A few years ago, music was available to masses through record producers only - vinyl or CD, the support didn't really matter. The producer started to act as a director, setting trends, creating stars, shaping new generation' addictions based on his own vision, creativity and knowledge. As money was involved, the artistic vision may be surpassed by financial reasons, giving birth to monster kitsch productions. You might think that what you hear at the radio is what the DJ likes. Is not really so (link)... The producer or label dictated the playlist more than ever.

Then a revolution begun, nurtured by the technological evolution. The MP3 file was born. The audio digital format was there before,...

There's a frequent discussion that tries to give an answer to what makes a professional, what defines it and what sets it apart from the amateur. It's almost a cliche, like the image that worths as much as x words (substitute x with your own choice). You can see it on every respectable forum of any photography-related website.

Guess what, they're not different. I was reading an interview with a NG veteran researcher (not a photographer). He was asked if he consider himself a pro, after all these years. His answer, rather not, as he stills put passion in it, while a professional would do it only for money. I realized that what defines the amateur is not being the novice, but being a passionate about it. Does it mean that pros are not passionate?...

There is an old Romanian tradition where men offer a small gift to women on 1st of March. The gift is wear and always has a nice red-white string (that's what makes it a "martisor"). The initial custom was that men were receving gifts from women, something changed in the last centuries, the meaning is the same! ;)

It means that spring is here. Here is one for all you ladies out there! The only one on the site by the way, which should give all Romanians an idea about what to shoot this weekend. ;)

We probably lack many other local symbols so if you are not a Romanian you might want to consider your most important local symbols and see how they are represented on the site.

Happy 1st of March!

Contributors often ask this question: "do the extra pixels matter?". Here are a few thoughts about it.

What values most to us and the buyers is the content of your image. If the aesthetics are bad, it doesn't matter what your camera can do or how many MP it can produce. This is part of the review criteria and is also taken into consideration at sales level (a very good small image can sell at a higher price than a not-so-popular one with more MP).

Please consider the following, after the above is acomplished:

First, as the number of megapixels increases so is the technology. That equals a more powerful camera, hence better images from a technical point of view.

Second, one can crop an image in a better way if there are plenty of MP, so you will have a creative ...

Radiohead has launched a new album about one month ago. A controversial one, the album was recorded by the famous band on their own, without any recording label.

Consequently, the album was posted on the Internet and can be downloaded by users at the price they decide. Yep, you read it right, you can buy it for $1 or $100, you choose how to reward the band.

The download will be available until Dec. 10, 07. Album will go through traditional outlets from Dec. 31, 07.

Web 2.0 (almost) frees music!

Buy album here

Every month we break our own records. No need to bother you with this, you already know the trend. Some facts regarding our latest evolution are always welcome, so here we go:

October was the best month in sales, extended licenses, payments sent to photographers, images submitted, image reviews and new customers. Most contributors have seen a significant growth reporting personal records, with royalties increase going as high as 70-100% for some of them.

We've gained about 25,000 new live images in only 3 days. That's not a peak, but a simple check of the last few days. The approval ratio grew as the quality improved. As a side note, our hard working editors are always eager to see your comments, so drop them a nice reply on approvals too, not only on refusals. ;)

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The previous record of $4,500 for a SR-EL license was exceeded today with a $5,100 sale. The file was acquired with exclusive SR-EL rights by a chocolate producer.

The image listed on the left is for illustration purposes only. The acquired file was very similar, but it is not this file. We cannot post the original here, but I thought this info would be useful to contributors and to everyone analyzing our industry.

And just as a side note, being exclusive matters. Royalties awarded to the non exclusive photographer would be $2,550. The exclusive additional royalties for such sale add $510 more, which is not bad at all.

We have just been informed us that our application for membership in CEPIC was approved by the CEPIC Board of Directors and Dreamstime thus becomes the first member of CEPIC from the microstock community.

Sylvie Fodor, CEPIC Executive Director, sent us the news today and we take this opportunity to share the wonderful news.

To introduce CEPIC here is a description from their web site:

CEPIC, was established in Berlin in 1993 as a non-profit European Economic Interest Group (E.E.I.G) in accordance with the European Communities Regulation and registered in Paris in 1999. CEPIC has Observer Status at WIPO, the World Intellectual Property Organization and is an Associate Member of I.P.T.C, the International Press Telecommunications Council. CEPIC represents over ...

We see more and more downloads each day on Christmas images, so if you plan to have Christmas in your portfolio, it is now that you need to upload. In fact you can consider you are already late and really hurry. Designers are already downloading images and sending them to the client for review. Don't wait for the Christmas to arrive, very few will actually download them at that time and the selection criteria will be tougher. You might want to do a careful search before uploading, remember this is the most prolific theme of the year, so don't upload the same cliches.

Read Petar's new article for more hints on Christmas and stock photography.

What's the real royalty rate that Dreamstime awards to its photographers? Thanks to the bonuses we support, the royalties are in fact higher than our contract with you, the contributors, bounds us. While the Sell your images page or our terms mention the standard 50-60% rates, here is a detailed explanation of how much the real royalties are:

The credit in the lowest priced package equals $1. A download with such credit brings the photographer $0.5 or $0.6 if he is exclusive.

Higher packages come with bonus credits supported by the agency. For example the $100 package has 130 credits. A credit equals $0.76. But the royalties awarded to the photographer are the same $0.50 and $0.60 for the 1-credit download. $0.60 ...