About Us

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.

About Jim Pickerell

Jim Pickerell began his career in 1963 as a freelance photojournalist in the Far East. His first major sale, a Life Magazine cover, was a stock photo of the overthrow of the Ngo Dinh Diem government in Saigon, Vietnam.  He spent three-and-a-half years covering the war in Vietnam before returning to the U.S. where he was based first in New York and later in Washington, DC.

He spent the next ten to fifteen years focusing on assignment work, first as an editorial photographer, and later in the corporate area doing everything from event coverage to shooting annual reports. He worked on assignment in more than 80 countries around the world and regularly filed his outtakes with several stock agencies around the world. 

As the stock side of his income grew, Jim studied the needs of the stock photo market, and began to devote more of his shooting time to producing stock images. When the 1976 change in the copyright law took effect the demand for stock images that could be used for commercial and advertising purposes began to grow rapidly.

In the early 80's Jim helped establish the Mid-Atlantic chapter of American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP) and served as Vice President, President and Program Chairman over a period of six years. He served on the national board of ASMP for two years, was on the committee that produced the ASMP Stock Handbook in 1983, and was active in the fight to reverse the IRS rules that required capitalization of all expenses of stock photo production. 

In 1989 he published the first edition of Negotiating Stock Photo Prices, a guide to pricing hundreds of stock photo uses. The fifth edition was published in 2001. Those interested in updated information on pricing based on usage can find it at http://www.selling-stock.com/Article/pricing-stock-images-based-on-usage.

In 1990, he began publishing Selling-Stock, a bi-monthly newsletter dealing with issues of interest to stock photographers and stock photo sellers, with particular focus on issues related to marketing stock images. In 1995 the publication went on-line and today it provides daily updates of developments in the industry. Selling Stock is recognized worldwide as the leading source of in-depth analysis of the stock photo industry. 

In 1993, his daughter, Cheryl, joined him in the business. Together they established Stock Connection, (www.scphotos.com) an agency designed to provide photographers with greater control over the promotion and marketing of their work than most other stock agencies were offering at the time. The company currently represents selected images from more than 400 photographers. 

Jim has an expert understanding of the stock photo industry, its standard practices and developing trends. He frequently provides consulting services to photographers, stock agents and individuals in the investment community on stock industry issues. 

At age 75, Jim is still excited by the challenges the photography industry presents and expects to be participating in the marketing of photography, and advising photographers, far into the future.