Now the real fun begins

After the recent interview I have with Andy from StockPhotoTalk, I have received and contacted many of the major microstock agencies. I have worked out better downloaded and partnerships with Dreamstime, 123RF, StockXpert, LuckyOliver, and Fotolia.

WEW!

Things are start to go really well, the image database now has 600,000 images from the different agencies. I am hoping to have 2 million in by the end of September. Wish me luck!

NY Times mention Fotolia and iStock as Corbis competitors

The New York Times wrote a large article about Bill Gate's Corbis Images. They mentioned microstock and its entrance as a challenge to the stock photography community. As Imagetrail will hopefully someday prove, the results of microstock photography are a little more than "amatuer or semi-professional". In my opinion much of what is found on microstock site is more professional. The interfaces are often harder to deal with, but they also are improving.

Time will tell whether microstock will conquer, or just co-exist. There will always be different needs and different markets in stock imagery.

"What Corbis did not foresee was the rise of so-called microstock agencies like Fotolia and iStockPhoto. These sites take advantage of the phenomenon known as crowdsourcing, or turning to the online masses for free or low-cost submissions. Thousands of amateur and semiprofessional photographers armed with high-quality digital cameras and a copy of Photoshop contribute photographs to microstock sites, which often charge $1 to $5 an image."

Read the article @ http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/10/business/10corbis.html

What is Stock Photography?

Several times in the last couples week I have been asked "what exactly is stock photography?" At first I laugh because I think the anser is simple, and then I realize that to define it isn't so easy. So instead of a Websters definition (a direct answers) let me beat around the bush a beat

Stock Images Are All Around Us

The last time you drove you probably saw a billboard with a person (maybe an attractive female or an elderly couple) on it. Chances are you just saw stock photography. When you surf the web and see images to illustrate a point or to go along with an article chances are you just say some stock photography.

What Can I Do With Stock Photography?

Because of recent changes in the photogaphy market, many of these images that used to cost $100 or more are now availible for less than $5 (normal just $1 for web sized images). This means that instead of just having boring old text on your blog, you can add an image to spice it up a bit. Like this!

There are endless uses for stock photos (and illustrations), the photos I have shot have been used on websites, on church programs, in bridal show advertisements and on baby shower invitations.

Because of the low pricing of microstock photos (this is the "techie" name of this cheap photos) they are being used by many non-profit organizations and other groups that couldn't afford professional stock photography until now.

So, in conclusions: Stock photography is all around us, and we can use it to improve our designs for work, play or just about anything. If you want to make your school project look cool, add a professional image and impress your teachers.

PS: I should note that you must check the license of the agency you download from. While most uses of a photo are totally allowed, there are some restrictions. Each agency is different and you should contact them if you have licensing questions.

credits: spice image © Robert Ahrens(Fotolia)

The ImageTrail Search Engine has 200K images

Our search engine has now indexed over 200,000 professional stock photos that are availible for sale throw 5 agencies. Hurry up and try our new image search function.

Things are continuing to progress, each month we have many more visitors and lots of feedbakc on the system. Our goal is to have over 2 million images within six months and to be a great source for individuals and organizations looking for stock photos, stock illustrations and well... stock just about anything.

Things coming in the month of January-
* We will be adding one, maybe two more agencies to the database
* We will be indexing 100k-200k more images
* We will be rounding out some area of the site (more help, advanced search)

Things coming in February
* Another agency is coming on board
* Another 200K images
* Community responce features (report bad images, links, keyword matches, etc.)

Please check out the main page. Dont be discouraged by the simple appearance, try a search and see our growing results.

2nd Agency Complete

Dreamstime Images coming up

Code for the 2nd agency Dreamstime is complete. They are a little more complicated to index, but I think I have things figured out. I have learned that while Fotolia has a lot more images, Dreamstime has a lot more downloads per images (again, this is up to this point). The whole industry is changing places almost daily.

Selling your Stock Images

I thought I would drop a note in here about my other project MicroStockForum.com. This is a site where stock photographers (and amateurs wanting to become such) can learn about the new microstock industry and how to make a 2nd income (and sometimes an entire income) off of selling their photos online. Each agencies does their own marketing and selling images (illustrations and 3d renders are also welcome) on multiple agencies is a great way to diversify your income streams as well.

But now back to the important stuff....

The dream begins...

Introduction

Well, I have finally registered the domain name. I think that I will start a log of this journey just in case it flops, I'll have something to look back at. Well, first of all lets start out with what this is all about. I am a photographer and graphic artist. I am not the best at either one, but have managed to survive. I got into Microstock about 1 1/2 years ago and didn't think to much of it. Well my sales began to grow and I also started buying images for use in my own designs. I currently have about 500 images spread across most of the popular agencies. I prefer Fotolia for its international feel, Shutterstock for its simplicity and Dreamstime for its friendliness (in my opinion).

So Why ImageTrail?

The idea for ImageTrail cam from price shopping for images. I knew that many photographers like myself sell images on multiple sites. I also knew that designers like myself price shop. They often find "their image" and then go find the Microstock site that sell it for the cheapest. Well, I thought, wouldn't it be nice to have a site that indexes the agencies and so people could easily search all the stock agencies in one go! And this was the beginnings of an idea. I also hate the fact that each agency has its own feel and speed (Fotolia currently being the slowest). They change things and in my opinion overcomplicate the whole thing.

Google Images for Professional Images

My inspiration comes from Google Images. Every time I talk to normal people (meaning non-designers) they say oh... I grabbed that images for my blog from Google images. Well, in all reality most are safe doing this, though it is 99.99% illegal. So I want to create an interface as simple as Google Images, nothing fancy. Type in words and it spits out links to images. And so the process begins.