How to Format Stock Photos for Online Sales

So you have a digital camera and you think you can sell stock photos online? There are many online sources that provide inexpensive stock photos for businesses and publishers while at the same time providing amateur photographers a means for supplemental income. Lots of people jump into this and lose out, not because they don’t have the skills to succeed, they just don’t know the best way to format their stock photos.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

1. Take pictures that people are looking for. All the different sites offer wish lists or top searches pages where you can get ideas of what to take pictures. They suggest not taking pictures of flowers or the family dog because they already have a huge amount of these photos.

2. Take extraordinary photos. This is wear some of the photographers skills comes into play along with luck. Never leave the camera at home and have it ready to take that money making shot such as the boss spilling coffee down his front or a police officer who shut his jacket in the door. Any photo with extraordinary value is sure to make money in the stock photo market if it is formatted according to the rest of the guidelines. Be extremely creative on this front. You have nothing to lose.

3. High quality photos are a must. No blur unless it is part of the essence of the photo or enhances the subject. Since many of these photos are being used in publications it can be good to take photos on a white or textured background.

4. You must have good color. It doesn’t matter how good the justification of the picture is, if the color is dull it will not even be approved to sell. A good trick is to enhance the color through Adobe Photoshop.

5. Like color, light levels are essential. Even if you think you took the perfect photo, upload it into Adobe Photoshop and see if you can make it a little better before submitting it to the sites.

6. Look through books, ads and publications and see what photos are being used. It’s not a good idea to reproduce them rather this will help you to understand what people in this market are looking for so you can recreate the idea, not the exact photo. Also consider what types of photos will mesh well in a graphic design environment as many people are reworking the photos for this purpose.

7. Do not re-photograph an image or try to exactly reproduce it. Also stay away from company names and logos. All these things can be copyright violations and will cause your photos to get rejected.

Resources

• Sign Up for Big Stock Photo Here

[kt123]

on 1/25/2009 What is the best format to save a High Res photograph in for online use? I have been advised jpg. I am in the process of setting up an online sales site and keen to achieve an effect similar to this link on my products with a small picture of the image on one side which can be magnified on the other to show the detail. It is vital that the quality/ detail of the product can be shown but without taking ages to upload. http://www.coast-stores.com/fcp/product/-/ALLDresses/Isabella-Bandeau-Dress/2224653498.
Thank you for any advice! KT

[dzhii]

on 12/30/2008 haha a good way to get some extra cash for you, if someone joins with ur link