Recent Stock Photography Articles

Five Tips to Become a Faster Video Editor

As any filmmaker knows, time is money. Falling behind on a project doesn’t just put a dent in your schedule, it can also put a dent in your income. That's why it’s so important that you have some time-saving strategies up your sleeve to ensure that if some unforeseen delay occurs, you have the ability to steer your project back on course.

How to Be a Resourceful Filmmaker and Get B-Roll That Can Sell

One surprise people new to videography are in for is just how much footage you need for today's standard of ordinary video. As a result, getting B-roll and clips for transitions is crucial. Here's how to be more resourceful when you're out with your camera.

In Defense of Infringing Influencers: Instagram and Copyright

Every so often we'll hear about certain influencers and photographers stealing photos or using stock images to develop and build their Instagram accounts. On the surface, this seems horrifically bad I mean really really bad (insert Trump gif) but if we take a minute to really consider things, is it?

Diversify Your Portfolio and Earn Money Along the Way

With the advent of social media and the unattainability of life expectations brought with it, we, photographers, are on the very forefront of having the opportunity to make a difference in re-shaping the visual world. We are the ones with the tools to push for diversity whenever we put our work out there to be sold and used worldwide!

Emilia Clarke: Stock Photography Model

Emilia Clarke of "Game of Thrones" fame is certainly not lacking in career opportunities, but is it possible that she's found her dream job as a stock business photography model? Check out this hilarious video from Vanity Fair to see Clarke recreate tried and trued stock imagery poses.

Shoot What You Love and Sales Will Follow

Stock photography websites can be a great way to get your photos out there and gain some passive income. Choosing what to shoot or submit can be simplified by sticking with what you enjoy and letting your passion shine through your work.

The Fro Knows Paris

Recently Jared Polin, better known as “The Fro” visited The City of Lights to add to his portfolio more time-lapse and slow-motion work. Polin takes his viewers along as he journeys through Paris, offering tips along the way.

How Motion Array Just Became The Ultimate Video Maker's Platform

Stock video marketplaces are handy little operations. They provide a smorgasbord of top-quality footage and graphics all in one convenient place and all for one very reasonable price. But earlier this month, one marketplace took things to a whole new level.

You're Leaving Money on the Table

Stock photography is an industry that enables many photographers to make a good living. Though some photographers focus their entire career around creating stock imagery, almost every photographer has the ability to supplement their income with images they've already taken.

Easily Capture Everyday Items to Sell as Stock Photography

Have you ever considered the potential of the objects that sit in front of you every day? With the high demand for photos in social media and online marketing, your images of even the most simple items have value. Here’s how to capitalize on this and produce an easy portfolio of stock images to sell.

Why You Should Never Upload Your Images to Unsplash

If you've ever considered uploading your work to Unsplash, you should probably watch these two videos, or at the very least, familiarize yourself with the points raised by legendary commercial and editorial photographer, Zack Arias. If nothing else, Arias wants photographers to understand the risk of facing a lawsuit as a result of uploading their images to the site.

How to Rework Old Photos for Adobe Stock

Do you have old photographs just hanging around on your hard drive, taking up space? If you do, then perhaps you should consider uploading them to Adobe Stock. You never really know what sort of image someone out there is looking for - they might just want to use that shot that you currently have buried away in the archives. Sometimes, these old shots may require a little bit more work in order to ensure that they will measure up to stock submission standards, but the opportunity to make revenue on work you've already shot makes it a worthwhile venture. If you have old files you want to breathe new life into, the following guide for prepping and submitting those archived shots is just for you.

Building a Stock Catalog of Lifestyle Images Through Assignment Work and Adobe Stock

Building a stock photography portfolio and generating passive income can be one of the easiest ways a photographer can make money. However, creating a sizable portfolio that generates a worthwhile income month after month doesn't just happen overnight. Chances are you have already been shooting images suitable for stock without realizing it. With just a little planning and adjustment to how you see and approach assignments, you can turn your existing and future work into a growing stock catalog. Additionally, with stock sites like Adobe Stock built right into your Creative Cloud, submitting, tracking, and learning what sells is a relatively easy task.

Creative and Authentic Is the New Trend for 2018 Stock Photography

Stock photography companies are tallying their data from the last few years to predict what imagery trends will flourish in 2018, what they've predicted is fantastic news for us all. A mixture of creativity and authenticity are expected to dominate the new year's biggest image trends. It is so important for artists to stay on top of these trends as to not slip through the cracks, it's especially important this year because these trends are very different.

How I Use Adobe Stock as a Professional Photographer and Art Director

Let's chat about stock photography. I've used stock sites for nearly a decade while working as a designer and commercial photographer with great success. Most of the options I used in the past left a lot to be desired, which is why last year, I switched over to Adobe Stock. I made the change for many reasons, but the most important was their integration into Adobe Creative Cloud.

Selling Stock Photography as a Wedding Photographer

Finding ways to earn passive income as a photographer is invaluable. In this field of work, our businesses often require a large amount of direct hands-on time. Selling stock photography, especially when you have the ability to simply upload images you have already taken in a minimal out of time, can add a great deal of value. The online tools that are available today allow you to turn photos that would otherwise have been worthless, or stored hidden on your hard drive, into pieces of art that have real monetary value.

Shutterstock Unveils New Composition Aware Search Feature

Shutterstock has been working on machine learning-based technology for different features, such as reverse image search and visually similar image search, and last week they unveiled a new feature that will allow users to search images based on their compositions and layouts.

​Why the Next Era of Stock Photos Looks So #Instagood

Stock photography has always been something of an enigma. Used by brands, marketers, advertisers, and the media, it’s managed to withstand the test of time and the radical shift in how media is consumed and sold. Stock photography has, until recent years, served up functional, generic images that could be used in diverse ways by a core customer base. That’s no longer what creators want. To keep up with demand, stock photography providers have started evolving past cookie-cutter imagery to more compelling, artistic, and authentic visuals—keeping stock not only relevant, but making the industry a leader in the visual arts.

Photographer of 'Distracted Boyfriend' Meme Explains Process

One of this year's more popular memes has been the "distracted boyfriend" meme in which a girlfriend looks at her boyfriend in disbelief as he turns around and eyes another girl right next to her. Perhaps the most clever and fitting adaptation (for us) yet has been the above image from the D850 Facebook page. The relatively new photographer behind the original image spoke to Wired about his process and how he captured his most popular stock photograph yet.

Stop Waiting and Get Your Photography on Stock Image Sites to Earn More Passive Income

For freelance creatives, earning passive income is a great way to increase your annual profits, but getting a large library of images uploaded can be a daunting task. Plus, which agency should you use? When will you find time? The simple answer is the time is now, and the sooner you jump on, the sooner it will pay out.

Here's How to Freshen Up Your Your Old and Stuffy Looking Stock Business Photos

No matter how young and beautiful your models are for business stock photos, buyers often feel that the images come across as stuffy and old-fashioned. That’s not just a guess, it comes from many years of experience in the industry. Here are a few things you need to pay attention to when working with models for a business photo-shoot that will help make your business stock photos more attractive to buyers.

Epic Fashion and Fine Art Images His Own Way: Konrad Bak Changing the Perceptions of Stock Photography

Polish photographer Konrad Bak straddles the line between high concept fashion and lush fine art creations. Images collected in his book Konrad Bak PhotoART range from the elegant to the surreal could easily find a home in advertising campaigns or on gallery walls. However, Bak's work can surprisingly be found in the files of stock photography websites. challenging the perceptions of the quality and creativity many ascribe to stock.

How to Take Stock Photos That Sell

I’ve been making money from stock photography for about 10 years now. I very rarely set up a shoot, or go on a trip thinking “I can’t wait to take stock images and make money from this,” but I've managed to recoup some money I've spent on trips over the years. Although I don't shoot stock full time, there are a few things that I do to make sure that every shoot I do gets me at least a few nice stock-style images that I can try and sell.

When Shooting Stock Photography Finally Pays Off

A couple weeks ago I was contacted by a friend in Puerto Rico with an incredible story. She was walking through a gas station and noticed my face on a box. Without knowing, I had become the face of a brand.

What Photographers Need to Know About Public Domain Images and Stock Photography

In 2006, Leah Caldwell was eating at a Chipotle near the University of Denver when a photographer took her picture. When she got up to leave, the photographer asked her to sign a release form for use of the images, but she said no. Eight years later, when Caldwell went into a Chipotle in Orlando, Florida, she saw her picture on one of the restaurant’s walls, and subsequently in two other locations in California.

How to Impress Image Buyers in Stock Photography

Stock photography has been a main or side income for many photographers throughout the years. Contrary to general belief, stock photography is not dead, but rather stronger than ever due to the rise of the digital media. Rapid movement in social media urges companies to create new content on daily or even hourly basis, and the need of new imagery is unavoidable. This is just one of the reasons why stock photography still matters.

Have Your Photos Rated by AI

You can have your images judged by AI. Just don't blame me if you don't score as high as you thought you would. These developments are supposed to help people decide what images work best for the message you are trying to convey, so it's good to know it's there and to try it out. It's in the beta phase now, and the website is similar to that of EyeEm, the stock image library built in Berlin, where the images are analyzed and tagged automatically depending what is featured in the photograph.

Profiting Multiple Ways with Adobe Stock Images

I am always on the hunt for new stock images to incorporate into my photography and find that stock enhances my photography business in several ways. Stock provides me with the ability to incorporate different locations and textures into my images that I am not able to easily shoot. As a result, I have not only seen improvements in my own work, I have also gained an eye for spotting opportunities to take extra images to sell.


Fstoppers Interviews Shutterstock Creative Director Terrence Morash About Industry Trends

If you're a photographer or videographer, keeping abreast of creative trends is pivotal to best positioning yourself to continually evolve and turn profits. Fstoppers spoke with Shutterstock Creative Director Terrence Morash about how creative trends are analyzed and predicted and how photographers and videographers can use that information to their advantage.

Making Money With Your Drone Photography Through Adobe Stock

Ever since I got my drone, I basically keep it in my car at all times in case I happen upon some cool spot while driving. It turns out that all these random excursions have become something very useful to me: profitable stock photography.

Free Stock Photography by Joshua Earle on Unsplash

In this high-tech, fast-paced world, we all "snap pics." I'm going to go ahead and venture a guess that the majority of us tend to do so from our phones, since we now have these amazing portable devices that can provide a decent exposure for us. What has come out of these great technological advances is a larger-than-ever movement of aspiring photographers... which is great! The internet is now more saturated than ever with some pretty decent amateur work. So my big question for you today is, does this in-fact hurt the Professional Photographer?

Assets On Demand: Introducing Requests From Motion Array

Motion Array has been hard at work adding new features recently. For example, they recently came out with a video portfolio site builder. With this feature, any paid subscriber can create a custom site to show their video work, complete with text, images, and contact information (all editable). Users can even use their own custom domain or have one supplied by Motion Array. But now, Motion Array is at it again with Requests. Essentially, any paid member of the Motion Array community can put in a request for any type of creative asset that Motion Array offers.

Adobe Announces New Stock Contributor Program

Today, Adobe has announced the public beta of the Adobe Stock Contributor Site. Meant to integrate deeply with its Creative Cloud platform, the new service allows photographers, videographers, and illustrators to directly upload and sell their work with a high degree of efficiency and automation.

Splash From 500px Lets You Search Images by Color

Up until now, most stock image sites let you search by keywords, categories, date range, location, or other similar refinements. For most image buyers this has ben sufficient, however 500px has a new way to search called "Splash."

Pond5 Lets Photographers and Videographers Set Their Own Price for Stock Video, Stills, and More

A number of websites offer multimedia content to content creators for their projects through an easy-to-access online portal. But as well as those sites serve the many that use them, they all have one thing in common: they set the price for all content. Letting photographers, videographers, and musicians set the price for their own work, Pond5 is an exception in a set of businesses between which it is increasingly hard to differentiate.

Let It Go: Why One Photographer is Giving Away His Images for Free

Sam Zeller is giving it all away. It began with releasing 184 photos for creative commons use on stock photo site Unsplash. From there the Swiss photographer and FujiFilm ambassador has decided to unload an entire archive of his images taken across Europe for free use to anyone with the aptitude to find them.

Artist Recreates a Rembrandt Painting With Only Stock Photos

Ankur Patar is a photographer and digital artist based in Brisbane with a very neat and unique talent. He's able to create remarkable replicas of famous works of art using nothing but stock photos and Photoshop. Check out this amazing video of him recreating a Rembrandt work.

Photographers and Videographers Interested in Selling Stock Images, Meet Dissolve

Just the other day I was thinking about the great footage and images I have that might do well in a stock library. I just didn't know where to go and which site was best. so I closed the folder and let it go. But, here at Fstoppers we get the best news first. Perfect timing for sure. We got a heads-up from Dissolve that they are launching a rights-managed stock library with 50,000 images on June 1st. They also want to open it up to individual photographers to contribute and form part of their premium stock offering.

Can You Tell the Difference Between Stock Footage and Hollywood Footage?

Directors each have their signature shots, or do they? Creative trademarks like Wes Anderson’s symmetry, Alfred Hitchcock’s zoom-but-not-zoom, and Quentin Tarantino’s trunk shots might be central to their success — but so are the thousands of “normal” frames surrounding these shots: connective tissue often obtained from second units, stock archives, and even other films.

Adobe Announces Availability of Native 4K Stock Video Assets

Adobe Stock has been around for a short while now, featuring useful, deep integration into Creative Cloud products, as well as a more traditional online portal through which to purchase content. Through a blog post on its website, Adobe recently announced these platforms will now benefit from native 4K video content in addition to the photos and standard high-definition videos previously offered.

'Connectivity Lost': An Analog Short Film About the Digital Age

If you're like me, you have way too many apps on your smartphone. I know this might sound crazy coming from Fstoppers, but we really do rely too much on our phones. Yes, even the great iPhone 6s Plus. “Connectivity Lost,” by filmmaker Walter Stoehr, is a short showing what could go wrong if we depend on our phones too much.