Welcome back to the August 2021 detailed monthly report during these increasingly strange and desperate times. Hope you’re summer has not been a wash-out in terms of sales and travel plans.
If you’re interested to see how I did in my July 2021 earnings, click here. In fact, you can see all my earnings going as far back to February 2019! Blood, sweat and tears spilled over these digital pages…more frustration than joy to be honest but I have no choice but to keep going!
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Now for the results you voted in July…
This month we’ll take a small break from the Turd of the Month as August is quiet and not reflective of anything.
Buy me a Beer!
Throughout my blog, as you can appreciate, I’ve given quite a bit of my time to help you make sense of this complicated stock industry and focus on making money. I’ve also given away earnings info on some of my best-sellers which will directly lead to those images reducing their value (how much is impossible to say but suffice to say that copycat thieves may be lurking). In addition to the risk of those corporate clowns at Shutterstock shutting down my account for disclosing my sales on there.
If you feel that the information below and throughout the blog is useful I kindly ask you to donate as much as you feel is reasonable, such a price of a beer, by clicking on the following link below:
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Busy Brutally Honest Guy – No rest in August!
The Brutally Honest Guy takes not breaks whatsoever with many articles published in August, including:
Also, would like to congratulate Elijah on his first blog-post over at Xpiks on creating Smartphone footage that sells!
Now, onto the meat of this report, my detailed earnings…but let’s keep in mind that August is the slowest month of the year so we need to manage expectations accordingly.
First for stills….
Detailed Earnings
| Agency | Number of Images in port (added August) | Net Revenue for August (US$) | Avg Return Per Download (US$) |
| 123RF | 5,021 (0) | 10 | 0.58 |
| Alamy | 12,848 (7) | 44 | 4 |
| Arcangel | 1,032 (0) | 0 | 0 |
| Adobe Stock | 3,552 (0) | 368 | 5.4 |
| Bigstock | 3,870 (0) | 1 | 0.25 |
| Creative Market | 1,519 (0) | 7 | 7 |
| DepositPhotos | 6,623 (0) | 9 | 0.3 |
| Dreamstime | 6,867 (0) | 10 | 0.87 |
| EyeEm | 277 – (Partner) | 0 | 0 |
| Fine Art America | 690 | 0 | 0 |
| iStock (July) | 6,928 (0) | 86 | 0.51 |
| Robert Harding (Q2 2021 monthly average) | 384 (0) | 5 | 1 |
| Shutterstock Editorial | 857 (3) | 0 | 0 |
| Shutterstock | 10,722 (0) | 131 | 0.70 |
| Pond5 | 1,741 (0) | 0 | 0 |
| Picfair | 5,632 (0)8 | 0 | 0 |
| Photo4Me | 327 (0) | 0 | 0 |
| SignElements | 1,214 (0) | 2 | N/A |
| Wirestock | 1,178 (115) | 5 | 3 |
| Direct Sales | N/A | 0 | 0 |
| Total | 766 |
Moving swiftly onto clips…
| Agency | Number of clips in port (added August) | Net Revenue for August (US$) | Avg Return Per Download (US$) |
| Adobe Stock | 385 (0) | 0 | 0 |
| Pond5 | 1,490 (0) | 88 | 44 |
| iStock | 180 (0) | 3 | 1 |
| Shutterstock | 1,144 (0) | 29 | 7 |
| Total | 120 |
Totals: $886 for August vs $779 in July
Looking at the long-term (major agencies):
Now, as usual, lets break it down with results for the major agencies:
Poor month at Alamy
After a few great months over at Alamy, August was disappointing month with $44 net on 12 sales. Mainly small-time sales except for the following which earned me a cool $18 of a flooded Rotterdam, Netherlands.
Superb month at Adobe Stock!
Rounds 2 and Rounds 3 of Adobe Stock’s free-downloads selection yielded a cool further 39 images (on top of the already 16 from July) for an easy up-front payment of $195. Total results for AS were $368, thus easily crushing SS. Here are the ones selected so far for the free-collection:
iStockPhoto – continued disappointment…
Another disappointing month, although there were some decently sized-sales ($10 and $7 respectfully – see below), the volumes just weren’t there as I ended up the month at only $89 with 51cents/download (both stills and footage). The trend is certainly heading the wrong way, both in terms of volumes and average download prices…
Shutterstock – average month
New normal average month for me at Shutterstock at a total of $219 for stills at a decent 70cents/download and 4 clips sold for $29.02. Zero uploads for the month on both stills and clips.
Just one large sale to speak of ($88) of a favela in Rio de Janeiro.
Pond5 Pulls Through once again
Two nice sales over at Pond5 of the usual suspects:
Arcangel – 0 Images Accepted (56 uploads)!
Wow, 100% rejection rate at Arcangel…from 56 uploads. Need to start reassessing my submissions on there. Fortunately have some interviews coming up with Michael Mascaro, Arcangel Director, as well as Abigail Miles (5,555 accepted images), a successful book-cover artist with regular sales. They will shed us some light on keys to success so we may up my game.
Looking at the big picture – $$$$
I must keep reminding myself that even though my portfolio on there is just over 1,000, since starting to contributor to Arcangel about 4 years ago I’ve earned a total of $4,147 net on 16 sales for an average of $259/download, for the following titles:
| Payment Date | Book Title |
| Jul-18 | Mramor a Platno by Storey Stephanie – Czech Rep |
| Jul-18 | Quai des enfers by Ingrid Astier – France |
| Sep-18 | L’occhio dell’inferno by James Rollins – ITALY |
| Sep-18 | The Mercy Seat by Elizabeth Winthrop – US |
| Dec-18 | Sentieri 3e (Text Book) – US |
| Aug-19 | Bis zum Bitteren Ende by Nicci French – GERMANY |
| Aug-19 | Nero a Milano by Romano DeMarco – ITALY |
| Dec-19 | Les Sept sœurs by Lucinda Riley – FRANCE |
| Mar-20 | The Paris Children by Gloria Goldreich (ARC) – US |
| Mar-20 | Angels Weep by Colin Falconer – UK |
| Jun-20 | Milano a Mano Armata by Romano De Marco (eBook Only) – ITAL |
| Jun-20 | The Paris Children by Gloria Goldreich – US AUDIO |
| Jul-20 | The Paris Children by Gloria Goldreich – WEL |
| Oct-20 | Nero a Milano by Romano DeMarco (Digital Audio) – ITALY |
| Oct-20 | Those Who Are Saved by Alexi Landau – NA |
| Jun-21 | Brèves de comptoir, Tournée générale by Jean-Marie Gourio – FR |
All is not lost since the rejects (minus accepted similars) shall go to Wirestock to be distributed throughout the micros.
Speaking of Wirestock, many uploads
As you can see from my above earnings breakdown, other than some Alamy exclusives, I’ve pretty much stopped uploading to the Microstock agencies and instead opting to upload all to Wirestock. In fact, this month managed 115 uploads and results there are finally starting to increase after a slow start, especially on their Instant Pay program which is similar to Adobe Stock’s upfront payment:
The fact that they do the keywording in-house for both commercial and editorial (in return for a modest 15% royalties) is all the better to save me time to do what I enjoy, namely bash Shutterstock et al for being greedy bastards.
If you haven’t yet signed up to Wirestock and you’re interested, kindly use my referral link.
Hey, that’s my pic!
Spotted 7 of my pics here used in various publications…
Golden Nugget of the month
Undoubtedly the Golden Nugget of the Month agency goes AGAIN to Adobe Stock for having the vision to give contributors at least some $ up-front for customers to use our images.
Pond5 were pretty good too, with back-to-back nice sales, hope they keep it up and next month will be awarded!
How did you do in August?
Until next time!
About Alex
I’m an eccentric guy, currently based in Madrid, Spain, on a quest to visit all corners of the world and capture stock images & footage, when things go back to normal (Late-2021??). I’ve devoted eight years to making it as a travel photographer / videographer and freelance writer (however, had recently go back into full-time office work to make ends meet, although happy to report that it’s coming to an end soon). I hope to inspire others by showing an unique insight into a fascinating business model.
I’m proud to have written a book about my adventures which includes tips on making it as a stock travel photographer – Brutally Honest Guide to Microstock Photography
Alexandre Rotenberg's Brutally Honest Guide to Stock Photography & Footage 
My August was surprisingly good, especially considering the awesome deal contributors received from Adobe Stock for free images buyout.
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Thank you very much for your great information. Looking forward to the interviews with Michael Mascaro and Abigail Miles, I hope they help to avoid so many rejections, although I have ever thought that some algorithm must be doing something. I still do not see the meaning of the rejections, and the bad thing about it is that the reason is not known, to try to improve. I’m already investing in vintage -red- women’s dresses and talking to women to do photo shoots in the field …
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Me too, I’m looking forward! I’m in desperate need of help at the moment as nothing is getting through anymore at Arcangel!
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Hi Alexandre, I’m trying to remember where I read some about the Telegram group of Arcangel. Did you wrote a post about that or maybe a response at some comment? I can’t to find that group. Thanks a lot!
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Reminds me, I should join that group :)))
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Are you in the telegram group? they explain a lot there though it’s still a mystery about the large number of rejections.
We were given examples of what they need which I used for inspiration and I still got them rejected. That includes women in red and all those cliches.
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Some time ago I tried to join the group on telegram but it was impossible, some kind of error. I can’t access the Arcangel app either. I will try both again
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Thank you very much for your articles.
My golden turd of the month is Getty with one 1 CENT picture…. unbelievable…
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That’s disgusting…if results stay this way for another few months, iStock will certainly be “rewarded” with the Turd of the Month Award!
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Alamy continue to allow customers to use without payment with no checking or punishment the uk newspaper scheme gives rock bottom prices that are not even paid or misreported as digital use instead of print, even the mighty times along with the usual miscreants the sun and daily mail.
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Indeed! Their Customer Relations will always take the side of the buyer and never the contributor when it comes to disputes.
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I, too, tried with Arcangel – colossal failure. To say I am baffled is putting it mildly. Very, very frustrating. I submitted many, many images that are all very much in the same style by present accepted contributors yet mine were ‘not what their clients are looking for.’
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Same here. I have the feeling they are giving preference to the contributors who have been there for years. It is confusing because they have given us some examples of what they want and they have rejected what I have made for some mysterious reasons despite sticking to their list. Some people have been getting emails about the rejections and how to improve and some of us are not.
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Yeah, it’s a mystery but I trust that Michael Mascaro will clear up some of our lingering doubts with the interview soon to be published. Love Arcangel, just wish sales were more regular!
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Interesting…. thanks for sharing your experience, glad I’m not alone!
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Interesting…. thanks for sharing your experience, glad I’m not alone! (Sorry my reply was meant for @bluesecretgarden)
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Hi Alex thanks for article, i want to ask a question, i have exclusive account on pond5 , can i open another normal account on pond5 with same payoneer profile? thanks
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