Wow, we’re already halfway through the year…welcome to the June 2023 Brutally Honest Earnings Report, where as usual I’ll discuss my earnings for the month and industry news. I also have some cool travel news I’m keen to share and finally sold a book cover. Let’s get started!

June 2023 Highlights

June was a busy month for me in terms of travel as well as a few highlights here on the blog and elsewhere:

• How to start selling your photos online (Guest-post at Xpiks)
• Review of Topaz Sharpen AI Tool
• Interview with Doug Jensen, Stock Footage Expert – fresh insight after 2 years, including a special offer for his Master Stock Footage Course
• TikTok Updates

Travel update – Going on a Transatlantic Cruise in November!

In the May monthly report I ranted at how airline prices (and other costs) are through the roof and I had to frustratingly postpone a trip to Malta.

I’ve been planning on going back to Brazil at the end of the year as I have family there, but wasn’t so thrilled about paying some 1200/1300 euros for a return flight. So, since I don’t have any day-job commitments for the time being and things are quite slow on the client side (including clients low-balling me for drone work), I thought I would cross the Atlantic the old-fashioned way….on a boat!

MSC Seaview from Barcelona -> Rio de Janeiro

Not just any boat, a massive boat, together with 7,000+ other people. Wow!

How much did is the trip going to “cost” me?

Considering the journey is for 19nights/20 days, I paid around 1,000 euros for a basic cabin (with a small window)…which I think is a bargain! This cost only includes the buffet and water/coffee only. Everything else is extra including WIFI access, excursions, etc. That’s how they make their money.

Itinerary

Will I be able to recover my costs?

Really looking forward! Closer to the date of departure I’ll put together a blog post on what I hope to achieve from this voyage in terms of stock photos and footage, including the magical question of “whether I’ll be able to recover my costs”. Should be an ocean breeze this time considering so much to shoot within the ships and on excursions. Stay tuned!

Now onto the usual detailed earnings breakdown for the month.

Detailed Earnings Breakdown

Image Earnings

Agency	Number of Images in port (images added June)	Net Revenue for June (US$)	Avg Return Per Download (US$)
Alamy	15,542 (362)	235	12
Arcangel (RM-exclusive)	2,668 (96)	150	150
Adobe Stock	4,312 (21)	94 + 240 from free-download upfront payment	0.66
DepositPhotos	8,471 (88)	18	0.31
Dreamstime	8,516 (83)	18	0.90
Freekpik	866 (31)	15	0.07
Fine Art America	373 (0)	0	0
iStock (May 2023)	8,426 (137)	70	0.46
Robert Harding (Q2 2023 monthly average) – exclusive	452 (7)	5	1
Shutterstock Editorial	929 (6)	0	0
Shutterstock	11,696 (79)	125	0.48
Pond5	1,819 (3)	0	0
Photo4Me	389 (0)	25	25
SignElements	1,388 (10)	2	N/A
Vecteezy	530 (28)	2	N/A
Wirestock	1,960 (0)	4	N/A
Total		1,003

Clip Earnings

Agency	Number of clips in port (added June)	Net Revenue for June (US$)	Avg Return Per Download (US$)
Adobe Stock	905 (6)	20 + 16 upfront payment for free usage	5
Pond5	2,259 (19)	30	30
iStock (May 2023)	677 (41)	11	2
Shutterstock	1,685 (16)	46	7
Wirestock	104 (0)	0	0
Total		123

Net Totals: $1,126

Overall thoughts on June 2023

I’m super super pleased this month, which gives me a little bit of hope that there’s still some life left in this industry and it’s not all doom & gloom. Not counting those huge book cover sales, best month since March 2020 when the shit hit the fan.

Even without considering the one-off AS payments it was a good month and I particularly liked seeing that all of the major agencies pulled their weight to make this a balanced month (including clip sales at the top-3), with obvious highlights from Alamy and Arcangel. Even the minnows and POD helped out!

I hope this is the start of great things to come or at very least things stay this way while I keep adding strong commercial work to my portfolio such as the below which was accepted by Robert Harding.

Bearing fruits from past labour

This is a strange business model in that we don’t see the fruits of our labour for quite a long time (in some cases, never). In other words, the images we produce today won’t reach their full potential for at least six months, up to a year or even longer. So, if I’m having a good June 2023, it means that I worked hard in June 2022 and June 2021 for this to happen today (in simplistic terms).

This business model isn’t for everybody as some people prefer to earn for their labour immediately or soon after and that’s when the traditional 9-5 office job comes in…security. Each to their own but I much prefer the unpredictability that comes with stock, including the longevity of earning potential.

Some of my regular sales are over five years old and keep selling regularly and for instance, this image is selling now more at Adobe Stock than a Year1. Go figure!

Now let’s go through the major sales at individual agencies.

Shutterstock

Ironically, in such a great overall month, the usual best-performing agency was relegated to a bronze turd at third place! Still a decent result overall, but not strong enough for mighty Alamy (wow, did I really say that) and Adobe Stock. Some highlights include:

On the video side, no significant sales with the exception of the Madrid drone shot which is a regular seller so far earning me $167.

Towards the end of the month I had a nice sale of a recent clip in Lisbon.

Alamy, apologies, you’re not a microstock agency

My love/hate relationship with Alamy is endless. Last month, I ranted how I earned pittance from them and called them out as microstock agency. Here’s the rant:

No matter what Alamy themselves say or some of their loyal yet deluded contributors say, Alamy is a microstock agency. How do I make this bold statement? Well, just need to look at the individual average prices…19 sales earnings me a net $28, which comes to a very microstock $1.47/download on average!!!! My historical average on there is 7x that at $8.10 net.

Only one “decent” sale which I captured in 2018 of the control room of public operations in Rio de Janeiro earning me a whopping $7 net.

Just come out of the closet already, Alamy and admit it – you are microstock and not even top-tier. I’ll still love/hate you nevertheless. Perhaps my vintage prints, as discussed, will sell for a decent amount though but not going to get my hopes up.

This month I love Alamy as suddenly I’m getting some huge sales. So I must formally apologise to Alamy, which came out of nowhere to become the top-performing agency for the month at $235 net (not counting Adobe Stock’s one-off $5 giveaway).

The highlight was for $120 net at Lisbon’s Timeout market I captured back in 2019:

Next, $37 earned from a top-down of Copacabana Beach iconic mosaic and palm trees, I captured in January this year.

I fully expect Alamy to give me a horrible, disgusting, low-ball month in July – bring it on!

Adobe Stock

Strong month at Adobe Stock at $114 even not considering their $5 per image upfront payment for free usage scheme. Highlights include regular downloads of the progress flag, this being LGBGT+ month and all.

What I find most fascinating is that this image is available for free under a CreativeCommons license at both Pexels and Pixabay (under my free-download for donations experiment like a fking idiot). Yet, somehow, buyers still gravitate towards purchasing a license. Weird but in a way it makes sense, they’re simply not shopping around. The million-dollar question is whether if I had not placed this image for free if it would have sold more on paid-sites…so far, no evidence of that.

As for videos at AS, some sales for depressed prices, which we’ve all become accustomed:

$5 upfront giveaway

A total of 48 images were selected by Adobe Stock in return for $240. As for videos, two were selected earning me $16 total. Cool!

Pond5

Only one clip sold at Pond5 from my latest Spanish adventures earning me $30. A small step to eventually recover my costs from the trip.

iStock

Average month at iStock at total of $81 with nothing really special to report for images. On the clips side, some drone shots sold but for depressed prices.

One print sold at Photo4me

96 images accepted Images at Arcangel and one sale (finally)!

Despite working hard every month to upload quality book covers, I haven’t had a sale for 6 months, which feels like ages. Happy to report that the dry spell is over and there finally was a sale this month for a German book…here’s the cover:

I shot this cover in September 2022 after finishing up a gig for a client in Constancia, Portugal. What I found most interesting is that the story takes place in Taormina, Sicily. Here’s the summary:

A couple on the verge of separation takes a trip to Sicily to reconcile. A few kilometers from the airport, on a dirt road, their rental car hit an unidentified object. The next day, they decide to look for a garage in Taormina to discreetly repair the damage.
A very bad idea.

The cobblestones and whitewashed facades are similar, which makes for a wider commercial appeal. Also I suppose the building on far right could be the garage from the story. Anyway, hope this is the start of a strong sales trend particularly as I’m upping my game adding some cool overlays / light effects!

Rejections are killing me!

Being a brutally honest blog and all, I need to show the reality that I’m still getting lots of rejections at AC, including whole batches! I worked hard at one batch to pretend to be a dead/injured runner/hiker at the side of a path, but I suppose it wasn’t interesting enough or the quality wasn’t there. Oh well, the show must go on.

Top-20 accepted this month

Happy to share with you my top-20 accepted images of the month out of the 96 accepted!

Support the blog!

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 help you to focus on making money. If you feel that the information below and throughout the blog is useful I kindly ask you to buy me a coffee.

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Keep in mind that I’ve put in many many hours of my time to compile these comprehensive reports when I’m not chasing the sun!

Until next time!

Stay tuned as the next interview we have lined up is with Dave Wall, Arcangel Contributor and Educator.

About Alex

I’m an eccentric guy, currently based in Lisbon, Portugal, on a quest to visit all corners of the world and capture stock images & footage. I’ve devoted eight years to making it as a travel photographer / videographer and freelance writer. I hope to inspire others by showing an unique insight into a fascinating business model.

Most recently I’ve gone all in on submitting book cover images to Arcangel Images. Oh and also recently purchased a DJI Mavic 2s drone and taking full advantage and perhaps a Mavic 3 soon.

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