Welcome to the February 2024 Brutally Honest Report, where as usual I’ll be discussing my earnings and industry news including news on Artificial Intelligence. I’ve been traveling for three months so it’s nice to be “home” in Portugal catching up on work. Let’s get started!
10 days in São Paulo
As a Carioca* (someone born in Rio de Janeiro) working up the courage to finally visit and experience Sao Paulo, Brazil’s largest city and the financial engine of the country wasn’t easy. I had many preconceived ideas about both the city and the people (as someone from a rival city naturally has), look at Paris vs Marseille….Rome vs Milan…New York vs Los Angeles, etc. So I tried to take it all in with as blank of a slate as I could.
Overall, I really enjoyed the city…it has a tremendous to offer and if you’re traveling to Brazil (really hope you do), it’s not a stopover on your way to Rio by any means, perhaps it may even be the final destination. Of course, SP doesn’t have the rustic nature that Rio offers or its energy (particularly during Carnival/New Years) but it more than makes up for it with superb gastronomy, architecture and culture.
Was also a great place to capture book covers and I have to admit that overall I felt much safer shooting there than in Rio! Here are some of my favourite shots from Sao Paulo before embarking on my flight to Lisbon.
Beco do Batman, the nickname for the area around the Vila Madalena neighborhood with its dense concentation of graffiti lining the streets, popular with tourists, Sao Paulo, Brazil, South America 
Carnival street party known as a Bloco, Sao Paulo, Brazil, South America 
High perspective view of people and financial buildings at Vale Do Anhangabau, Sao Paulo, Brazil, South America 
View of a large mural in Sao Paulo, Brazil, South America 
View of the main street in Liberdade neighbourhood, home to a large part of Brazil’s Japanese community, Sao Paulo, Brazil, South America 
YouTube version of the report below!
Monthly highlights on the blog
Quiet month blog-wise with just one article:
Catching up with Daniele Carrere, Microstock Guru
This month I caught up with Daniele Carrere, a veteran stock footage editorial contributor who published a super useful step-by-step article on How to Avoid Paypal Fees on his blog where he has saved hundreds of dollars a year. Also the Xpiks Blog has put out a breakdown on the different payment options.
In addition to congratulating him on a great article, I took the opportunity to ask him a few questions regarding the current Microstock footage market which he agreed to make the answers public.
1. How are your video sales if you don’t mind me asking? Mine have experienced a huge drop during the last year, volumes are steady but average price especially on SS is a disaster but also surprisingly Pond5 and AS. Istock is very low and has always been.
I’ve chosen Pond5 exclusivity. Sales there remain steady compared to the same period in 2023, despite having 20% more videos. This is somewhat concerning. However, what truly worries me is Sora, which is impressive. I prefer not to comment on news when I lack sufficient information, but given that these videos were released by OpenAI, I don’t believe they are fake. I hope they keep that tool priced at a premium.
2. I’ve also been impressed by Sora but firstly, are you not concerned about Shutterstock’s purchase of Pond5 which may encourage them to match their lower prices?
Pond5 has had a policy of not having higher prices than other microstocks for years. Before becoming exclusive in 2020 or 2021, anyway before the acquisition, I was forced to lower my Pond5 prices to $79 because I sold the same footage on Shutterstock.
Anyway, that is a very small problem, compaired to the arrival of AI like Sora.
How do people know Pond5 and Shutterstock will match the prices? Did they talk with their CEO or hack his computer? They simply don’t, as myself, but I don’t comment because I have something more useful to do: producing new stock footage, launching new businesses, reading new books, walking in front of the sea. In Italy we called those kind of guys, keyboard lions. They just need someone or something to blame for their unsuccess. I’m an online entrepreneur, I’ll never be part of that talking.
3. One last question, why would you be so worried about Sora when the majority of your videos are editorials (I remember from your course) and thus “real” which cannot be altered or created for editorial purposes (perhaps illustrative editorial but only within a limited scope). Yes, for sure they will likely impact the majority of commercial work but not editorials. These days, when I do upload to micros, it’s mainly editorials.
I now primarily sell historical footage. Have you watched the Gold Rush era video on Sora’s presentation? It’s more real than Hollywood reconstructions. But Hollywood sets cost millions, while Sora will cost far less, even though I hope they will price it at thousands of dollars at least.
Microstock buyers are all different. If they need a street of Paris today, some would like it to be real, while others won’t care if the footage was generated by AI and is indistinguishable. Once you can use Sora to generate footage, there will probably be a microstock site where you can get all the footage you need generated by Sora like systems for a given price. Let’s say that will reduce our business by 50%. It will be a huge problem, and think about if it will reduce it by 90%. Let’s wait and see what happens.
AI News – Introducing Sora
Daniele mentioned above that he’s worried about how Open AI Sora’s development will impact the stock footage industry and elsewhere. But first, let’s look at some examples including the Gold Rush video that he mentioned.
Yeah, without a doubt Sora is a game-changer and many creatives will be made redudant in the near-future. Some further examples of Sora’s scope:
It’s all just too new, let me think about all this first and do some research
I have to admit that I have to do some research on all this and think about its practical short and medium term commercial impacts, as well as regulatory. I’ll discuss Sora in more detail perhaps in March/April on likely a separate post.
Let’s now move onto the usual detailed earnings report where I’ll be using a new metric.
Detailed Monthly Earnings Breakdown
Now calculating average return per image in the portfolio
Notice that this month only instead of “Average Return Per Download” I’ve decided to take the “Average Return Per Image”, which essentially means I’m calculating how hard each image in the portfolio is working to generate – essentially how strong a portfolio is overall…large portfolios full of spam/similars as well as irrelevant content will have a very low return. On the other side of the coin, a small focused portfolio full of relevant subs that rank well should do much better.
How to calculate Return per Image
To calculate this metric I take the net earned divided by the number of images. For instance, at Alamy, in February I earned 1/3 of a cent per image in the portfolio – tough times, whereas at Adobe Stock I earned an average of 2cents per image. So, my port at Adobe Stock overall is working 6x harder than at Alamy this month.
Image Earnings (US$)
| Agency | Number of Images in port (images added Feb) | Net Revenue for Feb | Avg Return Per Image |
| Alamy | 15,971 (67) | 57 | 0.003 |
| Arcangel (RM-exclusive) | 3,940 (165) | TBD | TBD |
| Adobe Stock | 4,546 (15) | 77 | 0.02 |
| DepositPhotos | 8,207 (17) | 12 | 0.01 |
| Dreamstime | 9,087 (21) | 8 | 0.01 |
| Freekpik | 1,010 (0) | 7 | 0.07 |
| Fine Art America | 373 (0) | 4 | N/A |
| iStock (Dec 2023) | 8,876 (69) | 131 + 75 ADAGP Collective Licensing Payback 2023 | 0.01 |
| MotionArray | 138 (10) | 3 | 0.02 |
| Robert Harding (Q4 2023 monthly average) – RM/RF exclusive | 519 (24) | 19 | 0.04 |
| Shutterstock Editorial | 962 (0) | 0 | 0 |
| Shutterstock | 12,193 (16) | 120 | 0.04 |
| Photo4Me | 398 (0) | 0 | 0 |
| Wirestock | 3,066 (0) | 10 | 0.03 |
| Total | 523 |
Clip Earnings (US$)
| Agency | Number of clips in port (added Feb) | Net Revenue for Feb |
| Adobe Stock | 1,053 (1) | 4 |
| Pond5 | 2,608 (3) | 0 |
| iStock (Dec 2023) | 832 (10) | 4 |
| Shutterstock | 1,958 (2) | 17 |
| Total | 23 |
Grand Total: $546
Thoughts on the month
Not great, not terrible…
But really, $23 on clip sales…I’m speechless.
Let’s now discuss detailed earnings from the major agencies.
Shutterstock
The once mighty Shutterstock is struggling so far in 2024…in January SS came second to Adobe Stock and now in February it lost out to iStock! Must be the that “great reset” they implemented in 2020 that is having an impact although in theory sales should pick up from March as I’m now Level 4 for pics and Level 2 for clips (although doubt it will make a huge difference).
No major sales to speak of except for this aerial view of Birmingham on a clear spring day that I captured back in 2017, which earned me just over $24.
On the clip side, nothing to brag about and not worth mentioning.
Alamy
Unpredictable Alamy were predictably poor this month with just $58 net on 9 downloads. I have by far the largest port size at Alamy at an impressive 15,971, but less impressive is that it’s average return per image on there is 1/3 of a cent. Probably a lot of useless microstocky images on there while Alamy buyers are mainly after editorials. Should I delete pics that haven’t sold on there after 7+ years…nah.
Just three decent sales on there:
Adobe Stock
Decent month at Adobe Stock at $77 with 111 downloads. No major sales but decent volumes at least. Here are some of the best-sellers:
Nothing to brag about on the clips department and I can just about afford a Brazilian Arrabica coffee from this aerial drone clip of coffee fields in Brazil.
Pond5
iStock
Moving onto happier news, a decent month at iStock for $135 combined, including a nice one-off payment worth $75 for “ADAGP Collective Licensing Payback 2023”. Not sure what it entails but I’ll take it! Not major sales to report other than these two and they weren’t even that large.
Robert Harding
Robert Harding reported for Q4 2023 and I hesistantly opened up the report fully expecting very low sales. Indeed, all sales but one were low (microstock numbers), but the larger sale I suppose made up for it earning me $50 net. I have fond memories of that day in April 2018 in the Netherlands.
Arcangel
No sales in February, although I should hear about March sales from early on in the new month. I think there will be a few…
Nevertheless, a strong month uploading wise with 165 images accepted bringing my port to an impressive 3,940.
Here are 15 of my favourite images from February.
What’s in store for March? Interview with a Stock Wizard!
I have an interview coming up with a very talented lifestyle photographer, Andrea Piacquadio, who has sold literally millions of images at various microstock agencies.
I’m keen to ask him all sorts including how he views the rising and potentially disruptive force of AI impacting on his current and future sales (or not). He also tells me that he has helped set up Tiltsnap, a new stock agency with a different ethos where free stock images are exchanged for social media following.
UPDATE: Here’s the link to the exclusive interview!
Next month I’m also hoping to dig deeper on OpenAi Sora and other AI-related news.
Hope you’ve enjoyed this blog post and feel free to post below!
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.
I’ve gone all in on submitting book cover images to Arcangel Images. Oh and was also flying a DJI Mavic 2s drone regularly (although it crashed into Botafogo Bay on NYE – here is the story), which I’m likely upgrading to a Mini 3 Pro and eventually an Air3 in 2024.
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 