Getty, stock photography, crowd-sourcing and the end of the world...
Tuesday, June 22, 2010 at 9:04PM I thought I'd let the dust settle a little after the latest chapter in the stock photography story, as the stock photography giant, Getty Images, opened its doors to the masses. Now I feel it may be time to make my contribution to the discussion.
There has been a great deal of buzz (e.g. A Photo Editor and Bohemian) surrounding this latest news in a couple of years that has seen Getty morph from a 'by invitation only' top-end agency to a crowd-sourcing photo seller.
Originally a photographer would, once proven in the industry, be invited to contribute to a Getty house collection, be assigned a Getty editor and work directly with them. In 2008 Getty decided to make the big jump and tap into the enormous commercial resource which is the billion+ image strong Flickr photo site. This involved editors inviting photographers to provide specific photos exclusively for the Flickr collection. Reports suggest that this was plagued by editors being swamped with submissions and therefore editing turnaround was very slow. Finally, in the past days this relationship between Getty and Flickr's top photographers (pro and amateur) has made way for a mass-participation policy whereby any image on Flickr can be requested by photo buyers. Many photographers have complained that the slice paid to the photographer (as low as 20%) is unfair due to the negligible marketing effort Getty puts into these 'request' sales.
When I first stepped into the world of commercial photography in 2004 aged eighteen and gained my first agent, it was a very different landscape. Digital cameras were only just starting to replace film as the work-horse of a professional. Everything just seemed a lot slower and less manic. Stock was still an area few hobbyist photographers had even heard of - placing your images with a library and waiting for them to be licensed (not sold - subtly different) for either editorial or commercial use. It required, and still does, high levels of technical skill as the images need to be suitable for any use, even up to bill-board size.
Summarising the change over the past six years is a tricky task, especially since the stock industry had barely changed for the twenty years beforehand. That was the world of stock houses holding duplicate transparencies and sending clients CDs or slides of images to choose from. Stock photographers were professionals, mostly full-time, and in far shorter supply than today. Now, anyone with an SLR camera can play - but to what end?
So what do the major players in the photo library industry; the photo buyers, photo agencies and photographers each want out of the deal?
Photo buyers: Cheap prices, high quality, option for exclusivity on image, bulk discounts, quick and easy deal completion.
Photo agencies: Large quantities of images, high return per image sold, low overheads for sourcing and selling photographs.
Photographers: Limited competition with other photographers, royalties which reflect the cost incurred in creating photographs, ease for selection and upload of photographs to agency.
Clearly these conflicting motives do not lend to each party being able to have an optimum outcome. The truth of the matter is that there are thousands of photographers and only a handful of major photo stock houses such as Getty Images, Corbis, Photolibrary and Alamy.
Photo buyers are likely to be sure-fire winners in this constantly changing marketplace as the prices endlessly drop and choice expands. Their only annoyance may be that due to the recent oversupply of very average images, they have to wade through more to find the high-value gems.
Agencies, but only the large ones, also win. Smaller agencies are instead outcompeted and engulfed as they struggle to keep up with instant download and fulfilment of 21st century stock. Getty, Corbis and the other giants appropriate hundreds of smaller libraries to increase the size of their collection and gain a near monopoly. This power leads to an ability to give photographers a 'take-it or leave-it' decision on contracts which leave photographers with as little as 20% of sales. Serious photographers really can't do anything except give in as they feel they have to sell through Getty etc. or perish. Niche photographers can still work with the top-quality specialist survivors such as OSF (who are owned and allowed to exist as before by Photolibrary, another giant).
Very much at the bottom of the pile therefore are the photographers. Many years ago there were two content and happy groups of photographers; professionals who fed their families with the money made from selling photographs and there were hobbyists/amateurs. Both loved taking photos but for totally different reasons. The professionals had the pressure of having indemnity insurance etc., maintaining a good reputation and always having their 'commercial head' on. Now there is little or no distinction between the two in many people's eyes - anyone can market their work as stock, often through atrocious contracts offered by microstock agencies (who sell image licenses for below $1). An amateur sees this tiny annual accumulation of earnings as pocket money but takes hundreds of thousands of dollars of work from a professional. You can't blame photo buyers for this - they are simply getting a better deal. Neither should amateur photographers selling their work for nothing be vilified - they are often totally oblivious to what they're agreeing to.
This principle from stock is now spilling over, even more worryingly, into the assignment photography business as weekend snappers offer to shoot weddings etc. for $200 or even free. Only when the happy couple find the flaws in this 'bargain' - no professional insurance, no-shows, terrible results - it is too late. This can result in a certain bitterness from the pro photographers who lose out.
One positive to be taken from the latest agreement between Flickr and Getty is that it's another nail in the coffin, in the commercial photo world at least, for the unfair and devaluing Creative Commons movement by the 'everything should be free' brigade. It does not however stop full-time stock photographers from coming under siege from all directions.
All being said - there is no point in, as a photographer, harking back to the 'good old days'. They are gone and crowd-sourcing in the creative industry is here to stay. Photography as a profession has always been about being both an artist and a businessman and this has never been more relevant. We must instead look to the future, try and predict future changes, and evolve with them. We must try and stay ahead of the curve, rather than react to it. Quality, original photography delivered on-time and on-budget with a smile will, or should, always reign supreme. What do you think?
Reader Comments (5)
Alex,
Another interesting piece. Thank you.
I'm afraid I fit firmly in the category of those who are making life hard for you pros. I'm a happy snapping amateur and if someone randomly emails me and asks to use one of my Flickr images (http://www.flickr.com/photos/alastairhumphreys/sets/72157605217631125/) for $100 I say 'Yes please". It's pocket money for me and a nice bonus.
I definitely think life is hard now for photographers, but the cream will rise to the top, especially if you are both good and hardworking AND imaginative about how to earn money from photography. I always think that the best and luckiest will continue to do well, but it's a hard time for people who are merely 'good' - a scan through Flickr will show you 100000000s of 'good' photos.
Al
Thanks Al. You're quite right - the cream does rise to the top and many pro photographers are shown up by the poor quality of their work compared to the best 'amateurs'. This can lead to a lot of the protests from old pros.
It's a competitive world and no-one could ever expect you to turn down an offer of a sale (I'm delighted you're talking about $100 rather than $10 or 'a credit line'. This moderate/reasonable pricing can only serve to increase the value of images to where it should be.)
As a long-time admirer of your photography and general outlook on life and business, I think you have little to worry about and could easily make the switch to full-time.
Well written and insightful analysis. I suspect it gets harder and harder for full time Pros to make a living. The top Pros with strong reputations will be able to maintain business share I think to a degree, but new Pros will have a very difficult time breaking in.
I suspect that in the end you'll see fewer Pro photographers and lots more amateurs who need a 2nd job to really stay at it.
Thought provoking article which in my view goes a lot deeper than just the world of stock photography. To me, it's essentially about the world of commerce and how you add/gain value in a commercial world.
In effect stock photos are being commoditised in the same way that many other "products" have been or are being. This is part of the "supermarketisation" of markets with big players competing for distribution, market share and profit margins. The advent of digital processing/production is serving to replicate the industrialisation that has taken place in other markets.
The issue for the distributor is how to retain quality, choice and service for the end consumer. The issue for the producer is how to control production but maintain quality. Unless these all come together along the whole chain it could prove painful and messy. There is always the use of "premium" services whereby the "cream does rise to the top" and the rest potentially get lost in the mass of "others", too numerous and too timely to trawl through. Similarities with search engines optimisation spring to mind!
Time for photographers to change, manage the change, create new services/markets and diversify.
I found your article when searching for information about crowdsourcing photography. The microstock industry is based on price competition, which as a creative I am not interested in participating in. The industry is undergoing major changes as the microstock business model is not sustainable. The internet has made free and cheap photography readily available, some of it great but most of it not so great. As a photographer, I want to be compensated in proportion to the quality of my work and not just by sheer sales volume. For my ego, it's nice to get recognition by receiving requests for publishing or posting my work in exchange for a credit, or to have it downloaded on a microstock site, but it will not pay my bills or help me to continue providing excellent photography for appreciative clients.