A fairly good month during which I uploaded some new stuff. Here’s my breakdown of each site:
iStockphoto: My portfolio on this site now consists og 160 images. 18 of these were added in October. The earnings amounted to $20.97 from 18 downloads. iStockphoto is still my favourite site and this is where I recommend beginners to start out. Just submit your best three photos (not too similar ones) and you’re good to go. If you get rejected, you can try again after a while. They’re quite picky, but that is a good thing in the long run. Rather than rejecting all new images, they are sensible enough to root out some of their old weed from slacker days. My approval ratio is 62 %.
Dreamstime: This is another very good site. They are not excessively picky here, so it might be a good place to get started with microstock. My approval ratio is 87 %, but this is mostly with material that had already been approved at iStockphoto. Since April, 2008, my total earnings are $84.91 (from 91 downloads). I now have 160 images online, 11 of which were added in October. This was my second best month by far, with $21.31 in earnings. This site is starting to rival iStockphoto. Another good thing about Dreamstime is that the earnings increase as an image gets more downloads. I now have a few Level 2-files.
Shutterstock: This is where many new microstockers get started. However, after a while I found their payout of $0.25 per download almost insulting and removed all my images. SS was my best earner; I made around $100 on just 100 images in a few months. I have now uploaded 28 of my new images to give it a new try. If they generate more earnings than iStockphoto and Dreamstime, I may decide to swallow my silly pride and put more pictures up for steal here.
123rf: Very little activity. I have 48 files here now and 5 downloads all in all. Not worth the effort.
Fotolia: This site stands out with a very very low acceptance rate. I’ve read about this phenomenon elsewhere on the web as well. It is obvious that they have too many images online, but they have chosen the worst way to deal with that. They leave old, outdated, bad, probably non-selling material from their startup days online and reject new contributions. This is sure to provoke anger amongst contributors (it does, read other forums and blogs), and that is surely not a good thing if you’re hoping to stay competitive. I have 4 sale here now, which is not bad with a portfolio of 5 images. However, with the low chances of gettin a picture accepted, it’s just not worth it.
SnapVillage: Owned by Corbis, I find it very strange how little effort they put into this site. Their site doesn’t even work properly with Safari! I have around 30 images online to test the waters, and so far I have one download at $3. One!
PantherMedia: This is a German, fairly professional-looking site with slightly higher prices than typical microstock companies. The approval process is rather confusing, but I have now uploaded 29 images, of which 20 were approved. I have one download at €2.97, hardly worth the time it takes to upload.
