Content and usage is just the buyers problem?

Firstly I must say that this is by no means legal advice, just my understanding and opinions on some of the aspects of digital asset delivery via the internet.  

Looking around the various Forums and Blogs I often read that the end client or customer is legally responsible for the image, and how the image is used, but what about the image content are you sure that you have no responsibility that you have not already discharged.

There are some sweeping statements which are often used as a blanket response for all types of possible scenarios and image violations, but rarely do the posts and comments question the artists and merchants responsibilities, and was enough really done to protect the interests of the artist, agency, merchant, end client or customer?

Does Microstock have real Diversity?

I was reading this topic “Cultural Diversity, What is Needed in Imaging?” over on the Micro Stock Group forum, quite a lively topic with some good replies.

I posted a couple of replies myself and started to think ‘”just how diverse in other areas are the stock sites already?”, as we tend to have preconceptions and visual stereotypes, many images I see like this one here are departmental, as they fit nicely into subconscious boxes,  the ones that spring to mind are the many family images which are mostly mum, dad, kids and grandparents, I then considered how many of these typical families I know myself and there are not that many, so what if I had to write an article with a single parent and child as the focus, how diverse is the selection of images and what images to use?

Shooting Big Cats in the Garden

Being in the United Kingdom when I say “I will be going for one days shooting of the Big Cats in the Garden”, I do get some funny responses, until I explain that the shooting is only with a camera and the garden is the English county of Kent which is know as the “Garden of England”, the Big Cats are also protected from harm.

Keyword Editor for Photoshop

Over on the Micro Stock Group forum we were looking at Image keyword tools and the site owner posted a link to a tool he had used.

This Photoshop plug-in that helps photographers to add metadata keywords to their images efficiently and easily. Main tools: spell checker, correction suggestions, synonyms suggestions, sorting, deleting duplicate, and counting. Saving groups of words and complete Templates of Meta-data.

The plug-in has no limitations and is from 2006, I tried to visit the website for Deep Perspective but the link was not valid, but I thought it may be worth looking at the tool anyway.

Photoshop Tutorials

Over on one of my other websites I have published three Photoshop tutorials, often when I read tutorials they might say something like , ‘now use the Channel Mixer’, sometimes I do not have a clue as to where the channel mixer is on the menu structure, and the text often assumes  you understand what it is talking about.

When I write a tutorial, support email or training aid, I will often insert an image rather than text, I think that an image is a far better reference point and a visual descriptor.

If I had to start up a new microstock website

This was the title of a topic here on the MicroStockGroup, and there are many good points raised from the Photographers, but the general consensus is along the lines of a microstock boutique agency, with exclusive content both RF and RM, much along the lines of the Istock Vetta collection, invited contributors and selected content.

This is an option that many other microstock site might already be looking to follow, I thought hard about what would be my target market ,and I still really think that the largest most under serviced asset users, are still bloggers and content providers, and the small sizes are still the future of this industry, the niche collections are the cream and do have a place but are an already limited revenue stream.

PicApp one asset in unlimited blogs

There is a new service called Picapp much along the lines of the idea I have already written about here, they have licensed images from some biggest stock sites including Getty Images, Splash News, Corbis, you just use a plug-in which embeds an image in the body of your blog, the image will carry an advertisement that is how Picapp makes it’s money, you do not download or copy the image just embed it, what effect will this type of service have on artist revenue.

 

WordPress blogging with Windows Live Writer

This Blog was written and published direct from my laptop to my Word Press blog, this was done using Windows Live Writer (WLW) a free application from Microsoft, the benefits of using Windows Live Writer are many, you can take your time writing your blog post, save drafts, retrieve a blog you have posted for editing, if you have more than one blog you can post the same article to multiple blogs, here is a quick overview of how to setup WLW and post to your blog. 

Contributing to a new business

It seems like there is a new digital media agency coming online every month so how do you decide to contribute to the latest business as an artist.

The new business already have their software and slick new website ready to go, and they now need customers and content, the customers will not even look at the business unless there is a large amount of quality content, so the first step for the new business is to find appropriate suppliers with artist content.

Fair Trade Chickens and Eggs

I used the word ‘Fair’ in a reply to a blog post on the Microstock Diaries Blog , I was commenting that Stock Sites could return a higher percentage if artists paid a penalty for rejected assets.

A reply to my comment had the following text, “Also, this is just my view, but I think you weaken your argument any time you use the word “fair”. It’s a capitalist market so the forces of supply and demand are what determine reward.”