April 14, 2007 by pmelcher.

A lot has been said about those who contribute their images to microstock sites or the free photo sharing sites. A lot of bad things, mostly, said by professional photographers. But an article in the NYT of today just juggled a thought I had years back as this trend was rising. Is it really a wave of amateurs or is it the rise of a new breed of pros? What defines a pro photographer, especially in the commercial stock world? Some have studied and have a degree in photography. great, but that does not make you a good photographer. Others declare themselves pro as soon as they sold a few images. Microstockers can now say the same, big deal. I, even thought not at all a photographer, have had some of my images published. No big deal. We tend to consider a pro someone that makes a living from their craft. I know a lot of photographers who, although they try, cannot even say that. So what is, really, the difference, if any?

Maybe it is time that the magnate of the photo syndication mafia start looking much closer to what is going on rather then just smile and walk by shaking their shoulders in disdain.

Equipment and the process have become much easier to handle. What used to be a big ordeal: getting film, loading, taking 24 or 36 images, seeing the result a week later, looking at crappy 5×7, putting them in a box never to be seen again has come a long way. Now, first and foremost, you can shoot and edit immediately, and erase, and shoot again, and again. and get better.

I know a lot of photographers who never went to photography school. They learned by trial and error, just like the amateurs are doing now. You get my point.

If I was running a photo agency right now, which I am not, I would be looking and contacting all these potential talents. This is a goldmine waiting to be taken. Yes, Flickr was bought by Yahoo but no ones stops you from contacting some of the great photographers there and offering them a real job. Before Microsoft and other image buyers do it for you, while you sit there, complaining and waiving your arms up in the air. Remember, it is not Flickr that is interesting, it is the images that they host. That should tell you something.
It would be nice to see the “professional” stock photography industry lend a helping hand to all these emerging talents instead of either ignoring them or putting them down. This is, after all the new crop of professionals. Why do the NPPA, ASMP, PPA, and other self proclaimed churches of photography, not offer free classes on syndication, business affairs, 3 months trial membership ?

Why doesn’t PACA or CEPIC offer them a guide on how to choose the best representation and agency ?

Why doesn’t the so called “professional photo community” offer a helping hand to these new arrivals before they get eaten by sharks ? Because they think it will make them disappear? as in” if I ignore a problem long enough, it will cease to exist”?

I don’t think so. It is only going to become a bigger and stronger trend. And the ones that will survive this surging wave are the ones that will accept, embrace and adapt to the challenge. The others should look for another job, quickly.

Posted in yahoo, web 2.0, flickr, Microstock | Print | No Comments »

February 9, 2007 by pmelcher.

I came upon a cool new website today and starting playing with it. The result, if you click on “run this pipe”, is all images in Flickr that corresponds to a news item on Google News.

It is very interesting and when I have more time, I will attempt to create more pipes of this sort. You can customized the source of the news, and I believe, the source of images. I just didn’t have much time to play with it today. I haven’t figured out yet how to keep the headlines next to the images, but then again, I did this in 10 minutes.
The point of this exercise is to show that one could easily create an automated online news magazine, just using Flickr as an image source. Since it is an aggregator, and I am not a commercial user, I am assuming I am not breaking any copyright law.

Play with it and let me know.

Google News run through Flickr

Posted in yahoo, keyword, google, web 2.0, filter, news | Print | No Comments »

January 9, 2007 by pmelcher.

A favorite topic of mine this one is and a major aspect of what we do here at Melchersytem. Born from a multi national background and having traveled a lot through my (short) life, I am extremely sensitive to local cultures. What I see in the photo industry is quite disturbing. I am assuming it is because photography continues to drag this legend that it is an universal language coupled with the No Boundary internet perception.
It all started with Corbis and its first website, Corbisview. All was English ( American, that is), with American design, touch and feel and search logic. Simple enough, it was American, made by Americans and had all the money in the world therefore the whole world would use it as is. To add insult to injury, photo editors would go through the Bettmann Archive and decide which topic and image would be granted the right to be scanned and added to the Mighty collection. Quite obviously, not only the content was heavily American centric ( baseball legends for example), it would also eliminate world events that was not taught in US schools for lack of “sellability”. If I do not know what or who it is, it doesn’t exist.

Soon after, GuettyOne was launched. Because of its more commercial stock oriented content, it had some content that was interesting for non Americans, but it was more an accident than an effort. Needless to say, the design, up to the keywords, where in English.
After that, a torrent of other agencies followed suite with pale copies of their own, thinking like a New Yorker, if i can make it here (the United States), I can make it anywhere . Furthermore, the English and the Australian speak English so there you go, I am already international. This still continues to this day. American arrogance.

People do no read photography the same way all over the world. Photography is only universal when it reaches genius level. most art buyers are not looking for an Henri Cartier Bresson image. American should get over themselves. especially in the editorial field. Images are being sold for 6 figures every day in different countries in the world and they are not of Brad Pitt or Angelina Jolie. With the rise of reality tv shows, while the concepts are being exported, the celebrities they create cannot cross the border. But they are super mega stars in there country. I use to license a lot of images of American soap opera in Europe, Japan, South America many, many years ago, in the “slide age”, because most TV stations would translate them. Today, not only these country produce their own soaps, they export them to each other and none of the stars are American. Russia is the biggest importer of Brazilian soap operas. The same goes for politics and international news. Just ask Time, Newsweek, Business Week why they have foreign editions.
Same with websites navigation, text, keywords, appearance. While some US agencies understand that a big us corporation might have different ads concepts for the same product in different part of the country to reach local sensibilities, they do not understand that France and Germany are not the same country. or don’t want to. Green is a very popular color in Germany right now, but who in the USA would design their website in green? It’s not just about the content, the packaging matters. A lot.

And I would much prefer using a product that functions the way I think and work than me having to learn another language. Including search logic.
Yes, localization is expensive. But there is no escaping it. It will not disappear. It’s actually getting worse. The more the world is becoming a global market, the more people and sensibilities are local. Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, and just recently Myspace.com who just launched a French version, have understood that. But not the photo community. Because I can be seen from anyone outside my country with my website, I am international says the photo community.

There is an effort to be made. I always use the Olympics for example. The organizers have to deal with thousands of different cultures and languages ( they are more than 7,000 languages in the world) . How do they do it ? They use Pictograms, most of them that they invent themselves. The photo industry could do the same. Imagine if from website to website, it would always be the same pictogram to download an image. And just think of conceptual searches and how they differ from one culture to another. What makes an American happy is not the same as what makes a Japanese happy, or an Australian.
On the content side, instead of a filter that would block content not available for an image buyer because of contractual restriction, it should be a filter that would actually show an image Buyer images more relevant to his/her country and culture : a local tv star, a local politician or a local concept.
Yes, technology has made it easier to license an image across the world, now it is up to sensibilities to make that image sellable across the world. Using Pictogram verbs and client sensitive imagery would finally make local all photographers or agencies that would want to become global.

Posted in google, yahoo, pictogram, photojournalism, editorial, corbis, france, getty | Print | 1 Comment »

January 5, 2007 by pmelcher.

Let’s say your a commercial stock photographer or agency and you are ready to embark on a new photo shoot. You probably have a direction, an objective in what and how you want to shoot. At least let’s hope you do.

Therefore you should have already a set of keywords, if not written down, somewhere in your mind. Well, give them a test. See how many times the keyword (s) have been entered in the Yahoo Search engine…and what else is there. Obviously, the more the search term has been entered, the more interest there is for it.

And you know advertisers are looking at the same tool. And are or will be looking for images to illustrate their campaign. No need to explain more. Read the rest of this entry »

Posted in yahoo, web 2.0 | Print | No Comments »