It is getting harder and harder for image creators to get higher royalties on their images in
iStock’s Signature collection. Royalties go up based on the total number of times images belonging to a particular creator are downloaded during the year.
Download targets for Exclusive contributors have been around since 2017. At the beginning of the year the contributor starts with the ending royalty rate of the previous year. On January 1st iStock starts counting downloads for the year. Essential image downloads are counted as one while Signature Plus downloads are counted as 2. Some, but not all, downloads of Signature images through Gettyimages.com also count as 2. Others, probably mostly Premium Access sales, only count as 1.
If at some point during the year, the contributor’s downloads exceeds the target number for the royalty he is already receiving then his royalty rate goes up the following month. For example, if he exceeds the number on June 5th, his royalty rate will increase on July 1st.
On the other hand, if the contributor starts the year at 35% and doesn’t reach the new target by the end of the year, his rate will drop to 30% on January 1st of the following year.
This chart shows how the targets for photos have risen over the last 3 years.
| |
25% |
30% |
35% |
40% |
45% |
| Year |
Royalty |
Royalty |
Royalty |
Royalty |
Royalty |
| 2017 |
Default |
500 |
5,000 |
20,000 |
300,000 |
| 2018 |
Default |
550 |
5,500 |
22,000 |
330,000 |
| 2019 |
Default |
650 |
6,500 |
26,500 |
396,000 |
| 2020 |
Default |
800 |
8,500 |
34,500 |
515,000 |
They have different targets for Illustrations and Video that exhibit the same trends.
One might think this is an indication that iStock images are selling better than they have in the past, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that these sales are generating more revenue for the photographer, or for Getty Images.
The iStock pricing chart for U.S. licenses indicates that the prices for Signature images are 3 times higher than Essentials images. However, in some countries iStock has reduced the price of Signature images to the same as Essentials.
In addition, many of iStock’s Signature collection images are now being licensed as part of Premium Access deals where the price per usage can be even lower than the Essentials price on iStock.
Thus, it is possible to license a lot more usages while the total revenue generated during the year still declines. This is probably why Getty has determined that the number of downloads necessary to reach a higher royalty rate needed to be raised 20% in 2019 compared to 2018 and an additional 30% in 2020 compared to 2019.
They have discovered how to sell more images, just not how to make more money for the images they sell.
Will all photographers please work harder, spend more of their time and money and produce more images just so Getty can make the same amount of money – or maybe a little bit less – than it has in the past.