There have been a lot of changes at iStockphoto in the past week, the biggest one being the royalty structure changes for the contributors. I’ve had some time to really think about this, so instead of posting my thoughts on some random forum I thought I would discuss it openly on my blog.

First of all, here’s a little bit about me: I’m a photographer and I make my living by licensing my images through iStockphoto.com. I currently make 40% royalties on my images as an exclusive photographer with iStock and I sell enough to support myself, pay my bills and even lease a small studio near my home. I work hard at this business and I love my job.

As for the changes … in a nut-shell iStock has determined (and known for some time) that their current royalty structure is unsustainable (info on these changes is detailed here). In order to do so they’ve basically set sales levels that each contributor has to reach in order to maintain a set royalty rate. In the past it was all based off of historical download figures … for example if a photographer sells 25k photos then they will stay at 40% royalties, regardless of how many images they sell from that point forward. However starting next year our royalty rate is based on the previous year’s “redeemed credits” and we are required to sell a certain amount of credits each year to maintain that level.

So what this means for contributors is that those who are not going to meet the credit level for the end of this year will drop to a lower royalty percentage. It is affecting both exclusive and non-exclusive contributors, and even admins and inspectors aren’t immune from the changes. iStock is confident that 76% of its exclusive contributors will see either no change or an increase in royalties (mentioned here), and they’ve done a lot of math and projections to get those results. Kelly Thompson (iStock’s COO) had even stated that they will re-evaluate the target credit levels at the end of the year if their projections are off.

iStock is a business, they need to make money … that’s just the bottom line. They’re not being greedy and trying to screw the contributors over, nor are they blindly following orders from Getty. They don’t want to see people lose money, and this was a difficult decision to implement, trust me. iStock is doing what is necessary in order to run their business—they are addressing a long-term problem to make sure that iStock becomes more profitable as it grows. I get it … even if I end up being one of the unlucky ones, I get it.

So … will these changes affect me? Right now I honestly don’t know what will happen to my royalties next year. Since I don’t know what my numbers will be at the end of the year then I’m bracing myself for dropping to 35%, which would mean a 12.5% drop in earnings … roughly a month-and-a-half’s worth of income. And yes, that’s a lot of money, folks. Am I happy about that possibility? Not really, but I will still be okay if it happens. I’ll have to make changes, but I won’t have to drop everything and find a new job.

In my opinion this new royalty structure makes sense. The artists who are creating new content, selling it and turning a higher profit are more valuable to iStock, and it’s going to encourage all artists to produce higher quality files in order to maintain and increase their sales output. I don’t want my royalties to go down—none of us do—but whatever happens next year one thing is sure: I’m extremely motivated and encouraged to create new content and am now very much accountable to myself to do so if I want to continue at my current 40% royalty rate.

I can appreciate the fact that everyone has their own opinions about this, since everyone’s circumstances are different. I stand to potentially lose several thousand dollars because of this decision … yet I’m staying with iStock and don’t plan on going anywhere. In the long run I anticipate this move to be more profitable to those who keep up their hard work of creating quality content. My success is in my hands alone, and there will always be challenges and disappointments. This is one of those times, but it’s not slowing me down … in fact it’s making me stronger. :)

I have a LOT of old negatives … not super old, mostly from the late 1990′s when I was in High School, but I took a ton of photos during those years. I also am somewhat of an organization-freak and kept pretty much all of them filed away in contact sheets and even have many of them labeled with the month/year and also some info on where the images were photographed. Stuff like that was important to keep track of since there was no such thing as metadata with film photos (unless you had a specialized camera attachment, which most photogaphers did not).

Ever since hearing about ScanCafe through podcasts and websites such as Photofocus and TWiP I have really wanted to try them out, since it would be nice to have my negatives digitized and backed-up on my computer. So a few months ago I did just that. I picked out about 10 contact sheets of negs and packaged them up and sent them to ScanCafe, and I have to say the process was smooth. I received a notification when my negatives arrived, were being scanned, and when they were shipped back and I even was able to track the progress via their website (see photo below).

Overall I’m really impressed. The image quality is pretty good and, like I said, the process was really simple and smooth. Here are some of the pluses that I experienced when using this service:

- When I received the disk of images each folder was labeled the same way that I have each contact sheet of negatives labeled … definitely a bonus I wasn’t expecting.
- The scanning progress was really easy to follow using their website … you never have to worry where your negatives and/or old photos are located.
- The prices are good and they always have good deals and discounts you can take advantage of.
- After I initially placed my order I decided I wanted to “upgrade” to the pro scanning service (basically just giving me a larger file). I contacted customer support and they were able to make the changes seamlessly.

This is one happy customer … it will take some time, since I have a lot of negs to get through, but I’ll eventually have all of my negatives safely scanned and archived on my computer, thanks to ScanCafe. :)

Canon 7D, Canon 70-200mm f/4L IS lens, 1/160 sec at f/4.5, ISO 100

I’m setting up a stock photo-shoot (the theme is going to be a “casual business” environment) at my studio in Draper, Utah planned the late morning/early afternoon of Saturday, September 18 … and I need models! Here are the details:

- Looking for 5-8 people, male and female, age ranges in the 30s, 40s and 50s
- No modeling experience necessary
- Must be comfortable signing a model release; the images are for my stock portfolio on iStockphoto.com

For more information or to be a part of the shoot please send an email (nicole@nicolesyphoto.com) or contact me through the web-form, and if possible please include a recent photo of yourself (or link to one).

For more information on modeling for my business please view my modeling FAQs here.

There are a lot of fun events coming up in the next few weeks at Pictureline … next week, Sept 16 and 17, is DigitalFest at the downtown store (check out Rich Legg’s blog post on it here) and the following week, Saturday September 25, I’ll be doing a book signing for my book Canon 7D: From Snapshots to Great Shots at Pictureline in Draper. So be sure to stop by between 11am and 1pm and say hi!

What: Book signing with author Nicole S. Young
Where: Pictureline in Draper, UT (map)
When: Saturday, Sept 25 from 11am to 1pm

More info here

Yesterday iStockphoto.com announced some pretty big changes to their royalty program for contributors, along with more changes to collections (Vetta, Getty, etc.) and a few other things that will affect buyers as well. A friend and fellow iStockphoto contributor Sean Locke wrote up a detailed blog post about the changes … take a look at his post over on his blog.

I won’t get into the details of how this will affect me other than I’m fairly confident that I won’t see a change in my own royalty percentage. There is, however, a big uproar in the iStock forums from some very unhappy contributors (check it out here).

I’m going to be starting a dedicated series on my blog about food photography and need your input! I have some previous posts on food photography and food styling but really want to write more detailed posts that are aimed specifically at non-photographers who want to take great photos of their food (don’t worry, photogs … you’ll get lots out of this too!).

Soooo … ask away! Any and all questions relating to photography, cameras, lighting, editing, etc. are welcome, as long as they are in regards to photographing food. Feel free to link to your blog or any photos you have questions about, too.

To ask your question or tell me what you want to know you can leave a comment below or send me message on my contact page. :)