More flowers, abstract

Flowers are a typical subject that is hard to get approved at stock agencies. It isn't that they don't want them, but that they are a common subject among 'amateurs' and also easy to come by. Finally - flowers are beautiful all by themselves! Last weekend I was at a friend's for dinner and noticed their clear glass coaster sort of acted like a sheet of glass with water drops - only easier to move around. I glanced around the room and figured the vase of roses would be cool to shoot through it. I (naturally) had my 40D, 60mm macro and flash at the ready so I held the glass close to the flowers, focused on it, and bounced the flash off the ceiling to light the flower behind. Voila:


© Photographer: Bradcalkins

Two images found!

Just by chance I found two of my images out in the real world this week. Last Friday I flew through the Victoria airport and I took a second to glance in the Victoria calendars on sale. Amazingly I found one of my images in the first calendar I looked in! This is the shot they used for February 2010:


© Bradcalkins

Then, on Monday I received the latest copy of Photo Life. Sure enough, I had an entry in this month's Showtime contest that made the cut (the theme was Juxtapositions):



© Bradcalkins

Free stock photos

Many people may be unaware that Dreamstime offers free stock photos, in addition to the commercial ones. In some cases they are older or lower quality, but many are there because contributors want to attract people to their portfolio.

This is an example of mine that I donated a while back:

Recyclable

There are some additional limitations on use, but for many these may fit the bill - especially for non-commercial work. I also found it of use when I started out in stock as I could get my hands on top contributors images to get a feel for how their quality was at 100% to see if I was in the ballpark or not quality wise. Handy to avoid rejections on your own work.

You'll also note that contributors get their other images shown next to the free one, so this may provide some additional exposure. You still have to sign up (I think) to get the free images, but there aren't any other charges or commitments...

GF1 and stock

The GF1 is proving to be a capable stock photography camera, as well as being perfect for my go anywhere camera. Unlike the G10, which I left at home too often, the GF1 gets grabbed whereever I'm going. The G10 wasn't a camera you could slip into your shirt pocket either, so I'm not really finding any cases where I wish I had the slightly smaller G10. As a result, I'm also getting more out of the GF1 in terms of stock photography - just becuase I have it with me. Here are couple of recent uploads that were accepted this week:

Dreamstime ups prices, lowers levels

Interestingly, Dreamstime has announced that the number of credit per sale will go up in January, and they have also lowered the levels required to hit higher credit values. Both good per sale for contributors, but will buyers go elsewhere?

Link to post

Power meter

Here is a shot of a power meter that I took with my new GF1. We had a new meter installed so it was sitting at very close to zero, and I thought I'd better get in there and grab a photo early on. The photos were pretty boring (see example above), so I spiced it up a bit with black and white and a zoom effect. The zoom helps to get rid of the logos, at the same time as it plays off the energy side of things. Happy to say it was approved for sale today - another stock shot with the GF1. DT isn't accepting Panasonic RAW files yet, so I've been converting to DNG - probably more useful to buyers anyways (they don't have to have the absolute latest to make use of the files).

New images online

Had a group of images approved today, but for some reason the one below really appeals to me. I don't know if it is the old engine, the blues, or what - it just feels like it could as easily by 1970 as 2009...



The shots of the kids playing on the WII guitars are pretty cute, too: