Pure Reviews

So Bigstock has announced that they are going to start doing subscription sales this year.  Joining what seems to be a new industry standard they are setting their royalty base at only $0.25.  Sadly this seems to be more and more common ( Fotolia , iStock , 123RF , etc).  The odd part of this announcement is that Bigstock was bought by Shutterstock so they could have pay as you go style site.  So this begs the question of why start moving your site to the SS formula with lower royalties.  How do you feel about the changes, comment below. As you know, we already offer Bigstock customers the flexibility of pre-paying with credits. Next week, we’ll be offering our customers an increasingly popular way to buy images:  subscriptions. How will this affect me? Subscriptions can generate higher download volumes, which can increase your total earnings from Bigstock. Here’s how you will earn royalties from Bigstock subscriptions: Eve...

 A few changes to note that have gone into effect at a few sites. Dreamstime : Dreamstime has launched a mobile image section allowing you to submit cell phone photos and digital model releases.  To celebrate this new feature their next assignment will be mobile shots.  Also their is now a new category called "Mobile."  Other requirements are 3 MP minimum resolution still applies and we will not accept upsampled images.  DT is accepting model releases from: Model Release, ASMP Release and Easy Release (on both iOS and Android).  Join today ! Shutterstock : SS has launched a new features called Portfolio Pages that allows contributors to show off their work via personalized URL's.  Another feature on your portfolio page is allowing you to create public sets.  So log in and and set up your today or join Shutterstock here . Bigstock : Bigstock has launched a new partner system that will open their collection to other companies with ...

Another month of 2012 is in the record books and it was a good one.  The top 3 sites are Alamy (thanks to a very large sale), Shutterstock (had a large increase from last month) and then Dreamstime .  123RF and Bigstock are also nipping on DT's heels.  Below is the chart featuring all the sites I had a sale on.  Every site I submit images to is on the left.

Bigstock launches a new way to make purchases of your images, via Pay As You Go.  Contributors get 30% out of the $0.50 USD credit.  See the little chart below for the price breakdown via credits/ pay as you go.  This new feature includes your extended license images and went live on June 2nd.  All pay as you go credits can use major credit cards, see Bigstock for details.  To sign up and join Bigstock click here . Checkout their video here: Video Pay as You Go Credits (just like before) Small $0.90 $0.50 Medium $1.50 $1.00 Large $2.70 $2.00 X-Large $3.90 $3.00 Vector $3.90 $3.00 Extended License $29.70 $25.00

Shutterstock is building bridges to Bigstock as a way increase image submissions.  They are starting to roll out a test program for their most active Shutterstock users that will allow them to just upload once to Shutterstock and have the images avalible for download also at Bigstock.  The idea is to save photographers type on submissions and increase the image volume at Bigstock.  This is currently in test phase only and is not open to everyone yet.  Right now Shutterstock still plans to keep the sites indpendant as SS is marketed to subscriptions and Bigstock is marketed pay per image uses.  See the write-up below . We’re excited to tell you about a new program we’re offering to a select group of Shutterstock contributors. We’re calling it the Bridge to Bigstock . Here’s what we’re doing and why we think it’s a win for everyone. As you may know, Shutterstock and Bigstock are two stock image sites owned by Shutterstock. They’re run as separate bran...

BigStock continues to do upgrades as they bring it into line with Shutterstock's high standards.  The largest update is new and improved charts, sales data, exporting.  Features they now allow are you to high your full name if you wish and also have added a tax section to help with that every complicated part of the government.  Below is a reproduction of the improved charting system. If you sell stock images, you know how important—and rewarding—it can be to track your sales. Bigstock thinks our contributors deserve the best reporting tools, so we’ve just introduced some upgrades to help you track your sales. Here’s what’s new: The Commissions Hover. When you’re logged in to Bigstock, just hover your mouse over the words “your account” on any page to see your latest statistics at a glance. The Image Earnings Graph. Visit the “Your Account” section of Bigstock and track your earnings visually over time with our new graph showing your earnings per day. Yo...

As another month passes and we do our month look back at sales.  The top three are iStock , due to an extended license sale, Dreamstime , and then BigStock .  Over all the month was steady with very small amount of growth.  I have however begun a massive upload of new images that will take place through out May and June...hopefully after that is finished I will see a jump in the numbers.  Currently I am taking advantage of iSyndica's free upload promotion going on this week.

BigStockPhoto drops the Photo in the name to reinvent itself at BigStock . Shutterstock bought them a while back and have geared up the new face with a flashy clean new name, logo, and overhauled website. I can only guess that we will see BigStock adding other media applications like video down the road now that their name is more versatile. Below the screenshot are just a few other upgrades the guys have been working on. Join BigStock here . An entirely new design focused on clean presentation and ease-of-use A new and enhanced search engine New image sizes with larger previews and thumbnails A “liquid layout” for search results and lightboxes, allowing users to see more images on the page Full support for multiple forms of Boolean logic in search (for example, show me: horse AND gallop NOT farm) New navigation Redesigned and improved upload tools for contributors Updated and edited text throughout the site A transition from “galleries” to the more traditional “lightboxes...