What is Microstock?

Microstock or more precicesly microstock photography is a special type of stock photography, which in particular atracts hobby and semi-professional photographers. While stock photography atracts professional, full time photographers with equipment costing tens of thousands dollars which earning hundreds or thousands of dollars for each photo sale, micro stock photography is completely different to that.   Most microstock photographers don't have expensive equipment. Many don't even have one of the expensive (but worthwhile) DSLR cameras, but simple (and much less expensive) point and shoot cameras probably very similiar to what many of you have at home. The difference? Those microstock photographers earn money with their cameras, sometimes enough to pay off their new camera within a few months and later, when their portfolio of photos grows, even more!       How does it work?   It's very easy in fact. First you need photos with a good technical quality. No snap shots please. Try to avoid over exposure , noise  and bad composition . Given that, you are already close to having a photo which will earn you a few bucks. Even better (and much more bucks) if your photo also has stock value, that is if a designer can easily use it in their design. If you think that you can shoot such photos (and honestly, most hobby photographers can do this, otherwhise it wouldn't be micro stock) then you should get started now.     How much does it cost?   Nothing! Signing up with microstock agencies is completely free!     How much do I earn?   Peanuts. Cents. Maybe a dollar. But you get this for each time your photo is downloaded ! And this is the most particular difference to regular stock photography. Rather than waiting weeks for a sale and then earning hundreds or thousands of dollars, you will have many downloads each day as many people buy your photos because microstock agencies sell them at such reasonable prices. With a reasonably sized portfolio (number of photos), for example 500, you will easily get 20 to 60 downloads each day at one (in this case Shutterstock) of the agencies. This agencie will give you 25 cents for each download. This is already a reasonable amount ( ~300 USD each month! ) and will become even more if you consider that there are six big agencies (which get you a lot of earnings) and many more small agencies (which still provide reasonable earnings).     But won't it be a lot of work? I will also have to add keywords and description to all the photos, or?   First of all, you shouldn't see the photographing itself as work. As a hobby photographer you should enjoy shooting and if you earn a little bit to pay for your hobby - hey that's great, right? Said that - yes - you will need to add keywords and descriptions to all the photos. However, you will only need to do it once and you can directly add them to your photo. All the agencies can read this information from the photo and for most the uploading process is very fast. The keywords and description are added to photos by using a program which supports IPTC - just follow the link to download your favourite free software to do this. Most image editors - incuding Photoshop - support it.     How does Microstock Monitor help me with all that?   If you start microstock photography it makes sense to sign up with as many agencies as possible in order to multiply your earnings. Microstock Monitor is a free software which will help you to keep track of all of your earnings with each of these agencies in real time and in a single window, without the need for you to check all of the different websites regularly (which can get very time intensive).     Ok, I'm sold - where do I start?   My personal suggestion is to not get started with the very hard agencies (they will review your initial submission and only let you in if your photos are technically perfect). Also, don't start with the very easy agencies (those are easy to get in, but won't earn you much). Shutterstock , iStockPhoto and StockXpert are hard to get into (but also very good earners). Don't start with these, but keep them in mind. I'd suggest you to start with Dreamstime , Fotolia and BigStockPhoto . After that go with Lucky Oliver , 123RF and Featurepics . Then (and by that you will know the game) go for the others.     And please, if you get into microstock photography after these tips, absolutely send me an e-mail with a link to your photos. I would love to see your work!