Posted by Mike DiVita on February 4, 2007 at 5:54 PM
I know there have been some discussions on various online stock agencies but does anyone have any experience with Digital Railroad? They had a very busy booth at the NANPA convention a couple of weeks ago. They were promoting high profile clients like Tom Mangelsen. The fees are $50/month unless you pre-pay for 1 year at $45/month. If you have your own e-commerce account there are no commissions otherwise they charge 5% on sales.
Thanks,
Mike
Posted by Randy Beacham on February 5, 2007 at 3:39 AM
I checked out their site shortly after they went online a year or two ago and my take was that the site was better geared towards general editorial, photo journalism and advertising photogaphers than outdoor or travel photographers. But that was just a quick look. It looked like a well run, professional site.
The price sounds about the same as AGPix. But the big difference in my opinion is that outdoor related photo editors and art directors will use AGPix much more often since it has a long history of working in the outdoor field and hence, they can find what they're looking for much faster.
Before you take my word for it however I would suggest going to the site and doing some photo searches for outdoor photography subjects and see what you come up with. I would also suggest contacting the site and asking them for information as far as what kind of photo buyers use the site. Even if they can't give you lists of specific clients they should be able to give you some breakdown as far as the percentages that various photography fields use the site.
If you do that maybe you can check back and let's us kow what you come up with. Thanks, Randy
I've been doing similar research over the past six weeks or so. If you've been reading these pages, then you're already aware of such places as istockphoto.
Another site that fell into my lap recently is photostockplus.com. It held some interest for me, as I also shoot weddings, and I believe that photostockplus.com has a way that I can create password protected areas, so that only people who are aware of the event, the address I've given, and the password, can enter, view and order prints.
Then, about a week ago, I started to get really interested in Digital Railroad. I've been doing my research on it, contacting some of the photographers, etc., to get a take on the site. As a part of my research, I googled Digital Railroad to see what would come up, to get a sense of how well the site might be marketing itself. There were several pages that came up with photographers comparing Digital Railroad to Photoshelter.com. After reviewing Photoshelter's site, and checking with some of its members, I'm likely going to sign up with them, as I can get the separate PW-protected sites there for events. Photoshelter.com also has recently integrated FotoQuote into its site, so it's much easier to price stock images...
Good luck,
Tim!
Posted by Randy Beacham on February 5, 2007 at 11:23 PM
I was checking out photoshelter recently too and was pretty impressed with the site. If I was going to add another site that would be the one as well. Randy
Posted by Mike DiVita on February 6, 2007 at 2:03 AM
Thanks for the info on Photoshelter. The prices seems more reasonable upfront but a 10% transaction fee could add up after awhile. I also like the built in FotoQuote and PW protected pages. I looked into the Digital Railroad manual and it looks like you can set up lightboxes with permissions set for specific users so in a sense it's similar to PW protection. I guess I'll keep both in mind for now.
Mike
PhotoShelter provides a la cart pricing that seems deceptively cheap in the beginning, but they charge for added-on services. So, for example, in order to FTP from PhotoShelter or be able to have clients download high-res images, their members have to have a “bandwidth” subscription, while Digital Railroad give a generous monthly allotment of 75GB of bandwidth as part of their basic subscription package.
DR allows buyers to save Digital Railroad member images, and the images always link back to the branded pages of that photographer – no one else has this feature online. The PhotoShelter brand is always on top of their member’s brands
Digital Railroad has some powerful features geared toward the pro photographer that PhotoShelter does not offer. For example, their lightbox system allows you to create edited image selections for your clients and to permission all images with viewing, editing and/or download capabilities.
Many photo buyers have remarked that they will not waste their time searching a site that doesn’t deliver high-quality relevant images – this is why they won’t regularly search Flickr, Photoshelter, or PhotoBucket.
Posted by Darwin Wiggett on February 7, 2007 at 10:08 AM
I guess my 'advetorial' was not obvious??
Also I plan to develop my own e-commerce site using Lightroom in the near future (have only heard great things about them from other photographers) - http://www.lightboxphoto.com/
I am not paid nor sponsored by either companies, I just like what they do.
Darwin
Posted by Gary Crabbe on February 8, 2007 at 2:23 AM
I went with DRR, and for a number of reasons I wasn't too impressed with PS - some of which have already been alluded to in this thread. I think DRR is a more professionally oriented site.
Posted by Walter Rowe on February 8, 2007 at 4:11 PM
Gary - how long did it take for your DRR investment to pay for itself? How well known were you before you signed up for DRR? How many clients are repeat vs. new for you? I'm just curious whether you have a lot of new people who find you on DRR or if most of your clients are ones who already have a relationship with you. With an annual fee of roughly $540, one or two good editorial agreements would pay for it and the rest is gravy.
Posted by Don Miller on February 8, 2007 at 10:11 PM
The best site is the most buyer oriented, right? Putting shots online and looking professional is no longer difficult. The flash templates that are increasingly used look very nice. So which site does the best job for the buyer? A site taking a cut of the sale may be a very good thing if they are out marketing to photo users.
The portfolio site here is focused at the photographers. But keywords are polluted, and too many images are not suitable for stock (and they shouldn't be).
It seems that 20-30 photogs should be paying one person nice commissions to sell to photo buyers. The best photos don't make money if buried. Many of the average reviewed photos posted in the galleries are better than 98 percent of what is purchased for print.
Posted by Gary Crabbe on February 9, 2007 at 3:23 AM
Walter:
I haven't made a dime of DRR yet.Then again, I've had images online with them for less than a month. Besides, I'm too busy to spend time steering people away from my own web site. I use it for the archive factor, and build lightboxes for clients. So far I've done a few of those and all has gone mostly well.
But I gotta say, for selling pictures, the global search returns at PS were dismal.
Posted by Don Miller on February 9, 2007 at 7:17 AM
It doesn't seem to me that regular stock buyers would be googling for photos, unless it was very 'niche'. How does a creative at an ad agency look through photos to find a background for his tent ad?
Posted by Mike DiVita on February 9, 2007 at 11:40 AM
Gary,
Are you uploading full size images to DR? How large are they? I've been uploading some of my 35mm scans which are about 55Mb. Needless to say it's painfully slow, about 30 minutes per image. I'm not sure if it's my side or their side that's so slow.
Mike
Posted by Gary Crabbe on February 10, 2007 at 12:50 PM
Mike:
my images are all lo res at the moment. I will likey soon upload higher res, but as L12 Jpegs vs. tiffs, but this would be for a select group of images. Besides, doing Jpegs will allow you to upload 3x more images.
Discussion
14 repliesThanks,
Mike
The price sounds about the same as AGPix. But the big difference in my opinion is that outdoor related photo editors and art directors will use AGPix much more often since it has a long history of working in the outdoor field and hence, they can find what they're looking for much faster.
Before you take my word for it however I would suggest going to the site and doing some photo searches for outdoor photography subjects and see what you come up with. I would also suggest contacting the site and asking them for information as far as what kind of photo buyers use the site. Even if they can't give you lists of specific clients they should be able to give you some breakdown as far as the percentages that various photography fields use the site.
If you do that maybe you can check back and let's us kow what you come up with. Thanks, Randy
I've been doing similar research over the past six weeks or so. If you've been reading these pages, then you're already aware of such places as istockphoto.
Another site that fell into my lap recently is photostockplus.com. It held some interest for me, as I also shoot weddings, and I believe that photostockplus.com has a way that I can create password protected areas, so that only people who are aware of the event, the address I've given, and the password, can enter, view and order prints.
Then, about a week ago, I started to get really interested in Digital Railroad. I've been doing my research on it, contacting some of the photographers, etc., to get a take on the site. As a part of my research, I googled Digital Railroad to see what would come up, to get a sense of how well the site might be marketing itself. There were several pages that came up with photographers comparing Digital Railroad to Photoshelter.com. After reviewing Photoshelter's site, and checking with some of its members, I'm likely going to sign up with them, as I can get the separate PW-protected sites there for events. Photoshelter.com also has recently integrated FotoQuote into its site, so it's much easier to price stock images...
Good luck,
Tim!
Mike
PhotoShelter provides a la cart pricing that seems deceptively cheap in the beginning, but they charge for added-on services. So, for example, in order to FTP from PhotoShelter or be able to have clients download high-res images, their members have to have a “bandwidth” subscription, while Digital Railroad give a generous monthly allotment of 75GB of bandwidth as part of their basic subscription package.
DR allows buyers to save Digital Railroad member images, and the images always link back to the branded pages of that photographer – no one else has this feature online. The PhotoShelter brand is always on top of their member’s brands
Digital Railroad has some powerful features geared toward the pro photographer that PhotoShelter does not offer. For example, their lightbox system allows you to create edited image selections for your clients and to permission all images with viewing, editing and/or download capabilities.
Many photo buyers have remarked that they will not waste their time searching a site that doesn’t deliver high-quality relevant images – this is why they won’t regularly search Flickr, Photoshelter, or PhotoBucket.
Tim!
Also I plan to develop my own e-commerce site using Lightroom in the near future (have only heard great things about them from other photographers) - http://www.lightboxphoto.com/
I am not paid nor sponsored by either companies, I just like what they do.
Darwin
My DRR page.
The portfolio site here is focused at the photographers. But keywords are polluted, and too many images are not suitable for stock (and they shouldn't be).
It seems that 20-30 photogs should be paying one person nice commissions to sell to photo buyers. The best photos don't make money if buried. Many of the average reviewed photos posted in the galleries are better than 98 percent of what is purchased for print.
I haven't made a dime of DRR yet.Then again, I've had images online with them for less than a month. Besides, I'm too busy to spend time steering people away from my own web site. I use it for the archive factor, and build lightboxes for clients. So far I've done a few of those and all has gone mostly well.
But I gotta say, for selling pictures, the global search returns at PS were dismal.
Are you uploading full size images to DR? How large are they? I've been uploading some of my 35mm scans which are about 55Mb. Needless to say it's painfully slow, about 30 minutes per image. I'm not sure if it's my side or their side that's so slow.
Mike
my images are all lo res at the moment. I will likey soon upload higher res, but as L12 Jpegs vs. tiffs, but this would be for a select group of images. Besides, doing Jpegs will allow you to upload 3x more images.
Cheers & HTH