Instead of paying on a scale based on a variety of factors, the buyer pays a one-time flat rate for the rights to use an image. There might be restrictions, but in general, they can use the photo how they want without having to go back and re-negotiate every time they want to use it. You might want to put a lot of information in your post, which is fine but keep the image composition simple. If you’re going to include text or emojis to the image, don’t overdo it and make it too cluttered, or your viewers will scroll past it in their timeline.
The more thought, research, and planning you put into your photos, the better their commercial potential will be. Keep track of those trend reports, and think about how you can incorporate Licensing into shoots you already have planned. All of these insights speak to a need for honest, inclusive images that inspire trust, and that’s more than a trend–it’s a movement that’s here to stay. Similarly, you can shoot some summer vacation themed photos in spring so that travel agencies have time to download and use them in their marketing. If there’s a local festival, holiday, or event in your area, go ahead and cover it (and get those model releases signed). There’s always a surge in demand for these kinds of images when the time rolls around.
We hope these tips on creating creative stock photography images that sell help you before your next shoot with Shutterstock. For more tips, click and download the Shutterstock Contributor Success Guide. If you’re not a contributor yet, consider signing up to Shutterstock to get started earning money doing what you love. Creating creative stock photography is the ultimate way that a photographer can set their work apart from the rest in the stock image business.
The striking stock photo would make a perfect thriller or horror poster, with huge spaces for titles and credits. As you might expect, this photo contains green flowers on a white shelf in a beautifully decorated blue room. The modern, rough paint style and bold white-on-blue color palette would make this photo perfectly positioned on any design, lifestyle, or wellness website.
Scope out a location a day or two in advance to find unique areas that offer your lens a view that’s entirely different than something you’ve already seen. Creating sellable stock images starts with crafting an image that can’t be found anywhere else. Imagine you are a customer and you’re looking to purchase an image, but it’s cropped too tight for you to put text overlay for the signage you want to include.
Stock photography dates back a century, but it was the dawn of the digital age that led to its emergence as a leading force in advertising and publishing. Stock photos are used for just about anything — from book covers and magazine spreads to social media ads and billboards. They also come in many different forms, created by artists and journalists working all over the globe. Here’s a quick discussion on the basics of the industry and how it works. This photo contains carefully positioned slides of grapefruits, oranges, and lemons, laid on a pink background with scattered green leaves.
Creating sellable stock images starts with considering how the image will be used depending on the customers needs. When you stage a product stock photography shoot, think like the customer who is going to purchase that image. Find creative ways to display generic products so that customers can envision their own product within the image before they purchase. Another “challenge” is that you won’t know who bought your photos, but that’s also part of the fun. Seasoned stock photographers have pages of tearsheets and examples or images of theirs that they’ve found “in the wild” throughout the years. You could be reading a magazine on an airplane or browsing books in the mall and come across your photo—that’s the beauty of stock photography.
There are loads of stock images out there and a lot of different styles. It may be tempting to choose images based on what you like, but you need to consider best free photo stocks for designers your brand and your audience’s expectations. Choose a style of image that suits your brand and message but is also plentiful to allow for consistency.
For private buildings, ensure you get a property release before you shoot. Always have releases available on your phone or printed out so that you never miss an opportunity to shoot someone new. With the help of The Create Fund, photographer Charlee Black is leaving her hometown behind to create a new path in stock photography. That’s where the first stock agencies came in, facilitating the licensing process by bridging the gap between buyers and photographers. In exchange for helping the photographer market his work, the agency would keep a percentage of every sale. It was a win for everyone — the buyer saved money by purchasing images that had already been made, and both the photographer and the distributor got paid.
When dealing with sensitive topics, such as illness and death, suitable images can be challenging to find. This picture of the Sad Eyes of an Elderly Woman is the perfect option for those tricky-to-tackle subjects. Some events are hard to predict, but we recommend putting together a Licensing calendar to keep track of timely or seasonal topics. For example, advertisers will start looking for images to use in their holiday promotions months before December, so get those uploaded in advance. Public domain is pretty straightforward — anyone can use the images for free, as many times as they want, and in as many different ways as they want.