[STOCKPHOTO] Does RF affect RM pricing?
Dan Heller
across the board because royalty-free images are so inexpensive. The
thesis: does a CD with 300 images costing $50 erode the perception of
value for "rights-managed" images, where per-images prices are
considerably higher, and terms of use are more restricted?
To answer the question, we need to start with a top-down view of the
photo-buying market place. Unlike years past, when there was a single,
flat marketplace of photo buyers and sellers, like an open flea
market, today's market is highly segmented. I liken it to a pyramid,
where the top is populated by a very few number of highly
sophisticated buyers, and the bottom is the general public. To service
any tier in this model, one has to not just have appropriate price
points, but have certain skills and expertises to meet the unique
demands of that tier. (I'll get into the details of that soon.) As
with any business, one wants to find the highest price per widget, but
that's putting things in simplistic terms. Part of that equasion is
the trade-off between the price and cost-of-business. The time and
other non-tangible requires required to sell a unit for $X may not
fare as well if you could streamline certain business processes that
allow for higher bottom-line profit. Which model you choose is
affected by where your experience, skills and expertises are.
What complicates the analysis, however, is that these segments
overlap. (Buyers may vascillate from one segment to another, based on
case-by-case circumstances at any given time.) Even in this case, one
doesn't need to sell "less than what the market will bear;" instead,
the challenge is to find "the range in prices that any given market
segment will bear." Since our goal is to establish whether
higher-priced rights-managed images are affected by lower-priced
royalty-free images, the questions then become:
1) Do sophisticated top-tier buyers buy royalty-free images?
2) Is there a market for rights-managed images at the bottom (the
consumer)?
As noted earlier, the photo-buying marketplace used to be a single,
flat, uni-dimensional landscape, where all buyers are largely the
same. As long as photographers see it that way, it's easy to see how
they feel that RF prices and terms are affecting the RM marketplace.
Now, just because the marketplace is NOT that flat model, but tiered,
it doesn't automatically dismiss the premise. It just means that the
"single marketplace" argument isn't a sufficient one to establish that
RF affects RM pricing. Other data needs to be examined.
The internet and the boom in technology that allowed for everyday
people and businesses to produce high-end marketing compaigns has
allowed the end-buyer for images to expand from mostly media and
corporations to literally every single individual that has a computer
and might have a need for a photo. I'm not saying that each of these
people WILL buy images--I'm saying that the characteristics of these
individuals are identical, so far as we know. Therefore, one cannot
discern which may be buyers and which may not be based on their
demographics alone. To have more accurate data would require
organizations that survey photo buyers to include the general
population in their studies, to see who is buying images, from what
sources (including their own photography), for what price ranges, how
often, and what their future buying potential might be.
Because no one does this sort of survey, we don't know if 10% of the
population participates in image purchases, or 1%. Even if .1% of the
US population were to buy one image a year for $100, that's 300,000
people buying $30,000,000 worth of images. That's not small change,
and distributed over 10,000 semi-professional photographers with
websites, that could be a nice $30,000/year income. Granted, these are
all hypothetical figures, and while we don't know the reality of this
market, we do know that it "exists," which is significant in and of
itself. The question is, who's serving it? And how?
In my business, I can extrapolate from anecdotal data some of these
answers because 90% of my licensing is from the general population
that has no idea what a stock-photography business is, few have ever
heard of RF licensing, and frankly, none of them read license
agreements any more than any of you read the license agreement dialog
boxes that come up when we purchase software. Just click the "Agree"
button and move on.
It should be noted that a good 10% of my clients are actually the
higher-end sophisticated buyers, who require a very different style of
client management.
From all this data, I can not only extrapolate what these demographics
look like, but more importantly, how they ACT.
Pricing is directly associated with perception of value, and a photo's
value is largely based on how it factors into the larger project into
which it will be incorporated. That is, if a small church in the
middle of Nebraska just wants to use an image as part of their monthly
newsletter, the house-wife volunteer who works in the office every
other sunday that is responsible for typesetting this newsletter will
start by doing an image search on some search engine, and upon finding
one she likes, will look at the price. She ignores "terms and
conditions" and bypasses all the bios, resumes, and other
self-aggrandizing blurbs photographers say about themselves. She isn't
likely to go to a stock photo agency because those results rarely come
up with specific searches. For example, type "photos of buenos aires"
in google and see how many stock agencies appear on the first page.
You may get some agencies now and then, but for the most part, you get
specific pages that may not even be from prophotographers. Pick your
topic and your results vary, but it should be understood that this is
how the vast majority of the photo-buying public finds images (whether
consumers or sophisticated buyers).
The one part of this business that frustrates everyone is knowing the
buyer's budget. Obviously, it varies--and there's neither a science to
it, nor even an art. To what degree you can alter someone's
willingness to pay a tad more or a tad less is just as variable as the
customer himself. The more often people buy, they do see more patterns
in prices among various photo sources, and in this context, one can
argue that higher prices across the board would influence such buyers'
price-break point.
But as you get into such buying patterns, you're also moving UP the
pyramid to more sophisticated buyers, which lends more credence to the
argument that higher, more consistent pricing policies across the
board will yield higher per-photo prices. Here is where people worry
that RF pricing and unlimited terms can affect the broader perception
of price. But, that doesn't take into account how the very business
model for higher-tiered photo buyers transforms from a
volume-sales/automated process one, to a more consultive,
individualistic model, which is not one that is easily managed by just
any photographer. One can't necessarily expect to just raise prices
and get the higher-end buyers who pay them consistently. It takes a
cross-section of skills, knowledge and expertise in areas beyond just
photography for a photographer to get a highly-sophisticated photo
buyer to pony up bigger bucks for images. At the same time, the
existence of lower-priced RF images doesn't affect the higher-end
buyer's perception of value. (It may affect their negotiating tactics,
but that is a skill that is part of the package of skills and
expertise of the photographer in question.)
Since high-priced images are often part of high-priced marketing
campaigns, the value isn't so much in the image itself, but in
conveying how that image is an effective marketing tool for the
product being marketed.
This brings us to another big misconception about the photo buying
market: Photographers hope and expect that the marketing organization
has people to do that, and will therefore find the value in their
images. This may happen, but it's a simplistic assumption that will
not be true often enough to fuel a profitable photo business. More
often is the case that, for the photographer to satisfy the demands of
this tier of buyer, he or she has to be the one that communicates a
dedicated and customized message (a "pitch") that sells not just the
image, but the ideas behind it. In other words, the successful
photographer at this tier is one that knows the client's business.
For example, say a bank is interested in licensing an image for a new
brochure about opening up a new form of checking account. The ways the
bank will acquire the image will fall along the spectrum of the degree
of sophistication held by the marketing person responsible for
acquiring the images. Most photographers would like for the marketing
organization to have the expertise that wouldn't require any
consultation on the photographers part. Instead, they hope, that
marketing person will have done all that work, and over considerable
search and deliberation, would just license the image they want from
the photographer.
In the case where the marketing group has done the work, and the
resourceful photo-buyer has found many sources for the type of image
desired, it's just a matter of choosing one. Here, an RF disk or that
of the photographer's website doesn't matter. They don't care about
anything but price. It is this case where photographers feel that RF
prices impact the price of RM sales. Thing is, this scenario is far
more the exception than the rule. More often than not, the person at
the bank doing that brochure is usually working alone--and this person
needs guidance. The photographer that has background in consumer
marketing for financial services is going to use much more compelling
and convincing language to promote whatever image he feels may be
suitable for that brochure. At this point, the client has placed trust
in the knowledge and expertise of the photographer, and the "photo's
value" is merely a symbol of that expertise. In other words, the value
is less in the photo than in how photographer communicates and
entrusts himself with the client. Take a look at any of these
brochures in banks, and you'll notice how mundane the pictures
are--any moderately proficient photographer could take them. But,
chances are that the photo was bought by a junion-level marketing
person who spoke to a sophisticated photographer who knows this
business.
(Yes, it does happen that such people may use images from an RF disk,
but there are perils with that, since the image may already be used
elsewhere, etc. RF into this market does exist, nonetheless, but it's
not typical, and the data that DOES reflect surveys of buyers at this
level show this.)
As a photographer, the more expertise you have outside of photography
and into the market segment you are selling into, the more consultive
time you'll need to spend with your clients on forming the broader
message that your imagery provides. This is why advertising
photographers tend to make $50,000 for a photo shoot. But, most only
get one a month (and their expenses are high). On the other end of the
spectrum, most stock photographers try to sell hundreds of images a
month, most of them not being consultive sales.
Moving back down the spectrum to the mass market, "impulse purchases"
for a simple use like the church's newsletter are great, but to make a
profit catering to the mass public, you have to be good at "business
processes." Here, the successful photographer would have skills in
developing a quick, simple and streamlined website, or at least a good
assembly-line process for production of CDs and marketing himself.
Also, photo subjects have to be broad, and in very high volume. Good
internal business management helps considerably, but the key to it all
coming together is understanding the nature of how distribution
systems work. This is NOT something one has to have _before_ entering
the business--it's more of an intuitive thing. You have to have a
general perception that price points are the result of trial and
error, not by solidarity among photographers as a group. Smart
business people watch buying patterns and behaviors of their clients,
and make adjustments accordingly. If you're the type that just copies
a price list from another photo website, or feel that you shouldn't
drop prices because you think it'll erode the market, you don't have a
sense for business. Those simplistic views don't apply in a market of
this size and erratic nature. Finding client purchasing patterns and
behavior analysis is often an ongoing challenge--what used to work
before may not work next month. Constant refinement in one form or
another is to be expected.
I've always recommended that emerging photographers think of their
forray into the photo business more as an extension of the previous
business they were in. Whatever your expertise you bring with you into
photography will give you a huge advantage when trying to sell into
that same market segment. It also helps when competing against other
photographers, should the occassion arise. Sports photographers,
fashion, travel, food, or whatever: most people came from somewhere
before they got into photography. If you know the BUSINESS of that
industry, that's your best place to start. If you are just trying to
get into photography because you love the art, you're going to face
much bigger challenges than whatever RF pricing may seem like.
So, in closure, the whole issue of rights-managed images and
royalty-free images is skirting a much more important discussion: how
to identify which business model is the best fit for your type of
experience and expertise. My feeling is that 90% of the buying public
doens't know or care what RF or RM means--they just want to buy what
they need and get it out of the way. Unless you're selling to a very
small niche, then the issue shouldn't concern you.
What's more, there's a "much-ado-about-nothing" effect going on here
as well. Most RF images don't need to be RF--it wouldn't affect sales
one bit if the "terms" happened to state "one time use," instead of
the "unlimited use" they currently state. Also, selling huge volumes
of images on a single CD for a small price is not really flooding the
market with thousands of images at a tiny price point as it appears.
Most people who buy those disks do so to get access to one or two
images on average. The rest (including the CD) is often discarded
before too long. The buyer would just as likely pay the same price for
those few images they DO use as opposed to the entire set they get on
the CD. (This would be an RM license model.) However, it just so
happens that it's easier for the distributor to get those individual
images to the licensee in this "many images per CD" method that is
typical for the RF license model. This, especially compared to dealing
with each client and each image on a case-by-case basis as RM would
dictate.
Hence, we've answered our questions:
1) Do sophisticated top-tier buyers buy royalty-free images?
Yes, but not enough to affect their perception of value of the images
sold on a per-item basis due to the added consultive attention they
need and desire.
2)Is there a market for rights-managed images at the bottom (the
consumer)?
Yes, because most people don't really care about RF or RM; they just
want an image at a price that meets their budget. Optimizing how one
meets those needs while not overburdening oneself with overhead in
distribution raises the question on whether an RF-type model can be
employed effectively.
At the end of the day, RF and RM don't really affect pricing--it's
what blend of business paradigms you adopt that will ultimately govern
how you run your business, and thus, the optimal price points you end
up with.
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Mark Sykes
<SNIP>
> At the end of the day, RF and RM don't really affect pricing--it's
> what blend of business paradigms you adopt that will ultimately govern
> how you run your business, and thus, the optimal price points you end
> up with.
My lowest and highest RF sales (via Alamy) are $39.00 and $415.00
respectively.
My record lowest L sale ever (via Imagestate) was $12.00 last month.
As those figures are before commission the $12 L sale equates to just over
£2.00 UK. Barely enough for a beer in my local pub!
Go figure.
Regards
--
Mark M Sykes
Mark Sykes Photography
m: +44 (0)7860 247900
t: +44 (0)1274 877801
Howard M. Paul
>Many photographers that sell their images feel that prices are eroding
>across the board because royalty-free images are so inexpensive. The
>thesis: does a CD with 300 images costing $50 erode the perception of
>value for "rights-managed" images, where per-images prices are
>considerably higher, and terms of use are more restricted?
Other influences includes that of international news organizations. A former
British international magazine client paid fotoQuote rates when it licensed
images from me a few years ago; it now obtains images from both AP and Reuters
for $50 - $75 for 1/4 page, worldwide rights. This is the result of, among
other factors, the P-J community caving in to AP when it grabbed freelancers
rights several rights.
Howard
_______________________________________________________________________
Howard M. Paul (303) 829-5678 Fax: (303) 871-8356 hmp...@ecentral.com
Photography for Communication & Commerce http://howardpaul.photofolio.com
Emergency!Stock http://www.emergencystock.photofolio.com
Yesterday I learned I CAN walk backwards, photograph a forest fire
and eat a bagel (with cream cheese) at the same time!
Jim Hunter
>At the end of the day, RF and RM don't really affect pricing--it's
>what blend of business paradigms you adopt that will ultimately govern
>how you run your business, and thus, the optimal price points you end
>up with.
>
Dan,
I have to disagree with you on this one and here are two recent
experiences that lead me to believe that RF has had a great impact, not
on MY pricing but on pricing that potential clients are expecting.
1. About a year ago I was contacted via e-mail by a company wanting an
estimate to photograph one of their signs that had been recently
installed. They wanted the photograph to show the main sign in the
foreground and the building with additional signage in the background.
The proposed usage was for large prints (apx. 30x40 inches) for trade
show displays, web and possibly brochures.
Since the proposed subject matter is only about a mile from where I
live, I went up to take a look at it before giving the estimate (a good
idea whenever possible) and saw that this was not going to be a
particularly easy photograph to make.
I faxed them what I thought was a VERY reasonable estimate and got an
almost immediate phone call asking why the estimate was so high. During
the course of our conversation, she mentioned that they had recently
bought a disk with images similar to what they wanted. The disk had
only cost $300 and they could use any number of images off the disk as
much as they wanted without any further costs so $300 was as much as
they were willing to pay.
I asked if any of the images on the disk were of the particular sign
they were wanting me to photograph and of course, the answer was no.
After hanging up I did a bit of research on this particular company and
discovered that they are a very large, multi-national sigh manufacture
who's after tax profits for the previous year was in the multi-billion
dollar range.
2. I also assist for a friend of mine who is an architectural
photographer. He was contacted by a large flooring manufacturer about
wanting to license use of up to four photographs for advertising of a
house that we had photographed for a magazine article but which showed
extensive use of their flooring.
Since my friend was going to be out of town for the next few weeks
teaching a workshop, he asked me to contact the company. We discussed
pricing which included discounts for licensing of multiple images.
Once again, after contacting this company, the subject of RF was brought
up. I was pointed to an on line stock photo site that had images that
were similar to what we had but were being licensed as RF. They were
using the prices of these RF images to determine what they would pay and
of course also wanted unlimited use for all time.
One other item that I read recently that leads me to believe that RF has
affected pricing RM.
In an article currently on pdnonline
<http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/index.jsp> there is an article entitled
"*Take Stock?"* One of the Senior Art Buyers interviewed states, "Even
the art directors have been trained to seek out RF images first before
pursuing rights-managed."
The article can be found at
http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/features/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000919172
subscription required.
Personally, I find that to be a VERY scary statement.
--
Jim Hunter
Photography
Assignment - Stock - Fine Art
6300 Prairie Sage, NW
Albuquerque, NM 87120
505-259-2411
http://www.jimhunter.com
j...@jimhunter.com
http://jimhunterphotography.blogspot.com
"The future ain't what it used to be"- Yogi Berra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
Stockphoto Seller
Nice abstract discussion, Dan, but one that is full of false assumptions and lack of experience for the world we are in. The stock photo marketplace was anything but "flat" when we started the agency in 1980, and it is still not. There is a gulf between editorial and advertising sales of stock photography, and RF affects each side differently. You have to be engaged in dozens of conversations about pricing with photo researchers, photo editors, AD's, etc to have any idea of the depressing effect RF has on stock photo pricing. You have to know that bean counters are dictating RF to their photo personnel who formerly used and would still prefer RM. You have to experience time and again the instances where image quality gives way to price, where a cheaper photo is chosen even though it is not as good for some purpose. And you would do well to separate business to business sales from your vague "photo buying public," as some kid getting an image for a bedroom wall poster is irrelevant to
b-to-b sales of various kinds.
Your essay has little to do with the interactions we have with our clients on aspects of pricing a couple of dozen times each month (we are small). It's not an academic exercise--we are being damaged by RF both in how we do business with clients and in pricing; and it's not just the matter of convenience by a long shot. For our branch of the industry, it's a lose-lose.
Carl May/BPS
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Brian Seed
Behalf Of Stockphoto Seller
Sent: Wednesday, June 01, 2005 5:27 PM
To: STOCK...@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [STOCKPHOTO] Does RF affect RM pricing?
"For our branch of the industry, it's a lose-lose......"
Carl, please elucidate. Yours are specialist, niche images I'd have
thought. The kinds of images not available as RF. Is it simply that RF has
reduced all prices, even for those for the more exclusive material?
Is it not possible to maintain a premium price for your specialist
photography, work that requires special knowledge and often special
equipment? What do buyers say to you when you tell them about the kind of
work that goes into much of your photography?
Brian Seed
David Barr
>Is it not possible to maintain a premium price for your specialist
>photography, work that requires special knowledge and often special
>equipment? What do buyers say to you when you tell them about the kind of
>work that goes into much of your photography?
>
>Brian Seed
IMHO the damage is done by clients having the perception that
pictures should be cheap.
Obviously there is a segment of the market that will appreciate the
importance of unique pictures and the advantage of knowing the
history of the pictures and will pay for this premium service. Many
other clients will latch onto the fact that other pictures are sold
at a fraction of the price and will never be convinced that they
should pay more.
An ad agency might be used to paying fair market value for pictures
but after they fill a request with an inexpensive RF image it is
only human nature for them to want to maximize their own profit by
filling future requests with more low cost images.
David Barr
--
Photobar Agricultural Stock Photography
Simplify your Search http://www.photobar.com
http://www.photobar.com On line catalogue
http://www.stockartistsalliance.com SAA member
http://www.cama.org/ CAMA member
Sean McCormick
>Many photographers that sell their images feel that prices are eroding
>across the board because royalty-free images are so inexpensive. The
>thesis: does a CD with 300 images costing $50 erode the perception of
>value for "rights-managed" images, where per-images prices are
>considerably higher, and terms of use are more restricted?
>
>
Let me put it this way... It's hard not to notice when talking to
teenagers how their perception of the value of a CD purchased in the
store has been eroded by ready access to tens of thousands of 'free'
songs on the P2P file trading networks. As my neighbour's kid said to me
after I tried to explain copyright to him: "Buy a an album in the store?
Dude, that's what my *grandparents* did!"
This left me feeling old and more than a little pissed off.
Sean McCormick
--
Digiteyesed Photography
http://www.digiteyesed.com/
Portraiture and fine art landscape photography.
Circle of Confusion Magazine
http://www.circleofconfusion.ca/
Hyper-focused on Canadian photography.
tyler olson
Tyler
-----Original Message-----
From: STOCK...@yahoogroups.com [mailto:STOCK...@yahoogroups.com]On
Behalf Of Mark Sykes
Sent: June 2, 2005 8:33 AM
To: STOCK...@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [STOCKPHOTO] Does RF affect RM pricing?
on 01/06/05 02:43 pm, Dan Heller wrote:
<SNIP>
> At the end of the day, RF and RM don't really affect pricing--it's
> what blend of business paradigms you adopt that will ultimately govern
> how you run your business, and thus, the optimal price points you end
> up with.
My lowest and highest RF sales (via Alamy) are $39.00 and $415.00
respectively.
My record lowest L sale ever (via Imagestate) was $12.00 last month.
As those figures are before commission the $12 L sale equates to just over
Ł2.00 UK. Barely enough for a beer in my local pub!
Go figure.
Regards
--
Mark M Sykes
Mark Sykes Photography
m: +44 (0)7860 247900
t: +44 (0)1274 877801
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Stockphoto Seller
First, we are a niche agency in the natural sciences and have many "specialist" images, but our collection goes far beyond those. It went farther a few years ago, but I have been stripping it down and dropping marginal photographers in the non-specialist areas of nature and eco-travel because those once-important subject areas have been clobbered by RF and a flood of amateur competition. Ask most niche agencies and they'll tell you their core sales pay the rent but they need a full spectrum of sales to do well. Well over half of our sales are to textbook publishers, but we need the advertising and other areas to have any kind of vital business and to do our job of marketing the images of our photographers to any place they might have a use.
Second, though we closely control our images, we are not without competition, some of it quite good. As agency after agency has been bought out or decided to dabble in RF because it is cutting in so much, competing images are leaking into RF and other pricing schemes. And where they don't go RF, some of our competition has been agreeing to low pricing deals with several of the big educational publishing corporations. It amounts to something close to RF pricing if you want to do business with them--or at least get the full needs lists and not just the tough subjects they can't find elsewhere. And more and more the publishing corporations are asking for rights for all editions of a title and for all the ancillary publications, both print and electronic, that go along with most textbooks these days. So for a low single price that would once have served for one edition of the printed book or issue of a magazine alone, they now try to get blanket rights for all time. There have always
been some clients who try to bargain for all they can get, but now they *expect* the blanket rights because that is what they get with RF. For a successful introductory textbook, the RF-style fee will easily end up being, on average, one-fifth to one-tenth what the photo source would have made over all editions and all ancillaries. And, to repeat, if one does not go along with this, one may end up doing no business at all with some publishers.
My agency survives only because we still have some clients who are trying to compete in their markets with quality and who care about having the best available visual information in images. Not everyone wants a mediocre "widget." But our future is severely constricted because so many others, and especially the biggest corporate publishers, have been conned and have conned themselves into thinking any photo is as good as the next.
David Barr mentions a big factor that has been oft-repeated on this list and in the mags: photo users sold on RF by a sea of promotion now expect images to be available that way. A related factor is that bean counters at companies that use photos have learned about RF (and even cheaper/lousier sales schemes) and are dictating to their photo staffs that such images must be sought out before they can go to RM sources. And it isn't always the bean counters--some photo staff people with loose standards seek out RF to make their budgets look better to their bosses. Freelance photo researchers are being ordered to use RF, even though finding RF images of some subjects takes much longer than going to a reliable agency or photographer known for coverage of the subjects being sought.
So even college science textbooks and magazines covering science and nature are becoming loaded with RF and its spawn.
"Maintaining a premium price" gets at another problem non-editorial photographers seldom understand. A big biology textbook may have hundreds of photographs (and sometimes from a dozen to over a hundred of ours). Other products, like CD's may have over a thousand images apiece--we provide over 1500 images, edition after edition, to just one CD that supplements a successful introductory biology textbook. We don't negotiate every one of these individual image uses--neither we not the client has time for that. Rather, there is usually an understanding going in as to how we price, and we even put out price lists for some kinds of publications. When selling in quantity, all images tend to be priced the same for the same specific kind of use. Yes, we might be able to hold a client up for a high price for an image not immediately available elsewhere, but we'll hear little from them in the future and they'll do all they can to find another source so they don't have to reuse our image. The
only per-image negotiating we do these days is with uses of single images, especially the relatively few sales we make on the advertising/commercial side
The way photos are being obtained by almost "boiler room" operations these days, there is little to no discussion of what goes into an image most of the time. Many have been so overcome with the polluted atmosphere of RF, including the notion photos are commodities, that they don't recognize the differences and varying values in stock photographs. You fill holes and move on--in fact you have to do this to survive if you are being paid per spec rather than for your time. They don't care to know that a photographer may have traveled to the ends of the earth to get a particular subject or that a micrograph may have required years of education and over $100,000 worth of equipment to obtain. Of course, there are still good photo professionals hanging on in unappreciated jobs who know such things, but they aren't calling the shots or paying the bills in the big, mediocre corporations. There is simply no opportunity in typical dealings to support an individual editorial photo's worth.
I'm overstating the case somewhat, but the rant above describes a spreading malaise. More and more I find myself thinking the only near-term general treatment that can be effective for independents of all kinds in photography will be the broadening of the now-channeled and blindered marketplace.
Carl May/BPS
Brian Seed <bs...@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
From: STOCK...@yahoogroups.com [mailto:STOCK...@yahoogroups.com]On
Behalf Of Stockphoto Seller
Sent: Wednesday, June 01, 2005 5:27 PM
To: STOCK...@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [STOCKPHOTO] Does RF affect RM pricing?
"For our branch of the industry, it's a lose-lose......"
Carl, please elucidate. Yours are specialist, niche images I'd have
thought. The kinds of images not available as RF. Is it simply that RF has
reduced all prices, even for those for the more exclusive material?
Is it not possible to maintain a premium price for your specialist
photography, work that requires special knowledge and often special
equipment? What do buyers say to you when you tell them about the kind of
work that goes into much of your photography?
Brian Seed
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Mark Sykes
> What is your highest L sale?
>
> Tyler
$1600.
Regards
--
Mark M Sykes
Mark Sykes Photography
m: +44 (0)7860 247900
t: +44 (0)1274 877801
e: ma...@marksykesphoto.com
w: http://www.marksykesphoto.com
Howard M. Paul
>Let me put it this way... It's hard not to notice when talking to
>teenagers how their perception of the value of a CD purchased in the
>store has been eroded by ready access to tens of thousands of 'free'
>songs on the P2P file trading networks. As my neighbour's kid said to me
>after I tried to explain copyright to him: "Buy a an album in the store?
>Dude, that's what my *grandparents* did!"
>
>This left me feeling old and more than a little pissed off.
>
Imagine the felling of the accountant of the band that loses more to stolen
copies than they actually sell; try paying a road manger with that!
HP
Robert Rosenthal
on the controversary "Re: Does RF affect RM pricing?"
I work with my shooting wife in a stock photo business in sunny San
Fran. But I'm commenting not as a stock businessperson but as
someone's who's been on the stock buying end.
I've done a fair amount of stock buying in my various roles in
marketing and communications for real estate, healthcare, law, and
other industies.
Yes, we love cheap RF, and will gladly put down $150-400 per RF image.
But we don't have any illusions that what we're getting is a premium
product that explicitly communicates our chosen message. Instead, RF
has let us enter a marketplace we otherwise would never, ever have
been able to afford in classic RM marketplace.
Here's my point, which you may blast if you please. I believe that RF
raises the general bar of visual literacy across the culture in such a
way that for most people there is now instant awareness of the
enhanced quality of most RM product. When you see terrific imagery,
you know it. That's why images from only a few years ago already tend
to look dated and less desirable. Right as we speak, this visual
literacy is at a fever pitch these days, in part due to this easy
access to high quality RF imagery (not to mention the web, cable,
direct mail, catalogs, and the whole gamut of marketing).
All photogs, designers, illustrators, etc. can benefit from this
enhanced literacy if they are in the business of creating premium
products. [Now get ready to flame me.] Thus I can't understand how
some photogs on this list complain about not getting their Getty RM
contracts when their own web portfolios clearly show they are not
currently producing premium imagery. They wait and wait for Getty to
call back. Those Getty editors are perhaps some of the most visually
literate folks around these days. They certainly know it. And if they
see great imagery, they pounce. I know photographers - and not
necessary well-known names, just ones with a unique eye, a sense for
what sells, and enough shots to demonstrate their ability to produce
in quantity - who were offered contracts within hours in every Getty
collection, RF and RM.
Flame away.
Thanks,
Robert
Dan Heller
That photographers feel that royalty-free licensing (RF) has eroded rights-managed (RM)
pricing is understandable. As supply of any product increases, prices come down. It would
follow that RF's ubiquity and lower prices would seem to give buyers pause when
considering RM images, which are typically more expensive. The natural thinking is that if
there were no RF images, then RM pricing would not have eroded.
I have posed the idea that this cause-effect relationship is more of an illusion, the result of
an overly simplistic perspective that doesn't take into account many other factors. In fact,
after my analysis, I concluded that not only is RF not responsible for RM's woe's, but that a
more fundamental underlying structural shift in the industry is responsible for both
conditions.
It's important to address this because efforts to remedy RM price erosion need to be
directed elsewhere, and perception of RF needs to be reconsidered. This would have a
great impact on how individual photographers choose to run their businesses, from how
they do their marketing, pricing, distribution, and (perhaps most importantly) where they
spend their "productive time" in developing future strategies.
The discussion of this analysis starts where I usually start all of my articles when talking
about the changes in the photo industry: the abrupt shift in the supply-demand-
distribution model since the emergence of the Internet and critical-mass adoption of
digital photography. It was at this time that we saw the quick emergence of the RF
licensing as well as the erosion of RM prices. The question still remains: did those changes
occur consecutively, or were they concurrent (within a very short timeframe)? If RM pricing
eroded _after_ RF was introduced, then one could reasonably argue that one _caused_ the
other. If they *did* happen simultaneously, then one cannot presume that one caused the
other--they happened at the same time as a natural byproduct of the reshaped industry.
We look for answers by looking at three data sets:
[] The growth curves of the number internet users in the 1990s
[] Sales data for affordable, professional-quality digital cameras
[] Licensing (sales) survey data from photo-industry groups
There is an apparent synchronicity between all of these events, showing that there is a
direct correlation between them all. In other words, pricing for images was dropping
across the board at the same time the number of internet users was growing, as well as
the increase in the sales of professional-level digital cameras.
Because of this synchronicity of these events, we can surmise that the emergence of RF did
not "cause" the fall in prices for RM. Instead, both are the result of the changes caused by
the two factors, *supply* and *distribution*. But, how solidly can we trust this summation?
"Simultaneous" must be within an allotted timeframe, since it's hard to really pinpoint
cause-effects on a day-to-day basis.
In economic theory, for one to claim that a particular event is the cause of another, there
needs to be a latency period where the effects can permeate through the supply chain, and
for the societal impact to have taken place. Here, people would have to have "fully
adopted" one particular event (ie., technology, fad, fashion or method) before the culture
(or the industry) phased to the next event (which would be said to have been "caused" by
the previous event).. In a book called "Crossing the Chasm", by Geoffrey A. Moore, he
describes this time period as _the chasm_ because it's a period after an event occurred,
where "nothing happens," other than people adapting to that new paradigm. It is during
this time that the next generation of people take it to the next step (caused by the first
step). This applies to technology, toys, food, music, and yes, marketing and pricing
models. Data analysis from all sorts of industries over the years has produced reliable
predictions on how long this chasm tends to last. Usually about ten years (with some
allotment for some variances).
So, for us to study whether the emergence of RF licensing models has affected RM prices
directly, we would like to have data that shows that RM prices remained stable for a
considerable period of time before the marketplace finally caught on and said, "hey! we're
paying too much!" Even with the most generous and liberal interpretation of sales data in
the photo industry, there is no way we can establish that RF has had a deteriorating effect
on RM prices. In fact, all the data shows that RM prices eroded simultaneously with the
emergence of RF.
The statement that RM prices have eroded for no other reason than the supply has
exceeded demand by a larger margin is a lot for photographers to accept, especially when
faced with tough negotiators on the other side of the table. If you are told, "I can get an RF
disk for $X, so you should charge less," that may be true, but it's not _because_ of that RF
disk that you're getting that tough line. You can get a line from the endless supply of
classic negotiating tactics, including these hits: "our budget only allows for $X," "we can
get it from Joe for $X," "we promise to pay you more when we are bigger," "if you give it to
us for $X, we promise to buy more in the future," etc...
For those who are still clinging to the premise that "if RF didn't exist, we wouldn't have this
problem," or "if pros just wouldn't participate in RF programs, the problem wouldn't be as
bad," they're ignoring certain organic realities about the nature of economics. In fact, that
royalty-free images emerged is an interesting development whose explanation is not too
different from how physicists explain why the laws of nature are the way they are: if they
weren't that way, the math wouldn't add up and the universe wouldn't exist. Einstein's quip
about this was, "God may not have had a choice in how he designed the Universe." In a
sense, royalty-free licensing, as one of the many forms of life in the "licensing and
distribution" part of the photography world, is an inevitable by-product of having a free
and ubiquitous distribution channel (the Internet) and the ease, low-cost and simplicity of
producing production-quality images by anyone.
The inevitability of RF comes in the form of plain and simple free-market economics:
When you have a ton of assets that _used_ to have value, but it is now threatened by a
flood of new supply, you want to get rid of it fast, for whatever you can get. What's more,
if that new supply is continuous, it _will_ find a distribution channel to flow through. And
even if the photographers who shoot these images didn't actively solicit their images,
there will be entrepreneurial types who will see some value in this vast of fresh supply
churning out of the well, and solicit those photographers for them. (Raise your hands if
you've been
asked.. I certainly have.)
With the established disassociation between the effects of RF on RM pricing,
photographers can now do several things to improve their pricing strategies. First and
foremost, accept that price erosion is not a blip in the system that was caused events that
can be corrected, reversed, or avoided. You cannot do anything about prices by changing
external events, short of blowing away the Internet completely. Prices will not improve by
trying to "dissuade photographers from participating in RF programs." Instead, spend
more time focusing on productive ways to market and solicit your images. You'll make
better decisions on what opportunities are worthwhile, and which aren't. Whether one
chooses to participate in RF has more to do with the specifics of that photographer's
business model. E.g., one who shoots thousands of images a month, and spends very little
time with image management and has no desire to engage in other revenue-generating
activities may find RF a great way to rake in the pennies by the handful.
Another thing people can do improve their pricing is by improving their negotiating skills
and longer-term business strategies, but that's beyond the scope of this article. See:
http://www.danheller.com/biz-sense
Believe it or not, we're now just about ten years out from the abrupt change in the photo
industry since the internet changed it in the mid-1990s. The old paradigms no longer
apply, and those who follow them are going to start falling by the wayside soon enough.
Those who are able to adapt to these new paradigms will be successful, and cross the
chasm to the next era of the photography world. My sense is that those who feel
intimidated by RF will not be part of that group.
Dan heller
http://www.danheller.com/
Stockphoto Seller
Amazing that ten years into this increasing polluted and subverted marketplace that some are still trotting out the hackneyed and long-disproven apologies for RF! Sure it was an "innovation," but an innovation that helped make the stock world worse, especially for independent photographers and RM agencies. Some people just don't get it that not all change is good, that it is even easier to tear down than build up. Anyone who does not know that RF is not aimed at tearing down RM has not been looking at RF marketing and listening to RF promoters over the past ten years.
Those who keep buying into stock photography's decline through a corporation-dominated marketplace and regressive pricing schemes only retard the sweeping business improvements needed to revitalize the overall industry.
Carl May/BPS
Dan Heller <ar...@danheller.com> wrote:
That photographers feel that royalty-free licensing (RF) has eroded rights-managed (RM)
pricing is understandable. As supply of any product increases, prices come down. It would
follow that RF's ubiquity and lower prices would seem to give buyers pause when
considering RM images, which are typically more expensive. The natural thinking is that if
there were no RF images, then RM pricing would not have eroded.
I have posed the idea that this cause-effect relationship is more of an illusion, the result of
an overly simplistic perspective that doesn't take into account many other factors. In fact,
after my analysis, I concluded that not only is RF not responsible for RM's woe's, but that a
more fundamental underlying structural shift in the industry is responsible for both
conditions.
....
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Stockphoto Seller
Anyone who does not know that RF *IS* aimed at tearing down RM has not been looking at RF marketing and advertising and listening to RF promoters over the past ten years.
Carl May/BPS
Stockphoto Seller <bpsli...@pacbell.net> wrote:
Anyone who does not know that RF is not aimed at tearing down RM has not been looking at RF marketing and listening to RF promoters over the past ten years.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
David Kilpatrick
Dan Heller wrote:
> That photographers feel that royalty-free licensing (RF) has eroded rights-managed (RM)
> pricing is understandable. As supply of any product increases, prices come down.
It's not really to do with the licensing model.
33 years ago when I was just out of college I bombarded agencies and
newspapers and magazins with pix. In the British photo press magazines
alone, in 1972, I had over 250 pictures used - and this was when each
repro cost a fortune and pages consisted of 2/3rd type and 1/3rd halftone!
Today, I doubt I would get 2 in print if I didn't own photo magazines
myself. My pictures were used because there was a desperate shortage of
anyone making modern, repro quality b/w 10 x 8s (the equivalent then of
today's 50mb TIFF) which looked as if they were shot on 35mm with
something other than a standard lens and a yellow filter (different from
all the Rolleiflex and routine images they had on file from the 1960s).
I happened to be young, using 35mm, keen on experimenting and a VERY
decicated darkroom printer.
Supply and demand created a market. A few of the other young
photographers I knew from the same period went on to publish magazines
or work for them, and one or two are still around as names on Alamy.
We didn't have to cope with the sheer numbers of people shooting usable
stuff, which there are today. Very, very few people could make a good
b/w print or shoot a decent colour transparency (even fewer could make a
really good colour print but that was irrelevant).
Anyone can take fantastic pictures today. They are generally so much
better educated visually. Television, film and publishing have all
raised the aesthetic bar constantly (and lowered other standards, OK!).
Shooting pictures for today's fairly intelligent and aware individual is
about as natural as writing a letter was 100 years ago.
It doesn't matter whether RF or RM - there are enormous numbers of
technically excellent images out there today, and that's why it is
harder for any one photographer to profit from simply being able to take
them.
Those who create truly unique work do well. Ordinary folk like me who
just had a handle on technical control and a fair eye for composition in
the past no longer have any advantage. As Olan Mills proves daily,
anyone can be trained to be a photographer and it takes a couple of weeks...
David
--
www.iconpublications.com www.troubadour.uk.com
www.maxwellplace.demon.co.uk/pandemonium
Original recordings: www.soundclick.com/davidkilpatrick
Photographs: www.alamy.com
Howard M. Paul
>Imagine the felling of the accountant of the band that loses more to stolen
>copies than they actually sell; try paying a road manger with that!
>
Howard M. Paul (303) 829-5678 Fax: (303) 871-8356 hmp...@ecentral.com
Photography for Communication & Commerce http://howardpaul.photofolio.com
Emergency!Stock http://www.emergencystock.photofolio.com
Yesterday I learned I CAN walk backwards, photograph a forest fire
and eat a bagel (with cream cheese) at the same time!
Fred Voetsch Publishing
>Once again, after contacting this company, the subject of RF was
>brought
>up. I was pointed to an on line stock photo site that had images that
>were similar to what we had but were being licensed as RF. They were
>using the prices of these RF images to determine what they would pay
>and
>of course also wanted unlimited use for all time.
>
>One other item that I read recently that leads me to believe that RF
>has
>affected pricing RM.
I would have handled this by explaining the difference between stock
and assigment and let them make up their mind.
And certainly RF licensing is effecting photo prices. But what really
had the effect is the Internet. After all, that is how they knew about
these RF images, in all likelyhood. Another major effect is the digital
camera and automation of the picture-taking process. In other words,
many of the photographer's skills have been outsourced to a computer
chip.
Put these together with the fact that EVERYONE and his brother knows a
little bit about photography and I see them having a MUCH greater
effect on photography prices. But what exactly is the issue here? If
the price quote was realistic then they would pay it. If you over
priced based on some inflated sense of what you feel your skills are
worth then they will look elsewhere. I just don't see how this has much
to do with RF unless you are specifically looking to make that
connection.
I know this won't be a popular opinion because the truth is often not
pleasant for those who wish to avoid it but the real issue here is that
our customers are becoming educated to the real worth of a photograph.
In many cases it is not what you wish it to be. If it is, they will pay
the price.
And in fact, Jim, go back and read YOUR OWN WORDS again, only this time
read them from the perspective of an objective observer or an
assignment-only photographer. The evil here can easily be seen as STOCK
PHOTOGRAPHY itself. YOU simply wish to point the finger down the line
at RF.
Yes, RF is part of the problem for those upstream, but where does the
blame end? Where YOU wish it to? For you, sure, but don't expect those
of us who have to find a way to compete in a world not of our making to
toe YOUR line or to do things that only make sense for someone in your
situation.
I don't like the fact that other agencies sell at much lower prices
than Acclaim Images but my answer to that is to position Acclaim so
that we can expect higher prices because we have better images, better
customer service and are more professional. That is a continuing effort
because the only constant in the universe...is change.
Brian Seed Asked of Carl May:
>Is it not possible to maintain a premium price for your specialist
>photography, work that requires special knowledge and often special
>equipment?
I think this question is self-answering. If the images are that special
and unique and in demand then Carl can charge what the market will pay.
We live in a world where the same people shop at Wal-Mart or Costco and
then go home to million dollar houses (at least in Southern
California). People want to save a buck and will always try to get the
lowest price on a commodity (stock photography IS a commodity, that's
why it's called STOCK photography) but they are certainly willing to
pay top dollar for something of value, something that is special and
unique, something of a rare commodity.
The answer for me keeps coming back to the fact that much of what is
available is simply not that unique and as the distribution becomes
more liquid the prices will certainly continue to drop. RF is only a
small part of that but an easy target for those who need one.
Sean McCormick Wrote:
>Let me put it this way... It's hard not to notice when talking to
>teenagers how their perception of the value of a CD purchased in the
>store has been eroded by ready access to tens of thousands of 'free'
>songs on the P2P file trading networks. As my neighbour's kid said to
>me
>after I tried to explain copyright to him: "Buy a an album in the
>store?
>Dude, that's what my *grandparents* did!"
>This left me feeling old and more than a little pissed off.
Touche! The times, they are a changin', for the better, IMO.
Music and photos should be shared as much as poossible, IMO. That may
mean some hardship for those who are used to an easy life and don't
want to change but we all are part of something bigger and I see a
brighter future in a world where more music is shared and more pictures
are shared and along the way we will find a way for the musicians and
photographers can make a decent living. That WILL happen. It IS
happening.
Fred Voetsch
http://www.AcclaimImages.com/
Brian Yarvin
successful, and cross the
> chasm to the next era of the photography world. My sense is that
those who feel
> intimidated by RF will not be part of that group.
Dan:
I just wanted to publicly thank you for these posts.
The typical Stockphoto perspective on sales methods can sometimes feel
like North Korean propaganda. To challenge the party line here is
truly brave and the best and the brightest of the mailinglist will do
their best to wear you down.
Keep up the great work!
Brian Yarvin
http://www.brianyarvin.com
Quang-Tuan Luong
First, I'd like to thank you to take the time to post such an
informative and well-thought write-up.
In my experience, there are two factors that clearly show the RF
affecting pricing.
1. I often get comments from prospective clients that they are used to
pay such and such low prices for their images. Those prices are
clearly RF prices, since no RM agency would license to them images for
their usage at those prices.
2. Most of the quotes that I give that are accepted are within
high-end RF prices. Most of the quotes that I give that are not
accepted are those that are significantly more than high-end RF prices
(ie $400).
Tuan.
Stockphoto Seller
Carl May/BPS
Brian Yarvin <br...@brianyarvin.com> wrote:
> Those who are able to adapt to these new paradigms will be
successful, and cross the
> chasm to the next era of the photography world. My sense is that
those who feel
> intimidated by RF will not be part of that group.
Dan:
I just wanted to publicly thank you for these posts.
The typical Stockphoto perspective on sales methods can sometimes feel
like North Korean propaganda. To challenge the party line here is
truly brave and the best and the brightest of the mailinglist will do
their best to wear you down.
Keep up the great work!
Brian Yarvin
http://www.brianyarvin.com
----------------------------------------------------------------------
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Yahoo! Groups Links
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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Stockphoto Seller
Carl May/BPS
Fred Voetsch Publishing <fre...@yahoo.com> wrote:
Brian Seed Asked of Carl May:
>Is it not possible to maintain a premium price for your specialist
>photography, work that requires special knowledge and often special
>equipment?
I think this question is self-answering. If the images are that special
and unique and in demand then Carl can charge what the market will pay.
We live in a world where the same people shop at Wal-Mart or Costco and
then go home to million dollar houses (at least in Southern
California). People want to save a buck and will always try to get the
lowest price on a commodity (stock photography IS a commodity, that's
why it's called STOCK photography) but they are certainly willing to
pay top dollar for something of value, something that is special and
unique, something of a rare commodity.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Fred Voetsch Publishing
>Here's my point, which you may blast if you please. I believe that RF
>raises the general bar of visual literacy across the culture in such a
>way that for most people there is now instant awareness of the
>enhanced quality of most RM product. When you see terrific imagery,
>you know it. That's why images from only a few years ago already tend
>to look dated and less desirable. Right as we speak, this visual
>literacy is at a fever pitch these days, in part due to this easy
>access to high quality RF imagery (not to mention the web, cable,
>direct mail, catalogs, and the whole gamut of marketing).
Robert, I found your remarks to be very valuable and insightful, not
because I agree with them but because they provide a bit of a new
perspective and build upon what I have been hearing and seeing for
myself.
Rather than making more comments on RF vs RM I think I will leave it at
that, except to say thank you for your input on the subject. We need
more of that here. For those of us who are trying to deal with a
rapidly changing marketplace, input such as yours is invaluable.
Fred Voetsch
http://www.AcclaimImages.com
Derick Rhodes
a smallish but successful RF company (= instant
flamability?!?):
There is no such thing as a clear-cut distinction
between RM and RF anymore . . . and especially not
when it comes to pricing or quality.
High-end royalty-free images are oftentimes far more
expensive (indeed, prices have been RISING for many
companies in this segment of "the market" over the
last few years) than RM images, and, in many cases,
the images prodcued by RF companies are every bit as
aesthetically solid as those produced by RM companies.
What this discussion is really about, from my
perspective, is what it means for photographers to
sign deals/work with RF vs. RM companies in an
increasingly less black and white photography market.
Are there RF companies out there who will give you an
excellent deal and sell your images for respectable
prices? Of course.
Are there also RF companies who take an el cheapo,
clip-artish (subscription, anyone?) approach, and try
to buy photographers out of the rights to their image
collections for ridiculously low amounts of money? Of
course.
The problem with attempts to generalize about either
RF or RM is that you end up missing out on what's
actually happening around you.
Finally, there are image buyers for absolutely every
segment of "the market," and there should (and will)
be someone/some company willing to provide imagery to
meet a wide variety of scenarios . . .
What Getty (and others) have recently demonstrated by
acquiring "wholly owned" libraries is that they're
going to offer customers an entire range of options:
From lower-end, inexpensive, subscription-oriented
imagery to amazingly expensive, high-end RM/customized
services.
The question here should be: Where does my work
realistically fit in with this new reality, and which
companies provide the best opportunities for me,
personally, as a photographer?
> STOCKPHOTO-...@yahoogroups.com
>
>
>
>
>
__________________________________
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Brian Yarvin
Carl:
Contrary to the suspicions of most people on this list, I did NOT
write a note praising Dan because I wanted to hear your opinion one
more time. I did so because I find his posts informative and well
reasoned.
Robert Rosenthal's post was excellent too. It addresses the issue of
visual literacy and the rapidly increasing sophistication of photo
buyers everywhere. This is something I deal with every day and wish
was discussed more here.
It is very tempting to say something here that would send you off on
another tirade - you're an easy target. But why should I go to the
bother of thinking up some clever idea when I know that you'll be off
and running no matter what.
Brian Yarvin
Food Photography, Writing, and Recipes
http://www.brianyarvin.com
http://www.farmsandfoods.com
Stockphoto Seller
Carl May/BPS
Fred Voetsch Publishing <fre...@yahoo.com> wrote:
Robert Rosenthal Wrote:
>Here's my point, which you may blast if you please. I believe that RF
>raises the general bar of visual literacy across the culture in such a
>way that for most people there is now instant awareness of the
>enhanced quality of most RM product. When you see terrific imagery,
>you know it. That's why images from only a few years ago already tend
>to look dated and less desirable. Right as we speak, this visual
>literacy is at a fever pitch these days, in part due to this easy
>access to high quality RF imagery (not to mention the web, cable,
>direct mail, catalogs, and the whole gamut of marketing).
Robert, I found your remarks to be very valuable and insightful, not
because I agree with them but because they provide a bit of a new
perspective and build upon what I have been hearing and seeing for
myself.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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Stockphoto Seller
All Getty ever demonstrates is that it will do anything to drive the marketplace. It's all about Getty, not serving clients. That's the nature of big corporations of all kinds; it's what they do.
Anyone trying to "fit in" with a scene directed for the benefit of someone else deserves their hardships and eventual decline. The true reality is that independents have to take back their share of the marketplace by broadening it to include all kinds of activities not dominated by self-serving corporations.
Carl May/BPS
Derick Rhodes <drho...@yahoo.com> wrote:
The problem with attempts to generalize about either
RF or RM is that you end up missing out on what's
actually happening around you.
a wide variety of scenarios . . .
....
What Getty (and others) have recently demonstrated by
acquiring "wholly owned" libraries is that they're
going to offer customers an entire range of options:
From lower-end, inexpensive, subscription-oriented
imagery to amazingly expensive, high-end RM/customized
services.
The question here should be: Where does my work
realistically fit in with this new reality, and which
companies provide the best opportunities for me,
personally, as a photographer?
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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Stockphoto Seller
It's not necessary that you or any other particular individuals "get it." What is important is that enough people get it to take the concerted actions necessary to move at least portions of the marketplace beyond its current dominated, channeled, and degraded state. I fully realize that there will always be those who have only a narrow, self-centered, short-term perspective (in fact, that is probably how a majority of people in the U.S. approach life) on what is going on. They're welcome to their world, but not to mine.
Carl May/BPS
Brian Yarvin <br...@brianyarvin.com> wrote:
> Again someone blows the point.
Carl:
Contrary to the suspicions of most people on this list, I did NOT
write a note praising Dan because I wanted to hear your opinion one
more time. I did so because I find his posts informative and well
reasoned.
Robert Rosenthal's post was excellent too. It addresses the issue of
visual literacy and the rapidly increasing sophistication of photo
buyers everywhere. This is something I deal with every day and wish
was discussed more here.
It is very tempting to say something here that would send you off on
another tirade - you're an easy target. But why should I go to the
bother of thinking up some clever idea when I know that you'll be off
and running no matter what.
Brian Yarvin
Food Photography, Writing, and Recipes
http://www.brianyarvin.com
http://www.farmsandfoods.com
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Tim McGuire
>
> Anyone trying to "fit in" with a scene directed for the benefit of
someone else deserves their hardships and eventual decline. The true
reality is that independents have to take back their share of the
marketplace by broadening it to include all kinds of activities not
dominated by self-serving corporations.
Hi All,
I liked the above quote froma previous thread about RF affecting RM
pricing... it lends itself to something I was going to post below...
read on.
--------------
As a photographer who is dedicated to the RM business model of basing
licensing fees on how the image is used, I've started wondering if I
should really continue to feed my work to "agencies" that represent
both RM and RF collections. These companies, especially Getty and
some of the bigger distributors, seem to have positioned their RF
collections to dominate the heart of the stock photo business...
the "middle of the road", "bread and butter" stock uses that make up
the largest percentage of the revenues in the stock photo market (of
which, the agencies/distributors take at least 80% of the revenues
leaving what's left for the photographers).
If I am to remain committed to a RM way of doing business I'm
beginning to think that my "agencies" are purposely cutting me (my
images) out of the largest revenue segment of the industry and
perhaps I should look elsewhere to distribute my work in an
environment where my photographs get marketed to and will be seen by
all potential clients for any/all potential uses. I think my
big "agencies" are no longer working for my best interests but more
and more often are only working for themselves and their best
interests… at my expense.
I would like my "agencies" to develop ways for my RM images to better
compete with RF for any and all potential licenses, but I'm beginning
to think that is not really what THEY want. They want RF to dominate
the highest revenue generating segment of the market (where they get
80+% of the revenue) and have my RM images pick up a few dollars
(Euros...) selling for those very small uses where RF can't compete
on the low price point end (though subscriptions will soon change
that!) and those high-end exclusives that come around every once in a
while.
Can an "agency" really represent equally, images held within two very
different and polarized business models and still not favor one model
and the images contained in it over the other? Do my "agencies" want
my RM images to compete for all licenses neck and neck with RF? And
do they want to evolve the RM licensing experience and perception so
that it can compete better with RF? They may say they do but I don't
think they do.
Tim McGuire
Fred Voetsch Publishing
>The question here should be: Where does my work
>realistically fit in with this new reality, and which
>companies provide the best opportunities for me,
>personally, as a photographer?
A valid question, IMO.
I find this industry unheaval exciting because I embrace change and so
I adapt well to it while other people here obviously do not have that
attitude. But I think that it's important that as a group we quit
spending so much time on RF vs RM and start dealing with how to educate
all involved, and that means dealing with reality. The reality is that
RF is not going away.
A month ago I had convinced myself that RM could do anything that RF
could do and I probably was correct but there's one little problem with
that: I can't change the rest of the world. THEY expect RF, some of
them anyways, and some expect RM and some will only buy on the cheap
and some will not consider buying cheap. It's important that I
understand why and how best to take advantage of all of this.
While some here may wish to clump all of RF together and call it crap,
it is important that we continue to place a clear dividing line on
price so that we can sell the better smelling crap at a higher price.
:-)
One RM seller stated long ago that they really don't care about iStock,
they cared about me, and he was right. Because my prices were too low
(and perhaps still are) and I was blurring the line between RF and RM.
But perhaps the answer for that person was to raise his prices and
separate from me and those like me? Maybe not, but we should consider
such things and also be realistic about what we can and can not
control. I was willing to consider his POV and it profited me but many
are not so open-minded.
When I visit a photographer's site and they are selling prints for $500
or $1,000 dollars I ASSUME that they are worth it. THINK ABOUT
THAT...they might be able to sell those prints for 1/10 that and still
make a nice profit but by simply raising their prices, offering a few
words of self-praise, a signature and wrapping it all in a good-looking
package they have completely and totally put themselves in a whole
other category from someone who sells prints for $25. They may only
sell 1/4 as many prints but the profit is greater, their commodity has
a greater perceived value and there is less work involved. Plus you can
now call yourself an artist and throw a tantrum if anyone dares
question anything about your "art". :-)
On the other hand, if you're going to ask those kinds of prices you can
not spread your work all over the internet and expect it to still have
an aura of exclusivity. You may lose marketing channels and therefore,
income, and in the long run you may end up making less money. Only the
person in control of this commodity (your photos) can make these
decisions and of course, that person should take in all considerations,
not just money but how this will effect your lifestyle and all sorts of
other things.
So for those of you coming into this business I suggest you take a
good, long look around and see what is what. Jumping in and swimming
upstream is much harder than jumping in upstream in the first place. I
jumped in in the middle and am swimming upstream and it's working out
for me but it would be much easier if I had jumped in a bit farther
upstream. But then, I like to swim and enjoy a challenge.
Fred Voetsch
http://www.AcclaimImages.com/
Brian Yarvin
> under attack.
Carl:
Glad to hear it!
I really do enjoy reading his posts and am happy to see him here.
Brian Yarvin
Food Photography, Writing, and Recipes
http://www.brianyarvin.com
http://www.farmsandfoods.com
----------------------------------------------------------------------
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Ei Katsumata
wrote:
> Those who create truly unique work do well. Ordinary folk like me who
> just had a handle on technical control and a fair eye for composition
in
> the past no longer have any advantage. As Olan Mills proves daily,
> anyone can be trained to be a photographer and it takes a couple of
weeks...
This is a very good point, David. I think with the introduction of low-
cost, high quality digital cameras, the market's been flooded with
imagery in a relatively short period of time. If transparencies or
8x10 glossies were still the standard in stock media, I doubt that we
would be seeing the abundance of good imagery we are today.
Ei Katsumata
Rubens Abboud
> With the established disassociation between the effects of RF on
RM pricing,
> photographers can now do several things to improve their pricing
strategies. First and
> foremost, accept that price erosion is not a blip in the system
that was caused events that
> can be corrected, reversed, or avoided. You cannot do anything
about prices by changing
> external events, short of blowing away the Internet completely.
> http://www.danheller.com/
Dan,
My entry into stock photography is relatively recent, so my views of
RF are not jaded by the historical impact -- perceived or not -- on
general stock pricing.
After intense research, consisting primarily of reading free
Internet lists, I've come to the informed conclusion that
photographers have the collective business accumen of cement.
Cement has the advantage of being hard to ridicule.
No amount of economic theory and historical analysis will erase the
simple fact that today an RM image is priced per use, whereas an RF
image is priced per pixel.
Do you know of any software company -- even operating in an area of
intense competition -- selling their software by the byte?
Are books priced by the page? Is a 300-page business book needed to
complete an MBA priced the same as a 300-page novel?
Whenever you look at copyrightable artifacts of the economy,
intellectual property such as software and books illustrated above,
you find a reasonable correlation between the price of the
item/service and how it is used/benefit derived by the client.
It doesn't take a genius -- which explains why even I can come to
this conclusion -- to understand that the problem is not that RM
photographers think badly of RF photographers' business practices,
but rather whether RF photographers know how to practice business at
all!
Best regards,
Rubens.
http://www.TheImageNation.com
Travel stock photography
Theodoros Papageorgiou
> No amount of economic theory and historical analysis will erase the
> simple fact that today an RM image is priced per use, whereas an RF
> image is priced per pixel.
>
> Do you know of any software company -- even operating in an area of
> intense competition -- selling their software by the byte?
Hmm, software development and the software market are way more complex
and evolving than the photography market, in fact the photography
business is heavily influenced and transformed by the advances in
software.
This essay here makes some useful points on this subject and
stimulates an interesting parallelism:
http://www.webmink.net/free/Publish-ix.htm
Regards,
Theodoros
Jim Hunter
>I would have handled this by explaining the difference between stock
>and assigment and let them make up their mind.
>
>
>And in fact, Jim, go back and read YOUR OWN WORDS again, only this time
>read them from the perspective of an objective observer or an
>assignment-only photographer. The evil here can easily be seen as STOCK
>PHOTOGRAPHY itself. YOU simply wish to point the finger down the line
>at RF.
>
Fred,
This person knew very well the difference between stock and assignment photography. She was also most definitely not going to pay assignment prices. What I could not understand was that although NO stock or RF photos existed of their products, that was all they were willing to pay. It's sort of like someone who wants a large custom house built to their specifications but are only willing to PAY for a tract house.
Also, I don't see the evil here as STOCK vs. ASSIGNMENT but more as RF pricing vs. STOCK and ASSIGNMENT pricing. This has been mostly caused by RF but also by photographers who either do not value their own work or do not know the value of their own work.
There are far too many art buyers out there these days that look first to RF and not finding what they want there look to RM stock. Then, if they think the price is too high for the RM stock, they start looking for a photographer that will shoot the image they are looking for but at RF prices.
To illustrate my point, here is a quote from a recent article at pdnonline <http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/index.jsp>.
"There have been many times when we've decided to shoot a campaign that
we'd originally planned to use stock for because the stock prices were
prohibitive. As much as possible we try to use royalty-free images.
Even the art directors have been trained to seek out RF images first
before pursuing rights-managed."
I have been seeing and hearing more and more of this since the early 90s. Seems like more and more art buyers do not place ANY real value on the images they need to either sell their products or illustrate articles in their publications. From my point of view this is directly attributable to RF since it has grown more ubiquitous right along side RF.
I also do not think that the internet is to blame for constantly declining prices. Sure, the internet has made it much easier for anyone to look for images but designers and art buyers are constantly bombarded by mailers and ads in the trade publications by companies continually hyping the advantages of RF.
--
Jim Hunter
Photography
Assignment - Stock - Fine Art
6300 Prairie Sage, NW
Albuquerque, NM 87120
505-259-2411
http://www.jimhunter.com
j...@jimhunter.com
http://jimhunterphotography.blogspot.com
"The future ain't what it used to be"- Yogi Berra
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Rubens Abboud
>> Hmm, software development and the software market are way more
complex
> and evolving than the photography market,
Theodoros,
Complexity has nothing to do with it. It's all about understanding
the value your product has to your customers.
A programmer might see himself as a "software coder" and measure his
worth by the number of bug-free lines he codes in one day.
A software analyst sees himself as a "software designer", and
measures his worth by the efficiency of his designs within the
technical architecture.
The business analyst sees his worth tied to how well his solutions
meet client needs.
But the software company they work for -- and who is responsible for
marketing and selling these professionals' collective work in a
viable market -- will price their products using a completely
different measure: how much do my products benefit my clients?
This is why you as an individual pay only a hundred dollars or so
for using Microsoft's Windows, and a multi-national with 10,000
employees using the same software will pay 10,000 times more.
This is why ERP software used to help multinationals run their
businesses is priced in the millions of dollars, and the same ERP
software used by mid-sized companies to do the same thing costs
hundreds of thousands of dollars. The software is the same, but
clients and uses are not.
A stock photographer needs to identify image market needs, design
appealing images, produce and then market them. In other words, he
has to be as flexible as an entire software company.
The RF photographer is similar to a software company that sells its
product based on how much they've produced: therefore considering
only the work of the programmer.
The RM photographer prices his product similar to how software
companies price theirs today: the more you benefit from it, the more
you pay.
Microsoft has billions in the bank. Open source initiatives don't.
As a businessperson, guess which software strategy I have chosen to
mimic?
Best regards,
Rubens.
http://www.TheImageNation.com
Travel stock photography
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Sean McCormick
>Also, I don't see the evil here as STOCK vs. ASSIGNMENT but more as RF pricing vs. STOCK and ASSIGNMENT pricing. This has been mostly caused by RF but also by photographers who either do not value their own work or do not know the value of their own work.
>
>
I recently had a discussion with a prospective client here in Edmonton.
The client informed me that 'nobody charges for useage here in
Edmonton'. Apparently photographers can't 'get away with that scam any
more' because of the large library of royalty free images out there.
That's well and good, but this fellow is after light paintings of his
business equipment. This is a 24 hour hot shot delivery service and he
would like an image approximating this one...
http://www.digiteyesed.com/portfolio/images/2004/10/00022.php
...incorporating two of his trucks under star trails. I politely
declined the job because I demand control over how my images are used.
There are two other good night shooters in my area, I've already heard
from them that they told him to go climb a rope as well.
Yeah, RF is becoming a royal pain in my ass as it pops up more and more
during discussions with clients.
Sean
--
Digiteyesed Photography
http://www.digiteyesed.com/
Portraiture and fine art landscape photography.
Circle of Confusion Magazine
http://www.circleofconfusion.ca/
Hyper-focused on Canadian photography.
Fred Voetsch Publishing
>Do you know of any software company -- even operating in an area of
love to see you try here. 100 words or less, please.
All of them, but let's take Adobe:
Photoshop has a flat price like RF. And like the RF I license, you pay
extra per computer (end-user) and the license lasts forever and is
non-transferable. They do not base the price on region, how often I
will use it or how many images I will be working on daily. They do not
base the price on whether my images will be seen on the cover of Time
or the wall of my home.
Photoshop Elements, a lite version of Photoshop, sells for about 1/5
the price, much as a small version of a RF image sells for a fraction
of the price of the high res version yet is based on the full version.
OK, that was 126 words. I appologize. But I could have given many more
examples of how software is more like RF than RM.
Now come on, really challenge us this time.
Hey, how about this one:
Why is it OK to sell stock and hurt assignment photographers but it is
not OK to sell RF and hurt RM sellers?
Two words: Moral relativity. But I'll give you 100 words. :-)
Fred Voetsch
http://www.AcclaimImages.com/
Dan Heller
> When I visit a photographer's site and they are selling prints for $500
> or $1,000 dollars I ASSUME that they are worth it. THINK ABOUT
> THAT...they might be able to sell those prints for 1/10 that and still
> make a nice profit but by simply raising their prices, offering a few
> words of self-praise, a signature and wrapping it all in a good-looking
> package they have completely and totally put themselves in a whole
> other category from someone who sells prints for $25.
EXACTLY. For a longer discussion on this, see http://www.danheller.com/biz-prints
> They may only
> sell 1/4 as many prints but the profit is greater,
Actually, quite the contrary. As discussed in the article referred to above, I started out
selling at a lower price, but it wasn't until I raised my prices to astronomical levels that I
started getting a swell of orders. AND from buyers who were much easier to deal with.
While the article discusses this phenomenon (transitioning your client base from the
cheapo "tire-kickers" to the more sophisticated buyer), in the context of print sales, the
same principle applies to stock sales. What's more, I DID mention that in my previous post
on this thread: there are tiers of stock buyers as with print buyers, and although there is
some overlap beteween who buys RM and RF, the majority of buyers are either one or the
other. Granted there are more RF buyers in many market segments, that doesn't mean
there aren't enough RM buyers to justify a very good business model.
Most people who run businesses have expertise or other attributes that will allow them to
succeed more easily in one or the other, and the smart business person will recognize this
fact and direct their business accordingly. The failures will go to those who cannot see
that the market is segmented, and will be overwhelmed. Of those who try to tackle *both*
RM and RF will almost assuredly fail, or will find that they only succeed at one or the other
eventually.
Dan Heller
http://www.danheller.com/
Dan Heller
> Internet lists, I've come to the informed conclusion that
> photographers have the collective business accumen of cement.
While I must admit that I have found the photographer community to be much different in
how they perceive their own businesses to be significantly different than any other
professional in other industries, it's not really my place to portray them using such
descriptive terms. :-)
That said, the one thing about pro photographers that is also different from those I've
found in other industries, they are unique in that they work almost entirely alone in a
business model that involves the production and manufacture of a product, its marketing
and sales, and its administration. Doctros, lawyers, accountants, you name it, they all may
work alone too, but they only need to be proficient at ONE thing to achieve a degree of
success: the focus of their practice. Hence, they only do a subset of the tasks that
photographers must be good at to succeed at all. What's more, alll of the other "solo
professionals" perform a service whose value is very specific and measureable, whereas
photographers produce somethng that the client can--at best--only HOPE may work for
them. This makes it very hard for them to quantify their value like a doctor might.
What's more, photographer is perceived by non-photographers as something that isn't all
that hard, so "where's the beef?"
Because very few people have ALL the skills necessary to do all business tasks well, while
also doing well at their trained craft or service, photographers are at a disadvantage
because they are more likely to fail if they don't do those other tasks as well. (For
examples, a doctor or lawyer doesn't have to do nearly as much ongoing marketing and
sales to keep a business going as a photographer must).
In the end, photographers are the most likely to fail at their professions than the others
are.
Because of this serious disadvantage, photographers have naturally found benefit in
solidarity, and so it has become part of the culture. there is a unifying feeling among
photographers that believes that, if we all act together, we can do more than if we try to
do it alone.
This was true... before the Internet.
After the Internet, the supply-demand imbalance threw more content (photos) and people
into the industry, disrupting the modus operandi.
the articles on my site, and my posts to newsgroups like this, are more intended to be
anlytical and probing of how the photo industry maps into proven economic models and
paradigms. there are those here who have advanced degrees in such topics and do follow
along without too much trouble. Others may not. and others still react emotionally and
viscerally to my posts... sometimes, achieving nothing more than venting their piping hot
anger towards... well, there's always someone to be mad at.
Anyway, I [try] not to engage too much with the tit-for-tat jabs with those who can't carry
on civilly, but I recognize it as a fact of life for any (and every) online discussion board. (It's
been this way since my first exposure to them when I was on Compuserve in the late
1970s.) Over time, you learn to just skim those posts for a possible morsel to chew on,
but usually, there's nothing there.
Dan Heller
http://www.danheller.com/
Dan Heller
> and evolving than the photography market,
The software and photography market are as different as apples and oranges, which is
why I rarely make comparisons between them in most of my posts. that said, there are
commonalities in the economic models behind them that do map bidirectionally. Indeed,
the reference essay you showed is an excellent one. On the other hand, THE biggest
difference between the technology world and the photography world is that of "culture."
An excellent example of this is found in the game "Doom."
Doom broke new ground in the tech world by GIVING AWAY their software for free over the
Internet. You could download and play doom all you liked, no questions asked. then they
came out with the "pay-for" version, and a couple of guys in Texas made millions. Tens of
millions. Then hundreds of millions.
Here's the difference between tech people and photographers: before the Doom guys
made a single dime, everyone in the tech world saw exactly what was coming, and the
response was a quiet, "...geniuses..."
In the photography world, if someone even whispered a business strategy where a
photographer might shoot an assignment for free, or give away anything (even RF
pictures), you hear collective scream, "NOOOO!!" from the industry. And even though the
people who take this risk more often find their own careers taking off, the majority of "pro
photographers" will find any and every explanation in the world to discredit this behavior
as "bad" --bad for the photographer, bad for the industry, and bad for just about anyone
else.
(Watch, you'll see a reply to this post arguing just such a position soon enough.)
Dan Heller
http://www.danheller.com/
Quang-Tuan Luong
>
> Whenever you look at copyrightable artifacts of the economy,
> intellectual property such as software and books illustrated above,
> you find a reasonable correlation between the price of the
> item/service and how it is used/benefit derived by the client.
It depends on the price range. Photoshop costs more than Photo
Elements because it is a more complex program, which could actually be
quantified by number of bytes. But on the other hand, whether you are
a hobbyst or a top advertising photographer, you pay the same for a
copy. However, the more expensive specialty software (Oracle, Matlab,
etc...) is priced by user. So in software you see the same models as
RM/RF.
Quang-Tuan Luong
> >Do you know of any software company -- even operating in an area of
> >intense competition -- selling their software by the byte? but I would
> love to see you try here. 100 words or less, please.
>
>
> All of them, but let's take Adobe:
Not really. As mentioned in my other posting, the high-end
professional software (none of the stuff sold by Adobe would qualify
as such) is indeed licensed by usage. Examples are Oracle, most
enterprise software like SAP, scientific software such as Mathematica,
Maple, Matlab.
Sean McCormick
>In the photography world, if someone even whispered a business strategy where a
>photographer might shoot an assignment for free, or give away anything (even RF
>pictures), you hear collective scream, "NOOOO!!" from the industry. And even though the
>people who take this risk more often find their own careers taking off, the majority of "pro
>photographers" will find any and every explanation in the world to discredit this behavior
>as "bad" --bad for the photographer, bad for the industry, and bad for just about anyone
>else.
>
>
I can see being selective about what one gives away, but I'm having a
hard time seeing where the value is in giving everything away. A
musician may fill more seats at their concerts by giving away free MP3s
of their songs over the Net, but not all musicians enjoy performing
live. Speaking for myself, I'd rather go out and make the images that
interest me and get paid for them, rather than giving them away at no
charge in order to increase my credibility/marketability as an
assignment photographer. (I like sleeping in and assignment work just
screws that up for me.) Yes, the approach works for some, but I don't
think it's for me.
I won't argue that offering free samples will induce a customer to buy
-- I just ordered both of your books online. :-)
Sean
--
Digiteyesed Photography
http://www.digiteyesed.com/
Portraiture and fine art landscape photography.
Circle of Confusion Magazine
http://www.circleofconfusion.ca/
Hyper-focused on Canadian photography.
Rubens Abboud
> >Do you know of any software company -- even operating in an area
of
> >intense competition -- selling their software by the byte?
>
>
> Photoshop has a flat price like RF. And like the RF I license, you
pay
> extra per computer (end-user) and the license lasts forever and is
> non-transferable. They do not base the price on region, how often I
> will use it or how many images I will be working on daily. They do
not
> base the price on whether my images will be seen on the cover of
Time
> or the wall of my home.
Fred,
You are not looking at it from a business person's point of view.
You are looking at it as a photographer. You illustrate my
perceptions of photographer's business accumen perfectly! :-)
If Adobe Photoshop was like RF, your Photoshop v1.0 would still be
usable on current machines, you'd still be able to get support from
Adobe for it, and you'd still be able to produce images with it and
run it along all the other programs you use today. All existing
software would read .PSD v1.0 today as easily as they read CS2 .PSDs.
The software industry is entirely RM. You have a piece of paper
saying you *CAN* use v1.0 of Photoshop, but the software industry
makes sure you will have *NO* choice but pay for re-use of your "RF"
software within 3 to 5 years. Does your current computer read the
5.25" floppies with Photoshop v1.0?
Images have a much longer lifespan. Textbooks, CDs, etc... can run
the same image for ages and continue to effectively communicate.
Images don't stop "running".
> Why is it OK to sell stock and hurt assignment photographers but
it is
> not OK to sell RF and hurt RM sellers?
I am not one of those who feel that RF photographers are ruining it
for everyone else. I am one of those that feel that RF
photographers are ruining it for themselves.
While I respect everyone's choice in how they make their living --
with the possible exception of timeshare salesmen -- I do often
wonder how the RF model makes business sense to any sensible
business person with a long-term outlook!
Best regards,
Rubens.
http://www.TheImageNation.com
Travel stock photography
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Rubens Abboud
wrote:
> It depends on the price range. Photoshop costs more than Photo
> Elements because it is a more complex program, which could
actually
be
> quantified by number of bytes. But on the other hand, whether you
are
> a hobbyst or a top advertising photographer, you pay the same for a
> copy. However, the more expensive specialty software (Oracle,
Matlab,
> etc...) is priced by user. So in software you see the same models
as
> RM/RF.
Quang-Tuan,
Everything starts looking as RF when you don't look at it from a
business perspective.
You need to consider the revenue generated at sale, and the revenue
stream generated down the line. When you do this, you'll understand
that all software is RM.
When you buy Elements as a hobbyst, you indeed pay the same as a
pro.
But the design firm who uses it for their 20 employees will pay 20
times more. Furthermore, if any of these 20 employees want to use
it for their personal projects, they will pay for it again.
RF imagery is sold at the same price whether you are an individual
or a company. I can use it to hang a single print on my bathroom
wall, or it could be used by Microsoft in a multi-million dollar ad
campaign to sell their next Windows version.
Adobe knows that each version of their software has a lifespan of,
at most, three to five years. After that, you can be a hobbyst,
pro, or the Queen of England, but you won't get support for it, it
will not run on Windows XPP v10, or interface with ZippyDoo v1.0
(killer app that will be all the rage in 2009). So, it might appear
as "RF" on paper, but you, I and Adobe know that it is "RM" in
spirit.
Adobe knows that when you buy their "RF" Elements or CS2 today,
you'll need to pay for re-use in a few years time. You'll have no
choice if you want to keep using it!
RF imagery is sold once and will never again generate any revenue
from that client.
Yet, images have a much longer lifespan than software. They don't
stop communicating when a book goes into its 10th reprint.
When one sells their images as RF, they need to consider not only
the amount generated at sale, but the amounts forfeited down the
line.
Best regards,
Rubens.
http://www.TheImageNation.com
Travel stock photography
----------------------------------------------------------------------
David Kilpatrick
Sean McCormick wrote:
> Dan Heller wrote:
>
>
>>In the photography world, if someone even whispered a business strategy where a
>>photographer might shoot an assignment for free, or give away anything (even RF
>>pictures), you hear collective scream, "NOOOO!!" from the industry. And even though the
>>people who take this risk more often find their own careers taking off, the majority of "pro
>>photographers" will find any and every explanation in the world to discredit this behavior
>>as "bad" --bad for the photographer, bad for the industry, and bad for just about anyone
>>else.
>>
>>
>
> I can see being selective about what one gives away, but I'm having a
> hard time seeing where the value is in giving everything away. A
> musician may fill more seats at their concerts by giving away free MP3s
> of their songs over the Net, but not all musicians enjoy performing
> live. Speaking for myself, I'd rather go out and make the images that
> interest me and get paid for them, rather than giving them away at no
> charge in order to increase my credibility/marketability as an
> assignment photographer. (I like sleeping in and assignment work just
> screws that up for me.) Yes, the approach works for some, but I don't
> think it's for me.
>
> I won't argue that offering free samples will induce a customer to buy
> -- I just ordered both of your books online. :-)
>
Depends on what you call 'giving away'. I make a certain amount as a
musician as well as a photographer - a tiny amount if you don't count
musical instrument sales, which are worth much more to me than stock
photography. I 'give away' music in that it can be listened to free, but
it's not the same as selling a CD or doing a paid gig.
Photographers who show good hi-res images on internet are doing the same
thing - almost anyone using PBase and putting up full res files does it.
I do, to support magazine articles and provide full res downloadable
images for other photographers to judge. They are still my copyright
images, and I am giving them away, in effect.
I buy photography over internet - I research articles and features which
we eventually pay for - and unless a photographer has pretty good 'free'
viewable images, I can not begin to judge whether they will make the
mark. On the whole I avoid the tiny-image, watermarked sites or Flash
presentations because they can conceal quite mediocre real files, as I
have learned in the past.
There might be a very good reason for a photographer running a paid
image website - mini library - to allow each new client a free full res
download just to be able to see the quality involved.
David
--
www.iconpublications.com www.troubadour.uk.com
www.maxwellplace.demon.co.uk/pandemonium
Original recordings: www.soundclick.com/davidkilpatrick
Photographs: www.alamy.com
Fred Voetsch Publishing
>...but it wasn't until I raised my prices to
>started getting a swell of orders.
That's very true and was a big part of my point: selling your prints
for $20 instead of $100 or even $1,000 may be hurting your sales and it
certainly puts you in a class that you may not wish to be in and that
is something too many newbies don't have any perspective of.
But of course, once your prices get to a certain level, you will begin
losing sales (unless your work is really special) so while you may
begin losing sales you may still be making more and doing less work,
and one could argue, helping out others' by propping up prices and
leaving a vacuum beneath you.
I do think that this is a very basic premise that we should be putting
forth here on a regular basis that is much more valuable than the RF vs
RM debate: that underpricing can cost you sales and can cause long term
damage to your reputation. Selling RF will also put you in a certain
category and were I starting out fresh in this business and licensing
only my photos I would license only RM.
In fact, for most photographers who have a simple site without the
ability to instantly deliver a photo, licensing RF is a huge mistake,
no matter the pricing, since you are not even taking advantage of the
one main principle of selling RF: instant gratification.
Fred Voetsch
http://www.AcclaimImages.com
Sean McCormick
>There might be a very good reason for a photographer running a paid
>image website - mini library - to allow each new client a free full res
>download just to be able to see the quality involved.
>
>
I'm waiting to hear back from a calendar company that is interested in
this image:
http://www.digiteyesed.com/portfolio/images/2005/02/00303.php
I have made the full-rez version available for them to inspect. I have
no problem with letting a client eyeball the goods before purchasing,
but I spent too many years seeing the habits of our customers when I
worked at a dot com to ever trust the majority of them with my files.
Sad, eh?
s.
--
Digiteyesed Photography
http://www.digiteyesed.com/
Portraiture and fine art landscape photography.
Circle of Confusion Magazine
http://www.circleofconfusion.ca/
Hyper-focused on Canadian photography.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Dan Heller
> >...but it wasn't until I raised my prices to
> >astronomical levels that I
> >started getting a swell of orders.
>
> That's very true and was a big part of my point: selling your prints
> for $20 instead of $100 or even $1,000 may be hurting your sales and it
> certainly puts you in a class that you may not wish to be in and that
> is something too many newbies don't have any perspective of.
The discussion is getting out of context... your original point was that "some forms of
sales" (like prints) may do better priced higher because of the nature of that kind of sale.
And I agreed, because the overhead in doing business on a one-by-one basis (like print
sales) means that you're going to lose a lot of money if you don't price high enough to
offset the time, resources and other costs of doing business. It's particularly true (and
easier to see) in "art sales" because of the time and materials costs associated with making
a print (possibly framing it) and sending it to the buyer.
Just like in the RF vs RM models, there are corresponding models for art: the high-
volume/low-price model and the low-volume/high-price model. Most photographers
don't do the high-volume model because of the physical nature of "art" sales. Some
successful artists get to this point, and in so doing, yield revenue by virtue of quantity at
lower prices.
This has nothing to do with art "quality" or photographer's "reputation"--those are
irrelevant in either model. They are, however, important factors in an effective "marketing
strategy" (but only if the execution of that strategy is successful).
While most photographers don't have the resources to go after the high-volume/low-cost
model for art sales, they DO have those resources for the very same model in digital image
distribution, thanks to (and because of) the Internet. Enter: "royalty-free."
Indeed, you can enter the RF market pretty easily if these are your characteristics:
*) you have a huge supply of images
*) more images come in on an on-going basis
*) you don't have the infrastructure (time, manpower, resources) to deal with customers on
a one-on-one basis.
*) you DO have a CD burner and a small home office where you can take credit card
numbers and send out CDs on-demand.
Anyone in this scenario will assuredly find the RF model to be much more profitable and
easier than an RM model. Again, "quality" and "reputation" have nothing to do with either
model.
To characterize one model over another as being "bad" or "good" is not how one needs to
look at this. It's "bad" if you're not making money, and it's "good" if you are. That said, I'll
be the first to say that my problem with RF isn't that it exists or that the prices are low, it's
that the people who do it have very little sense of what price the market will bear. Most
sell these CDs for far less than what people would be willing to pay, most of the time.
What's more, making the terms of use "unlimited and unrestricted" is also unnecessary.
They could write in terms that are more restrictive and not even get anyone's attention,
frankly. (I wrote about this several days ago in one of the first messages that started this
thread.)
The only people hurt by this are those who sell RF--I don't believe it affects the rest of the
industry, as I've pointed out before. My problem is purely on the analysis side.
If you want to assign "bad/good" to the RF model because you feel it affects the rest of the
industry, then I'll just point you back to my previous posts that argue it doesn't: the
market is tiered in such a way that there are buyers at all levels. The "erosion of prices"
doesn't come from RF, it comes from the very over-supply that caused RF to exist in the
first place. Since you can't get rid of that, you're not going to get rid of RF, so it doesn't
make sense to try to "educate" photographers simplistically, like this:
> I do think that this is a very basic premise that we should be putting
> forth here on a regular basis that is much more valuable than the RF vs
> RM debate: that underpricing can cost you sales and can cause long term
> damage to your reputation.
I believe quite the opposite is true for so many reasons at so many levels, that it's hard to
put it all in a single message. I'll only mention the top-most layer: it presumes that all
photographers (and their business models) are alike, and that a single "mantra" like this
applies to everyone. As illustrated by the bullet points above for the prototype RF image
seller, different people have different skills, longer-term objectives, resources, and so on.
Therefore, trying to get someone to adopt a business model that only works within a
limited set of skills and means will fail to do the one thing you're trying to do: help the
photographer, and by extension, the industry. (The "industry" succeeds when a greater
majority of photographers achieve whatever it is their goals are, rather than having
everyone follow the same goal.)
One of the keywords you used here is "long term" -- and that's precisely why it's
important NOT to be educating emerging photographers on one-size-fits-all mantras as
you're suggesting here. Instead, it's better to map out the various classes of photo
businesses that exist, and highlight the various and DIFFERING strategies that go along
with them.
As I noted, to get into that is beyond the scope of what can go in a single posting, but
over the years, this subject has come up so often, that I've compiled all my various
postings into one, which you can read here:
http://www.danheller.com/biz-sense
To give you a sense of what that page has, I've included the table of contents:
1 Introduction (451)
2 Three Stages of Career Development (789)
3 Long-term vs. Short-term Strategies (711)
4 Assignment Evaluation Checklist (243)
4.1 Jumping in Too Soon (698)
4.2 Realistic Timeframes (339)
5 Effectiveness and Efficiency (569)
6 Sense of Self (981)
6.1 Role Models: The Risky Wildcard (689)
7 My Business Model (1186)
7.1 Caveats to My Business (458)
8 Summary (200)
(The numbers in parens are word-counts for the section.)
Dan Heller
http://www.danheller.com/
John Fowler
>Fred Voetsch Publishing <fre...@yahoo.com>
>
>I do think that this is a very basic premise that we should be putting
>forth here on a regular basis that is much more valuable than the RF vs
>RM debate: that underpricing can cost you sales and can cause long term
>damage to your reputation.
Not to mention sales, Fred.
A few years ago I was a field editor for a Canadian veterinary journal
- and covered the annual convention, especially the financial management
seminars (by far the most popular). I learned one important thing - the
time most vets raised their fees was immediately after their return from a
convention seminar. Prices up, business volume up, profits up.
John T. Fowler
Photography For Education
http://www.johnfowler.ca
http://www.StockArtists.com/JohnFowler
Howard M. Paul
you handle a situation in which a stock imaged was selected, the license sent
and then the client says,
"These are web-based electronic versions of already printed books. Each book
is being "posted" on the web in it's entirety. However, our client may not
use every single title that we have been clearing permissions for. So, when
we have confirmation that the title will be used/posted, we will pay for the
content. If a request from the client for a particular title is cancelled,
we would have to return the invoice marked "please cancel, material not
used." Payment or cancellation is being processed as quickly as possible
and we appreciate your patience."
My initial reaction is, "You rented the car. It was your choice to not
drive it
anywhere. Kindly pay as per the contract." I know it won't fly, though.
_______________________________________________________________________
Howard M. Paul (303) 829-5678 Fax: (303) 871-8356 hmp...@ecentral.com
Photography for Communication & Commerce http://howardpaul.photofolio.com
Emergency!Stock http://www.emergencystock.photofolio.com
Yesterday I learned I CAN walk backwards, photograph a forest fire
and eat a bagel (with cream cheese) at the same time!
David Barr
> client says,
>
>"These are web-based electronic versions of already printed books. Each book
>is being "posted" on the web in it's entirety. However, our client may not
>use every single title that we have been clearing permissions for. So, when
>we have confirmation that the title will be used/posted, we will pay for the
>content. If a request from the client for a particular title is cancelled,
>we would have to return the invoice marked "please cancel, material not
>used." Payment or cancellation is being processed as quickly as possible
>and we appreciate your patience."
Paul you could tell the client that electronic versions of already
printed books have a special rate for web versions of the same book
and that in order to license the pictures at this rate all pictures
that were in the original are therefore available for the web version
and must be licensed even if they do not choose to use them on the
web.
Reuse of the images for web version of a book where the client will
pick only a small selection of the original images will be invoiced
at a higher web use rate.
David Barr
--
Photobar Agricultural Stock Photography
Simplify your Search http://www.photobar.com
http://www.photobar.com On line catalogue
http://www.stockartistsalliance.com SAA member
http://www.cama.org/ CAMA member
Dan Heller
> My initial reaction is, "You rented the car. It was your choice to not
> drive it
> anywhere. Kindly pay as per the contract." I know it won't fly, though.
I started a new policy last summer where I do not deliver an image before it's paid for.
However, it sounds like your situation is where the image WAS used for a print version, but
they are extending their use to a new medium. In this case, it seems to me that they
haven't licensed the image for that new use yet, which means that they are perfectly within
their rights to say exactly what they said. However, if they have NOT yet used the image,
but licensed it from you with the INTENT to use it as you described, then you're right on
both counts: 1) they have to pay you, and 2) they probably won't.
I should point out that my policy shift from invoicing to "pay up front" is not necessarily
something I recommend to a wide audience. I wouldn't have gotten away with it in the
past, but I was only able to do so now because of this analysis: I don't have problems with
sales at all, but collecting on unpaid invoices is a huge time drain. What clients I may have
potentially lost by not allowing images to go out before payment received has been made
up for by the increase in productivity time gained, and by the fact that I'm not starving for
clients. Readers need to weigh their own particular circumstances carefully before
following such a model. (In other words, I would still recommend taking such business if
your revenue stream is still light enough that this added revenue is worthwhile.)
Dan Heller
http://www.danheller.com/
Tim McGuire
wrote:
In my limited experience with licensing stock I'd say that this seems
reasonable on the clients part. Why should they pay for something
they are not going to use. IMHO, if you make this a sticky situation
and push the client on this just because you already sent an invoice
the next time they put a book together they may look for RF to avoid
these RM "hassles". RM licensing is based on use.
My 2 cents.
Tim McGuire
> While I know this varies greatly between stock and assignment, how
do most of
> you handle a situation in which a stock imaged was selected, the
license sent
> and then the client says,
>
> "These are web-based electronic versions of already printed books.
Each book
> is being "posted" on the web in it's entirety. However, our client
may not
> use every single title that we have been clearing permissions for.
So, when
> we have confirmation that the title will be used/posted, we will
pay for the
> content. If a request from the client for a particular title is
cancelled,
> we would have to return the invoice marked "please cancel, material
not
> used." Payment or cancellation is being processed as quickly as
possible
> and we appreciate your patience."
>
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Darren Wisdom
Depends on the length of time taken for your client to come to a decision
and of course your relationship with that client. Over 30 days from date of
invoice; insist on payment in full. Otherwise suggest that you charge a
cancellation fee for canceling your invoice and raising a credit note.
Best regards,
Darren Wisdom
zefa images UK Ltd
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-----Original Message-----
From: STOCK...@yahoogroups.com [mailto:STOCK...@yahoogroups.com] On
Behalf Of Howard M. Paul
Sent: 06 June 2005 16:32
To: STOCK...@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [STOCKPHOTO] "Not used, please cancel"
While I know this varies greatly between stock and assignment, how do most
of
you handle a situation in which a stock imaged was selected, the license
sent
and then the client says,
"These are web-based electronic versions of already printed books. Each
book
is being "posted" on the web in it's entirety. However, our client may not
use every single title that we have been clearing permissions for. So, when
we have confirmation that the title will be used/posted, we will pay for the
content. If a request from the client for a particular title is cancelled,
we would have to return the invoice marked "please cancel, material not
used." Payment or cancellation is being processed as quickly as possible
and we appreciate your patience."
My initial reaction is, "You rented the car. It was your choice to not
drive it
anywhere. Kindly pay as per the contract." I know it won't fly, though.
_______________________________________________________________________
Howard M. Paul (303) 829-5678 Fax: (303) 871-8356
hmp...@ecentral.com
Photography for Communication & Commerce http://howardpaul.photofolio.com
Emergency!Stock http://www.emergencystock.photofolio.com
Yesterday I learned I CAN walk backwards, photograph a forest fire
and eat a bagel (with cream cheese) at the same
time!
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Courtesy of The STOCKPHOTO Network - http://www.stockphoto.net/
Posting Rules - http://www.stockphoto.net/Subscriptions.cfm#rules
STOCKPHOTO Archives - http://www.stockphoto.net/Archives.cfm
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----------------------------------------------------------------------
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STOCKPHOTO-...@yahoogroups.com
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Fred Voetsch Publishing
>Indeed, you can enter the RF market pretty easily if these are your
>characteristics:
>*) you have a huge supply of images
>*) more images come in on an on-going basis
>*) you don't have the infrastructure (time, manpower, resources) to
>deal with customers on
>a one-on-one basis.
>*) you DO have a CD burner and a small home office where you can take
>credit card
>numbers and send out CDs on-demand.
>Anyone in this scenario will assuredly find the RF model to be much
>more profitable and
>easier than an RM model. Again, "quality" and "reputation" have
>nothing to do with either
>model.
As someone who reviews as many as a dozen submissions a day from
photographers I can assure you that "quality" and "reputation" ARE
effected by how you license your images and with whom.
And you can enter the RM market just as easily by buying a book or two
and provide yourself a lot more protection, legally speaking. And I
believe you would generate more income licensing RM. Several things
would effect this: You would charge more in many cases; you would be
seen by buyers as worth more and have a more professional presence by
offering a quality site with RM images; they would be more likely to
return because of your more professional presence.
I believe that RF has a place but it is not the place to be for someone
coming into this industry with their own site. I did that and can say
that I would be in a better position had I started licensing RM. My
experience now shows me that people do not balk at licensing RM images
nearly as much as I thought they might. It also tells me that RM is
nothing to be afraid of.
I also question your statement that "Anyone in this scenario will
assuredly find the RF model to be much more profitable". Upon what do
you base that aside from your own experience and can you directly
compare the RF experience with a RM experience of equal potential?
I am an optimist and like to suggest to people that "I have done it so
you can too" but that doesn't mean that it is the best way to go for
most. I would say that both you and I are exceptions in being people
who make a living in this business selling RF without relying on a
major agency.
I see no photographers at all who seem to be succesful in this business
with *their own* RF sites. I see many of them with RM or mixed
licensing sites. Perhaps we could solicit some feedback here?
Fred Voetsch
http://www.AcclaimImages.com
Dan Heller
> photographers I can assure you that "quality" and "reputation" ARE
> effected by how you license your images and with whom.
that may be, but I, as someone who does market analysis of the broader market, not
necessarily the anecdotal data like yours, can confirm that "quality" and "reputation" are
very low on most buyer's minds. They see a picture that they think suits their needs, and if
it meets their budget, they buy it.
Now, again, I'm talking about the broader market as a whole. Not specific, narrow market
segments. YES, it's true that some buyers like quality. and YES, it's true that the better a
photographer's images, the better he'll likely do with them. And YES, it's true that
reputation says a lot for how well you do within particular market segments, especially
those where competition is hotter and "name sells." (Indeed, I talk about this at length in
my marketing article, http://www.danheller.com/biz-marketing)
However, all of these pale in comparison to the larger market opportunities, which is big
enough for anyone with a much lower bar of "quality" to yield some appreciable income.
> And you can enter the RM market just as easily by buying a book or two
I have no dispute at all that the RM market is far easier to get into than what most RF
sellers think. I also stated that it's far more profitable than what most RF sellers thing. It's
true that RF sellers are just simply short-sighted in what their real opportunities are. In my
mind, RF doesn't "need" to exist for the people that do it. If those same people knew what
the market opportunities were like and the true nature of buyers, it's not a far step to
mosey on over the grey line to the RM model and still do quite well. (Indeed, an RF seller
could even maintain his distribution model.) But this strays from the real point. You're
saying that an RF model "shouldn't" exist, and that's silly--it will exist simply because it
"can." The number of players in the market are too great to do anything about it. And,
fortunately, the types of markets they penetrate are limited enough that RM sellers needn't
worry about it. The only people tht RF hurts are themselves. Whether RF exists or not, the
market conditions (oversupply) is such that RM people still have to be better at negotiating
around a client's tough-pricing policy. Granted that's not easy for everyone, but it's a skill
that is necessary to survive in today's field.
> I also question your statement that "Anyone in this scenario will
> assuredly find the RF model to be much more profitable".
The conditions I pointed out were very specific, and I need not renumerate them now. the
point to that list was that they described skills (and lack thereof) that would not make
them good candidates for selling RM.
> Upon what do
> you base that aside from your own experience and can you directly
> compare the RF experience with a RM experience of equal potential?
If you're not good enough at negotiating where you can figure out how to justify your
prices, you're better in RF. If you don't spread your revenue income across a number of
different activites, you're better in RF. If you don't have the people skills to develop new
relationships, you're better at RF. If you are really good at quickly generating hundreds or
thousands of images and very little of anything else, you're good for RF.
Dan Heller
http://www.danheller.com
Steve Smith
--- Fred Voetsch Publishing <fre...@yahoo.com> wrote:
.
>
> I believe that RF has a place but it is not the
> place to be for someone
> coming into this industry with their own site. I did
> that and can say
> that I would be in a better position had I started
> licensing RM.
Fred,
Can you honestly say that Acclaim would have been more
successful if you had started with RM? I don't think
so... previous posts you've talked about how Acclaim
got where it was because of your masterful command of
SEO, amongst other things. Something you do deserve
credit for, by the way. You and I have both stated
that web buyers look for instant gratification, which
they don't get with RM.
You don't seem like the kind of guy who's content to
build the business over many years. You're on an
aggressive curve and you don't hide that fact.
Starting as a humble RM supplier would not have gotten
you to where you are today, but building your business
and customer base using RF has now allowed you to take
that leap into a more sophisticated model. The rest
(better, more sophisticated images, customer service,
etc) have come later and now you have hit a point
where you feel the business is sufficiently mature to
take the bold move into RM (in addition to RF). Am I
right so far?
I am of the belief that RM buyers buy mostly based on
a relationship, whereas RF buyers buy mostly based on
convenience and price. A business should only
entertain getting into RM when they are mature enough,
have a good existing customer base and are willing to
dedicate countless hours to building relationships
with customers.
Cheers,
Steve
Steve Smith
World of Stock
http://www.worldofstock.com
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Steve Castle
Does your client wear the cost of printed versions of the book that
were not sold? You have been paid for images in those unsold printed
books. If it is posted on the web, then the same rules must apply.
You should be paid for the images.
Steve
Quang-Tuan Luong
> Indeed, you can enter the RF market pretty easily if these are your
characteristics:
>
> *) you have a huge supply of images
> *) more images come in on an on-going basis
> *) you don't have the infrastructure (time, manpower, resources) to
deal with customers on
> a one-on-one basis.
> *) you DO have a CD burner and a small home office where you can
take credit card
> numbers and send out CDs on-demand.
>
> Anyone in this scenario will assuredly find the RF model to be much
more profitable and
> easier than an RM model.
This is quite a strong assertion. I'd be interested in knowing how you
came to that conclusion, especially since you're not a RF seller
yourself as far as I can tell.
For instance, I don't see for example why you need more infrastructure
to deal with RM licenses than by sending *on-demand* CDs. It is true
that RF is slightly easier to automate than RM, but if you have the
desire to automate, the work of getting an automated price calculator
running up is trivial compared to the work needed to attract the
traffic needed for a RM or RF-based site to be viable.
Quang-Tuan Luong
do most of
> you handle a situation in which a stock imaged was selected, the
license sent
> and then the client says,
>
> "These are web-based electronic versions of already printed books.
Each book
> is being "posted" on the web in it's entirety. However, our client
may not
> use every single title that we have been clearing permissions for.
So, when
> we have confirmation that the title will be used/posted, we will pay
for the
> content. If a request from the client for a particular title is
cancelled,
> we would have to return the invoice marked "please cancel, material not
> used." Payment or cancellation is being processed as quickly as
possible
> and we appreciate your patience."
>
> My initial reaction is, "You rented the car. It was your choice to not
> drive it
> anywhere. Kindly pay as per the contract." I know it won't fly,
though.
Since they are upfront about it, it's similar to someone asking you
for a hi-res comp. I'd charge them a small fee, similar to the fee for
making available a hi-res comp. This is covered in my big catch-all
contract as:
"I. Default: [...] Once the image has been transmitted, refund and
exchange are subjected to a research and processing fee of at least US
$75. After forty-five (45) days, no refunds will be issued."
Fred Voetsch Publishing
them to accept a credit first.
I would think that the fact that they already paid their bill is an
extra reason to trust them and refund the amount. Just because we have
the money in our hands is no reason for our way of doing business to
change.
Fred Voetsch
http://www.AcclaimImages.com
Dan Heller
> For instance, I don't see for example why you need more infrastructure
> to deal with RM licenses than by sending *on-demand* CDs. It is true
> that RF is slightly easier to automate than RM, but if you have the
> desire to automate, the work of getting an automated price calculator
> running up is trivial compared to the work needed to attract the
> traffic needed for a RM or RF-based site to be viable.
The only problem people have with RF is the low prices--they don't
have a problem with the distribution. That is, who would complain if
someone sold an RF disk with 300 images, and each image cost
$1000/each? There may be some, but there would be a lot fewer people
saying, "my client won't license my image for $500 because he can get
the same thing from an RF disc for $30,000." So, let's be clear: the
only issue people have about RF is the PRICE, not the terms of use or
the distribution.
So, why the low price?
Simple: high volume... or, that's the GOAL of RF. (Not all who sell RF
are successful at it, but that's their goal, nonetheless. In fact, the
main faulty assumption with most who sell RF is that the market for RF
is bigger than it really is. But I digress....)
To get higher volume, an individual must spend less time on each sale
(since there is a finite amount of time available in a day). To spend
less time on each sale, one has to have "flat" pricing--or,
non-negotiable pricing--because that requires time...and there is a
finite supply of that.
"Automated pricing" is the only way to make money in volume sales.
One can do automated pricing in both RF and RM. In RF, it's about
flat-rate pricing for an image or number of iamges, and in RM, it's a
price calculator. Either way, neither will achieve VOLUME sales unless
prices are low enough to appeal to a mass audience.
To keep prices higher, one needs to either take the time to negotiate,
build relationships, or participate in these AND other time-consuming
activities and services to justify the higher price. You don't just
get it because you "stuck to your guns"--that is a naive and faulty
assumption. It's a good "negotiating tactic", but it's negotiation,
and that requires time per sale. (See longer analysis on fotoquote and
other pricing calculators here:
http://www.danheller.com/biz-pricing.html )
It is unreasonable to assume that an RM model can possibly work for a
single, independent photographer that does NOT negotiate. The only
ways one can make money in RM without negotiation include:
1) sets prices so low, that no one needs a one-on-one price negotiation.
2) photog has a well-established and returning client list that he can
depend on.
3) He has many alternative revenue streams for his images (multiple
agencies, distribution channels, etc.)
4) He is already well-known in a niche market segment that he can
create his own micro-climate of economic activity (such as fashion and
sports photographers).
For an individual to make a successful RM-based business in the
"general stock photography market," he must take the time to negotiate
prices, or lower his prices to compete in the over-supplied marketplace.
Summary: RF is a by-procuct of oversupply. Oversupply is the blame for
lower prices. Lower prices can exist in RM as much as RF. Blaming RF
for lower prices is like blaming death on a "fever" when the patient
really had pneumonia. The fever wouldn't exist unless a more dire
fundamental problem was there. Seeing photographers blaming RF for any
sort of market condition is just as simple-minded. Since you can't
stop oversupply, there is absolutely no benefit to having any kind of
discussion on why RF is bad, attempts to dissuade photographers from
participating in it, or much of anything else.
The only real value in discussing RF is when you're addressing those
characteristics where certain photographers might do better in it (and
what they would have to do) than in the RM market.
Dan Heller
http://www.danheller.com/
Tim McGuire
> have a problem with the distribution.
Hi Dan,
I think a lot of people have a problem with the overly generous
licenses granted by most all RF distributors / producers. Those overly
generous licenses can't help but dilute the future market for RF and
other licensing models. If the past RM licensing model has taught us
anything it should have taught us that clients will use the same
picture over and over for years. They used to pay for each additional
use and now with RF they don't have to. Is that an improvement in
licensing models? From a clients perspective it is but from the supply
side I don't believe it is. RF took the money that was "on the table"
and gave it back to the clients. Clients now spend that money
elsewhere.
Price based on file size is another problem with RF. It simply makes
no sense. If it's a feable attempt at getting more money for a larger
use it was a poorly thought out design for a business model. You don't
need big files for all large uses.
As for distribution, maybe RM could learn a few things from RF...
Tim McGuire
David Barr
>
>I think a lot of people have a problem with the overly generous
>licenses granted by most all RF distributors / producers. Those overly
>generous licenses can't help but dilute the future market for RF and
>other licensing models.
Tim I just had a request for pictures that I couldn't fill, not
because I didn't have the pictures but because I won't license on the
clients terms. Following is part of the email I received from the ad
agency.
" They (the agencies client) are trying to build their image library
also, so having them on-hand to use whenever needed is a plus.
Sometimes clients don't understand why they cant use the same image
from a brochure in a mailer or sell sheet without paying extra.
Educating clients about photography rights is tricky at times. It's
also hard to track which images can be used and cannot be used."
This is what the ad agency tells me but I wonder if the ad agency is
really telling the whole truth! Does the client only get offered
pictures that the ad agency can add to "their" library and continue
to license to "their" client at no additional cost to them.
The ad agency told me that they get their pictures from Fotosearch
and Getty One and usually pay $200-400 per picture RF. Out of
curiosity I did a search on both of these agencies web sites for
"chicken farming" , "dairy farming" and "pig farming" the subjects
that they were requesting from me. I could find very little on any
of these three searches that I think would be suitable for use in an
animal feed brochure, RF or RM.
Based on a quantity of images they wanted I could even match their
price and I invite anyone in the group to compare Fotosearch and
Getty One images on these subjects with those on my web site! The
only reason I couldn't fill the request was they were expecting one
time fee to use the pictures forever.
Although some people will purchase RF and use it only once I think
that many ad agencies and companies are building libraries of images
and in the long run this can't be good for the industry.
David Barr
--
Photobar Agricultural Stock Photography
Simplify your Search http://www.photobar.com
http://www.photobar.com On line catalogue
http://www.stockartistsalliance.com SAA member
http://www.cama.org/ CAMA member
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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Tim McGuire
>
> I think a lot of people have a problem with the overly generous
> licenses granted by most all RF distributors / producers. Those
overly
> generous licenses can't help but dilute the future market for RF and
> other licensing models. If the past RM licensing model has taught us
> anything it should have taught us that clients will use the same
> picture over and over for years. They used to pay for each
additional
> use and now with RF they don't have to. Is that an improvement in
> licensing models?
Sorry, I should refrain from sarcasm on this forum. The question I
posed above was sarcastic. Of course it's NOT an improvement. It's a
huge step backward IMHO.
At the same time,as a proponent of the "price based on use" business
model (RM) I will not bury my head in the sand and hope RF goes away.
RM must evolve to compete in the market place or it will, for the most
part, be relegated to a very small segment of the market which it once
dominated (IMHO).
If you read Jim Pickerel's Selling Stock newsletter take a look at the
part about a new RM licensing model in the latest instalment (story
734). I think it is a great idea who's time is way past due!
Stockphoto Seller
With a generalization like this, one wonders if you have been paying attention at all to the developments with RF and the impacts it has had on the stock photography marketplace over the past ten years. RF, as has been discussed on this list ad infinitum, has had major impacts on pricing structure (not just the prices themselves), licensing structure, forms of photo usage, the rush to digitization, and a redefinition of levels of acceptable quality for various kind of usage. These impacts ramify throughout operational procedures and business practices in stock photography. And, yes, the forms of distribution come into play, especially since RF CD and instant download methods usually result in a loss of image control by the copyright holder.
Carl May/BPS
Dan Heller <ar...@danheller.com> wrote:
The only problem people have with RF is the low prices--they don't
have a problem with the distribution.
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Stockphoto Seller
The reuse issue is huge with us, as well. Without reuse fees, our agency is out of business. Anyone who does not know the salience of this issue is simply not aware of the many kinds of reuse sales in both commercial and editorial stock.
But your farming examples raise another issue with RF, namely the erosion of standards for acceptability and quality. The insistence on RF in order to build in-house photo libraries, avoid reuse fees, cut down on the cost of clearing rights for reuses, etc., drives down what some clients are willing to use for images. So instead of an expertly created photo of farming for the kinds of animals mentioned, a portrait of a chicken, dairy cow, or pig will do as far as they are concerned. I'm sure you bump into photo researchers and photo editors regularly who don't know the difference between an image that is spot on for the subject matter and a photo that only alludes to the subject matter. I know we do, and we see it prominently at places where the photo staff is hired for computer literacy or for bean counting more than visual literacy.
Carl May/BPS
David Barr <phot...@PHOTOBAR.COM> wrote:
The ad agency told me that they get their pictures from Fotosearch
and Getty One and usually pay $200-400 per picture RF. Out of
curiosity I did a search on both of these agencies web sites for
"chicken farming" , "dairy farming" and "pig farming" the subjects
that they were requesting from me. I could find very little on any
of these three searches that I think would be suitable for use in an
animal feed brochure, RF or RM.
David Barr
>regularly who don't know the difference between an image that is
>spot on for the subject matter and a photo that only alludes to the
>subject matter. I know we do, and we see it prominently at places
>where the photo staff is hired for computer literacy or for bean
>counting more than visual literacy.
>
>Carl May/BPS
This is one of the advantages of dealing with a niche agency. It is
not just a question of pictures that might come close to filling the
request, the agency or photographer can give input to help in the
selection of the most appropriate image. I just received another
email from the ad agency to say they did not use a Getty One or
Fotosearch for this most recent request as their pictures were I
quote "a little outdated" . The images they did get were for
unlimited use and they paid $250 each.
It is this building of a library that is most harmful to both the
industry and in the long run to the clients. Ultimately everyone
has a library, the same images will appear in many libraries. It
takes many years to build a comprehensive library on any subject and
it is an ongoing process. Assembling a small collection of pictures
that can be used over and over again might be convenient but it is
unlikely that this is the best way to ensure that a company will have
the most appropriate pictures. It is also not in the best interest
of the clients to have images supplied in this manner as fewer
people willing to make a career out of stock shooting.
Selection of a picture can make a huge difference to the success of a
project. If a company is paying someone to create a brochure, trade
show display or adverts to promote their products or services why
save what might amount to 10 or 15% on the project and perhaps
reduce the effectiveness of the promotion.
David Barr
--
Photobar Agricultural Stock Photography
Simplify your Search http://www.photobar.com
http://www.photobar.com On line catalogue
http://www.stockartistsalliance.com SAA member
http://www.cama.org/ CAMA member
Thomas Hallstein
collections with RF images are, I'm sure, charging a "photography fee" either
directly or indirectly to each client's project that uses one of these in-house
collection photos. It ain't pretty...
Best to All,
Tom
^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^
Thomas Hallstein
Outsight Photography
Santa Rosa, CA USA
http://www.outsight.com
i l l u s t r a t i o n t o i n s p i r a t i o n
^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^~^
Stockphoto Seller
One tack in pushing the evolution of the marketplace beyond routine, machine-run stock photography might be to give extra effort to working with those clients who try to beat their competition by turning out something better. The principle would be expected to work with both commercial and editorial. I have been trying this approach with the textbook photo researchers who still wish to interact with their photo suppliers and it has some appeal. But it is going to take some breakthroughs, some books "known" and outselling the competition because of their photographs (which, as numerous as they are, are only a minor portion of textbooks and will need to be in books equal or superior in other ways as well).
Carl May/BPS
David Barr <phot...@PHOTOBAR.COM> wrote:
Selection of a picture can make a huge difference to the success of a
project. If a company is paying someone to create a brochure, trade
show display or adverts to promote their products or services why
save what might amount to 10 or 15% on the project and perhaps
reduce the effectiveness of the promotion.
David Barr
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