How to Make Extra Money Selling Photos to Microstock Sites

Ever wonder where those photos in advertisements and brochures come from? Many come from stock photos sites where photographers sell the rights to photos in their collection and make money.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

Things You’ll Need:

• Digital camera (4 megapixels or higher)
• Broadband Internet Connection

1. The first step is to get a digital camera with at least 4 megapixels. If you do not have a basic understanding of creating good photos and using a digital SLR camera take a course at a community college or get yourself a good "how to" book. Tips on photography can be found right here on E-How.
   You will want to visit some of the leading "micro stock" sites and see what kind of images are popular.
2. Google "micro stock sites" and see what companies are out there and the requirements that they have for selling your stock to them. Popular sites are istockphoto.com, fotolia.com, shutterstock.com and bigstockphoto.com. Some sites are more strict than others as to what they accept or reject. Stockphoto.com is toward the stricter end of the scale, my personal rejection rate is 40%, Fotolia has accepted 70% of my shots as a novice photographer. It depends a lot on what they are looking for at the time to add to their inventory. Fotolia will put any photos that they reject (if you permit) into a "free area" where you earn Google Adsense revenue when people click on ads near your photos so since these photos would have been rejected anyway you have a chance of making money.
3. It is possible to submit your photos to more than one site and this practice is common. You will not earn as much money from that particular photo on any one site but there is the chance that a "shotgun" approach will yield more revenue overall. Users of these sites (buyers) will pay anywhere from a dollar to twenty dollars a photo or a flat fee for unlimited downloads. You are paid a small percentage, usually less than a dollar for each image downloaded. It the buyer buys exclusive rights you might earn as much as $20. Payouts on stock photos sites are often in the form of "credits" which you can convert to cash and receive via Paypal.
4. If you do not have a collection of high quality photos then get clicking. Find what styles are popular on these sites and start building your library. If you have photos of recognizable faces (not in a large public crowd) you will need a model release form from these persons allowing their image to be used.
5. Use some kind of photo editing software. You can start out with the software that came with your camera to crop images and remove red-eye. As your skills and portfolio of photos increase you may want to purchase Adobe Photoshop Essentials ($99.00) to put a professional finishing touch on your work.

Tips & Warnings

• Build as large a portfolio as you can and upload the best shots.
• Don't expect to get rich. It may take a year or more of learning what kind of photos they are looking for and lots of rejection (don't take it personally) to get a hundred or more photos on their site. To get revenue more that $100 you must have hundreds of approved photos out there on one or more sites. Stock photo sites are looking for specific kinds of shots or unique photos that they can sell. If you can focus on a genre that is unique as well as take good photos you have a better chance of getting them approved.
• Get a signed release form (often available on micro stock sites) from recognizable persons appearing in your photos.