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Articles from June 2010
The Picture Archive Council of America has filed an
amicus—“friend
of the court”—brief in Muench Photography, Inc. v. Houghton Mifflin
Harcourt Publishing Company and R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company,
pending in the United States District Court for the Southern District
of New York. PACA is urging the court to reconsider a
recent summary judgment that deemed Corbis’ copyright registration processes to be invalid.
Stock image producers often have two misconceptions about
subscription licensing services: They believe subscription licensing is
simple and that for a very low monthly fee customers are allowed to use
any image for any purpose. Neither is true.
So says Polylooks, the microstock owned by T-Mobile parent Deutsche
Telecom, which just surveyed 2,200 Brits and says the results make for
interesting reading.
Universal Images Group,
the distribution business unit of the Virtual Picture Desk, has been
awarded a contract by the Encyclopaedia Britannica to provide an
extensive online library of low-resolution (150 dpi) images suitable
for educational use. The images will be supplied by numerous producers around the world and, together with Britannica's wholly owned content, will become part of a new subscription service, Britannica Image
Explorer.
After PicScout announced that it now offers image crediting free of charge,
some questioned the terms of use on the PicScout signup page, which
describe having to pay fees. PicScout has clarified the details of the
free and pay-for portions of its ImageIRC service.
I receive regular requests from photographers who want to know how they
can license rights to the images they have created over the years on
film. Here’s what I tell them. Licensing rights to images is very
difficult in today’s market because there is such an oversupply
available compared to the demand.
Sam Faulkner and Annie Marie Musselman, and respective agencies Mon
Frere and 619 Graphic Design, are the recipients of the 2010 Getty
Images’ Grants for Good program.
Getty Images-owned iStockphoto has announced an iPhone app that offers features for both image buyers and contributors.
The 15th annual gathering of the Picture Archive Council of America is returning to New York this Octobe.
Fotolia has announced the launch of an Adobe AIR application that offers desktop access to the company’s collection.
At the recent CEPIC Congress in Dublin, Ireland, CEO of UpperCut Images Miles Gerstein offered
CEPIC Daily
his assessment of the future of the stock photo industry. Gerstein
previously owned PunchStock, which he sold to Getty Images in 2006, and
Artville, which he sold to The Image Bank in the late 1990s. His years
of experience in the industry provide him with an important perspective
on where the industry is likely headed.
Don’t tell Cathy Yeulet that you can’t make money in microstock. She operates
Monkey Business Images,
one of the most successful microstock production companies. However,
unlike many microstockers, she is not new to stock photography. For
many years, Yeulet operated a successful rights-managed business in
Oxfordshire, U.K. When traditional royalty-free first began to take
off, she created the BananaStock brand, which she sold to Jupiterimages
in 2005 for approximately $19 million in cash.
She started uploading images to iStockphoto in March of 2008.
Photographers and editors of Getty Images have earned more than 90
industry awards in this year’s ceremonies that covered images and
multimedia productions. The honors include top-level placement at
competitions by the National Press Photographers Association, the
Overseas Press Club of America and World Press Photo.
Photo tracking solution PixTrakk—launched a year ago
by LTU Technologies, PixWays and TNS Media Intelligence (now Kantar
Media)—says it has a firm foothold in the French photo-agency market.
Getty Images is offering buyers who frequent Flickr as a source of
images an opportunity to license any image they see—even the images
that have not made it into the Flickr Collection on gettyimages.com.
Here’s the best chance you’ll ever have to win 100 Euros (or the equivalent in dollars). You can also respond to a photographer survey or have fun testing your knowledge of photography business trends. Check it out. It will only take a couple minutes.
A new 70-second video discusses image infringement, rights and protection.
Always on the lookout for new ways to popularize science content and
show off its footage, the Science Photo Library has released a rap video.
A recent survey revealed that more than half of Getty Images’ customers
use their mobile device to look at stock media Web sites. In response,
the Seattle company has developed a free iPad app to present its
imagery to buyers on the go.
PictureGroup, a music and entertainment media production company launched by photographer Frnk Micelotta last fall, has announced a merger with Elevation Photos.
U.S. educational publishers are admitting to more and more unauthorized
uses during the past decade and quietly entering into out-of-court
settlements with an increasing number of image suppliers for large
numbers of uses. In cases where the original license fee was well under
$1,000, publishers are now paying multiple thousands of dollars to
settle claims.
Jonathan Klein is CEO and co-founder, with Mark Getty, of Getty Images
and the most influential person in the global stock photo industry. For
fifteen years he led an aggressive acquisition campaign which positions
Getty as the leading source of still and moving imagery as well as
footage and music. He is a passionate believer in the power of the
image to create change in editorial as well as creative photography. In
this exclusive CEPIC DAILY interview, he gives frank answers to some
tough questions posed by Tweak founder Jerry Kennelly. It gives an
intriguing insight into Getty as a privately held company and their
vision for the future of the industry.
What do you know about the stock photo industry and its future
potential? Here are 20 questions to test your knowledge of facts
related to photo licensing. The answers are at the bottom of the story.
This story provides a list of useful articles that will provide the reader with a good background on the current state of the stock photography business and where it is headed.
If you are in the stock imagery business and want to stay current with
worldwide industry trends, the annual CEPIC congress is a must-attend
event. Held every year in early June—this year in Dublin, Ireland, at
the brand new Aviva Stadium—the congress provides an opportunity to
meet industry leaders and exchange ideas.
PicScout has made digital image-crediting services available to all for free.
During his keynote speech at the Dublin gathering of CEPIC, Stockbyte
founder Jerry Kennelly announced the upcoming launch of his new
business Tweak. Operating on a
content-as-a-service model, Tweak aims to become a major global
self-service design library and change the way customers access
creative content.
PhotoShelter has introduced a single configurable Web site theme for
its free and basic accounts, which cost under $10 per month. This means
that users are no longer restricted to PhotoShelter-branded image
galleries. The New York-based company has also added features to
support search-engine optimization.
Getty Images’ Thinkstock has announced it is leveraging social media to provide close to real-time support to art buyers.
Science Faction Images has integrated the Capture content management solution into its Web site.
PicScout has announced that Superstock, Corbis-owned Veer and newer
microstock Vivozoom have joined the agencies indexed via ImageIRC.
The traditional market for single images is under intense pressure. However, the demand for imagery that hangs together as a story is increasing in both editorial and commercial arenas.
German microstock Panthermedia is offering Pixamba’s media management software to its photo-buyer base. The two partner companies will be on hand at CEPIC's Dublin event this week to demo the product.
U.K. motion stock offering expands to include English Language Learning content.
James Cavanaugh recently posed this question to members of Linkedin’s
ASMP group: “A client wants you to create photographs that they can use
on social sites so they can ‘go viral’ to promote their company. It
means potentially countless people may use your copyrighted work. How
would you approach such a request?”
I suggest handling the job as an all-rights assignment.
U.K.-based Reflex Stock has set up a franchise in São Paulo and is seeking additional partners in all regions of the world.
New York-based subscription micro Shutterstock has announced several
search upgrades, including what it calls a real-time search engine that
indexes new images within seconds.
Multicultural specialist will introduce motion product at this week's CEPIC Congress in Dublin.
In an effort to obtain updated information on revenue trends in the
stock photo industry, we will be conducting a revenue survey at the
2010 CEPIC International Congress and New Media Conference, which that
takes place in Dublin on June 9–13. In a blind survey, we will be
asking representatives of every stock agency and stock image
distributor to answer five brief questions on behalf of their company.
On LinkedIn’s ASMP group James Cavanaugh outlined the following client
request
, “A client wants you to create photographs that
they can use on social network sites so they can "go viral" to promote
their company. It means potentially countless people may use your
copyrighted work,” and he asked “How would you approach such a request?”
This story provides my answer.
The International Press Telecommunications Council is holding its fourth international Photo Metadata Conference on June 9
in Dublin, in conjunction with the CEPIC Congress 2010. IPTC plans to
announce two upcoming metadata product releases at the event: new tools that integrate IPTC and PLUS metadata into CS3 and CS4, as well as a proposal for a controlled vocabulary system.
How does demand for images compare to what many agree is an
oversupply?
Alamy has introduced an image search filter that delivers images on white backgrounds
In line with the recent trend among large microstocks, Veer has
announced a freely available plugin that enables users of Microsoft
products to search for and buy Veer images from within Word and
PowerPoint documents.
Barcelona-based Age Fotostock
has announced the addition of video to its offerings, using its own
Technological Hosting Platform’s software and hardware to distribute
footage as it has been distributing still images.
What does the competition look like in terms of the number of images available online? Everyone knows there are billions of amateur images floating around the Internet, but what is the quantity of unique images currently available in professional collections?
Tomorrow's 2PM hearing could institute a $300 permit to shoot in New York—without distinguishing between extravagant film and televisions productions and small still shoots.
A comprehensive comparison of the various sizing and pricing strategies between the top 6 microstock photography sites.
Though many think the microstock niche is already overpopulated, the
recent launch of Stockfresh is notable given its provenance. The new
micro business was founded by Peter Hamza and Andras Pfaff of
Stock.xchng and StockXpert fame.
During last Friday’s hearing in the copyright dispute between artist
Shepard Fairey and The Associated Press, U.S. District Judge Alvin
Hellerstein said he thought that sooner or later, the AP would win.
Hellerstein urged the parties to settle.