Stock
photography
Most online creative assignments
need stock images to give them some additional depth, appeal and professional
look. More so creative writers, either fiction, news, poetry or fact based.
Webmasters and bloggers also need to introduce imagery and photographs to
enhance the readers experience by bringing the words to life.
Stock photograph have become one of
the most sort after and important tools needed online today, they are used on
blogs, websites, magazines, newspaper articles, article directories, books,
posters and handbills.
In the stock photography world there
are high cost stock photography, low cost paying/buying photography and mid
ranged costs depending on the trading stock company. Stock photography might be
offered to paying customers through agencies at a price or downloaded free of
charge.
Some stock companies create their
stock photographs by using professional models and photographers, who create
high quality images. Such companies own the license of the image but sell the
image either as a one of transaction, or for a limited period with strict rules
and regulations, on distribution, use, and attribution.
Other stock photography agencies use
both professional photographers and models and also receive member images from
armature photographers. In this arrangement the armature photographer might
retain his copywriter to the images unless otherwise specified, so stock
photography is photographs that are purchased through licensing for specific
usage that cover a wide range of topics.
Types
of stock photography websites
There are basically three types of
stock photography macro stock and micro stock photography agencies; you can
also include mid-range stock photography and free stock images. The tradition
stock image agencies come under the macro stock and they provide both high
prices as well as low prices depending on the volume, size and usage.
Macro stock photography
Macro stock agencies offer
professional taken photography and could attract a high premium price, they are
high priced and licensed to a particular person or group. They are the most
common type of traditional stock photography having a very large data base
covering any topic imaginable.
The leading tradition stock
photography companies include, Sipa press, Corbis and Getty image, each owning
the licensing rights to their stock photographs.
Which
type of stock photography website do you prefer?
- macro stock websites
- micro stock websites
- free stock websites
Micro stock photography
Micro stock photography agencies use
both professional photographers and armature photographers; most of their stock
is strictly for commercial purposes. Micro-stock websites sell royalty-free
images, animation images and vector art.
Some top micro stock websites that
accept both armature and professional photography are Dreamtime, 123RF.com,
Shutterstock, and Fotolia, they offer extended licenses fashion on pay per
download. Subscribers who have their photographs priced using special
algorithms or the person might be allowed to set own price depending on the
agencies rules and licensing. They are given commissions in certain percentage
according to the number of downloads.
Uploading and posting photographs in
micro stock agencies is free and their pricing and payment structures might
differ but each photograph uploaded goes through intense scrutiny and review
before accepted or rejected. Advancement in digital technology and cameras makes
photography submissions easier and readily available to the common man.
The subscribers to a micro stock
company are allowed to create a body of work (portfolio) which is offered for
sale; once the license is paid a percentage is given to the contributor.
Websites
to get free stock photographs
There are a number of websites to
get free stock photographs some of which are listed bellow
1 Wikimedia commons – free license
use
2 Flickr: creative commons -same as
above
3 Morguefile- free- credit image
creator
4 Stock.XCHNG- over 400,000 images
5 Imagesbase:Free stock
photographs-Allows commercial use
6 Pixabay- High quality public
domain images
7 Freephotos.com
8 Freerange stock photographs-
Allows commercial use
9 Free stock photos- used under
license
10 Stockvault.net
11 Unprofound.com –Non profit
organization
12 Public domain clip art
Images
found in stock photography
Stock photography covers several
niches from still-life, abstract, architectural, animal, plant life and nature.
Other popular topics highlighted in stock photography are human moods and
behavior such as gesticulation, emotion, family, fashion, traditions, object
art or photography is also popular.
Acceptable image sizes could be
between 800x600 pixies, and should not contain recognizable people unless
certain permission is granted, and contributors have to add keywords.
Vector graphics
Vector graphics can be said to be
strokes, lines and curves through the use of computer graphic to create an
image that retains clarity when magnified or scaled up. Almost all vector
formats support simple objects, text, color, meatballs and other elements.
Vectors can mirror an image, stretch or use positioning.
Royalty free images
Many people mistakenly think royalty
–free images mean the images are free to use, but they are wrong. Royalty-free
images are not free images and they attract a fee to down load such images.
Many of such images are protected with bold visible water markers which
indicate that the licensing of the image comes under that company.
The copywriter protects the
contributors or authors’ works as well as the service provider under literary
and artistic works.
Royalty
free and free image websites
- stockvault
- Fotolia
- Pixabay
- Morguefile
- 123RF
- Dreamtime
- Shutterstock
- Freedigitalphotos
- imagebase
Stock
photography tips
Copyright
infringements on stock photographs
Copy write infringement might be
unauthorized use of image, resizing or adapting image without the creator’s
permission and duplicate copying. Other copy write infringements are not following
the licensing rights and wrong attributions not permitted by the author.
Liability of stock images copy write
can fall on the publisher of such unauthorized image, an unauthorized user or
group which may incur stiff penalties and legal fees. Most stock companies
offer licensing agreements that adequately protects the buyer, but there are
few exceptions.
How to take acceptable stock
photographs
There are many people joining stock
websites to showcase and earn a small income through downloads, it is not an
easy venture like most serious ventures but with time like every online
endeavor pays eventually.
You cant get rich selling stock
photography but can earn a fair wage while having fun, after signing up to a
royalty-free website, the main challenge is getting the image accepted. Every
stock website is guided by its on rules on composition, and they reward
creativity.
Positioning of the subject matter is
important while taking your creative composition, remove any logs,
advertisement, street names, product branding from your composition.
Certain sizes are acceptable over
others, no recognizable person, negative themes and so one, it is important to
go through the legalese, rules and regulations before submitting any original
composition to a royalty-free stock website.
Alternatively start your own stock
photography website using acceptable good practices, images and getting your
own water marks and licensing
How
to sell stock images
How
to use stock photographs
Stock photographs add value to your
blog, website, and article or book publication; can you imagine a newspaper or
magazine without any photographs? They make otherwise bland content come alive
giving the audience a visual representation of the topic, high quality stock
photographs don’t come cheap so adequate budgeting and planning is necessary.
How to sell stock images
To start selling stock photographs
you need to signup with a reputable stock photography website, joining is free
and can be done rather easily. Build up a portfolio using creativity, following
the rules, dedication and hard work while learning photographic techniques and
ideas.
Do your best work to produce high
quality images that would be readily approved and earn steady wages of
royalties as high as fifteen percent (15%) per download. Stock photography
websites use the pay per download or pay as you go format, and making as high
as forty five percent (40%) in some cases like istock when you have exclusive
status.
Stock photography websites have
forums that help new members, articles, stock apps, contributor lounge and
referral programs, the also have tutorials covering licensing, selling stock,
subscription, and legal.
Creative
commons licensing
All creative commons users most
attribute (credit)any creative work they intent to use in the proper way
stipulated by the type of license provided, the licenses include attributions
such as CC BY, allows commercial use, redesign, remix, and distributions.
Attributions under the Share-Alike which is CC BY-SA that allows redesign,
remix, to organization use they type of stock images.
Attribution-No device CC BY-ND does
not allow changes to the creative work or photograph to be used but it can be
used both for commercial and non commercial purposes. The attribution
Non-Commercial CC BY-NC is clear enough but it can be used for wedding
anniversary, birthdays and engagement cards or brochures.
The creative commons attribution
–Non commercial- Share Alike also has a non commercial tag but credit is
necessary and important. The Non-Commercial-No-Device covers more stringent
rules allow only downloading and sharing, and the creative works most remain
unchanged.
Creative
commons
Creative commons is all about free
legal licensing, they are a non profit organization that share and use
photography, university course materials, use and remix royalty-free images.
They have different copy write licenses under the creative commons license
while keeping intellectual right of contributor.
Creative commons grant special
licensing Permissions to edit, expand, redesign, remix copy and distribute
creative work, the contributor has the say in the kind of license and mode of
usage.
There copywriter provisions are easy
to use with some rights reserved for the creator and the general public with a
view to use and share creative work like, visual, song, publications and
photographic images. Creative commons allows publishers use and share and
sometimes modify creative work for free under specific licenses.
The work might include blog content,
articles, photographs, images, academic work, songs and streaming videos,
creative commons is an alternative to regular copywriter as to permissions and
usage. They offer an easy standardized way to grant users copy write
permissions
Free
stock images
There are free stocks images that
you can get legally that have copy write automatically generated in favor of
the image creator.
About free images
1 the quality of free images are
poor in relation to professionally stock images
2 the copyright for free stock
images are automatically generated to the original creator
3 Recognizable images such as side
or full frontal is not used because of litigation.
4 Free stock images are usually
devoid of any legal backing
Totally
free photos and Public domain photos
Yes you can get totally free
photographs to use on your articles, blog, website, hub, advertisements and
promotional, they can be used in a commercial and non commercial project.
Although the images have automatic licensing to the creator the user should
attribute-credit the image out of courtesy and good practices. Some free stock
photograph websites are particular about attribution/credit while others on
this platform advices the user to always attribute images.
The images on free photograph websites
provide user rights, and contact with creator of image might be necessary for
certain commercial projects.
Public domain works
Public domain works are usually
protected for an extensive period usually running into several years but become
public property after the demise of the original creator after a period for
public use. They become public work when their intellectual property right
expires and are subject to certain rights.
Public domain works cover
photographs, publications, content, music, movies and multimedia, others are
visual arts and imagery, some public domain websites under multimedia and movie
are Movie image achieves, and American memories collection.
Image and visual arts has websites
like Art library society of North America, galleries and museums under. Org or
.edu, public domain Sherpa, and the U.S Government official images web search.
Others are U.S Government photos and images, Wikipedia Commons and Flickr
Public domain.
Conclusion
There are many stock photography
websites online that allow usage either for commercial purposes or private. You
can either buy stock photographs from macro stock websites or micro stock
websites which are cheaper.
All images used online should carry
one type of licensing or the other and publisher using such creative work
should credit the source according to the license it carries. If you can take
your own images the better and only use images you have the legal right to use.
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