[Russ Stiggants]

Good on you for giving it a go, Milton! I have looked at your site and can see what you’re attempting. Keep this thread advised of your success – I am sure everyone will be interested in whether you make sales, comparative to your effort. I agree with your theory that if all those who have images to sell could band together to form a ‘viral co-operative’, for the want of a term…well, it certainly would provide an alternative to the traditional ‘stockhouse’ way of selling clips.

I’m sure a version of what you suggest has already been suggested (in fact, I think it may have been proposed even in this forum from memory), but in theory it could work if as you suggest, everyone was dedicated to making it work.

I still think the underlying flaw in the ‘stock’ footage argument overall is that you need to have the ‘stock’ that someone wants. It may be great to have a really good shot of a yellow flower against a green background, when someone may want a blue flower against a black background. You understand what I mean. As I said in an earlier post, many excellent visual sequences seem not to have sold at all – while those who are making generic graphic backgrounds seem to be having moderate success.

Clearly ‘reality’ stock is difficult to move. This may be because advertising/PR types (a) may not have the imagination to use stock shots effectively (b) loathe to use something being ‘in the public domain’, or (c) want to shoot it themselves (and make a bucket of money out of the client for doing so). For example, I was recently in a briefing with an advertising agency (I was a bemused observer on the ‘client side’) and was amused when the agency showed some stock still photos (which would have done the job) only to watch them convince the client that the photos had a ‘stock feel’ and were not worthy. The client didn’t look at the bottom-line cost. The agency appealed to his ego and succeeded in ‘selling him up’. Thus the ad cost him several thousands of dollars, whereas he could have opted for an equally good ad, literally for hundreds of dollars (maybe not as ‘tailored’, but good enough to have sold his products). Go figure.

Thus I am contemplating new models to maximise stock footage by jumping the divide between being a mere ‘provider’ to being a ‘producer’ utilising my stock shots in a way which might be interesting to various clients. I think the weakness in stock shots is that they are a ‘solution looking for a problem’ in world markets. If you reverse that equation and identify a local ‘problem’ and provide a local ‘solution’ based on your stock footage, the chances are greater that you’ll make money from your library. Better to make $1000 locally (or by industry sector), than nothing at all by appealing to a disinterested ‘world’.

Hope this helps – and as I say, please keep us advised of your success or otherwise.

Russ

[Russ Stiggants]

I don’t have any experience with this personally as I have not ventured into selling stock footage for all the reasons discussed in this thread – despite having some images which I think would be worthy of making available. I just can’t wrap my head around (1) selling my images for peanuts and (b) a stock house taking an exhorbitant amount for the pleasure.

Now I know the stock houses say that they give you great exposure and we the videographers should be grateful that they’re providing the service for us to make money – any money – on the back of their hard work…..but at this stage I can’t see anyone making enough money to make it worth their while. from my look at stock houses, I see that those who make ‘generic’ backgrounds and the like seem to be doing better than videographers hanging up ‘reality’ vision — either way, I see an awful lot of good shots with no buys….

As for the copyright issue – sure the law is on our side – but (a) you’ve got to find copyright infringement in the first place, as you say, and (b) do you seriously think the average videographer is going to mount a legal case costing thousands of dollars over 10 seconds of vision for which he might get $25???? Nah – ain’t going to happen.

I think the answer might be to establish your own website – do your metadata properly – and flog your own clips direct. That way you can keep tabs on your client/s and make him/her aware of the issues of copyright infringements. What with good search engines these days, the ability to build very cost-effective websites – and Paypal, there’s no reason not to give it a try. Then you can charge what you like! In Australia for example, you want stock footage out of the Australian Broadcasting Commission? You pay scores of dollars per second!

Maybe that’s the way to go…..

Russ

[Russ Stiggants]

Randy does make a good point – and good on you Russ for going into it further.

here’s a what if….

What if you make a stock-footage sale to client x who uses the footage in his TVC or corporate docco. So far, so good – you get a payment (peanuts usually by the looks of things) and the deal is done. But client x later gives his video (including your stock footage) to some other party who wants to use portions of it in another, unrelated video. Client x thinks he owns all the footage (and he does to the edited tape) but he effectively hands on your stock footage (edited as it may be). Thus your footage may be used in another production without your knowledge – and without payment to you.

And here’s another what if….

Production House n buys your footage and uses it in production b. Now another client pops up and could benefit from the same footage, albiet edited in a different way. Does the production house acknowledge that? The good ones will – but what about the not-so-honest?

Some points to ponder….

Russ

[Russ Stiggants]

Hi Russ…

Interesting to hear that the prices paid for stock footage seem to be going down, which only goes to confirm why I started this thread in the first place…..selling stock footage does not really make economic sense unless you’re sitting around with nothing else to do. After a year since I created the thread, you’ll notice a paucity of people reporting wild success. If I were you, I’d being going with those who return as much money as possible to you. But given the state of the world economy, I don’t think I would be holding my breath…..

[Russ Stiggants]

Thanks for your advice Mike…..

Production work in my town has always been pretty slim, but I’ve made a living out of it for many years.

That’s not really the point however….

Like many pro’s, I’ve kept just about every camera tape I’ve shot (over more than 25 years) and have some very interesting vision some of which has never seen the light of day (you know how it is – shoot x-number of tapes for a 10-min ‘corporate’). For example, I’ve done a lot of stuff for the mining, oil and gas industry in some of the most remote parts of Australia, as well as a lot of agricultural/horticultural stuff (and a whole lot more). It just seems to me that this is an untapped resource that could spin off some dollars.

I do agree with you that production is still where the real money is (and I’m doing that increasingly with video-on-the-web) but I’m still keen to explore the stock ‘option’.

Like you however, I agree there’s got to be a profit to it. If in the end I’m spending $100 dollars of my time for only $10 return, that really doesn’t make much business sense.

That’s why I’m keen to hear from ‘suppliers’. No offence to the middlemen; I understand it’s in their interests to talk-up stock sites.

At the end of the day, I guess I’ll only find out the truth by spending a day or two pumping up a number of shots and passing them on to a number of stock ‘houses’. If it doesn’t work, then I’ll chalk it up to experience.

Russ

[Russ Stiggants]

Thanks for this Charley….

I have looked at your site and am interested in exploring the options…unlike other stock sites however, I don’t have any clear idea about how you can help me, what your commission is or how I would get my images to you, given you are in Florida and I am in Australia. With Pond5 I can send QT files by disc, rather than attempting long uploads.

While I appreciate your post, Let me say as a weather-beaten ol’ journalist, I find that the responses I am getting are from outfits like yours keen to represent my (potential) video-library – but remarkably I am not hearing from fellow video-pro’s who have used any of the growing numbers of stock-sites out there in internet-space – and more importantly can report that they are making money, relative to their ‘cost-of-acquisition’.

This indicates that either (a) selling stock footage returns ‘peanuts’ in terms of value to the shooter, (b) it’s still the province of amateurs and kids with ‘toy-cams’ who reckon 20-bucks is really good, or (c) so-called ‘hi-end’ video sales are the province of Getty Images and the like.

Being self-critical, my stuff is in the middle to upper-end of the range. I don’t want to sell stuff for hundreds of dollars a minute, but neither do I want to sell it for chicken-feed.

I am still to find that middle ground.

That’s why I started this thread and after 4 months am still not getting the response I’ve been hoping for.

Is this because the pro’s are not interested in selling stock, or is it because the ‘fundamentals’ still are not right?

[Russ Stiggants]

Thanks for your advice Melissa – it’s good to hear from a producer who is actually turning a buck out of stock.

I do take your point that the more ‘generic’ animated stuff has opportunities – the more I look on the stock sites, I see more and more of that being offered. I will check out Revostock again – I am also looking at Pond5, so if anyone has experience there, I’d appreciate comments. I do agree that the hassle of uploading (and I know there are ‘auto uploaders’ out there) seems to offer challenges…but I guess they can be tolerated on the understanding that it might be worth it in the end.

I’d also like to hear from those who may actually use stock footage (any ‘customers’ out there?) to get an understanding of how they use stock footage and what they may be looking for. For example, are there people out there only looking for a ‘grab’ to insert in a Powerpoint – or maybe only interested in a ‘still’ from stock footage? What about ‘screen’ sizes? Smaller screen sizes at more modest resolutions than may be needed for ‘mainstream’ television raises interesting selling opportunities – and scalable pricing structures.

I certainly have an extensive library which I am looking at afresh with the notion that some stuff at least is ‘offerable’ as stock footage; as I see it, this is a new area for many pro camerapersons/videographers like me (particularly those who have never trashed original camera tapes), so I am feeling my way.

I really appreciate your comments – and those of others who may want to contribute.

[Russ Stiggants]

Thanks very much, Jerry.

cmd+F12 did the trick!

[Russ Stiggants]

Steve, I’m with you. I hate sales too. I agree with you that those of us who do choose to work independently – and who are unable or unwilling to sell ourselves – need to find people who can sell for us.

Over a few years, I paid big buckets for two young ladies to do that for me (sequentially, not at the same time!) The first was better than the second – but once I had ‘trained’ them and they were both becoming useful and productive, both left to join other (non-competing) outfits (one went on to sell cars, the other to sell ads for a newspaper).

There were no employment issues (I supplied one with a company car and healthy expense account – the other with a good car allowance and expenses) and looked after them exceptionally well.

We all became very good friends and there were no hard feelings on my part when they left. I am still good friends with both – but I had to come to terms with the fact that they were both young and had to move on career-wise, even though I was paying them top dollar.

I think I took their departure harder than they did: I lost something from my business beyond employee/employer relationships.

This in fact points to an interesting phenomenon – in ‘micro’ businesses, it’s really hard to separate employment from friendship, particularly as you work so closely with those who are part of your professional life.

In a bigger business, there’s more separation.

Not so for the sole-trader.

Now I hire no-one, although I do agree with you that the best way to go these days is maybe to engage a freelance sales-rep and sell on commission. Trouble is, getting the right sort of person to sell that way is easier said than done.

Still, Ben could probably benefit from this approach, so long as (a) he can find the right person (b) he can absorb the lazy few grand it takes to get that person up-to-speed and ‘incentivize’ them, and (c) accept the clients that sales-person will bring to him.

In my case, like a lot of so-called ‘creatives’, I rejected working for some people my sales-girls brought to me. I knew the clients who preyed on them and who were looking for great ‘creative’ at insulting prices.

But…aahhhh….the good thing for working for yourself is that you have the ability to say ‘no’ whenever you like. When push comes to shove, you have that sublime ability to tell a potential client what you think of them.

Not good for sales, but very, very satisfying!

These are the grey areas of self employment – but Damn! I can sleep at night, I only work for those I want to, and I still have great fun from time to time telling potential clients to go stuff themselves.

I go hungry often – but I feed off an empty stomach.

[Russ Stiggants]

As well meaning as a lot of the posts to this topic are, I think most really miss the mark.

At the heart of Ben Choo’s dilemma is not whether working from home is good or bad or how to manage his time/life commitments, although clearly these matters must be weighed up in his decision-making. He has been given excellent advice by the many posters who do work from home – I work from home and empathise/sympathise with all the comments made.

More importantly I believe, Ben’s decision will likely be predicated by a much more fundamental imperative: Will he make a living without the fundamental ‘human infrastructure’ that bigger studios provide?

Here is the key in what he says: [Ben Choo]: “I hated presentation! Pitching! It’s not me. I just wanted to edit!”

Editing from home demands that the practitioner is more than a good editor. He’s also the janitor, the receptionist, the book-keeper, the coffee-maker, the logistics manager, the Chairman of the Board…..do I need go on? Most importantly, he needs to be a salesman! Unless the Edit Fairy has sprinkled him with magic ‘come to me aren’t I terrific’ dust, at some stage he’ll be sitting there until the Moon turns purple waiting for someone – anyone – to come a knockin’.

The alternative is for him to work for the right studio that will appreciate his talent. Maybe that’s part-time work or full-time work – but the point is, he’s not responsible for beating the bushes to flush out his next job.

Ben is fretting for his future now and his health is suffering.

All I’ve got to say is to work for yourself, from home, requires the fortitude, discipline and steely-resolve of a ‘special-forces’ soldier and the flare, resourcefulness and entrepreneural skills of a bounty-hunter. Does Ben have those qualities?