Isolated wheat spike series

You can buy the entire series at iStockPhoto. If you are not an iStockphoto member, then I have made a small selection from the collection for my other agencies that you can select from on the bottom of this page.

I took the shot of my most successful photo series in last july. These photos are shot with several different techniques. Starting from the basic ones when the spikes are lieing on a white sheet, or with using a white wall while holding a boquet. Finally this series also holds a more creative shot where I have achieved isolation of the boquet by stabbing the spikes through the white sheet, so I can take a shot from above without having to think about how to hold the spikes standing during the shot.

The series presents the wheat spikes in various situations. First we can see several spikes in parallel and crossing positions, then we can see the spikes in boquets from different views points. There are some boquets that are isolated on white without any further decoration, however I have made several shots with our blue vases and spring decorations. Earlier, I have found out the scattered particles around the theme of the photo can be more attractive to the buyers. Therefore I have made some wheat spike shots that are laid among scattered wheat seeds, and with no surprise these are my most successful wheat spike shots.

My selection from Shutterstock:

• Wheat spike with seeds
• Bunch of wheat spikes
• Three wheat spikes with seeds
  

My selection from Dreamstime:

• Wheat spike with seeds
• Bunch of wheat spikes
• Three wheat spikes
  

My selection from Fotolia:

• Overhead view of wheat spike boquet
• Five diagonal wheat spikes
• Bunch of wheat spikes in a laid blue vase
  

Puszedli series

You can buy the entire series at iStockPhoto. If you are not an iStockphoto member, then I have made a small selection from the collection for my other agencies that you can select from on the bottom of this page.

Mezes puszedli is one of my favourite desserts, so it was obvious that I was useing this kind of cookies in my first real photo series. Since I did not found any meaningful translation for the name of the cookie I have come up with the name honey biscuit. This series were shot in my early days, I have tried to make shots of as many cookies I could stand not to eat while shooting. The biggest amount had gone to my favourite puszedli pyramid shots - unfortunately my buyers don't like it that much.

The series features the mezes puszedli in several situations all isolated on white. First it offers single cookies on white background. I have two color variations of the cookies: one with honey only and the other one with cocoa flavouring. These color variations offered my to play with different layouts and patterns, so the next kind of shots are offering nine multi colored cookies shot from above. Then I have moved towards the pyramid structure. The shoot includes side, diagonal and top views on the cookie pyramid. Each setup have alternate versions because I shot them with different coloring. Finally I have put the cookies in use and shot several photos about their everyday use on tea time or just as you would bite them.


My selection from Shutterstock:

• Single honey biscuit
• Single cocoa honey biscuit
• Honey biscuit with poppy seed

My selection from Dreamstime:

• Honey biscuits and mug with spoon
• Honey biscuit pyramid side view
• Honey biscuits and a jar

My selection from Fotolia:

• Honey biscuit pyramid side view
• Two piled honey biscuits with chocolate cover
• Three honey biscuits
  

Lightboxes on iStockphoto

After two months of data collection I have finally got to the point to publish my lightboxes and some of their data. On the course of these two months I have created 14 lightboxes. When I create a lightbox I also create a reference link in each photo that is added to the lightbox. The reference link shows my favourite or best selling image from the series among whith some simple text that I hope directs the buyers inside my portfolio. Some of the series are specific to a single shoot however some of them are general so it is possible that a single photo belons to multiple series therefore it could have multiple reference links.

Here is the current list of my lightboxes:

Series name	link to iStockphoto	Views	Icon
Honey biscuits	Link	9
Wheat spikes	Link	7
Isolated desserts	Link	5
Kiwi peeling	Link	3
City of Pécs, Hungary	Link	2
Chocolate cube assortments	Link	2
City of Miskolc, Hungary	Link	2
Aqua desserts	Link	1
Coco biscuits	Link	1
Half cut coconut	Link	1
Easter eggs and decoration	Link	1
Christmas	Link	0
Cocorod desserts	Link	0
Bathroom decoration	Link	0

As you can see I did not receive so many views on the lightboxes, however I have observed some sales that occured around the times the number of views increased on the lightbox including the sold image. Thus I think it is very useful to publish private lightboxes with your content. My other observation is related to the generic lightboxes. My most generic lightbox currently deals with isolated desserts, however it seems like the lightbox has much less impact than the specific lightboxes. It is also interesting to see that I have barely received views on the series (called coco biscuits) that holds my most frequently sold photo at Shutterstock. I am not worried the christmas lightbox, because I think it will become more popular in the christmas season. However my other series without any views might show the lack of interest on their topics. Alternatively they might not be clicked because the images I have added as their cover images are not suitable for advertising the series.
Finally I plan to discuss all of my lightboxes in a separate blog entry, so the first column will become more active as it would lead you to the blog entry I wrote about the specific series.

Statistics of February

February has became my second best month in earnings for me. I have had 101 downloads with no more than 381 images online. Even though the number of downloads raised a little it is still far away from the record of last August. I have got 10 new accepted images, this is the lowest amount since I have started microstock. These ten images were mainly related to easter, but I also made a few on the current local festival.

I have got my first extended license sale at Shutterstock. Without this sale this month would have been even worse than the previous one. With the extended license sale at Shutterstock I have got a new BME there since last August. Shutterstock was gaining a little momentum over last month with an extra 10 sales even further in earnings. I was hoping better consistency at iStockphoto, however my sales dropped dramatically there from the BME in January, I hope this is not going to be a trend. Based on the earnings results iStockphoto has even lost its monthly crown against Shutterstock. Dreamstime has sold 17 files in a short month that is a new record there, however these sales are either subscriptions or one credit sales so the BME of december seems far away. As for Fotolia I cannot say any good news, its already bad performance has degraded even further.

Here you can find the details for my report:

Agency	Portfolio size	Downloads	Earnings ($)	Change	Views
Fotolia	345	4 sub, 3 OD	2.55	-33%	1296 (~)
Dreamstime	291	15 sub, 2 OD	5.81	+64%	218 (up)
Shutterstock	381	64 sub, 1 OD, 1EL	45.88	+182%	N/A
iStockPhoto	235	11 OD	13.03	-49%	3292 (up)

My multi-site view/download figure is 137 views/download in the month (116 views/download all time). Since I reporting this number this is the first time it decreases significantly. This is mainly because of the high amount of sales at Dreamstime. iStockphoto is back to the league of 300 views/download. Fotolia has barely changed in this figure. As an opposite Dreamstime has almost doubled the number of views on my portfolio, so their views/download figure has been increasing a little.

As I already reported it on my previous statistics page the only agency that I can count on is ShutterStock. This is still the case, however this time it seems iStockphoto could be a good performer even though its fall this month (they are still in the second best earner position with a large margin). My strategy of uploading to iStockphoto all my work accepted by other agencies finally seems to starts paying. My portfolio at iStock have almost reached the 250th accepted photo. In the middle of the month I have already predicted that my earnings would drop significantly at iStockphoto, thus I figured I need some new technique on attract buyers. This new technique is the introduction of my thematic private lightboxes that are referred from all the images they hold. I plan to introduce these lightboxes in this blog soon. They are still in their youth however I can see that they are already generating some further clicks.

At the end of this blog entry I put my total earnings comparison after the end of February. Since I have started at the different agencies at different times I have scaled the earnings down to an average day on each agency in its past year. On this figure you can see that agencies except ShutterStock started to get equalized results. iStockphoto is a little bit stronger than Fotolia or Dreamstime but the difference is still small compared to the overall result of Shutterstock. Trends of the past three-four months show that I am probably going to have the ranking stabilized as I have it today.
So here is my current agency ranking:

1. ShutterStock (-)
   
2. iStockPhoto (-)
   
3. Dreamstime (-)
   
4. Fotolia (-)

Statistics of January

January has suffered a major setback in earnings for me. The saver of the month was iStockphoto where I have had my new BME. Shutterstock was falling even further in earnings. And this month both Dreamstime and Fotolia was performing so badly that I have not seen this bad sales since last June-July. I have had 82 downloads with no more than 371 images online. The number of downloads has decreased significantly since December because of the fall of Shutterstock. I have got 20 new accepted images. This month I have made only two new series, both were short ones. I have seen quite high interest about my Pécs series that covers 2010's European cultural capital. So I also decided to add some further images to my portfolio about Pécs. Shutterstock performed so badly again that it has lost the monthly crown for the second time I have been selling stock photos. But instead of Dreamstime this time the crown went to iStockphoto with a large margin.

Here you can find the details for my report:

Agency	Portfolio size	Downloads	Earnings ($)	Change	Views
Fotolia	336	1 sub, 4 OD	3.8	-76%	1275 (up)
Dreamstime	276	5 sub, 2 OD	3.54	-82%	110 (up)
Shutterstock	371	50 sub, 2 OD	16.26	-11%	N/A
iStockPhoto	197	18 OD	25.45	+109%	2938 (up)
StockXpert	344	NONE	0	-100%	2650 (up)

My multi-site view/download figure is 232 views/download in the month (113 views/download all time). This figure has also suffered a major increase mainly because of StockXpert, where I have seen an unprecedented increase in views that did not result downloads at all. iStockphoto made a huge comeback by lowering its 340 views/download figure from the past month to an almost average 163 views/download.

As I already reported it on my previous statistics page the only agency that I can count on is ShutterStock. This is still the case, however this time it seems iStockphotos good performance might lead to a second regular performer. My strategy of uploading to iStockphoto all my work accepted by other agencies finally seems to starts paying because of the steady growth of earnings since last August. My portfolio at iStock have almost reached the 200th accepted photo. Previously it seemed like they don't like my work, however the newly submitted photos have a quite high acceptance rate for me (around 80%).

Unfortunately it seems like even though I have had high hopes for StockXpert they started to drop in earnings and this month they have reached the unprecedented 0 donwloads. This low amount of sales did not happen since I have started to upload to them... Last month I decided that unless they start to bring some "significant" money in soon, I will not even upload to them anymore. I beleive this will be the case if they are not going to sell anything in Febryary.

At the end of this blog entry I put my total earnings comparison after the end of January. Since I have started at the different agencies at different times I have scaled the earnings down to an average day on each agency in its past year. On this figure you can see that agencies except ShutterStock started to get equalized results. As a result of December's bonanza at Dreamstime and Fotolia, they postponed iStockphoto to achieve its awaited second place till this month. My overall ranking however seems to get really unstable for the bottom _three_ places because their daily earnings are really close (the difference between the lowest and the highest ranked agencies is just over 30%). In the coming months I hope these agencies will get more stable earners, as a result they will be more stable in ranking.
So here is my current agency ranking:

1. ShutterStock (-)
   
2. iStockPhoto (^, was 3rd)
   
3. Dreamstime (v, was 2nd)
   
4. Fotolia (-)
5. StockXpert (-)

Statistics of December

December became my BME so far, thanks to the BMEs at iStockphoto, Dreamstime and Fotolia. The past month became BME even though my Shutterstock income suffered a major breakdown. I have had 101 downloads with no more than 355 images online. The number of downloads has decreased significantly since November because of the fall of Shutterstock. I have got 22 new accepted images. This month I have made only two new series, so I lowered my upload average a little bit, however this month I have reached my best acceptance ratio so far (for example I have had only a single rejection at Dreamstime). PPD has peaked at all agencies this month. I have had two series of sales at Dreamstime and also at Fotolia. Without these sales Dreamstime would have closed an above average month, meanwhile Fotolia would have seen troubles again. In case of Dreamstime one of my images just reached the second level. Shutterstock performed so badly that it has lost the monthly crown for the first time I have been selling stock photos. Therefore in December the best earner agency of the month is Dreamstime.

Here you can find the details for my report:

Agency	Portfolio size	Downloads	Earnings ($)	Change	Views
Fotolia	324	4 OD, 4EL	15.3	+446%	1193 (~)
Dreamstime	270	2 sub, 12 OD	19.18	+140%	97 (down)
Shutterstock	355	62 sub, 2 OD	18.24	-31%	N/A
iStockPhoto	150	8 OD	12.12	+87%	2726 (up)
StockXpert	324	7 sub	2.1	-40%	1361 (up)

My multi-site view/download figure is 145 views/download in the month (96 views/download all time). This figure has also suffered a major increase mainly because of iStockPhoto, where I have seen an unprecedented increase in views that did not result downloads. As an opposite Dreamstime made a league of its own by breaking the 7 view/download barrier in December.

As I already reported it on my previous statistics page the only agency that I can count on is ShutterStock. This is still the case. Unfortunately it seems like even though I have had high hopes for StockXpert they started to drop in earnings and now they are cancelling most of my income from them by dropping subscriptions entirely. They suggested that if I would like to have subscription sales then they would cut the already low fixed rate of 0.3 to 0.25. This drop does not seem to be bad on first sight in my case since Shutterstock subs earn the same amount for me today, however at Shutterstock I have perspective. So I have opted out from the new subscription model of SXP, and I also decided that unless they start to bring some "significant" money in soon I will not even upload to them anymore.

My strategy of uploading to iStockphoto all my work accepted by other agencies finally seems to starts paying. This month was BME but the number of downloads did not change even though I have uploaded quite a lot to them. My portfolio at iStock have just passed the 150 accepted photos. Previously it seemed like they don't like my work, however the newly submitted photos have a quite high acceptance rate for me

At the end of this blog entry I put the my total earnings comparison after the end of November. Since I have started at the different agencies at different times I have scaled the earnings down to an average day on each agency. On this figure you can see that agencies except ShutterStock started to get equalized results. As a result of this months bonanza at Dreamstime and Fotolia, they really get a boost, and even though I thought iStockphoto is going to climb to the second place this month, it did not happen because of the strong competition from Dreamstime. My overall ranking however seems to get really unstable for the bottom _four_ places because their daily earnings are really close (the difference between the lowest and the highest ranked agencies is just 15%). In the coming months I hope these agencies will get more stable earners, as a result they will be more stable in ranking.
So here is my current agency ranking:

1. ShutterStock (-)
   
2. Dreamstime (^, was 4th)
   
3. iStockPhoto (-)
   
4. Fotolia (^, was 5th)
5. StockXpert (v, was 2nd)

About photo: Clay angel praying towards God

You can buy the picture on top by following these links:

• Buy the photo at Shutterstock
• Buy this shot with red background at Dreamstime
• Buy this picture with red background at Fotolia
• Buy this angel photo on iStockPhoto
• But the praying angel photo above at StockXpert
  

The subject of this blog entry is my best earner image that was submitted in November. This is the sixth blog entry in the series I have started to introduce my best photos: best earner photo, overall best earner in November, most downloaded photo.

History: This photo was shot as the closure of my Christmas series. I have been shooting Christmas themed pictures since early August. Most of them I have published by early September. I have decided that I will submit some photos even after the majority of my Christmas shots were already available, because I wanted to make sure my little portfolio gets some exposure in the huge crowd of Christmas photos. The best earner of this series is a composition of Christmas spheres and a plastic pine branch.

In this series I have made shots about the Christmas related objects of our home. We have started with the more obvious ones, that we use for decorating our home for Christmas. Then we have progressed towards those that could have some relation with Christmas. Since the Christmas season seems to be over, it is most likely that the series will not be extended till next August.

Content: This photo presents an angel praying towards the top right corner of the image. The direction suggests it is praying towards God. This is a plastic statue used for decoration. Even though it is plastic it has tremendous amount of detail imitating strokes of the hand during the formation of a clay statue. This can be best observed around the eyes of this little statue. The focus is on the face of the angel, therefore its wings and its kneeling legs are a little bit blurred. Finally the statue has a yellowish or brownish coloration. This however I don't think adds to the overall look of the photo so I recommend you to use it in black and white.

Technique: Finally let's talk about the creation of this photograph. It looks like this photo is easy to isolate. However because of its color is so close to white it is easy to burn parts of the statue. Since I still only have a single light setup isolating this object would be much better on a non white background. I have tried several backgrounds, but for me only the white and the red was working. The white background of this photo becomes gray if you don't want to burn parts of the statue, therefore this image needed a little more fine tuning than the red background ones. (You can see the red background ones here, and here.)