Welcome to my September 2026 Brutally Honest Earnings Report, where the long-term goal remains unchanged: trying to cover all my gear and travel costs entirely through stock income. Sounds crazy, right? Yeah, probably.
Let’s dive right in!
Monthly Highlights
You may recall my very first 2026 goal on my 2025 yearly recap report.
Lo and behold, I actually follow through on my goals occasionally!
I’m planning to publish the new eBook around November, the third in the Brutally Honest Series.
For now, here’s the cover reveal, thanks Annie Milleflore for helping me with this cover and the design of my upcoming eBook as well as other collaborations.
More details will follow soon, including how to get a copy and some early-bird pricing. In the meantime, here’s the table of contents:
Trickiest chapter
Chapter 10: “Different Cultures, Different Reactions” was particularly challenging to write because it tackles a sensitive and rarely discussed subject: attitudes towards street photography among some recent (and not so recent) immigrants to Europe.
As usual, I’ve tried to approach it directly and brutally honest rather than pretending these awkward real-world situations don’t exist. Locals also cause problems but they’re generally a different kind.
Traveling around Portugal
I’m continuing my little experiment of travelling around Portugal, creating new stock content while trying to spend as little as reasonably possible in the process.
Fortunately, Portugal is still a pretty good place to do that. Once you get outside Lisbon, Porto and the main tourist hotspots, travelling can still be surprisingly affordable especially during the low seasons.
In July, I spent a few days shooting in Porto. In August, it was Coimbra, a famous university town.
Three days in Evora
For September, I waited for the worst of the summer heat to disappear and headed east into the Alentejo, using Évora as my base for three days.
Nearby I visited what is considered the “Stonehenge of Portugal”, known as Almendres Cromlech, such a remote location with few people that I flew my drone around with no problems.
As well as a day-trip to Elvas to visit some impressive UNESCO World Heritage Site fortifications on the border with Spain.
Next up in Portugal I have a few places in mind, including Tomar and Peniche. Then perhaps the port of Sines for some industrial shots.
Alentejo trip costs
Once again, this was a relatively cheap stock-production trip.
I spent less than €300 for three days, including accommodation, transport and food. The accommodation was basic but comfortable and, more importantly for this kind of trip, centrally located.
That’s exactly the sort of cost structure I’m aiming for.
At under €300, I don’t need the trip to produce some spectacular immediate commercial return. A handful of decent licences over the coming months, or even over several years, could eventually recover the entire investment.
And that’s really the experiment: can relatively inexpensive photography trips around Portugal eventually pay for themselves through stock?
I’ll keep tracking the results and reporting any interesting licences that come through.
Picked up some poker tournament client work
In any case, I was quite busy with client work working a full 10 days of the month at poker tournaments as the main photographer / videographer (and 6 in August). So this yielded much more than this silly stock income, although it would have probably been more profitable for me to play instead of shoot. Hours are long as sometimes the final tables are only settled at 3AM but fortunately I can also work on my own stuff while I wait.
And on the side managed to gather some stock from those days, including the insides of an evil slot machine! This will go towards a potential book cover at Arcangel.
As well as some videos generic poker videos…
And money shots…
Horse shoot
Also had a really fun horse shoot for stock with a former model / professional poker player who owns a beautiful horse, Sandra Naujoks.
Thanks Damiano for introducing me to her and organising this opportunity, you also got some cool shots of your future wife.
Other News – Getty Struggling
Last but not least, I published an exclusive Interview with Filipe Barroso, Documentary Filmmaker based in Lisbon.
Now, let’s get to the money part.
Monthly Earnings Breakdown
📸Image Earnings (USD)
| Agency | Number of images (new images Sept) | Net Revenue Sept | Avg Return Per Download |
| Amazing Aerial – exclusive (Aug) | 1,732 (200) | 47 | 11.75 |
| Alamy | 17,500 (0) | 40 | 2.66 |
| Arcangel (RM-exclusive) | 6,736 (31) | 200 | 200 |
| Adobe Stock | 4,927 (0) | 93 +$53 Firefly AI Payment | 0.85 |
| DepositPhotos | 8,884 (0) | 7 | 0.36 |
| Dreamstime | 9,876 (0) | 3 | 0.37 |
| Freekpik (now Magnific wtf) | 1,217 (0) | 10 | 0.06 |
| iStock (August) | 9,365 (0) | 56 | 0.49 |
| MotionArray | 480 (0) | 9 | 0.31 |
| Robert Harding (Q2 2026 monthly average) – RF exclusive | 741 (0) | 22 | 2 |
| Shutterstock | 12,849 (0) | 38 | 0.48 |
| Total | 578 |
🎥Clip Earnings (USD)
| Agency | Number of clips (new clips Sept) | Net Revenue for Sept | Avg Return per Download |
| Amazing Aerial (Aug) | 1,354 (147) | 19 | 6.33 |
| Adobe Stock | 1,612 (0) | 76 | 7.60 |
| Pond5 | 3,419 (0) | 0 | 0 |
| iStock (Aug) | 1,251 (0) | 20 | 2.86 |
| Shutterstock | 2,787 (0) | 1 | 1 |
| Total | 116 |
Grand Total: $694
Thoughts on the month
September is traditionally a strong month but this year, like the previous few was rather lacklustre especially with how expensive things are getting in the real-world. Quite a bit lower than September 2025 when I earned net $857 and $840 the year before.
Let’s see how Amazing Aerial performs in September, I’m counting on them!
Milestone month – Avoiding “PASI”
September marked a small but significant milestone.
For the first time ever, I didn’t upload a single new asset to Pond5, Alamy, Shutterstock and Alamy, which I’ve conveniently grouped together as “PASI”.
I’m not really boycotting them per se, it’s more that I can’t get any sort of motivation to upload them, even if it just takes a few minutes. That probably tells you everything you need to know about how much faith I currently have in those three agencies, especially Shutterstock/Pond5.
Shutterstock is the most dramatic example. September produced my worst Shutterstock result since 2014. Both in terms of royalties and volumes. For an agency that once sat at the very centre of the microstock industry, the decline has been extraordinary.
As for uploads, for the past two years they have really dropped as you can see, peaking in May 2020.
New content therefore goes where I believe it has a better chance of generating a worthwhile return.
Amazing Aerial News
Amazing Aerial produced a quiet August at $66 (both photos and videos). Again it’s August so can’t expect too much.
Nevertheless, some highlights include:
Hugo, meanwhile, had another superb month, earning $1,318. Over the past eight months he has been absolutely crushing it there having earned $9,080.
Since I receive 10% of his net earnings as having introduced him to the agency, I’m super pleased. So far I’ve earned $908 from his sales and some from others.
Keep up the great work, Hugo!
📈Other Best-Sellers
Arcangel
And finally, something I’ve been waiting quite a while for. After many months of uploading, waiting and hoping, I finally sold a book cover through Arcangel. This brings the total number for this year to 5, which is still quite disappointing.
Relatively quick turnout as this was captured just before Christmas 2025 at El Prat Airport in Barcelona waiting for my luggage to arrive. Some cool light and reflections and a bright pink luggage arrived creating a nice colour contrast.
At $200 net, it was easily one of the highlights of the month and another reminder of why I’m increasingly interested in agencies and collections capable of generating meaningful individual licence values rather than chasing thousands of tiny subscription downloads. Note that this is just an average licence price as I’ve been asked not to give specifics.
Plans for October – Heading west!
I’ll be spending most of the month in Brazil. Then November off to the US (Florida) and then Canada (Vancouver) where I’ll spend a few weeks visiting some friends and shooting. I went to High School there 1997-2000 and that’s when I started to experiment with photography as it was one of the classes offered (it was just the beginning of digital so I was shooting and developing film).
I’ve been having some random thoughts about if I should travel elsewhere in Canada. One location that I would be keen to explore is Montreal but might be too cold for my tropical blood come December.
✈️Upcoming Travel Plans
| Month | Location |
| October | Brazil and back on the 20th |
| November | USA then Canada (arrive on cruise) |
| December | Back in early/mid December. Then maybe Milan or Greece around Christmas or a road trip through Spain, still deciding |
| 2027 | East Asia, India (Dmitry?) Poland…Israel (Oct)? Caminho de Santiago via Portugal |
Until next time, here’s a pic of me holding a giant papaya in Brazil.
About Alex
I’m Alex, eccentric, based in Lisbon, and on a mission to explore every corner of the globe while capturing stock images and footage along the way.
For the past 12 years, I’ve been grinding as a travel photographer/videographer and freelance writer. Along the way I’ve also written The Brutally Honest Guide to Microstock Photography, a book packed with war stories and practical tips for anyone crazy enough to enter this business and more recently, The Brutally Honest Guide to Drone Laws in Europe.
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