single sale (one of the two images they originally chose last year for the Beta testing). Oh well, maybe the next round will prove better.

Bigstock saw fourth place with 16 downloads (mainly subs). As previously posted, Hastings and
St.Leonards subjects continued to do well here.

123rf were down at fifth place with 9 downloads (again, mainly subs). At least I kept my Level 2 status at the end of the month.

Fotolia managed just one sale to make sixth place in the list.

Glyne Gap from Galley Hill

Finally, a sale at Yaymicro (from one of their Partner sites). This was my first sale from Yay since last August and February also marked a year since my last sale directly on the Yay site itself. The easy uploading and quick batch editing keep me supporting them with new images but really (on a business level) I should give up on them. The trouble is that I still remember the good early years when they used to get me regular sales at decent rates. I just keep thinking the lack of sales cannot continue there forever. Can it?

Recent uploading saw me revisit some images from my 2008 trip to the Greek island of Meganissi as well as a set of images from a local beauty spot here called Glyne Gap. I'm a bit hesitant to admit it was the first time I had visited it since moving to Hastings in 2009. I'll certainly be going again in the near future! Regards, David.

January Sales Updates:

Alonissos -first Extended License on Istock

There were certainly some encouraging signs in January as we came out of the Christmas and New Year holiday slowdown.

Inevitably, Shutterstock came out on top by a long way with a sprinkling of On Demand sales (not the best month for these) and one modest Single sale.

A strong month for Istock putting them in second place with 6 credit sales and 12 sub/PP downloads. What boosted things here was getting my first ever Extended License sale on Istock with my image of the coastline on Alonissos island.

Dreamstime managed third place with a pleasing 23 downloads. Sadly, all but one were 35cent sub sales which pulled the actual income down. Greek island images featured strongly in this months downloads.

Breitling WingWalkers in action

Bigstock was just pipped into fourth place (by only 2cents) with 17 downloads. As I have mentioned before local Hastings images seem to do well here with 9 of the 17 being from my home town. In fact, images downloaded on Bigstock seem to be rather quirky -often being ones that haven't sold much elsewhere (as well as the usual Margaret Thatcher type good sellers).  This suggests that they have a distinctive group of customers -no bad thing in my opinion.

123rf came in at fifth place with 9 downloads. Now, I am quick to express disappointment here with 123rf
and January looked like it was heading the same way with only four sub sales for most of the month. However, things were redeemed by 2 LEL sales and a Large sale on the 31st (a Saturday at that!) which was enough to push me back to Level 2 at the start of February. Hopefully, I can remain at that level for some time now. Further, the backlog of pending Editorial images all got reviewed and accepted right at the end of January after sitting there all month.

Finally, in the sellers list, Canstock pulled in 2 downloads which was a nice surprise given that I do not often see much action with them.

Skiathos Town and harbour, Greece

Nothing from my other sites in January with Cutcaster becoming a casualty when I decided it was no longer worth my time and broadband costs to continue uploading new material. With a current port of 1498 files, I have had just 8 downloads since joining in January 2011. Increasingly picky reviews where images that are accepted and sell on the top tier sites were being rejected didn't help matters. I'll just keep my port there and check in from time to time in the hope of a surprise. If I had to speculate about the problem here I would guess that, though they accept Editorial images, they do not have the Editorial buyers that would be interested in my port. Lifestyle/models/isolation images may do much better here for some.

Uploads in January included new images of the Breitling WingWalkers (an ever popular seller) and some views over Skiathos Town taken during my 2012 trip to Alonissos. February has got off to a slow start but, hopefully, things will pick up as the month goes on. Regards, David.

October Sales Updates:



Douglas C47-A Dakota

A great month in October on my number one agency, Shutterstock, helped along by my new higher earning level as well as a $28 enhanced download for one of my Margaret Thatcher images. Good On Demand sales and a modest Single Download also added to the mix.

FineArtAmerica came second this month with the sale of a framed print of Pedi bay on the Greek island of Symi (pictured). Just as a reminder, if you have the paid premium account (currently $30 per annum) you also receive a percentage commission on the printing materials and frame etc in addition to the fee you have set. You are also allowed unlimited uploads as opposed to the 25 image limit with the free account.

Pedi bay, Symi island

Istock were third this month with an improving 12 credit downloads and 15 sub and PP sales. The new pricing structure there is certainly helping with most of my credit sales being around $1.40 -certainly better than the below a dollar commissions I often used to see for smaller size uses.

Dreamstime made fourth place with 8 downloads. As mentioned last month there was a long gap in sales which ran right through to October 17 giving DT little time to pick up before month end.

Bigstock came in at number five with a healthy 15 downloads but as they were nearly all subs this pushed the earnings down. Bigstock do not seem to be a site where I get large individual sales -let alone an Enhanced Download. Nethertheless, as part of the Bridge to Bigstock programme, they require no effort on my part and sales are regular there.

New Esperance Morris, Hastings

Finally, in at sixth place were Fotolia with 4 downloads. I am actually quite pleased with that result as my portfolio there is still very small (circa 100 images). As they do not take Editorial images I only make infrequent uploads to them when I have something suitable.

October saw new uploads including an airshow image of a WW2 Dakota, which I decided to give a period feel to by converting to B/W. I also carried on working through my images from this years Jack In The Green festival at Hastings including a couple of the New Esperance Morris dancers. Regards, David.

Eastbourne pier -Another fire disaster:

Damaged section of Eastbourne pier

Back in October 2010 I posted here about the tragic fire that destroyed much of the historic Victorian pier here in Hastings.
History has recently repeated itself with fire destroying a portion of the pier at Eastbourne -some 17 miles along the East Sussex coastline.

Pier entrance -showing damage beyond

Breaking out around 3.00pm on Wednesday July 30, the fire was initially reported as being a small in nature but soon developed into a major incident with fire crews from around East Sussex attending aided by the RNLI lifeboats from Eastbourne. The band of smoke stretched along the coast to Hastings and beyond.

Thankfully, nobody was hurt in the incident and after some hours the fire was brought under control -leaving the rest of the pier intact. I took these images the next day which clearly show the extent of the damage.

Damaged section -with the saved section beyond

Opened in 1870, Eastbourne pier was one of fourteen seaside piers designed by Victorian architect Eugenius Birch -including Hastings Pier and the West Pier in Brighton (also a victim of fire some years ago).


The good news is that Eastbourne hope to have their pier rebuilt and re-opened sometime in 2015 whilst in Hastings work has been underway since last year with a planned re-opening in Spring/Summer 2015.
There is something especially British about these old seaside piers which generates much love and affection for them. Indeed, like Hastings before it, the fire at Eastbourne received National newspaper and television coverage here in the UK.
These images are currently available from all my main (editorial) photo agents. Regards, David.

February sales updates:

An average month in February with, as usual, Shutterstock way out in front. A good number of On Demand downloads and a high paying Single download pushed the income up nicely. Meanwhile, the Shutterstock app for Facebook continues to hiccup with just the odd sales update now and again. Forget about the Twitter app -it stopped last June for me and shows no sign of ever being reactivated again! Whether or not either of these helps sales I can't know, but they certainly do not hinder.

Dreamstime did well with 15 downloads but these were mostly subs sales thus only $6.90 in earnings. It's been noted many times how DT sales come in Subs waves and then Credit sale waves (without anyone ever really fathoming why). Think I'm now due my Credit sales period!

Istock perked up with 14 downloads ($10.18) and a further 5 PP sales ($1.40). The big news from Istock is that they are introducing subscription packages from April. Commission will be at $0.28 for non exclusives (in line with the current PP rate at Thinkstock and Photos.com). How this will affect sales remains to be seen. On balance, I expect to see an increase in sales and revenue from this. Parent company Getty Images also announced a plan to make millions of images free to use in "non commercial" blogs and the like. Obviously this produced predictable outrage amongst contributors with suggestions they were trying to drive competing agencies out of business. I take heart in the fact that Shutterstock seem unconcerned about the move and do not see it as a major threat. In reality how many bloggers are going to want to embed Getty images into their blog -complete with links to Getty and (potentially) some sort of advertising stream? I know I would rather just pay for an image for either of my blogs when I need to -without the Getty clutter around it.

123rf produced 12 downloads ($3.97) -again mainly subs sales. As mentioned before reviews of my (non editorial) images have ground to a halt -I still have an images from January/February in pending. A recent thread at microstockgroup.com suggested that they review large batches promptly but smaller batches or single images are left waiting.

Bigstock saw 9 downloads ($4.90). I'm still seeing an increasing number of subsciption sales here which, thankfully, are still being paid (for now) at the enhanced $0.38 rate for Bridge to Bigstock contributors.

Fotolia managed 5 downloads (1.25 credits). I still have a tiny portfolio there, but what does get accepted seems to sell.

Yay surprised with a single download paying 0.75 euros. Just what caused Yay sales to drop off a cliff after last April remains unknown. Google changed their search results at that time and some other agencies reported a fall in traffic after that -so that may be the reason. Even their multitude of partner sites seem to produce little or no sales.

Finally, having posted recently about no sales at Mostphotos for a long time, I had a sub sale in February for 0.27euros. Hopefully, that isn't it for another nine months.

Uploading in February included an archive image of British architect Sir Richard Rogers as well as images of the Krka waterfalls in Croatia and my local event -the annual Jack In The Green festival in Hastings. Regards, David.

 

September sales updates:

September started off slowly but there were signs of improving sales towards the end of the month.
As ever, way out in front were Shutterstock with my best sales (quantity and income) but, sadly, under their new revised Terms Of Service contributors are now not allowed to disclose detailed results -under pain of having your account closed if you do. The official reason given is that information is of use to competing agencies.  Personally I doubt that Istock executives are waiting in anticipation every month for my blog post so they can see how I did there. Some more cynical posters on the forums suggested that this might be a move to suppress future bad publicity for Shutterstock should they import the Received Credits system they are trialling at Bigstock (as opposed to the current lifetime earnings levels) -resulting in big drops in income for many contributors. I honestly hope they are completely wrong. However, it is their business and their rules. It's actually a great shame as month after month I have reported how well Shutterstock have done for me -with way more sales and income than the other sites. For further information check out this thread on the Shutterstock forumhttp://submit.shutterstock.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=132223

Moving on to the sales I am allowed to post about 123RF takes second place with 13 downloads and a BME there of $32.07 thanks to a Multi seat license and a Print Extended license on images of Boris Yeltsin and the Tentertainment music festival respectively.

Dreamstime produced 15 downloads ($23.55) in a strong month for them.

Istock managed 14 downloads ($8.76) with a further $4.12 from 10 PP sales. Before the price reductions there those 14 downloads would have produced considerably more income as many of them were previously Photo Plus images -now reduced to the basic Main collection.

Bigstock continued to see more activity with 12 downloads ($5.16).

Fotolia managed a couple of sales (1.85 credits).

Veer surprised with another sub sale ($0.25). Goodness. Better still their broken uploader has been fixed and I was able to upload my backlog of (non editorial) images -even getting some accepted.

Yay gets a mention if only to report zero sales for September. This means that since April I have had just one 0.75euro sale there (in August). On over 2000 images? With all those distribution partners? I am truly at a loss to know what has happened there. I really like Yay and have never had anything but friendly and prompt responses to any problems so they remain on my upload list. I just hope things improve soon. Yay also announced their new subscription and streaming packages (streaming as in small users like bloggers paying a modest monthly fee to have images streamed to their site from the Yay library, as opposed to actually downloading the images). This is aimed to appeal to those who would not normally pay for images or just steal them from the internet. Many would say that those users are not going to start paying anything for images -no matter how modest the price. I've stayed opted into this for now to see how it goes.

Uploading in September saw some images of the Hastings Old Town Carnival accepted as well as further Greek island images of Skopelos. I also revisited my archives for further 1989 images of Lech Walesa (President of Poland). Let's now see how October does. Regards, David.

July sales updates:

Again, not the big summer slump I might have expected in July.
Out front, as ever was Shutterstock with 133 downloads ($95.68). An Enhanced Download of Margaret Thatcher ($28) on July 31 pushing me over the payout limit once again - that was a nice last minute surprise.

Dreamstime did well again with 13 downloads ($18.36).


Istock produced 15 downloads ($11.87) plus 14 PP sales (for May and June) netting $3.92. The recent changes to pricing took a toll here with a number of my former Photo+ images selling for much lower rates in the Main collection. It might well have been a BME here but for that. Hopefully, some of my better selling images will eventually move up into the higher priced Signature collection.

123rf saw 10 downloads ($5.83). Their low pricing and reduced commission showing in the $ earnings.

Bigstock saw some activity with 8 downloads ($3.04). These were all $0.38 subs payments. That's a bit concerning as the six month period for receiving that amount (for Bridge to Bigstock contributors) is coming to an end soon. Looks like I'll be down to low 123rf type commissions soon.

Fotolia saw 6 downloads (2.45 credits).

Yaymicro continued to dissapoint with another month of zero sales. I had usually seen some monthly activity there either from direct sales or their myriad of partners but things stopped dead on April 28. It may well be that there have been partner sales not yet reported but three zero months is rather concerning. On the subject of Yay, I am still waiting to see my (non editorial) images appear on Alamy. I had high hopes for this partner deal but so far none of my images appear to have arrived there. I did query this and was told they were going over in batches and that it was a complex business (avoiding duplicates etc). I thought they were just going to flick an API switch and mirror the Yay library there -but it seems not.

A reminder about Picturenation - only sixteen days until they close the site. If you have any images there do check for any sales and request payout via the contact link on the site (any amount).

Uploading in July saw a set of images of a Lancaster bomber at the 2012 Eastbourne airshow (Airbourne) as well as a young Herring Gull chick -which has been spending time on my window ledge here in Hastings.
Regards, David.

Hastings pier - rising from the ashes:

Great news here in Hastings when the Heritage Lottery Fund this week agreed an award of £11.4 million to the Hastings Pier and White Rock Trust towards the estimated £13.9 million needed to restore our fire wrecked pier.

This much loved landmark was opened in 1872 and designed by Eugenius Birch (also responsible for Eastbourne pier and Brighton's West Pier). Some 280 metres long, the pier underwent a variety of changes over the years and in the 1960s and 1970s played host to many top music acts including Jimi Hendrix and The Rolling Stones.
Recent years saw lack of maintenance by the private owners and the pier was declared unsafe in 2008 and closed to the public. That is why, though having photographed it many times, I have never actually walked along the pier myself.
The 5th October 2010 saw a devastating fire (thought to be arson) which destroyed nearly all of the wooden upper structure and decking of the pier. As I posted at the time, I was able to get down there in the afternoon when it was still smouldering and being hosed down by the fire service. It certainly was a sad sight to see it in ruins - an event that gained coverage across the National press and Television news in the UK.
It has been a forlorn looking landmark since then but finally Hastings Borough Council have succeeded with a Compulsory Purchase Order against the owners and are handing the pier over to the charitable trust.
There is still some money to raise but, all being well, work should start in Spring 2013 with a re-opening in late 2014. It's not going to be just a rebuild of what was there but a whole new design utilising the original 1872 metal substructure -which survived the fire.

I'm greatly looking forward to watching and photographing the work in progress and, hopefully, taking my first ever walk on the pier in 2014. Regards, David.

Pirates invade Hastings!

Sunday July 22, 2012 saw thousands of pirates take over my seaside home of Hastings. First started in 2009, Pirates Day forms part of the Old Town Carnival Week. The following year Hastings won the Guinness World Record for the "largest gathering of pirates". Not to be outdone, in 2011 Penzance (where else?) beat the record with nearly 9000 pirates gathered. Fighting back in earnest this year Hastings switched the day from Friday to Sunday to maximise pirate availability and went on to regain the record with a staggering 14, 231 assembled on the beach. It was a fun day for all, rounded off brilliantly by a seafront display by RAF aerobatics team The Red Arrows (making their first appearance in Hastings since the 1980s). Now let's see who can beat that record! Regards, David.

April sales updates:

April saw another strong month at Shutterstock with 96 downloads ($52.51) and, as usual, a good number of On Demand sales.

Istock pleased with 11 downloads ($16.54) and three PP sales ($0.84). Editorial images were well to the fore here including two downloads of RAF display team The Red Arrows (pictured). The airshow season is approaching here so I expect to see more sales on Red Arrows images in the coming weeks. Also pleased to see that they are scheduled to do a display here in Hastings on July 22nd - the first time in twenty four years they have been here.

123RF produced 16 downloads ($8.24) , again mainly from my editorial images.

Dreamstime managed 6 downloads ($7.67) -a slow month for them.

A dissapointing single sale at Bigstock produced $0.50 (jumping ahead, May has started off much better for them).

Yaymicro saw one editorial sale (0.75 euros). I had hoped to see a jump in sales at Yay as they signed up with a number of new partner sites. Sadly, for various reasons, they are not currently including editorial images in these arrangements - thus excluding most of my portfolio. They tell me that this might change in the future.

Finally, Mostphotos produced one subscription sale (0.20 euros).

Uploading in April saw a continued push on my archive political images with a near 100% acceptance rate bringing my portfolio numbers up substantially.

Regards, David.

December updates:

A steady end to 2011 with sales continuing up to the Christmas holidays and, in a first for me, three sales on Christmas Day itself.

Shutterstock, as ever, led the pack with 70 downloads ($30.69) and another payout reached.

123rf carried on in great form with 20 downloads ($21.18) pushed up by two XLTiff sales paying $4.50 and $4.70.

Dreamstime continued to improve with 8 downloads ($9.21) and my third payout from them.

Istock produced 7 downloads ($7.69) with a further 5 PP downloads ($2.32). My portfolio broke through the 400 barrier and now stands at 412 with both Editorial and Commercial images being accepted.

Bigstock had 2 downloads ($4.00) and, as previously posted, a big boost to my portfolio size.

Fotalia produced I download (0.20 credits) and a continuing bunch of rejections of new uploads! (Needless to say these were images accepted elsewhere -this is going to be a long haul to build much of a portfolio there).

New uploads in December included an image of the charming Elizabethan houses at Sinnock Square in the Old Town area of Hastings (pictured).

Well, that's another year over -now onto 2012. Regards, David.

October updates:

A bit late updating this month -usually a good sign that the previous month wasn't much to get excited about. October was no exception to this rule.

Starting at the top, Shutterstock pulled in a healthy 72 downloads ($38.21) with the revenue there helped by 10 On Demand sales.

Istock saw 5 downloads ($4.82) with an additional $1.40 from 5 partner program sales. My portfolio at Istock continues to build and has now reached 339 images including a growing Editorial collection.

123RF netted 7 downloads ($3.97) with a mix of Editorial and Commercial images sold.

Dreamstime proved the biggest dissapointment with just 6 downloads ($3.13) mainly all subscriptions. No idea what happened there but my worst month on DT for a very long time.

Bigstock still showing life with 4 downloads ($2.50) all from my archive celebrity collection.

Fotalia saw my first ever sale. A subscription sale of the Greek island of Meganissi netting 0.25 credits. If my calculations are correct this amounts to around $0.30 -about average for a sub sale. My portfolio there has grown to 30 images now with the growth rate slowed by numerous "technical" rejections. A far cry from my initial 10/10 acceptance (they really were being nice to a newbie then!). The shame is that I had intended to get my portfolio up there really quickly but am now just submitting a few at a time for fear of mass rejections.

Nothing elsewhere in October.

Images sold in October saw a few of Robert Maxwell as I had expected -but nothing like I had hoped for on the 2oth anniversary of his death. Margaret Thatcher sales started to pick up as well, possibly due to the new film about her life starring Meryl Streep. That could be interesting to watch as the film gets released around the world. The film looks pretty interesting too from the clips I've seen.

Recent uploads saw a whole series taken around the Old Town Carnival Week here in Hastings. A very local event but a good opportunity for generic Editorial images such as drumming bands, dancers, a traditional Town Crier and a Tug of War competion (pictured). These were received well by the agencies with 30 accepted at Shutterstock in just one day.

November, so far, is showings signs of improvement over last month and hopefully the new uploads will start to generate sales. Regards, David.

April Updates:

April saw a Royal Wedding and continuing Summer like weather here in the UK. Both driving sales of my Westminster Abbey images and the Tentertainment music festival throughout the month.
At Shutterstock it was another BME with 84 downloads ($30.78) of which six were welcome On Demand sales paying $1.88 each. I passed the payout level again in April and continue to progress towards $500 total earings when my commission rate will go up.

Dreamstime also had a good month with 16 downloads ($19.87). This figure was buoyed up by several Level 2 and 3 sales paying a good amount of commission.

123RF produced a BME there with 25 downloads ($10.91) many of which were subscription sales of my archive pop music images. I am experimenting with making a handful of images available for their free (web resolution) download section. The beauty with 123 is that you can donate them for as little as just one day and it is not a permanent arrangement. I took a selection from across my portfolio(e.g. politics, pop music, travel, etc) and am viewing this as an advertisement for all my images. By donating for a day at a time you also ensure that the images rise to the front page as they reach expiry. In a new development, parent company Inmagine.com are now also including Editorial as well as Commercial images from 123 on their site.

Istockphoto, as previously posted, also had a BME with 8 dowloads ($7.26) and three Partner Program sales ($0.84). Editorial images continue to attract interest (and sales) there.

Bigstock looked like being a slow month until right at the last it produced 7 downloads ($4.50). All Editorial this time (mainly of the annual Jack In The Green festival in Hastings).

Yaymicro had no site sales but finally posted the Third Party sales for the last quarter of 2010. At 6.71 euros it was a bit dissapointing compared to previous ones but, netherless, enough to bring me my second payout from Yay.

Uploading in April saw a return to my Editorial archives with a number of negatives being scanned and submitted. These got pretty much 100% acceptance at most sites but I got unlucky at Bigstock when I got the inspector that doesn't like grainy B/W photos. Three batches rejected 100% despite all having been accepted within a few hours at parent company Shutterstock. So it goes... Regards, David.

March 2011 updates:

March saw some positive results with a BME at Shutterstock -80 downloads ($28.20) bounced up by the presence of five On Demand sales.

Picturenation showed what it can do with a high res sale of Labour politician Brian Sedgemore netting £6 in commission.

Dreamstime pulled in a respectable 12 downloads ($16.22).

Bigstock produced 2 downloads ($4) with, for the second month running, a $3 commission for one of them (Hastings pier fire).

123RF pulled in 5 downloads ($3.23) which, as usual, were mainly Editorial images.

Yaymicro produced one regular sale (0.50euro) but still no sign of the Third Party sales for the last quarter of 2010.

Meanwhile at Istock there were 3 Editorial sales ($2.98) and 3 Partner Program sales ($0.84). I now have a growing selection of Editorial images accepted and the three sales in March suggest these could do well as my portfolio gets bigger. Two were of the same image - Estate Agent signs in Hastings and the third was an image of a Shell petrol station.

No sales yet at Cutcaster but I continued to upload and now have circa 650 images online there.

Nothing in March for Veer, Mostphotos or Canstock (though, as previously stated, I have yet to upload much to Canstock).

Recent uploads include some images of Westminster Abbey which I am hoping will get some interest because of the forthcoming Royal wedding there. Regards, David.