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Articles from June 2012

ABC News’ VideoSource Expands Stock Video Library

By Jim Pickerell | 353 Words | Posted 6/29/2012 | Comments (1)
ABC News VideoSource has upgraded and expanded its website to provide greater and easier access to ABC News’ vast archival footage online.  Producers and researchers will now be able to browse, license and, in some cases, immediately access tens of thousands of video assets from ABC News’ expansive archives with the click of a mouse. It offers customers, including documentary filmmakers, educators or anyone with an interest in archival video footage, historically-rich news video from a vast collection spanning from 1896 to the present.

Specialist Footage Research from Robert Harding

By Jim Pickerell | 297 Words | Posted 6/29/2012 | Comments
Following its acquisition of Specialist Stock and its move into the footage side of the stock image business Robert Harding World Imagery has created its Comprehensive Research Facility (CRF) which not only offers research of its own collections but will also research a range of satellite suppliers including BBC Motion Gallery, NHNZ, Footage Search and SKYWORKS amongst others.

Alamy White Paper: 21st Century Image Licensing

By Jim Pickerell | 916 Words | Posted 6/28/2012 | Comments (4)
Alamy has published an 11-page white paper that examines the challenges current pricing and licensing models face. The paper summarizes a round table discussion where key industry decision makers, including picture buyers, photographers, journalists, commentators and stock image providers, examined the issue.

T3Media Launches Paya.com Offering 80% Royalties

By Jim Pickerell | 1006 Words | Posted 6/27/2012 | Comments
T3Media, Inc. (formerly Thought Equity Motion), a leading provider of cloud-based video management and licensing services, has announced the launch of a new licensing offering—Paya ™ (Pay-ya), the world's index of licensable content™. To watch a short video that explains how Paya works, click here.

UIG acquires MyLoupe and Ad Stock Images

By Jim Pickerell | 527 Words | Posted 6/27/2012 | Comments
Universal Images Group (UIG), owned by industry veteran George Sinclair (also the founder of the Virtual Picture Desk in 2002 and co-author of Britannica’s Image Quest), has acquired the business rights and digital library of the MyLoupe and the Ad Stock Images picture agencies.

Protecting Image Copyright Worldwide

By Jim Pickerell | 1521 Words | Posted 6/26/2012 | Comments
In November 2010 the UK government called for an independent review of the Intellectual Property laws and practices and assigned Professor Ian Hargreaves and a panel of experts to prepare a report. The report, submitted in May 2011, made 10 recommendations designed to ensure that the UK has an IP framework “best suited to supporting innovation and promoting economic growth in the digital age.”  I'd like to recommend a different approach.

Will Consumers Pay To View Issue-Driven Video Stories?

By Jim Pickerell | 377 Words | Posted 6/22/2012 | Comments
Since 2005 MediaStorm has produced 30 powerful, issue-driven video stories about real life people and problems. All this work has been available for free on their website. Most of these stories have been viewed a million or more times and they tend to draw large audiences outside the photo industry.

Subscriptions: Getting Easier For Customers To Save Money

By Jim Pickerell | 889 Words | Posted 6/21/2012 | Comments
In the near future photographers can expect to see are some dramatic changes in the way subscriptions are defined. Until now, most subscriptions have allowed customers to download 25 images per day for the duration of the subscription ranging from 1 month to 1 year. Now a number of new options are being introduced.

Race To The Bottom

By Jim Pickerell | 2591 Words | Posted 6/20/2012 | Comments
Stock photographers regularly complain about the “Race To The Bottom” in terms of pricing and they look for someone to blame. Favorite whipping boys are Getty Images, Alamy and microstock. But, these distributors are not really the problem. The problem is technology.
 

Yuri Arcurs Discusses The Challenges In Launching PeopleImages.com

By Jim Pickerell | 544 Words | Posted 6/19/2012 | Comments
Anyone thinking about setting up their own fully functional search engine to license images should read Yuri Arcurs article about the trials and tribulations he went through in creating PeopleImages.com.

Universal Image Group Expands Operations

By Jim Pickerell | 611 Words | Posted 6/19/2012 | Comments
Universal Images Group (UIG) has now opened an office in New York. This is in addition to its offices in Chicago, USA; Rome, Italy and Chelmsford in the UK. The business has achieved triple digit revenue growth through distribution and electronic publishing in the past year and it has become essential to provide a further production & editing center in USA.

Understanding The Stock Photo Business

By Jim Pickerell | 1559 Words | Posted 6/13/2012 | Comments (1)
Every few months I put together a summary of some of our most important recently published stories. This selection is designed to help investors who are trying to understand the industry as well as image creators just beginning to explore the idea of licensing their images. Regular readers will have seen these stories. Please refer friends interested in licensing images to this series of articles.

Lewis Blackwell Joins Evolve Images

By Jim Pickerell | 356 Words | Posted 6/12/2012 | Comments
Evolve Images (www.evolveimages.com) has announced that Lewis Blackwell has joined the company as Chief Creative Officer. Blackwell brings to Evolve an impressive array of credentials with leading experience in the image creation and licensing industry, as well as deep knowledge and active membership of the image-buying community.

Are There Positive Indications Of Growth For The Stock Photo Market?

By Jim Pickerell | 1241 Words | Posted 6/11/2012 | Comments (3)
Stephen Walker recently read a report about Shutterstock’s IPO plans on APhotoEditor.  He then posted the on following conclusions on the ASMPstock group on yahoo. "Traditional RM, RF are growing at a pretty good clip? Micro more so!" He also said, "I see these numbers as a strong indicator of growth and positive for stock shooters." I think he is entirely wrong. Read why.

Will Getty Integrate iStockphoto Into The Getty Images Site?

By Jim Pickerell | 1300 Words | Posted 6/8/2012 | Comments
Searching for a buyer for Getty Images or deciding whether to launch an IPO may be the least of CEO Jonathan Klein’s worries these days. He’s got to be looking at Shutterstock and Fotolia and anticipating that they will use a good part of their new found wealth to build their premium collections. When that happens, will these brands cut further into the Getty Images franchise?

Court Upholds ASMP's Rights In Class Action Against Google

By Jim Pickerell | 274 Words | Posted 6/7/2012 | Comments
U.S. Judge Denny Chin has issued an opinion denying Google's motion to dismiss lawsuits by the American Society of Media Photographers and the Authors Guild. The motion to dismiss had been based primarily on Google's assertion that  trade associations did not have standing to bring a copyright infringement suit on behalf of members. In his ruling, the Judge asserted that "given the sweeping and undiscriminating nature of Google's unauthorized copying, it would be unjust to require that each affected association member litigate his claim individually."

Visual Search With Pixolution

By Jim Pickerell | 1420 Words | Posted 6/6/2012 | Comments
Most online databases of stock photos contain hundreds of thousands of images that are never seen by potential buyers. This can be attributed to the fact that the sole way of finding images is through the use of keywords. Learn more about how Visual Search could go a long way to solving this problem and the specific strategy used by Pixolution.

Shutterstock Instant: New Search Algorithm

By Jim Pickerell | 463 Words | Posted 6/4/2012 | Comments (2)
Late last week Shutterstock sent out a press release introducing – a little pre-maturely it turns out – a new image discovery tool called “Shutterstock Instant.” In fact, if you go to the Shutterstock site there is no evidence that this feature exists. It turns out it is still a prototype. As with all prototypes when it is finally released to the public it may be quite a bit different than it is today.

Integrating Traditional Stock With Microstock

By Jim Pickerell | 1505 Words | Posted 6/1/2012 | Comments (2)
It no longer makes sense to keep microstock and traditional stock separate. It’s time to look at integration. Read this article to understand why and what the industry needs to do to go about accomplishing such an integration.

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This stock photography news site focuses on the business side of photography with a special emphasis on stock photography. Our goal is to help photographers maximize their earnings based on the quality of their work and the commitment they are prepared to make to the trade. The information provided will be applicable to part-timers as well as full time professional photographers. We’ll leave it to others to teach photographers how to take better pictures.

Jim Pickerell launched his career as a photographer in 1963. In 1990 he began publishing a regular newsletter on stock photography. In 1995 the information was made available online as well as in print and was gradually expanded to a daily service. Click here for Pickerell's full biography.

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