Make Extra Money Online from Micro Stock Photography Part 2
In part 1 I gave a brief introduction to those who want to pursue this path in making extra money online. Thank you to all who registered using my affiliate links. If you have patience to learn all the skills and secrets to getting more money from microstock photography, I’m sure you won’t regret it. To date, my Shutterstock income has reached $20, not too bad for a 11-photos portfolio eh? So in this part, I’m going to talk about the photos that you upload, what make them sell and what not
Type of photos
From my experience, when you’re thinking of taking a photo for microstock companies, you’ve got to differentiate between artistic photos and stock photos. Most of the time, artistic photos won’t get as much sale as you would want them to be. In my opinion, upon picking up your camera, start thinking the types of images that appear in magazines, websites and pamphlets. If you don’t have a clue of what they look like, try going to some of your local stores and flip through some magazines, go to your local health centres and flip through their pamphlets on heart attack or cancer or whatever health issues they have on display. I normally do this when I’m running out of ideas on what to shoot next. Sometimes, you’ve got a very good subject but you won’t get any sale because the way you present it is not the way that buyers want them. To me, the types of photos can be described as :
- Photos that tell a story explicitly - Think of a story you want to tell to your buyer using that photo. For example, you might want to say that smoking is bad. So you take a snap of someone crushing a cigarette, or someone making funny faces while looking at a cigarette etc. Now that kind of photos are easily picked up by your potential buyers as the photos can be used in ad campaigns and health pamphlets and so on.
- Photos that tell a story implicitly - Think of a concept that you’re gonna represent in your photos. For example, a photo that shows an apple tied up with a measuring tape might bring the concept of healthy diet or weight lost program. Similarly, a photo of a luxurious mansion might promote the concept of wealth in the community and posh life. I know a photographer who earned a lot from one beautiful photo of sunflower because it’s been used to promote a brand of margarine!
- Photos that can be used as background images - These are normally vector art images and not necessarily came out from your camera, but you probably need some photoshop skills to be able to create compelling images that can attract viewers. However, you can also create this type of photo by just shooting some textures inside and around your house, such as your own wallpaper, parquet floor etc.
So those are generally the types of photos that sell well in the microstock world. Now we move on to the next question : What types of subject do people want?
Subjects that sell
- People in activity - Popular subjects include elderly people looking healthy and doing various activity, or just smiling at the camera; or babies doing all sort of things (sleeping, smiling, laughing, yawning). If you’re blessed with babies recently, take a lot of photos of them. They are guaranteed to sell well. But remember, photos that have people with recognizable faces in them will need to have model release form signed and submitted as well. This is just basically a consent from the person in the photos that they allow you to sell the photos
- Nature/Landscape - Although nature and landscape photos are almost saturated i.e so many people uploaded their landscape photos already, still they have the potential in the market. But of course, with so many competitions, your landscape photos must be of outstanding quality and stand out from the others
- Business - From my observation, subjects that depict business activities sell the most compared to others. Any photos from people wearing business suits until photos of coins and notes will sell well. So think about business activities, stock markets, tools that business people used etc to make the most of it.
- Sport - Shoot people doing their sport activities, wearing sport apparels or just the equipment itself.
- Agriculture,Food,Drink - I love this category since it’s easily available, and you always buy them anyway. So before you eat those apples, shoot some photos of them first. I generally get more sales from simple photos of fruits isolated on white background. Sometimes you don’t have to be too creative to get a sale. Simplicity is generally good.
- Health - Anything to do with health issues is always needed as we deal with those issues everyday. Photos of doctors, nurses, medicine, drugs, and medical equipment can be used in a lot of magazines and health pamphlets
- Technology - Some example from this category are photos of people using technical equipment, photos of your mice (as in the ones you use with your computers), laptops, mobile phones, hi-fi and so on. Be careful not to include any logos or trademark symbols in your photos otherwise they will be rejected.
Photos that don’t get much attention
- Technical issues - Photos that are noisy, a lot of Chromatic Aberration, oversharpened, red eye, out of focus and blurry. Those are some of the issues that make your photos unwanted and unusable. So check those technical issues first before you start off your shooting session
- Snapshots - Photos that are normally reside in your family album are generally not needed and have less commercial values.
If you want to know more about what sells and what not, I would strongly recommend you to buy the book ‘Photos That Sell: The Art of Successful Freelance Photography
I hope this gives you a better view on the industry and some ideas on what to shoot if you’re planning to make extra money from microstock photography. I know I am. If you haven’t registered to any microstock companies, you can start now by registering with ShutterStock or Fotolia. Instead of just leaving your photos in your computer’s hard drive, why not getting some cash from them? Have fun taking photos 
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