Free Software For Selling Photos Online
Shutterstock
Shutterstock introduces single image sales
Oct 1st
Shutterstock, who came to the microstock market as a first agency to offer microstock subscriptions, joins iStock, Fotolia and Dreamstime by offering single images sales. The recent announcement on Shutterbuzz states that current royalty rates for subscription-based packages are not going to change. As per the new product which ‘is being tested in the certain markets’ the planned royalty rates are based on the contributor’s life-time earnings on Shutterstock:
- up to $500 – 20% payout rate
- $500 – $3,000 – 25%
- $3,000 – $10,000 – 28%
- over $10,000 – 30%
Shutterstock is an owner of BigStockPhoto.com, re-branded as BIGSTOCK sometime ago. BIGSTOCK, which deploys a traditional credits-based microstock model, was purchased by Shutterstock to complete their subscriptions offering. For the last few months in addition to the credits packages BIGSTOCK also offers immediate purchase of a single image. The single download prices start from $2.99.
BIGSTOCK single image sales
It looks like Shutterstock was closely following BIGSTOCK in this initiative and now they are doing a similar move.
All in all this is good news for the microstock artists. I believe that the contributors like me will be happy to increase their earnings effortlessly, by selling the same microstock collection on Shutterstock in a different way, so let’s wish Shutterstock good luck with their new baby.
Sell photos with LightBurner.com – new FREE online microstock content distribution service
Dec 8th
I am glad to invite you to try LightBurner Beta, our new free microstock content distribution and analytical service.
LightBurner customers can submit images to the following pre-integrated microstock photography agencies:
Microstock Photography Agencies Supported by LightBurner
Also you can define unlimited Custom FTP Channels, delivering your images wherever you want to, for instance your blog’ FTP server or your backup FTP site.
I plan to have at least 20-25 pre-integrated microstocks supported in December yet. Your suggestions for more destination are warmly welcome.
LightBurner Portfolio
The famous keywords suggestions + translations, first introduced in ProStockMaster in 2006 (wow, 4 years ago – who can believe it), is now a part of LightBurner too.
Other interesting features include built-in search in your portfolio, Similar Media area, cataloging by Lightboxes, Folders and Categories, notes on images and sales balance for each channel. Of course, LightBurner reads IPTC for any uploaded JPEG, so you get your files with all the metadata – searchable and cataloged, at your fingertips.
Easy Multilingual Keywording With Auto-Suggestion
The service is still far from being completed, however I believe that existing functions work quite well and have a great value to any microstock contributor. More agencies and more features will come in the next weeks. Without getting into the details, you can expect nice surprises in your LightBurner account.
How to get started
- register for a free account. In a few moments you will get a Welcome email with your credentials, including SFTP access.
- upload your files by SFTP (FileZilla will do)
- login and go to My Account -> My Portfolio -> Channels/Edit and select your sales channels / agencies
- select what files go where. Multiple options available, including “Assign” X files to Y channels, “Edit” of multiple files or simple drag-n-drop a file to a channel
Actually, that’s it. The distribution is automatic, so you do not have to do a thing.
Photos Sales Statistics
Your files statuses are updated accordingly: red square (undistributed) is replaced by yellow (partially distributed) and then by green (fully distributed). You will have to hit Refresh from time to time to see these statuses changes.
A few notes:
- All the original uploaded files are removed after 3 days
- Shutterstock delivery is over FTP, stats / balance can not be displayed due to submitters accounts blocking with a captcha
- At the moment LightBurner supports JPEGs only, no other formats and no model releases
- Later on ProStockMaster will work directly with your LightBurner account, thus saving you traffic, costs and time by uploading media just once
- The last but not the least: bugs happen. Please be patient, and report them! Contact: support(at)pixamba.com, david(at)pixamba.com or via LightBurner’ online form
FTP uploads to any microstock and stock photography agency by replacing Shutterstock
Nov 19th
Did you know that if you do not work with Shutterstock microsotck agency you can use “Shutterstock FTP” credentials uploading to any FTP-enabled stock photography agency instead?
Just keep in mind that what is shown as “Shutterstock” in PSM microstock software is in fact your trusted “ABC” stock photos agency.
Doing that is simple: go to “Upload->Stock Agencies->Shutterstock” and replace Shutterstock FTP server name with the name of the FTP server for “ABC” stock photography site, adding your FTP credentials for that stock imagery agency or stock content distributor.
From now on, each time you upload to “Shutterstock” the file actually goes to “ABC-stock”.
Uploads to Shutterstock microstock agency switched to FTP
Nov 19th
Please note that PSM requests the application restart after the auto-upgrade. When you get “please restart now” message always shown after the updates download please restart the app!. The application won’t work properly until you restart it.
If anyway the things seem to go wrong after the auto upgrate please download and install the full archive. Auto-upgrade is always incremental and it can not guarantee the binaries consistency if you missed a few previous updates. That’s why we always recommend upgrading to the latest available PSM release.
Mac only: if you choose to install the full archive to get the upgrade, be sure to select “Connect to the existing DB” at the first run of your new PSM copy and point to the folder containing your existing ProStockMaster_DB. Do not delete your previous PSM installation until you are sure that everything works as expected.
New in this release:
1. Uploads to Shutterstock microstock web site are switched to FTP. Go to “Upload->Stock Agencies” to change your credentials.
The FTP server name is already filled in for you by the app. Your FTP user name is your email address, which is on file with Shutterstock and the password is your regular Shutterstock web site password. Since the connection to Shutterstock is now via FTP only, your stock photos sales stats for this site can not be displayed anymore.
2. “Export Metadata” dialog added in “File->Export Metadata” menu. It creates a CSV file with JPG IPTC metadata and a few more file parameters for all JPGs in a specified folder. Optionally, it works recursively on all the subfolders of the specified folder. You probably remember this free JPG IPTC metadata dump utility? Now it is an integral part of PSM, available for free with any license. Just open “File->Export Metadata” menu and select a folder to be exported.
3. Fixed an annoying bug causing thumbnails not to be displayed in many cases.
I am sure you faced it at least once – you start PSM, open a folder and there are no thumbnails, just the file names with ‘…’ are displayed. Well, not anymore.
The app still needs some time to draw the thumbnails at the first access, but once the initial processing is done you get all the graphics instantly.
4. EXIF reading is back.
EXIF decided to leave PSM for a few weeks. Now it is back at its full.
5. Manage metadata – copying data between images: verified & OK. Also the dialog will close now when a user press OK in the “applied” confirmation message.
6. Alamy uploads: only one image can be uploaded. The issue is still there.
A quick check shows that the same is correct for Alamay uploads from their web either with their Java applet or with Alamy ActiveX control. Seems to be a problem with their web server. More info…
7. Minor fixes & updates for performance and graphics, here and there
Keyphrases handling by various stock photo agencies
Mar 8th
So here is the trick that Terry pointed me out a few months ago and Jorgen confirmed the same issue for some more agencies:
IPTC keyphrases interpreting differs between various stock agencies.
It means that if you index your image with a keyphrase like blue water, it will be retrieved OK from IPTC data on e.g. iStockphoto, but will become two keywords blue and water on e.g. Shutterstock. If you will try another trick by doble-qouting your keyphrase (note that PSM is a rare applications which allows you doing that without any problem) and your original keyphrase becomes to be “blue water”, Shutterstock will show it correctly as a blue water keyphrase, but iStockphoto will not show it at all (BTW, why is that iStockphoto.com?)
FIXED – Uploads to ShutterStock fail
Mar 16th
UPDATE: The issue is fixed. The new version 1.2.2 is available for download. You can upgrade your software by following the upgrade notes listed here: http://www.prostockmaster.com/upgrade.htm
I also fixed a minor issue with some gibberish which was sometimes inserted in the generated keywords list and made the version update verification procedure a bit more reliable.
In short, get the new version and enjoy!
-David
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Due to the recent changes at ShutterStock web site there is a new issue with ShutterStock uploads. At the moment the files uploaded with ProStockMaster do not appear on the web site, so please do not upload your work to ShutterStock until the fix is available.
This issue will be fixed during the next few days. Hope the update version will be ready for download before the weekend. Those of you who use version 1.2.1 will be informed automatically on ProStockMaster’ start that the new update is available. If you have an older version please go to “Help->Software Updates…” menu and verify periodically if the update is already available.
I am negotiating with the few sites to establish and use a dedicated stable API that will eliminate such unpleasant situations in the future (some of them already have such API). As usual, these things take time. Sorry for any inconvenience and thank you for your patience and understanding
Mac package update
Sep 23rd
The Mac packaging is updated!
Now Mac version is packaged with native Mac bundler and finally ProStockMaster on Mac is delivered and installed like any other native Mac application.
I like Mac look & feel: http://www.prostockmaster.com/images/mac_main_screen.jpg – really cool Mac-native GUI.
