Stock Photographer Basics
©Copyright 2006 Pelham Arno All Rights Reserved
12th May 2006
Most people come to try stock photography after learning the basics as amateur photographers, with the view to trying to earn some money, and get their photos out there and in use. They buy a camera, take photos of their family, pets, landscapes, flowers etc. These are the things that matter to them as an amateur photographer - photos they would like to show their family and friends, or perhaps display on a web gallery.
This transition can be difficult - for a number of reasons.
The subjects people are used to and 'like' photographing as amateurs, do not necessarily make the best subjects for stock photography. In addition, amateur photographers often want to establish themselves as 'artists', and be seen as a creative. For instance they will take a photo of an old person, crop a lot of the subject out (to make it arty), then apply loads of filtering, and maybe make it black and white too.
The goal of amateur photography is thus often simply to impress other people (and massage your ego, let's face it!). The goal of stock photography is very different - it is to produce images that sell. Fair enough along the way different people will make different compromises between what they regard as 'fun photography' and commercial photography, but the key aspect that makes a stock photograph, is its salability.
The problem with these 'art' shots, is that the world is full to the brim with 'artists', trying to sell their wares, using exactly the same 'artistic' tricks. And the market is relatively small.
Let's try to break down salability:
a) Number of potential buyers for your image's 'niche'
b) Quality of your image
c) Quality of the competing images in that sector
d) How much people are prepared to pay for that type of image
Thus in stock photography, the types of thought processes you should be going through in order to decide what, and how to take photos, are: What does the market want? How much competition is there in that field?
Rights managed vs Royalty free
Essentially there is a distinction between two main outlets for stock photography. 'Rights managed', where an individual licensing agreement is negotiated for each use, and 'royalty free', where the image can be used in almost unlimited ways for a single license fee. However, with royalty free the buyer has no option to buy exclusive rights to the image.
What this equates to in reality is a low volume of sales at high prices for rights managed, and a high volume of sales at low prices for royalty free.
Microstock
Microstock is the newest entry into the stock world, where the low price of doing business over the internet and economies of scale have made it viable to sell images for very competitive prices, as low as around a dollar. Microstock has been a huge success story, and while it has undoubtedly to some extent lowered the prices some designers are prepared to pay for images, it has opened up the world of stock imagery to a huge number of new buyers.
Here are the microstock sites I contribute to and recommend.
Examinations
If you are new to a particular agency, you will normally have to submit your first images for examination to make sure they meet the required standards. This can be particularly difficult for a newcomer to stock. In order to be successful I would recommend reading and familiarizing yourself with the information in this article, and joining and posting on the forums of the respective agencies BEFORE posting your initial images for examination.
Instead of immediately submitting your images for examination, first post them in the 'critique' sections of the forums, where other contributors will be able to let you know whether your images meet the standards, or if not, which areas you need to concentrate on improving. If you are lucky they will also give you tips as to which types of images are most likely to be accepted in your examination batch.
Spend a little time getting together your initial batch, as they will represent you to the agency. Pay particular attention to issues such as noise and artefacts (see the later section), which unfortunately are often responsible for rejections of new submitters at agencies. Best of luck if you a new submitter.
Market research
One of the most important considerations when choosing a subject is market research. How many people are out there who will be interested in buying photos of this subject? How many other photos are there already available of this subject, and what is their quality like - could you do better?
Some of the best ways to get ideas about what subjects sell is by getting feedback from stock companies. Look at the top50 / top100 lists, check the statistic for what is selling from other people's photos, and from your own previous photos. If you find some of your photos are for some reason selling hugely better than others, maybe you have found a new niche waiting to be explored. Take a few more similar photos and see how they do.
In general this should give an idea of some of the best selling topics:
1. People
2. Business and Industry
3. Lifestyle
4. Abstracts, Backgrounds, Concepts
5. Medicine, Science and Technology
6. Travel and Transportation
7. Nature, Wildlife and Agriculture
8. Food and Beverage
9. Homes and Interiors
10. Fine Art
11. Sports and Entertainment
12. Historical and Vintage
Conveying an idea
Generally, stock photos are used by clients in order to convey or illustrate an idea. The emphasis is usually on making the idea obvious - i.e. the photo should be clear in what it is trying to convey, and not cluttered, and not take the viewer a minute of scrutinizing to work out what it means. Obviously there will be exeptions, but in general making the concept obvious pays dividends.
Isolations
The ultimate example of this 'purity of concept' is in isolation shots, where a subject is isolated against a plain background (nothing to distract the viewer). The background is often pure white or black, as this can be particularly useful for designers building webpages or designs against white or black backgrounds.
Framing / Cropping
While there are no hard rules regarding framing and cropping in stock, in general you will have more success (i.e. less rejections, and probably more sales) if you bear in mind the final use of the image.
One of the fundamental pitfalls (carry over from the 'art' world) is cropping or framing in too close on the subject, and chopping some of it out. While this can be effective, bear in mind a designer can also easily crop out a certain portion of an image, if he/she desires. In short a close-crop can limit the usefulness of an image.
If you are having problems with rejections due to framing / cropping, try to ensure that your entire subject is within the frame, that none of it is chopped off. In common with this, if possible try and keep the subjects full shadow in frame too, without awkward chopping, if it is feasible to do so.
Other important tips are to try to keep horizons straight, and frame so as to minimize any 'chopping off' of distinctive features in the background.
Rule of thirds
This is really outside the scope of this article, but it is worth mentioning that a common technique used in framing is to try and include key elements of the photo along, or at crossings with, lines drawn to chop the photo into thirds in the horizontal and vertical direction. This technique draws its origins from the maths of fibonacci, and the so called 'golden ratio', which it is believed humans find instinctively attractive.
Depth of field
While the choice of depth of field (via aperture) obviously depends on the photo, it is a critical element to the photo and thus some thought should be taken over it.
Some people believe that in stock depth of field should be at extremes - either the whole photo should be in focus, or else depth of field should be used to completely blur the background and focus on the subject.
Personally I am not sure there are any strict rules, just that the choice should be appropriate to the photo. For example, in an isolation, unless used for dramatic effect, there is no reason why a large depth of field should not be used so as to allow as much of the subject to be in focus as possible. Of course there are other factors to take into account, such as the 'sweet spot' for the aperture of your lens.
In general though it is a good idea to try and maintain all, or as much of, your subject in focus as possible.
In order to get the best results it is very important that careful attention is paid to exposure at the time of the photograph. Over or under-exposure is a make or break factor. In the world of digital, over-exposure results in harsh clipping of the RGB values, with areas tending towards pure white and losing all detail. Under-exposure on the other hand, while partly salvagable by increasing the levels of each pixel, introduces sampling error and exacerbates digital 'noise', the bane of the stock photographer.
In general, the photographer should seek to set the aperture in order to give the desired depth of field, then alter shutter speed in order to give the correct exposure. While it is possible to alter ISO (sensitivity), on digital cameras anything other than the lowest ISO settings will introduce more digital 'noise' which could result in your photo being unsuitable for stock purposes.
Unfortunately this does lead to problems in low-light situations. Rather than compromising on a higher aperture in low light, it is possible to decrease the shutter speed and use a tripod to steady the shot and prevent blur. Of course this technique is only available with static (non-moving) subjects, with dynamic subjects under low light, you really are out of luck for stock photos unless you can introduce more light (e.g. use flash).
As standards for focus and lack of 'blur' are much higher in stock than in conventional photography, it also makes it advisable to use a tripod in anything other than situations with high light and fast shutter speeds. Of course, the amount of blur due to 'lens shake' during the exposure depends on the lens, but in general for non-telephoto shots I personally would recommend a shutter speed of at least 1/125th of a second, or preferably 1/250th of a second.
Lighting is one of the, if not the, most important elements of a good photograph. As one colleague is fond of saying 'it's all about the light'. This is very true, as without the light, nothing would happen. It's only the light bouncing off our subject and captured through our lens that enables us to capture the image at all.
As well as being important to provide enough light to give us a reasonable exposure and thus a technically good image, the lighting determines the 'rendering' of our subject, highlights and shadows, where they are, the dynamic range of the image and much more.
Although a thorough discussion of lighting would be outside the scope of this article, I will try and cover some of the most relevant points.
Dynamic range
One fundamental difference between images as seen by the eye and those seen in current digital photographs, is that of the far higher dynamic range visible with the eye. Our eyes are capable of capturing light from a huge range of intensities ... from a single candle far away, giving off only a few photons (the wave-particles by which light travels), to the power of the sun, a huge nuclear reactor giving off huge amounts of energy.
Granted if you put a candle next to the sun you would have a difficult time making out the candle (as our iris closes to protect us from the sun), but the principle is generally true within a single image captured by the eye, it can resolve detail within very dark areas of an image (shadows), as well as very light areas (e.g. highlights).
The problem is that current cameras can only (ultimately) display these images with values of light intensity between 0 and 255, with 0 representing the darkest and 255 representing the lightest intensity. In order to provide a rounded coverage of the dynamic range and accomodate the lightest highlights, this means that details within the shadows (and the highlights) must be crammed into a tiny number range (say 0-5 and 252 - 255). This is both harder for us to see in the final image and harder for the camera to capture accurately.
An example of this is taking a photo of a black rock on a sunny day, with a spoon on top of it. The spoon reflects the light from the sun, making an intensely bright highlight in the image. In order to allow the spoon highlight into the 0-255 dynamic range, the values for dark areas in this scaling must be crammed into the very bottom end of the scale. This means that in the final image, you will be able to make out detail on the spoon, but much of the detail of the black rock will be lost (it will look underexposed). This is an example of an image with a high dynamic range.
In contrast, if we were to remove the spoon, and expose the image purely for the rock, which has far less intense highlights, we can scale the exposure so that the image of the rock is far more detailed in the final result.
Due to these negative effects of high dynamic range (and due to aesthetic reasons) it often makes sense to try and minimize the effects of very intense highlights when taking photos. This can be achieved in a number of ways - for instance simply varying the angle to the light source, or using more reflected light, or 'softening' the light source.
Daylight
In daylight we are rather more limited in what we can do to vary the lighting than in the studio - but there is a lot that can be achieved. One of the simplest ways of avoiding too high a dynamic range is simply to shoot on overcast days, with cloud cover. The clouds will soften the light by increasing the area of the light source, which decreases the intensity of the highlights, relative to the overall illumination.
Other ways to achieve a more pleasing dynamic range are to use reflectors to boost the illumination in the shadowed areas of the subject, or to use flash to fill in 'where the sun missed'. An alternative is to shoot the subject under some kind of cover or shade, where much softer reflected light will usually prevent extreme highlights.
Studio lighting
Studio lighting (especially where the sun is eliminated) gives us the fullest control over light source placement and type. Reflectors or fill lights can be used to fill in shadows, and softboxes, umbrellas or simply bouncing the light can be used to soften the light sources.
White balance is both one of the most misunderstood, and easy-to-mess-up aspects of photography! We've all seen photos where the white (colour) balance is incorrect, where the whole photo comes out a shade of blue of yellow, and people's skin looks like that of an alien or a corpse.
What is white balance, and why do we need it?
White balance (or 'colour balance') is something we all have built into our eyes and brains. Whether I look at a white sheet out in daylight or under tungsten bulbs at night, I know that it is white, and it looks white to me. However, in each case, the distribution of photons of different wavelengths (the 'spectrum' of the light) hitting my eyes is quite different. My brain reinterprets this spectrum as white for me, and similarly readjusts (or attempts to) any other colours it sees.
The human eye actually sees light at the retina, where photons are received by rod and cone cells. Rod cells are very sensitive and can detect very low light intensities, but it is the cone cells which are less sensitive that are responsible for our sensing of colour. Humans usually (unless colourblind!) have 3 types of cone cells, which are sensitive to (mostly) red light, blue light and green light respectively. It is no accident that computers and cameras also usually store colour as red, green and blue.
Because of this reception limitation, any actual variation in the spectrum of light received at the eyes can be simplified to variations in the ratio between red, green and blue. The eyes and brain, by whatever mechanism, realise automatically that the colour balance of RGB of the white sheet is that which should be interpreted as white.
The truth is however, that under a 'yellow light' such as tungsten, the 'white' sheet is actually reflecting to the eyes a yellow light. When we look at a photo of the white sheet without a white balance adjustment, it appears to us as yellow. The question then arises, if the brain can interpret the 'yellow sheet' as white in reality, why can't it interpret the 'yellow sheet' as white from the photograph? The reasons for this aren't entirely clear, but what is known is that for the sheet to be seen as white in the photo, the light given off from the print or screen must be similar to that given off by a white object. This is defined as an equal ratio of R to G to B in a computer image.
This should make clear what the white balance adjustment is - it is an adjustment of the colours in the captured image such that white areas come out as a 1:1:1 RGB ratio (hence the name white balance). In fact this is achieved by a simple multiplier to the R and B values, at the very first stages of the processing pipeline, to establish a 1:1:1 ratio. This is very probably the same mechanism whereby the eyes/brain adjusts for white balance, as it coincidentally allows other colours to be interpreted (mostly) correctly too.
How do we set white balance to be correct in our photos?
From the previous discussion it should be obvious that in order to 'look right', our photos will need to have this adjustment made to the colour balance. Usually this adjustment is made on the camera at the time of capture, but on higher end cameras this adjustment can be made after the photo is taken from a 'RAW' file, in the RAW conversion process. This can be very useful, because it is very possible (and common) to make the wrong adjustment in camera, which as well as producing an image that looks 'wrong', can make it very difficult / nigh impossible to right again later in post processing.
Typically on the camera you will have to option to let the camera 'guess' the right white balance (auto white balance, which can be a bit hit and miss), to set a preset adjustment for typical lighting conditions (such as sunny, shade, cloudy, incandescent, fluorescent, flash), or to custom set the white balance to your specific shooting conditions by taking a photo of a reference white or grey object. Providing you have a colour correct 'pure white' or 'pure grey' reference object or card this should give you the most accurate colour rendition. It is usually possible to get quite a close match to the proper balance by using the presets (especially if there is a modifier) however this can be very tricky, and a bit hit and miss unless you have proper feedback (a small lcd will not be sufficient).
In summary, where a realistic colour balance is desired, I would recommend using a white card to custom set white balance for all shots where this is practical. Where this is not practical, I would recommend shooting in RAW so that the 'best fit' can be found on the computer after the shoot. Committing yourself to a particular preset and to jpg at the time of capture is somewhat of a gamble, unless you have prior experience of those shooting conditions.
In stock photography, the post-processing applied to an image can be as important as the capture itself. However, the best advice is to try as much as possible to 'shoot it right', i.e. get the best possible capture and not rely on post processing to salvage your shots. This is both because there are limits to what can be achieved in post processing, and because time is money - the less time you spend post processing, the more time you can spend taking photographs or doing other things. That said, if spending 10 minutes in post processing can save you half an hour at the shoot, then go for it.
RAW or jpg?
One question you will face as a stock photographer is whether you should shoot RAW or jpg. Many people have strong opinions one way or the other - I would recommend trying both and finding what works best for you. The biggest advantage to RAW in my opinion is the ability to change white balance after the capture - this is very difficult and in some cases impossible with a jpg capture. RAW also offers a little more dynamic range and greater options for 'tweaking' the initial conversion without damaging the image. On the other hand, RAW does take time to be converted, and there are potential archival issues that should be considered. Jpg on the other hand is faster to work with and a smaller file, but has been compressed in a lossy way at capture, contains less dynamic range and data, and relies on you having made the correct decisions at capture, particularly regarding white balance.
Processing pipeline
Whether you shoot in jpg or RAW, one thing to make sure of is to do all your post processing saving in a lossless format, such as TIFF or PSD. Each time you save an image as jpg, it degrades the image because it drops data to keep the file size small. This results in more and more noticible artefacts (things that were not present in the original 'scene'), particularly blockiness and halos around edges.
If you can, working in 16 bit colour mode (as opposed to 8 bit) will give a better quality result, even if the final export is an 8 bit jpg. This is because digital processing results in 'quantization error', which is higher in 8 bit mode because there are essentially only 256 'buckets' to assign the result of a process.
Noise
Digital noise is the bane of the stock photographer. All digital cameras produce a certain amount of 'grain' called noise, where they slightly incorrectly judge the RGB values of each pixel. On a plain area of an image, such as a blue sky or dark shadows, this noise can be visible as random dots of 'grain'. It has many causes, such as the random nature of light particles, interference at the sensor from other electrical circuits, cosmic rays, random events at the sensor etc. I'm sure a physicist could give you a full list.
The bottom line is that noise is seen as undesirable in stock photos by most stock libraries. This probably reflects the desires of designers and clients of the stock libraries. Many photographers are dismayed and upset by rejections for noise they consider 'acceptable', however it is ultimately for the stock library to decide the standards and requirements of photos they wish to accept.
The name of the game for photographers is thus to minimize noise (and often eliminate visible noise) in their photos.
The most important thing first off is to shoot at as low an ISO as is possible. Digital cameras increase their sensitivity by simply amplifying the signal at the sensor. This also has the result of, you guessed it, amplifying the noise.
Another important factor is the quality of the sensor. In general, larger sensors with larger sensor pixels tend to produce less noise than smaller sensors. You are much more likely to get low noise images from a good SLR with a large sensor than from a consumer point and shoot camera. Note however that even the best, most expensive cameras, won't produce a completely noise free image off of the sensor.
This is where the next stage in the battle comes in. In post processing, it is now common practice to use software specifically to remove or minimize noise. Programs such as NeatImage and NoiseNinja are the last line of defense against noise. Or even the humble blur tools. However the problem is that these techniques aren't without their downsides. Overuse of noise reduction can soften and 'plasticize' an image, and even introduce ugly artefacts. It is usually a good idea to only apply full noise reduction to areas of the image that really need it (such as sky and shadows), and thus preserve the more detailed areas of the photo.
Artefacts
Although noise is a large problem, it is not the only artefact that can occur in images. Other problems to watch for are 'fringing' (aka 'hazing') around the edges of objects, which can be caused by things like the physics of lenses (chromatic aberration), oversharpening, or localized sensor effects.
Although you don't need the most expensive and best camera to be able to enter the stock world, there is a minimum standard that is required in order to have a realistic chance of getting a decent percentage of your images accepted. A year ago you could have had reasonable success with a consumer point and shoot, but now standards are going up. Today I wouldn't recommend anyone considering buying a camera for stock to start with anything less than an SLR. It really is worth saving up for an entry level SLR because your time is worth a lot, and it isn't worth the misery of the rejections.
Good entry level models are:
Canon 350D
Nikon D50
Nikon D70s
Canon and Nikon seem to have the stranglehold on the pro market at the moment, so I would recommend going with one of them.
Sensors
When choosing a camera be sure to take careful note of the sensor
size. In general bigger is better (for a number of reasons, but ultimately, because of physics). Beware smaller cameras offering lots of features and megapixels but tiny sensors. At the end of the day, sensor physical size is more important than megapixels.
Lens
Camera bodies will come and go, but you will want to build up an investment in lenses, so choose wisely which brand of camera to go with. Both nikon and canon offer good ranges of lenses. Beware that some of the brands with smaller than full frame sensors offer cheaper lenses designed for the smaller sensors. These may be good in the short term, but in a few years when you get a full frame body, the lenses may be useless.
And finally, if you are going to do stock photography, you will have to get used to the idea of rejection.
We all tend to get attached to things we create, be it our work, our ideas, our children whatever. Humans have a built in tendency to implicitly add more value to something, because 'we created it'. The problem is that this can make it difficult for us to accept criticism.
We identify the work with 'us', so a criticism of the work is somehow a criticism of 'us'. A fundamental growth we can all make is to learn to look at our work objectively. Something we create is not 'us'. It's just the best we could do at that time with our present knowledge and resources. We have the capacity to improve. The best way to improve is to accept criticism ... take it into account in future work if it is valid, and ignore it if it is without merit.
That said, let's look at some common rejection scenarios (and apologies in advance for being rather blunt!).
Noise, hazing or artefacts
'The reviewer is obviously retarded! They rejected my entire batch of 100 photos due to noise hazing or artefacts! I can't see any noise! And they were accepted on so-and-so-stock.'
Ok this is a common post. As is in evidence the photographer couldn't see any noise, hazing or artefacts. This DOES NOT mean there was none, it simply means that the PHOTOGRAPHER COULDN'T SEE any noise or artefacts, nothing more.
Firstly, whether you can see noise depends on your monitor type and calibration. Flatscreen monitors usually make it easier to see noise. You must also be sure to view images at at least 100% size, that is 1 pixel of the image maps to 1 pixel on the screen. In addition, seeing noise, artefacts etc is a learned technique. Once you know what to look for you will spot it much easier. Reducing noise should be done as per the section above on noise. Some images will be unsalvagable. Cameras are not perfect.
Sharpening artefacts - are you applying sharpening, either in post processing or on camera? Try turning it off or down.
Fringing or sensor artefacts - are you using a cheap camera with a small sensor? You may need to consider upgrading. Also bear in mind that fringing tends to be more of a problem in certain situations, such as when sunlight and sky meets the horizon, trees or buildings. Perhaps you can avoid these situations.
'They were all accepted on so-and-so-stock!' - Different stock libraries have different photo requirements. This is what makes them different - they make their own collection to give the collection as a whole the greatest appeal. They may lose a few sales by rejecting your photo but their collection as a whole may be stronger.
'The reviewer is obviously retarded!' - hmm, not sure I need to even say anything about this.
Framing, cropping or snapshot
Is the whole of the subject in the photo, with nothing clipped off the edges? Is the subjects shadow clipped? Is the horizon straight? Is the lighting dull and uninteresting? Does it actually look like a snapshot? Does it look like it could have been simply improved by changing the viewer position or framing?
Example: I took this from the window of a moving car. There is no defined subject, and no possible subject is fully in the frame. The shops are also in shadow giving poor lighting. Not to mention the fact that we are moving so the scene is blurred, and there's a wing mirror in the shot.
Too many in library, or non-commercial
Usually this is fairly self explanatory. If there are no other 'whatevers' in the library, then probably they didn't think it would sell. Or they don't want to start having images of that type in their collection. Libraries manage a collection rather than a list of images. Try at another stock library.
Again the 'it was accepted and is selling at blah-stock' response is invalid. A library works by managing what is in its collection to attract buyers. The fact that an image would have sold is not the only criteria as to whether to include it in the collection.
Other posts
'Why do we have reviewers? Can't we just let the buyers decide for themselves what to buy?'
Because buyers don't want to wade through a mountain of sub-par images on the off chance of finding one they like, then only to find it has artefacts all over it. This is the service stock libraries provide, they provide a minimum standard to designers, and a collection of images that they think will be useful, without too many low commercial value images to clog up the searches. Ultimately this benefits you as well as them.
'My batch last week were all accepted and this batch were all rejected all taken with same settings at same time - why the inconsistency?'
Because, at the end of the day, the reviewers are human. They do their best. If some of your photos are rejected and some are approved, then maybe they chose the ones they liked best to accept, because they couldn't accept all of them. And maybe your images were borderline. If they'd all been far better than borderline doubtless they'd all have been accepted.
Being a stock photographer it is inevitable that at some point you are going to need some knowledge of intellectual property laws, both in order to protect yourself when taking and selling photographs, and to protect your own photographs from use without permission. Unfortunately you should be warned that this is a legal minefield.
In fact, even to give anything that could be construed as legal advice (without being professionally qualified) is itself illegal in some areas. As I am not a lawyer I am limited in what I can tell you, just point you to relevant sources of information. Or rather, I could tell you, but I'd have to kill you. That being said, you should bear in mind that nothing written here constitutes proper legal advice, you should obviously consult a lawyer specializing in international intellectual property law and pay him / her lots of money before publishing your first photo.
International law
Perhaps the biggest problem we face as stock photographers is that we must comply not just with the laws of our own country, but with the laws of the countries in which we take photos, and sell photos. Usually this equates to international law. Now the problem with international law is that all countries don't agree on the laws that should govern intellectual property, so the obligations and risks are far from clearcut.
Copyright, trademark and other laws
While we have all heard of copyright, it is not altogether obvious that copyright is only designed to protect certain types of IP (intellectual property). Other laws, such as trademarks, designs and patents are used to protect other types of IP.
Typical materials covered by copyright
Copyright does not protect ideas, names or titles, or functional or industrial articles.
Thus a photograph of a spoon (functional article) is covered by copyright, however, the spoon itself may not be protected by copyright. This is the reason why stock libraries will reject photos of artwork (covered by copyright), but often accept photos of functional articles provided logos etc are cloned out. However, there does appear to be a certain amount of grey area. Consider for example a tray (useful article) painted with a colourful illustration (artwork).
Liability
When doing any type of photographic work, you should be aware of the concept of legal liability. Unless working within a framework
such as a limited liability company or limited liability partnership, a photographer selling their work may well hold unlimited liability should someone decide that they are being taken advantage of by the sale. So IP laws are not something to be taken lightly.
Useful reading:
The Berne Convention
International copyright law
TRIPS agreement
Copyright cases
UK Intellectual property law
Independent photography forums
Yahoo Micropayment
Microstock Group
fredmiranda forum
Digital Photography Review
StockPhotographer Info
Talk Micro
Microstock forum
Microstock sites
Dreamstime
Shutterstock
IStockphoto
Any comments, improvements, mistakes, etc please send to me at:
coverme_imgoingin@yahoo.co.uk