Shutterstock Tips and Tricks
Shutterstock is a vast stock content website with a lot to offer. It boasts a library of images and videos so large, you wouldn’t be able to see everything in a lifetime, so Creative COW has put together a list of tips and tricks that will help save you time and money – and uncover some hidden gems.
Tip 1: Stock Footage Albums
If you come across a stock video clip on Shutterstock that fits your project, but you’d like perhaps one or two more scenes to round out your composition, there is a great chance that you can find more clips with the same actors, setting, and tone.
Once you are on the desired video’s display page, “More from this artist” can be found by scrolling further down the page. By clicking “See all” on the right side of this heading, Shutterstock will take you to the artist’s full library where you are bound to find clips of the same subject and quality.
Another option that you may find beneath the chosen stock video that fits your interests is the phrase “Same Model in other videos” as well as “Related stock videos.” These are going to be videos that you might easily be able to roll into the same project to maintain the theme.
Tip 2: Quickly Find Matching Music
If you are up against a short deadline, you’ll find that Shutterstock automatically helps to find a good piece of music to go behind a chosen stock video without you even asking!
At the bottom of the video’s page, Shutterstock will have two stock music selections that are often very right on. Shutterstock seems to take into account the pace of the footage, such that slow motion video, for example, will be appropriately matched with an aptly paced piece of music. You may be surprised by what you find!
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If you aren’t completely satisfied with the two music results that get returned with your footage, refreshing the page will serve up two brand new results.
Tip 3: Freebies
Shutterstock has a plethora of free images, videos, and even LUTs for color grading. While you will need a subscription to view and download most of Shutterstock’s free items, once your subscription is active, these “free” stock assets will not count against your account. This makes for a great way to explore Shutterstock’s quality and fit for your projects.
LUTs, or look-up tables, employ mathematical formulas to adjust the color in your footage. LUTs will create a sort of filter for your footage to lend a certain mood, and tie various pieces of footage together. Shutterstock offers 13 LUTs, mainly developed for use with footage from the Blackmagic Pocket Cinema 6K.
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Shutterstock has nearly 6 million free royalty-free images.
Shutterstock also offers over half a million free royalty-free stock footage.
Tip 4: Find the Most Premium, Professionally Created Images for Important Projects
If you’re looking to impress a client, you’ll want Shutterstock’s highest quality images. For this, visit the Offset image portion of the site to select from images that have been produced by award-winning artists with incredible skill. These are Shutterstock’s best images, and come with a flat price tag, rather than being included in a subscription.
You’ll notice that Shutterstock OffSet images are easily identifiable by the “OffSet” label in the upper left-hand corner of each image.
Because these Offset images are hand selected for their quality, the artists who have honed their craft to contribute these distinct photographs will receive a higher commission from Shutterstock.
You can also filter to find these OffSet images after entering your words into the search bar by clicking “Filters”, and then under the Premium Images section, click the button that says “Only premium images”.
Another way to access Shutterstock’s top images, one step below the OffSet category, is to find “Authentic” images within your given search.
To do this, enter your search into the image search bar and hit enter, then hit the “Filters” button beneath the search bar on the left side, and scroll down through the filters. You will see a section labeled “Authentic” that has two buttons beneath it; “Show all” (which is already selected for you) and “Only authentic”. By clicking the “Only authentic” button, your image results will change to a selection of images that have a very natural, poignant feel to them. You will undoubtedly see many Offset images this way too, but if you are trying to stay within your subscription for stock images and get the best that Shutterstock has to offer, this is an effective search method that will save you a lot of time.
Tip 5: Disable AI Images to Only Get Real Pictures
If your audience is as sharp as the folks at Creative COW, they can spot AI from a mile away, especially if that image contains people. At times, AI generated images are not appropriate for certain projects, and if your audience is sensitive to them, you may wish to exclude AI images from your Shutterstock search results.
If you would like only real images captured by a human being with a camera, enter your search term into the image search bar and push enter, then click the “Filters” button that will now appear beneath the search bar, and scroll down on the left hand side until you see “Exclude AI generated images”. Toggle that switch, and your search results should reload to now exclude all AI generated images.
A specifically tough spot for AI is images of crowds, since zooming in on individuals of an AI crowd is bound to show glitches. For my project, I needed images specifically of a woman speaking to a crowd. My initial search produced these that included AI generated images.
I clicked “Filters”, then toggled the button “Exclude AI generated images”.
Tip 6: Use the Reverse Image Search
If you already have an image that somewhat fits into your composition, yet you’d really prefer a more professionally composed version, Shutterstock has an AI powered Search by image function that can help!
The Search by Image function is great for those who aren’t even sure how to describe the image to get satisfying search results. It can be time consuming to try various different wordings in the search bar if you don’t even know the correct keywords. But if you already have an image that’s close, this function is helpful.
For another project, I needed to include an image of a specific snake that I’d found. However, the snake was not terribly cooperative in front of the camera, so the image I was able to take wasn’t very professional.
I didn’t even know the species of snake that I’d photographed, so entering keywords into an image search was going to be an arduous prospect.
Even though Shutterstock is not a wildlife identification tool, I dragged my awful shot into the Shutterstock reverse image search to see what it would come up with.
We hope that our tips and tricks have added to your experience at Shutterstock, and if you would like to add to this list, please comment below!
Learn more with these Shutterstock articles at Creative COW:
How to Sample Shutterstock’s Inventory to Complete Your Projects
Working With Shutterstock’s AI Editor to Create Unique Images
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