Making money from stock video

This article is food for thought for those just beginning in stock video and those who may questions about how to price their footage.

This thread, as I said, is food for thought not for a heated discussion on pricing, low balling or quantities on line.

http://www.simonwyndham.co.uk/making-money-from-microstock.html

Interesting article with good thoughts.Thanks for sharing!

Yes too, my thoughts become written words. Thanks for sharing the article.

Damn I can never bite my tongue...

The Article should be titled 'No Money in MicroStock'

It's an over saturated market with way too many people. However I have found the golden goose. You'll need After Effects CS5, Particle illusion 3, E-on Vue, Cinema4D and 18 months of extensive study. Leave the the camera on the shelf.

True there is "No Money in MicroStock" but then we don't sell photos here. Check the definition of microstock as the terminology just doesn't fit.

Yup Pond5 may be the only bright light around.

Footage actually does sell pretty well and there is allot you can't do with CG. You can make a CG clip of just about any thing but the time involved to do it is still too much. Yeah one day it will be another story but as of right now Footage still is doing pretty well.

Plus I can't make a CG Jake lean against a wall with the depressed look that's just so darn convincing.

I don't think I would encourage anyone to drop footage for CG, the people that get on here that are new to CG mostly make the same tutorials and that sells because the tutorials are good. That stuff is getting over saturated though, and buyers are becoming more educated on what's what. The new to CG, CG has a distinct look to it and doesn't sell all that much from what I see.

Same thing with the new to footage, footage. My footage work doesn't sell very well. I don't have much of it, I'm still learning. So I'm not trying to get actors right now, just shooting things that can't get frustrated with my lack of experience like bugs and landscapes. (I toss about 75% of the clips I shoot right now). These topics don't sell very well though, footage is largely in the topic. When you do stock, your a resource, you want to be the editors go to. This isn't some thing you just jump into with 200 clips and make allot of money. It takes real dedication and you need to want this type of career.
I think people that are new don't understand that the people that make very regular sales have been putting in work for years now. Dedication to this means investing allot of time into what editors need are, what categories aren't done, leaning new tricks all the time. One trick ponies go stale in stock over night. If you want to do this and last years, you should WANT to learn CG, and how to use a camera and step your game up with them all the time. Love what you do if you want to do this, do this because it's what you love, because there isn't truck loads of money or fame.

in 18months that market will also be saturated canadafirst....

Here are some stats on fractals:

There are 7540 on line.
Only 701 have sold.
Of the 701 none have sold more than once.

hmmm that is about 10%, I'd say that is good. That fractal dude prob has like 50% of the market share right now!