May Sales Updates:

Skywalk on the Metropol Parasol, Seville

A strong month in May for my bigger agencies and the usual low level results from the weaker ones. May also saw me give up on one agency and delete my portfolio and a routine check on another past agent threw up an unpleasant surprise.

Way out in front in first place were Shutterstock with a good crop of On Demand sales and two double digit Single Downloads boosting the income. Pleased to see editorial review times seem to have speeded up here -to within 24hrs of upload.

Second place was taken by Alamy with 2 downloads. The best one ( a television use of one of my archive Poll Tax Riots images) made a great illustration of their cut to 40% commission for non exclusive images. From a $68 sale they got $41 and I got $27. The difference really becomes obvious on larger sales. That said, I have no plans to make my images exclusive at this time as I prefer the spread of sales across different agencies.

In a strong third place were Istock with an impressive 47 downloads and an improved RPD (helped by a sale via Getty Images).

Redbubble took fourth place with 3 product sales ( two prints and a T shirt). I continue to be impressed by Redbubble and their regular sales.

Fifth place saw Bigstock with 6 downloads. I doubt they are ever going to take off as a high selling agency but the few dollars each month gradually add up.

Dreamstime managed sixth place with 7 downloads -pretty much all subscription sales.

Seventh place saw another sale on FineArtAmerica, this time just a greeting card (of the Houses of

Las Setas de Sevilla (Metropol Parasol)

Parliament). Not much but at least some signs of life there after my several years drought.

Eighth place went to Adobe with just a single download. Maybe one day they will start taking editorial, maybe not.

I finally gave up on Canstockphoto and manually deleted my small 350 odd portfolio and closed my account. They get to keep the $16 I earned over many years but I am happy just to forget about them. Low sales are one thing but picky, silly rejections (property release wanted for public landmarks and weird key word rules that didn't allow the keywords Hastings and Pier for an image of -guess what?)just didn't make them worth my time.

Puenta de la Barqueta, Seville

Meanwhile, over at Yay Micro I stopped uploading some years ago and requested them to close my account. They ignored that but, never mind, I opted out of all sales there including their own Yay Images site. So, no problem then? Sadly not - a routine check showed that they have added Deposit Photos as a partner site and automatically opted me in meaning all my (non editorial) images are now on an agency that I have never wished to sell through. I've opted out of that now as well and made another request for Yay to close my account -so far ignored. Anyone with images still at Yay should make a regular check of their partner list to make sure your images aren't being sent somewhere you don't want them. To be fair, they do at least offer an opt out but I was surprised that they had added a new partner and just included me in that.

Recent uploads have concentrated on my April trip to Seville including the impressive Barqueta bridge (Puente de la Barqueta) and the fabulous Metropol Parasol - more commonly known as Las Setas de Sevilla (Mushrooms of Seville). This was one of the highlights of my trip both for the overall view of the structure but especially for the walkway on the roof which offers great views over the City. I am sure I will be making a return trip to Seville in the future but meanwhile have a Greek island trip on the horizon - bring on the Retsina! Regards, David.

December sales Updates:

Dunsfold aerodrome Boeing 747

A mixed month in December with one great result from one site and a deeply disappointing one from another.

First up in lead place were Redbubble with a hefty 11 product sales and my Best Month Ever there. All manner of goods were purchased and, no doubt, the majority intended as personalised gifts for Christmas. I didn't get anything like this last year so it is good to see some progress made. Sadly, this festive spurt didn't carry over to Fine Art America where I received no further sales after my two in November reported last month.

Pushed to second place were Shutterstock with a fairly slow month overall. Obviously, unlike Redbubble, the holiday season took its toll here with many people on holiday during the final couple of weeks.

Third place was taken by Alamy with just a single sale but at well above microstock rates. This was another of my archive B/W images -this time of Professor Stephen Hawking.

Istock were in fourth place with 34 downloads. A reduced rate per download from last month dragged my income down here this month and I just missed crossing the payout threshold.

Fifth place went to Bigstock with 6 downloads. To be honest, if my images didn't go there automatically courtesy of the (now closed) Bridge to Bigstock I probably wouldn't bother with them. That said, it does gradually build up and I like to leave my earnings way beyond the $30 payout level to make it a decent amount when I do (eventually) cash out.

Sixth place went to Fotolia/Adobe with 5 downloads. I noticed that sales emails now come from Adobe with actual £ amounts shown (rather than the credits shown by Fotolia). A reminder that from

Douglas C-41 touching down at Dunsfold

February all uploading will have to be done at the Adobe portal. That's a new one for me to learn then!

Canstock reminded me of their existence with a single sale to make seventh place. I haven't uploaded there for nearly a year so have no great expectations. I will probably just keep my small portfolio there in case it does one day reach a payout. It's become a site that I now just check into now and again to see if there's been any action.

Finally on the subject of action (or lack of it) we have eighth place taken by Dreamstime with just a single $0.35 subscription sale. Probaly my worst month ever there (even my first month there with only a few files on sale produced more). Now, approaching 2.5k images, I get just one sale? It almost feels like I am being punished for my exceptionally good months a while back. I've said it before, I really like Dreamstime and the people there so I hope they can improve things in 2019. To make matters worse that one sale was on December 4 and not a single sale since :(

Having fun on the beach in Barcelona

Recent uploading saw me mopping up some outstanding images from the Dunsfold airshow back in 2014 including a WW2 Douglas C-41 coming into land and a Boeing 747. This is a retired British Airways airliner which is now used for film and television work. Viewers of the BBC motoring show Top Gear will recognise this aircraft as it quite often appears in the background during filming. More timely, were some beach images from my 2018 trip to Barcelona.

January is off to a slow start but, hopefully, will pick up as people are getting back to normality after the holidays. regards, David.

April Sales Updates:

Llibertat Presos Politics march, Barcelona

Another strong month in April with Professor Stephen Hawking images continuing to sell and right at the end a flurry of Amber Rudd sales following her resignation as British Home Secretary.

As usual Shutterstock were way out in front in first place. A good number of On Demand and a double figure Single download pushing them up. April also saw a milestone when my total downloads on Shutterstock passed the ten thousand mark. That's a lot of sales.

In second place Istock returned to form with 43 downloads. As controversial as Istock might be amongst some contributors, their regular positioning in second place for me tells why I continue to upload there. In spite of some very low paying subscription downloads the RPD (Rate per Download) continues to be higher than the old 28cents fixed rate.

Third place saw a good month at Dreamstime with 10 downloads. Two of these were higher paying credit sales which raised them in my rankings.

Redbubble came in fourth place with three product sales (a pillow, a T shirt and a sticker). Some lucky person now owns a pillow adorned with Margaret Thatcher :)

In fifth place were Bigstock with 10 downloads. My Tenterden food and drink festival images continue to sell there presumably to illustrate outdoor summer events. These images have yet to take off on parent company Shutterstock where my Tentertainment music festival images continue to shine. Sadly, this enjoyable local music event is no more following alleged complaints over noise and other matters. Still for over ten years we had a great event and photo opportunity.

Sixth place saw 123rf with 4 downloads. At this rate it looks like it may be a while before I get my

Teleferic de Montjuic cable cars, Barcelona

final $5 to payout and close my account. Meanwhile as well as stopping uploading this year I have also deleted the pending editorial images which have sat there since December. Whilst in delete mode I also removed the only images of Margaret Thatcher that 123 had in their library (unless you count a waxwork model of her!). In an interesting move their sister company -macro agency Inmagine has ceased as a separate site with buyers being linked over to the 123 Evo (premium) collection instead. Inmagine used to mirror 123 images in a Value RF section which might be another reason for falling sales (not every Inmagine buyer is just going to automatically move to 123 instead). It's a shame -123RF was once a good, fair agency for contributors.

Canstock surprised with not one but two downloads to give them seventh place. I have also stopped uploading there as well for now. They are not bad people but simply do not sell enough to warrant the time uploading. Silly rejections such as wanting property releases for public landmark buildings didn't help matters here -especially when the same building is already in their library. I'm keeping my account open there -who knows what might happen in the future?

Bringing up the bottom in eighth place were Fotolia with 2 downloads. Editorial please!

Missing from the rankings for the third month running were Alamy but (thankfully) May has started with a good value sale there so they will be back in next months updates.

The stunning Boquer Valley trail on Majorca

April saw me making my second visit to the fantastic City of Barcelona (this time for a full week). I hit photography gold on my second day there when the centre of the City came to a halt for a massive pro Catalonia demonstration and march (specifically calling for the release of Catalan politicians jailed after the declaration of independence in October 2017). As expected this made for some great photo opportunities. I also packed a lot more into my week including an exciting ride on the Montjuic Teleferic cable car line.

Other April uploading saw more images from my 2017 Majorca trip including a set of the Boquer Valley trail. Starting behind the town of Puerto Pollensa this goat filled trail takes you through the stunning rock formations of the Tramuntana mountains before ending in an isolated cove where you get to share the beach with yet more goats.

All in all a positive and exiting month in April with a wealth of new images to work on.
Regards, David.

November Sales Updates:

Barcelona bicycle sharing rank

A pleasing month in November with some strong results from some and only really one big disappointment.

Shutterstock had a good performance to stay at first place. A large number of On Demand sales and a rare Enhanced License kept them out in front.

Second place went to Redbubble with 3 product sales including a canvas print (products seem to sell better here so it was nice to get an actual art print sale). I have mentioned my lack of sales at Fine Art America many times so decided to go in and reduce my prices across the board there. I'll see if that has any effect.

Istock made a strong third place with 28 downloads and a pleasing amount of revenue. I am finding the batch uploading and editing on their ESP platform vastly quicker and easier than their old one at a time uploader.

A return for Alamy who made fourth place with the sale of another of my 1980s archive shots - this time of

Passeig de Colom, Barcelona

former Conservative MP Michael Latham. I continued to upload my (non archive) back catalogue here and now have a port of circa 2100 images.

In fifth place were 123rf with an outstanding 27 downloads. There was a theme there as nearly all the downloads were of my Greek islands images.

Sixth place went to Bigstock with 5 downloads. My images of the Tenterden Food and Drink Festival seem to have taken off here with several downloads turning up each month.

Dreamstime proved to be the disappointment in seventh place with just 3 subscription sales (and 35c sales at that). After last months upturn things just slipped away here.

Local Summer event - Tentertainment music festival

Fotolia, Mostphotos and Canstock took up places eight to ten with 2, 1, 1, downloads respectively.

Recent uploading continued with my Barcelona trip images (ahead of the Catalonian elections on December 21). I'm hoping my parliament building images get some sales in the coming weeks. I also edited and uploaded my images from the 2017 Tentertainment music festival -a subject that has always done well for me. For some reason the Istock reviewer rejected these as an Entertainment event best suited to the Getty newsdesk -despite just being people in a park at a local event that took place nearly six months ago! I'll re-submit those in due course as Istock have never had a problem with this type of image before and previous Tentertainment images are regular sellers on their site. Regards, David.

October Sales Updates:

Placa de Catalunya, Barcelona

October saw no sales at Alamy so they drop right off the list this month. It seems to be that it takes time to build regular sales there so I would expect them to jump on and off my rankings for some time to come. With a portfolio there now just passing the two thousand mark I am continuing to upload my back catalogue (as well as new images) and gradually building a presence.

With Alamy absent that, of course, leaves Shutterstock in top place and a good solid month of sales there. Shutterstock have recently caused some excitement by introducing a new submission editing page. I've only used it a few times but after spending thirty minutes trying to submit my first upload I found things got better once I grasped how the page works and I'm sure it will soon be totally familiar.

Redbubble made a strong second place with two sticker sales and a good print sale. As I approach the second anniversary of my last FineArt America sale I can only wonder at the big difference in performance from these two POD sites.

Istock came in third place with 35 downloads. Not as good as some recent months but subscription sales

Fountain in the Placa de Catalunya, Barcelona

are still averaging well above the old 28 cent flat rate payment.

In fourth place were Dreamstime with 5 downloads. A higher paying credit sale (above $5) and several of the $2 sub sales improved things here a bit.

Bigstock made fifth place with 9 downloads. A variety of sales but I'm still seeing a trend to local Hastings and area images - as I have noted many times before.

Sixth place saw 123rf with 7 downloads. I'm still languishing down at level 1 there and I'll need to see a lot more sales than that to have a hope of returning to level 2.

Catalonian Parliament building in Barcelona

Canstock made an infrequent appearance in seventh place with 2 downloads.

Fotolia brought up the rear in eighth place with just a single download (editorial submissions -please!).

Recent shooting and uploading has concentrated on my last minute trip to Barcelona following the declaration of independence there. Though only a two day trip I managed to get a number of key Barcelona images including, of course, the Catalonian parliament building. Hopefully, these will see some sales as fresh elections approach there. It was a brief but fun introduction to an exciting City and I will certainly be returning for a longer stay in the future. Regards, David.

July Sales Updates:

Margaret Thatcher - now at Alamy

A slowish month as expected in July as the usual Summer Slowdown continues. However, one agency did buck the trend to leap to number one position ahead of Shutterstock (probaly the only time I can remember SS not being at the top).

So, in first place we have Alamy with 3 downloads. One smallish amount, one good double figure amount and finally one mega sale netting me not far short of $100. This was for an archive image of British/Danish broadcaster Sandi Toksvig. British television viewers will know that Sandi is one of the new presenters of The Great British Bake Off which returns to screen shortly - presumably prompting this sale. The other two sales were both of the Greek island of Tilos, so nice to see some diversity of sales going on here.

In second place, of course, were Shutterstock with a slow month in terms of downloads. Only the fact that over 50% of the total income was for On Demand downloads brought the value up. No doubt they will be back to their top place next month.

Phil Lynott - now at Alamy

Istock continued doing well in third place with 53 downloads. Many of my subscription downloads are netting well over the old fixed 28cent flat rate and far outweigh the few that received a pittance rate. Others over on the Microstockgroup forum are also reporting increased sales at Istock.

In fourth place were Dreamstime with 5 downloads. A credit sale netting over $10 pushed them up the rankings this month (more like that please!).

Fifth place was taken by Bigstock with 9 downloads. My images of the first ever Food and Drink Festival in
Tenterden, Kent seem to be doing well here with a number of sales.

Redbubble took sixth place with one good product sale.

Seventh place went to Mostphotos with 2 modest subscription sales.

Finally Canstock came in in eighth place with 1 small download.

Poll Tax Riots - now at Alamy

Sadly nothing at all in July from Fotolia.

Uploading in July saw me, again, concentrating on uploading my portfolio to Alamy. This has been a twin track operation with me uploading regular batches of digital images and awaiting QC (Quality Control) passes before uploading the next batch. At the same time I have been working through my (mainly B/W) archive image scans from the 1980s-1990s. As I have written before you have to be approved for this archival route by submitting link/s to your archive images online somewhere. The great thing is that once given the OK your uploads bypass the QC process and are ready to put on sale as soon as the uploads are processed at Alamys end (usually within an hour or so).  The upshot of this is that I have pretty much had a continuing flow of new images ready to put on sale taking my portfolio now to around 1700 and rising. Not bad considering I had less than a hundred images back in February before they allowed Royalty Free Editorial images. This months post is illustrated by some of those archive images. More updates in September! Regards, David.

June Sales Updates:

The Markellos Tower on Aegina island, Greece

Another steady month in June with a number of my smaller agencies making it into my sales report as well as a continuing good run at Istock.
As ever, well out in front were Shutterstock with another strong month and income circa double of my second place site.

Second place went to Istock with another impressive month of 45 downloads -down from May but much higher than I had been seeing in previous years (and that's with limited uploading in 2017). As previously there were some very low paying subscription sales but others paying much higher than the old $0.28 fixed rate. I said I would see how the new percentage rates worked out in practise and I think it is fair to say that while I am seeing results like these I will be sticking with them.

Picfair took third place with another single sale. Looks like things are picking up here.

Fourth place was for Redbubble with a further three product sales (T shirt, Baby clothes, Sticker).

Bigstock saw fifth place with 13 downloads.

In sixth place were Dreamstime with 9 downloads with all being subscription sales.

Tourist rides in Aegina Town, Greece

123rf slipped to seventh place with 13 downloads (no big sales like last month sadly).

Alamy were in eighth place with a further single sale. Good to see no further refunds and my first sales are starting to show as cleared funds.

Ninth place went to Fotolia with 3 downloads.

Canstock had a single download to put them in tenth place.

Finally we have Mostphotos with two small subscription downloads.

Rhodes Cup yacht race, Tilos island, Greece

June saw little uploading due to spending (yet again) two weeks on the little Greek island of Halki. Whilst there I also took a day trip to Tilos island where I concentrated on photographing the abandoned village of Gera. Last years Tilos images have done well so I hope to continue that success with these. June also saw a General Election in Britain and I received a number of sales of Amber Rudd (Home Secretary) and Damien Green (newly promoted to Deputy Prime Minister). Recent uploads have concentrated on my 2016 images of the Rhodes Cup yacht race on Tilos (rejected by Istock as they deemed them "professional sport") and the famous landmark of the Markellos Tower from my April visit to Aegina. This interesting old building was once the seat of the Greek government during their War of Independence (from Turkey) when Aegina itself was the temporary Capital of Greece.

July looks like it will prove, as expected, the start of the Summer Slowdown with fairly low sales on most sites so far. Updates will follow in due course. Regards, David.

January Sales Updates:

Wartime defence post at Loggos on Paxos island

An unusual month in January as due to Istock transitioning to their new Enterprise Submission Platform (ESP) for uploading and account management no sales information was available so they are not included this month. Going forward I will include Istock stats in the month I get them notified (e.g. January sales will be in my February report -as that is when I got them). Worth mentioning that I have accessed the ESP site (with some issues initially) and have uploaded a small quantity of trial images -both commercial and editorial. The ability to batch upload and edit is a huge leap forward from the old one image at a time uploader. More on Istock in February.

In January, obviously, Shutterstock took first place as is always the case. Reviews there seem to be fast at the moment with a high percentage of approvals which has enabled a worthwhile growth in my portfolio.

Flying Cat 5 at Patitiri harbour on Alonissos island

In second place were Dreamstime with 8 downloads -again prompt and favourable reviews for my uploads.

Third place  went to 123rf with 10 downloads -sadly not a repeat of my BME in December.

Bigstock took fourth place with 7 downloads. Greek island related images seem to be selling well there recently.

A big surprise when Cutcaster turned up in fifth place with 2 downloads. These were my first sales there since 2014! I stopped uploading there a long time ago now. Even with these two sales my total downloads still only amount to 10 (with a port of 1.4k images). Still a long way to payout there.

The historic Acropolis in Athens

Fotolia came in with sixth place with 2 downloads. Until they decide to accept editorial images this is never likely to be a big selling site for me.

Finally in seventh place were Canstock with I download. My comments on Fotolia also apply to Canstock.

Not a stellar month overall but I am hoping my upload drive will start to pay off during 2017 as new material gets accepted. Recent uploads revolved around Greek images including a wartime defence post on Paxos, the Flying Cat catamaran on Alonissos and finally another image from the Acropolis in Athens. A lot has happened in Microstock in February (hence my late posting) so more of that next time. Regards, David.

September Sales Updates:

The abandoned village of Mikro Chorio on Tilos island

A routine month in September without any signs of a big uplift as the Summer period comes to an end.

Starting with Shutterstock, things were slow here with a number of zero sales days through the month including a weekday. I cannot remember the last time that happened and is far from encouraging. A good crop of On Demand sales made up over 50% of sales, along with one modest Single sale.

In second place were Redbubble with four product sales. T shirts, poster and phone case were the products this month. Redbubble has certainly proved to be a site worth uploading to.

Istock took third place with 3 credit sales and a further 32 sub/pp downloads. Images continue to be readily

Pondamos beach on Halki island

accepted here though with a slow review time for non editorials.

Dreamstime managed fourth place with a welcome 10 downloads. Three of these related to media tycoon Robert Maxwell whose death 25 years ago was a subject of a Dreamtime blog I wrote. It's not unreasonable to think that the blog post helped get those sales though it can't be proved, of course.

123rf came in at fifth place with 14 downloads -pretty much all sub sales. Review problems seem to have returned here with several images pending for weeks now.

Bigstock dissappointed with just 2 downloads putting them in sixth place. This was way less than my usual sales with them so I am not sure what happened there

The restored chapel in the Crusader Knights castle on Halki

Bringing up the bottom with just one download each were Canstock, Mostphotos and Fotolia (in that order).

Uploading in September saw me continuing with images from my July trip to the Greek island of Halki. Whilst there I took a daytrip to the nearby island of Tilos where I got some photos of the abandoned village of Mikro Chorio. I was pleased to get two sales of this image within days of uploading to Shutterstock. My images of Amber Rudd also continued to sell following her promotion to Home Secretary and  would expect that to be ongoing given her high profile. Regards, David.

July Sales Report:

Amber Rudd - new Home Secretary 

An average Summer month in July with just a couple of surprises along the way.

First place, as ever,went to Shutterstock with a reasonable though not great month. A good smattering of On Demand sales and one modest (though welcome) Single download.

Racing up to second place were Redbubble with no less than six product sales. These ran the gamut of prints, stickers, iphone case, and my first drawstring bag. A variety of images appeared on these from cats to Greek islands to Thin Lizzy singer Phil Lynott. It was quite exciting to see the "You've made a sale" emails keep arriving throughout the month.

A pleasant surprise from Dreamstime who made it to third place with 6 downloads. Of note here were the return of high paid credit sales with two images netting over $6 each in commission. Been a while since I had seen any of those.

Phil Lynott - popular at Redbubble

Istock took fourth place with just 2 credit downloads and a weak 17 sub and PP downloads - in fact just one sale from Thinkstock. As I have said before, I assume Getty are steering Thinkstock customers towards the subs packages at Istock as the PP sales have steadily diminished.

Bigstock were in fifth place with 10 mainly sub downloads.

In sixth place were Canstockphoto with a rare sale for me.

In seventh and bottom place were 123rf with just 2 sub downloads all month. This was certainly the unpleasant surprise of July. No idea what happened there. June saw 18 downloads and the first few days of August have already produced 6 sales. July did see the introduction of a new contributor interface and I kept hoping my sales just weren't being reported promptly but this was, sadly, not the case. I can't remember the last time (if ever) that I have had such low sales at 123. The danger here is that when the last 12 months credits are calculated in the future my awful July could push me back down to the lower paying Level 1 commission.

Pigs head - large credit sale at Dreamstime

Nothing from Fotolia (or the rest) in July including my seventh month running with no sales on FineArtAmerica -disappointing to say the least (especially when rival Redbubble is doing well).

No new uploading in July as I spent two wonderful weeks on the little Greek island of Halki. This was the second year running I have been there so took less images than I normally would. However, a day trip to the nearby island of Tilos had me maximising my time there to get as many images as possible. In a lucky break, my visit coincided with the arrival of dozens of yachts taking part in the Rhodes Cup yacht race which made for some good images.

The changes in Government which took place while I was away saw my local Member of Parliament Amber Rudd promoted to the senior position of Home Secretary and I was able to see downloads of her racking up in my sales reports from all the agencies that take Editorial (123rf excluded of course). 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.

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.

December Sales Updates:

Professor Stephen Hawking -new biopic

Inevitably, December was never going to be a great month with so many slow days over the Christmas and New Year holiday period. However, taking that into account there were some good moments.

As ever, Shutterstock was the number one agency -by far. A great start on December1 with an Enhanced Download of Professor Stephen Hawking. Sales of this image have increased a lot recently presumably due to the new biopic film The Theory of Everything which has just been released. I also had a good number of On Demand sales and two nice paying Single Downloads through the month.

Dreamstime performed well to take second place with 20 downloads. Greek island images seem to be doing especially well on Dreamstime of late -possibly as a result of the on-site blog I wrote on the subject.

Istock took third place with only 4 credit sales but a good 24 downloads through the PP and Subs schemes. Istock also had some big news that it was to be integrated further into parent company Getty Images. The main change for many is that commission payments will no longer be made "on request" but on a fixed monthly schedule (subject to reaching the $100 payout level). I don't get enough sales on Istock for this to be an issue but for high performers used to requesting weekly payouts this will not be a popular move.

Sopwith triplane at Dunsfold

Bigstock continued strongly to make fourth place with 15 downloads -pleasingly not just sub sales but a
number of credit sales in there as well. It's interesting to note that a good number of my sales on Bigstock seem to relate to my local area of Hastings and St.Leonards.

Coming in fifth were 123rf with a miserly 7 downloads. Sales there seem to be falling below what they were a year or two ago -despite increasing my portfolio size. Especially noticeable is the fall in editorial sales. Just to add to the fun, there currently seems to be a hiatus on editorial reviews with several of my batches still pending since January 1. Normally these get reviewed within hours.

FineArtAmerica came sixth with a sale of a greetings card. Some lucky person was due a Christmas or Birthday card featuring the Poll Tax Riots in London back in the early 1990s!

Rousoum beach, Alonissos island

Bringing up the rear I had a rare sale at Canstockphoto (my first in months) and just a single sub sale at Fotolia. To be fair, I only have small portfolios on those due to them not taking editorial images.

Uploading in December saw me revisiting my 2012 trip to Alonissos island with a set of images of Rousoum. I also carried on working my Dunsfold airshow images with a set of a 1916 Sopwith triplane (it's actually a 1997 replica but certainly looks the part).

Though I am writing this post well into January I'll use this opportunity to wish all readers of this blog a very happy and enjoyable 2015. Regards, David.

January sales updates:

It seems like only yesterday that I was writing my December updates post. Hang on, it was! Anyway, here we go straight on to my January updates.

In what turned out to be, in general, a rather slow month the leader of the pack (by a big margin) was, as ever, Shutterstock. Even here though there was a marked lack of higher paying On Demand sales which usually boost the income up.

Dreamstime produced 13 downloads ($13.82) with a mix of credit and sub sales.

Bigstock proved lively with 19 downloads ($8.67) with $0.38 subs well to the fore. Interestingly,one
of their partner sites added two "single merchandise" sales. T shirts? Mugs? Who knows.

Istock saw just 4 downloads ($3.19) with a further $1.68 from 6 PP sales.

123rf managed 8 downloads ($4.08) -virtually all subs.

Fotolia produced 2 sub downloads (0.50 credits).

And finally two sites I do not see much action with: Canstock had 2 downloads ($1.00) and a sale at Cutcaster produced $1.84 in commission.

Recent uploads followed a flight theme with a reworked b/w version of a Herring Gull and some more images from the 2012 and 2013 Eastbourne International Airshow (Airbourne) -a Chinook helicopter and the Breitling wing walking team. The airshow images were accepted everywhere except my best agent Shutterstock who insisted I needed "credentials" (i.e. a press pass/permit or similar). A prompt and friendly email came back from them when I queried this. It seems that ALL airshow images now need credentials. Even the ones that are free and open to the public like Eastbourne. That's certainly a big blow as there aren't any credentials issued for this event -they are not needed as it's held on the seafront for all to see (and photograph). I have sent them another email pointing this out and asking if there is any way forward for airshow images. I'll update this post with any developments. Regards, David.

Edit: Got a fantastically helpful response from Shutterstock. They took a look at the Eastbourne images and agreed they were OK to upload. Now all accepted. Going forward, should I cover other airshows, I will contact Credentials at Shutterstock with details of the show so they can make a decision on it. As they (rightly) said their inspectors wouldn't know the circumstances of each airshow when images are uploaded. So contact Credentials first before uploading. Great response from Shutterstock I thought!

December sales updates:

Catching up with my monthly updates my December report is rather overdue.

As ever, Shutterstock outperformed all other sites with the highlight being a further three Single and Other Downloads (SOD) contributing $27.58 to the total. These are starting to prove rather interesting and for very worthwhile amounts.

Dreamstime followed up with 10 downloads ($8.06) and a further $0.04 in referral income as one of my referred photographers had their first sale.

Bigstock produced 11 downloads ($5.04) with most of these being subs.

Istock ticked over with 6 downloads ($4.52) and a further $1.96 from 7 PP sales. Sales certainly seem to have declined at Istock over recent months.

123rf managed 11 downloads ($4.73). Again, mainly $0.25 sub sales.

Fotolia saw 6 sub downloads ( 1.50 credits).

Yay pleasantly surprised with one editorial sale of Robert Maxwell giving a worthwhile 3.75 euros in commission.

Nothing from my other sites during December. Picfair has proved rather dissapointing after my first sale only days after joining. Several hundred images uploaded since haven't seen any action. Still it is early days and I think the site has lots of potential. Hard not to like setting your own prices and getting 100% of that. Over at Mostphotos I hit the nine month mark without a single sale. I'm guessing that my mainly editorial images just aren't what their buyers are looking for.

Recent uploading included images of the Tilos Sea Star ferry (top) moored on the Greek island of Symi. Greek islands also featured with a set of images of the Express Pegasus ferry visiting Skopelos island. Regards, David.

 

October Sales Updates:

For a few days in October I thought we were going from the Summer Slowdown to an Autumn Abyss as the month started off so slowly. However, things picked up and October ended up being a strong month.

123rf get first billing here as I had a BME of $28.76 from 13 downloads. Two PEL sales of $11.25 each achieved that (Hastings pier and Dungeness lighthouse) though, in general, sales were busier there than for a long time. Hopefully, there is a return to form going on at 123.
Shutterstock (obviously) excelled with 103 downloads ($56.23). What else to say about this agency? They sell - that's it.
Dreamstime produced 10 downloads ($14.09). The search engine changes that favoured my images a few months back seems to be swinging the other way now.
Istockphoto picked up 8 downloads ($13.58) plus 2 PP sales ($0.52). Editorial images continue to grow here and my portfolio is now just off 600 in number. A far cry from the days (pre editorial) when I only had 150 images there and a rare sale. They (editorial) are currently getting excellent review times -often just an hour or two.
Bigstock saw 5 downloads ($6.90). I am still waiting to see the anticipated big boost in earnings here now that the majority of my portfolio has been transferred via the Bridge to Bigstock program, but I still feel that this is an agency that could do good things in the future.
Fotalia achieved 3 downloads (2.45 credits). This is still a very small portfolio for me but sales are encouraging on that small amount. I'm still bemused how any agency can not have a description field for uploaded images. How do buyers actually know what the image is of? My response is to have longer than usual image titles in which I try to cram in the required information. Probaly just my editorial instincts here as I want to explain the Who?What?Where?When? for my images.
Yaymicro had one download (1euro) and new tougher reviews resulting in a number of rejections for lighting/artifacts. Reminded me of the old days on Istock.
Canstockphoto produced my second ever download ($0.30). I still need to build my portfolio there.

Uploading in October saw more images of the Sussex town of Rye including the famous Mermaid Inn (pictured) and, of course, further images from my September trip to the Greek islands of Skiathos and Alonissos (pictured). Regards, David.

September sales updates:

Overall, September didn't prove to be the big climb out of the Summer Slowdown that I might have hoped but some pleasing results here and there all the same.
Shutterstock fell just short of my BME with 80 downloads bringing in $96.86. This was achieved thanks to two Enhanced Downloads (on the same day) of former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher netting $28 each.

Dreamstime didn't match the excellent results of late and just managed 9 downloads ($9.39)

Istock produced 6 downloads ($5.99) plus a further $1.96 from 7 PP sales.

Bigstock saw 6 downloads ($6.40).

123rf perked up slightly with 10 downloads ($5.28). On the plus side, jumping ahead here, October started with two PEL sales on the same day bringing in $22.50 so not all bad news at 123.

Fotolia saw 2 downloads making 0.50credits. Some fresh uploading of my back images saw my portfolio here rise to 60.

Mostphotos produced one subscription sale paying 1.50euros.

Yaymicro also saw one sale achieving 0.75euros. They have a forthcoming partner deal with Alamy which hopefully will produce some sales. Sadly, editorial images are not included in the deal but it will be interesting to see how my images fare on Alamy.

Finally, my very first sale at Canstockphoto produced $0.35. It is always pleasing to get the first sale at a new agency and especially so in this case as it was an image of Herring Gull chicks in their nest on my window ledge. I didn't even have to leave home to get that photograph!

A holiday on the charming Greek island of Alonissos (pictured) produced a lot of new images (awaiting edit). Flights were to the nearby island of Skiathos where I was able to capture the low level approach of a Boeing 757. This is not an airport for nervous fliers due to the very short runway - expect some rapid braking on landing. Return flights can only take off with a limited amount of fuel before touching down again on the Greek mainland for a full re-fuel. There's some good footage on You Tube for anyone interested. Alonissos itself is very unspoilt and full of pine forests and old donkey trails to walk.

October seems to be starting strongly so I hope to have some good results to report next month. Regards, David.

November updates:

November proved stronger than last month with some slower sites pulling in sales.

Shutterstock produced 67 downloads ($35.56) with just under 50% of that revenue coming from On Demand sales. My friends at http://www.microstockposts.com/ are currently running a poll on just that subject -check it out. Sadly, the month saw me just 20cents short of my $75 payout. On the plus side it will be an even better payout in January.

Dreamstime picked up with 9 downloads ($6.17) -though still far from their best performance.

Istockphoto continued to power up for me with 12 downloads ($14.79) and $0.56 in partner sales. Editorial is still doing well here and my total portfolio rose to 372 (with both editorial and commercial images being accepted).

123RF produced 13 downloads ($10.73). Sales seemed to lift towards the end of the month. A possible cause being that I changed a number of my "faved" images. For anyone not familiar with this useful feature it allows you to nominate 5% of your portfolio as favourites. These then get better exposure in search results. You can remove and add to these (up to your limit) at will.

Bigstock had a good November with 7 downloads ($5.50). Many of these from my celebrity archives. Still waiting on my invite to the "Bridge to Bigstock" program though.

Picturenation had one medium resolution sale (£4).

Yaymicro surprised with a sale paying a healthy 5 euros in commission. An archive image of former Chancellor Lord Denis Healey.

Mostphotos also surprised with a subscription sale paying 1.87 euros. Some contributors there are reluctant to allow subs (its optional) because potentially you can get a low rate per download if the buyer uses their full allowance. The three sales I had have all paid out worthwhile amounts.

Fotalia produced my third sale -a sub download (0.25 credits). Encouraging given that I still have less than 40 images online there.

Still awaiting those elusive first sales at Cutcaster and Canstockphoto and some more from Veer to take me over the payout level.

New uploads in November included images of the Sound Waves Community Choir (pictured) performing in Hastings. These had early success with downloads at Bigstock and 123RF. Choirs seem to be attracting quite a bit of interest these days so I have hopes for these images. Regards, David.