The
New Way
By: Rohn Engh
Stock Photography is
Changing Every Day. Are You Changing Your
Methods by Delivering High-Quality Digital
Images?
When you think about stock
photography, what comes to mind? If the pages of
a stock agency presenting its printed catalog
through the mail you may be right. For the time
being! Stock photo agencies are changing their
way of doing business at warp speed so you
either have to keep up or get left behind. -
Bob
The old-fashioned way of
looking at stock photography is usually by
visualizing basic information not particularly
interesting or beneficial any longer. But there
is a lot more to digital stock photography than
meets the (photographer's) eye.
New Generation Mediais a
phrase stock photographers will hear more and
more in the coming decade. Where’d it come
from? It’s a response to the increasing
ways you can transmit information in
today’s hi-tech world.
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Stock
Photography: A Changing
World
The good news:
these evolving forms of image
creation and image delivery have
created new markets for you.
As a
successful stock pho-tographer you
should be aware of what’s
ahead....
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...not only the
traditional print media: magazines, books,
textbooks, and catalogs, but also the pioneering
electronic media -- the communication companies
utilizing television, video processing, CDs, and
new concepts like digital video, cell phones,
desktop image delivery, screen-touch educational
tools, and on-demand picture retrieval.Many of
the latter elements are poised to explode into
wide use, with the rapidly increasing
familiar-ity of photobuyers and photogra-phers
with the marketing advantages of the
Internet.
Classic commercial stock
photography (the familiar scenics and
generalized “situa-tion” shots) as
we’ve known it over the past decades will
continue to be in demand, but the overwhelming
supply of these gen-eralized stock shots,
available now from discount sources on-line,
will dimin-ish their value -- and price tag.The
New Generation Media mar-ket is so vast that it
utilizes what has come to be known as
“micromarket-ing,” the ability to
isolate special-ized markets and respond to them
efficiently.Micromarkets are specialized (niche)
markets.
If you are not very
familiar with the latest about digital stock
photography, you now have at least a basic
understanding of how to buy digital images. But
keep reading for more!
To survive in the New
Generation Media, stock photographers will
become specialists themselves. The rules
haven’t changed, only the target. The
demand by photobuyers for content-specific
images will spur the new generation media
photog-raphers to focus on specific subject
areas they enjoy, and then service markets whose
needs match those areas.
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Stock Photos
by Bob Pardue
- Caption:
Stock Photo of Palmetto Bluff
Resort in Bluffton, South
Carolina
-
- Description:
Palmetto Bluff Resort located in
Bluffton South Carolina USA This
is a red boat house along with
three cottages located on a
lake.
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- Keywords:
Bob, Pardue, red, boat,
house, boat, landing, dock, pier,
lake, water, boating, boat,
boats, cottage, house, hut,
Palmetto, Bluff, Inn, Palmetto,
Bluff, Resort, Bluffton, South,
Carolina, SC, southeast,
southeastern, US, low, country,
Hilton, Head, inn, hotel, bed,
and, breakfast
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- More
Stock Pictures of South
Carolina
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The Generalist
Stock Photographer
The generalist (the
classic commercial stock photographer) will have
less prowess.How would you like to work with
photobuy-ers who call you by your first name,
allow you to call them collect, and look forward
with anticipation to your deliveries of
pictures? And there’s more. Your
photobuyers are easy to please, and rarely want
to art-direct your images.
Also rare: disputes, lost
or damaged images, legal suits. Your photobuyers
are accountable, and your relationship with them
and their company is long-term and worthwhile.
Each new photobuyer you
find in your particular market areas will be
worth $20,000 to $50,000 in sales to you over
the average ten to twelve years you maintain
this buyer relationship. I’ve described the
new generation photo-buyers, who are beginning
today to change their buying pattern from
broad-based to narrow-based.
Because media today is
becoming more and more narrow in its focus --
each market targeting to a differ-ent narrow
segment of the customer base out there --
content needs, e.g. text, sound, pictures, are
following the same pattern.
FOLLOWING A
PATTERN
No longer can a product
ap-peal to a wide audience. Instead, an
advertiser or publisher selects a particular
segment of that audience as their target. As a
supplier of images, if one of your areas of
strong coverage in your collection matches the
buyer’s photo needs -- you have made a
match.The new generation media, thanks to
computers, search engines, and sophisticated
database technol-ogy, will appeal to consumers
of special interest: medicine, educa-tion,
agriculture, transportation.
Not only the broad
spectrum of each of these areas but special
interests within these categories. Medicine, for
example, separates into a multi-tude of
disciplines like nursing, sur-gery, pediatrics,
etc.
And pediatrics breaks down
into areas of infancy, child care, childhood
diseases, etc.New media conduits like
mini-RF-agencies, micropaymant sites, and
Interactive TV will require highly specific
images -- to target their particular highly
spe-cific audiences.
Generic pictures (scenics,
landscapes, general-situation scenes) will
continue to adorn the walls of a
photobuyer’s office -- but he or she will
be signing checks for content-specific images.In
the new generation of picture acquisition --
look for more buyers to buy in volume -- dozens
of im-ages at a time.
YOU ARE
IMPORTANT
Because most publishers
produce their products (magazines, books, video
and educational program-ming pieces, etc.) in a
“theme line” -- you fit into the
production chain, and become an important
resource not only to the individual buyer but to
the whole field, i.e. other buyers within that
theme line.
Any one particular buyer
you deal with might change jobs or retire, but
the theme of the company or publishing house
remains, and you continue to be an important
resource to them. If your specialty area matches
the needs of a buyer, you have made a lifelong
re-lationship, and one that can be worth $20,000
to $50,000 or more to you through the years.
Hopefully the digital
stock photo report above contributed to your
understanding of new generation stock
photography. Share your new understanding with
other photographers and photobuyers. They will
thank you for it. Now, sell the images you want;
buy stock images you long for with this new
digital answer; buying photos online.
- You now have the
latest about the new world of buying and
selling digital stock photography. Keep in
mind that almost any subject changes over
time, so be sure you keep up with new reports
as they come to this website.
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About the Author:
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- Rohn Engh is director
of PhotoSource Inter-national and publisher
of the weekly PhotoStoc-kNotes. Pine Lake
Farm, 1910 35th Road, Osceo-la, WI 54020 USA
Email: info@photosource.com
Fax: 1 715 248 7394. Web site:
www.photosource.com
*** Digital stock images listed here are
not included with this article for reprint or
publication and must be licensed for
usage from Bob Pardue Stock
Photography.
Disclaimer: We hope this article by
Rohn Engh will be useful to helping you sell
photos online or will help you to understand
more about buying stock photos online but Bob
Pardue Photography accepts no responsibility
or does not insure or imply any degree of
reliability of this report or by working with
any of the photo buyers listed on this
website. Each digital stock photographer's
goals will be different and results in the
photo business will not be the same. Look
over any photosource information you find on
this site and always remember to search
online for digital images. Hope you enjoyed
this digital stock photo report.
THESE ARE
NOT FREE IMAGES - RELEASE & USAGE
RIGHTS:
All digital stock images
on this website are copyright Bob Pardue so
email
me about usage.
Unlawful usage of images is violation of
copyright and punished to the full extent of the
law.
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Dightal
Stock Photographer Bob
Pardue
Stock
Photos
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