Photos - Mixx » stock photos

Selling Your Photos as Greeting Cards

admin — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 08:22:10 +0000

A little over seven years ago I approached a greeting card company about starting a line of greeting cards. The planets must have been aligned right because the company agreed to give it a try…and it worked! We sell hundreds of thousands of cards a year through out the world. The images have also been used in gift books, printed on checks, used on calendars, posters, journals and even coffee mugs. Through this experience I have learned a few things, which I now hope to pass on to you.

To Self-Publish or Not?

If you want to make any appreciable money I would rule out self-publishing. Sure, you get to keep a much larger percentage of the money, but you have to ask yourself if want to sell photos or run a publishing company. Without going into a lot of detail, just think of the logistics of printing, selling, delivering, invoicing, collecting, dealing with returns…hopefully you get the idea. Just for a quick example, I was once on the phone with a photographer who was starting his own greeting card company. He said he had to end the call because the printer had just delivered 250,000 greeting cards, and they were folded wrong! Can you imagine? No thanks! His greeting card company is no longer around.

Finding a Publisher

To find a publisher just go to where greeting cards are sold and see who is publishing what. Your best chance to interest a publisher is to find one who carries the kind of work that you do. A publisher who distributes vintage Black and White humor cards is not likely to be interested in your close up flower shots.

Too, you have a much better chance of catching a publishers interest if you present a series rather than just one or two images. If I were looking for a publisher at this point I would mock-up a dozen cards, complete with inside text. The cards would work together. Some would be birthday cards and some would be for other holidays. Make it easy for a potential publisher to visualize what they would be selling.

Fee or Royalty?

If you believe in your images, take the royalty. The first greeting card that I licensed to my publisher, a smiling cat with a canary feather in its mouth, had I accepted a flat fee, would have brought me around $800.00. So far the royalties have come in at well over $5,000.00.

Research Your Publisher

Some card companies have good over seas distribution, others have none. Some have their cards in mass-market retailers (Target, Walmart), others primarily distribute through small card shops. Some have their own sales force while others rely on agents that represent a number of card companies. Take the time to research the card company and make sure they are someone you want representing your work and you. This will be a partnership with more give and take than you might expect. It is a good idea to know your partner.

While you are researching, check how the publisher likes work to be submitted. It is a good bet that if you don’t take the time to pay attention to what they want, they might not take the time to pay attention to your work.

Negotiate Wisely

Before signing a contract make sure you under stand the terms. They may want to have the right to negotiate any further licensing of your images. Not a good idea. Do they want worldwide rights? If so, do they have worldwide distribution? How quickly and how often do they pay? Do they offer an advance, and how much? Try contacting one of their artists and see what they think of the publisher. Take the time to understand every aspect of the contract, and don’t make the mistake of thinking that they will be looking out for you. They may like you, but they won’t be looking out for you.

By the way, most royalties start at 5%. I started at 5%, but as my work sold well and I became more valuable I was able to increase the percentage of my royalty. When you negotiate you can try to trade off a higher advance against a lower royalty or visa versa. Everything is on the table. In my case I eventually granted exclusivity for a higher royalty and managed to get my logo on the back of the cards too.

Creativity and perseverance

Getty your own line of greeting cards is a long shot. But it is possible. Do your research and find the right publisher. Prepare your submission meticulously and to their specifications. Submissions to multiple companies at once are fine. Use creativity, common sense and exercise perseverance. Oh yeah, and take the royalty.

Night Stock Photos

admin — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 08:20:37 +0000

One of the most interesting types of stock photos are night photograph. This photo is very interesting and can make for visually aesthetic, mysterious, unusual pictures. Most beginning stock photographers will usually stick with the sun. They will refuse to try out shooting at night with long exposures. Having to use a tripod sends them running back to their sun that exposes their pictures every time.

A great benefit to shooting stock photos in the night is that not many other people do it! If you could specialize temporarily in night stock photos and build a massive collection you could very well be the stock photographer that everybody runs to when they need a night photograph.

Do, however, recognize that night photographs are not in as high demand as photographs during the day are. There is, however, a limited amount of night stock photographs available. Let’s take the subject of going out with friends. There are dozens of stock photos showing friends having fun in parks, public gatherings, and a plethora of other places. But when it comes to showing them having a good time during the night there is a lesser selection. Fill in this gap and create a collection of night photographs based on the concept of fiends having a good time at night.

Night stock photos will require you to have a tripod. There is no changing this. Unless you have a massive array of lights at your disposal, a tripod will definitely be needed. When taking night photographs you are going to be exposing your photo for a very long time. That means that you will need the tripod definitely. A blurry stock photo because of a lack of a tripod will be worth nothing.

The professional stock photographer will probably be using many other devices when taking stock photographs. One such device is the remote release. The remote release is attached to the camera and enables the photographer to take a picture without touching the camera body. They simply push the button on the remote release and the shutter opens to expose the image. This has great benefits when taking night photographs. The biggest benefit is that you won’t be touching the shutter button and don’t have to worry about the photograph getting out of focus because you moved it. If you are going to be shooting a lot of night photographs you definitely need one of these shutter release devices.

An alternative would be to use the self timer on your camera. Honestly, I hate using the self timer. It’s annoying and always goes faster or slower than I want it to. If you like the self timer on your camera go ahead and use it. The self timer is a better option than pushing the shutter button with your fingers.

Stock photos at night can be very profitable and valuable. It is, however, fully depended upon the work that you do. Do not try to cut corners in night stock photography or any other photography for stock. Treat it as a professional stock photographer would.

Wildlife Stock Photos

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 10:20:06 +0000

As you will soon discover there are a large number of companies who now have websites where you are able to get wildlife stock photos from. Yes these can really help if you are looking to make your website look great or to use in an advertising campaign. But first let us provide you with a quick explanation as to what stock photographs are. Then we will explain what you need to do in order to get hold of such photos.

There are three types of photographs you can purchase and these are as follows:-

1. Rights Managed – Which are ones that you when you choose to use them you will then need to pay a fee to the company for every time you use within a specific time frame. So you can not use these just when you want but in the time frame that has been set by the provider. These kinds of photographs are ideal for use in brochures or advertisements in magazines or newspapers. But with this particular type of photograph you may find that sometimes you have the right to exclusive use of a particular image during the time that it has been licensed to you.

2. Released – These are ones that are normally entitled “Model Released” or “Property Released” and the model or owner of the property will have signed a release so that these can be licensed through a stock agency.

3. Royalty Free – These you are not charged a fee for them every time that you use them and can be licensed to you for indefinite periods of time. But when you licensing these ones you are not actually entitled to resell them. One of the big advantages to using wildlife stock photos which are royalty free is that they are released images (see description above) so you don’t need to worry about getting the releases for them.

Now we have looked at the types of wildlife stock photos a person can get let us go through some of the steps a person needs to take in order get hold of such images? Firstly, you need to find a stock photo website. Just by keying in the words “wildlife stock photographs” to any internet search engine will provide you with a list of sites that offer such images.

Then once you have found a particular site that you like the look of you can then start to search their databases for the kind of images you want. But in order to make your purchase from them you will first need to join the site. Although some sites offer you the membership for free and then you pay for the images you select, there are some sites which also require you to pay them a monthly subscription fee.

Certainly if you are only after the odd one or two wildlife stock photos then go for a website which is free to join and which you just pay for the images you are going to use. Whilst if you need more wildlife photographs more regularly then a membership fee paying site is probably the better alternative for you.