Blueberries anyone?

[DGMPhotography]

Yummy.

I think this is pretty stock photo worthy.

 

[ronlane]

Honestly, probably not. IMHO, it's too tight and the color doesn't look just right to me.

 

[Derrel]

Last week, my neighbor brought me a couple of quarts of fresh blueberries she had picked at a local farm. I made some blueberry muffins with them and took those on a charter fishing trip. These blueberries you have photographed look strangely like the blueberries my neighbor gave to me! What are the chances of that? I mean, pretty crazy, right?

As far as a stock image...ummm...I think they might not accept this image just due to their obsessive concern over even the most minute image noise levels; this image has more noise than it should, in my opinion, for a stock photo. The world today is seemingly obsessed over noise in digital images, and stock firms even more so than photographers b***h and moan about noise.

 

[tirediron]

If you want to shoot an image that's got a chance of making it with a major stock agency, they you need to plan it. Buy several quarts of berries, sort them, discarding [into a bowl of ice-cream or a pie shell] any that aren't of a uniform shape and hue, as well as any with even a slight blemish. Arrange them so that you have a carefully crafted "random" arrangement and light to minimize the specular highlights as well as to ensure that you don't have any large, featureless black areas. I would expect to put at least 60-90 minutes into crafting a quality image of this nature.

 

[DGMPhotography]

Okay okay, I don't think I defined "stock." I know this isn't actually good enough to be a stock image. Just a picture I took at lunch, and I agree with you John about arranging it.

I suppose I was referring moreso to the style of the image, than the actual aesthetics.

 

[Derrel]

Yeah..it is a sort of generic "blueberries" type of image. I pulled it into PS and tried messing around with it...first one I added a simple 80 cooling filter at 17 percent density...I like this look!



For a second look, I added some Cyan and some Magenta in selective color, for a more purple-y look.

 

[tirediron]

Okay okay, I don't think I defined "stock." I know this isn't actually good enough to be a stock image. Just a picture I took at lunch, and I agree with you John about arranging it.

I suppose I was referring moreso to the style of the image, than the actual aesthetics.

Ahhh... gotcha.

 

[DGMPhotography]

Yeah..it is a sort of generic "blueberries" type of image

^That's what I was referring to.

 

[kdthomas]

The toughest shooting I have ever done is an attempt ... Repeat: ATTEMPT ... to get 10 pics past a stock agency.

I got sick of it ... Got to where shooting was a chore, a battle of wills ... Climbing Everest ... Exhausting soul sucking frustration

 

[DGMPhotography]

The toughest shooting I have ever done is an attempt ... Repeat: ATTEMPT ... to get 10 pics past a stock agency.

I got sick of it ... Got to where shooting was a chore, a battle of wills ... Climbing Everest ... Exhausting soul sucking frustration

Gosh, that does not sound fun at all!

 

[kdthomas]

The toughest shooting I have ever done is an attempt ... Repeat: ATTEMPT ... to get 10 pics past a stock agency.

I got sick of it ... Got to where shooting was a chore, a battle of wills ... Climbing Everest ... Exhausting soul sucking frustration

Gosh, that does not sound fun at all!

It was NOT fun ... And for the record, I'm not really griping about shutterstock (well maybe I am a little) ... the problem was almost entirely me. All my time and effort was consumed try to figure out which lever to pull to get the banana. I was a hermit, a madman, like one of those crazy monks locked in a cave trying to carve the Old Testament onto a grain of rice. I became unrecognizable ... a dry, grizzled husk ... a shell of my former self ... imagine Ray Milland in The Lost Weekend. Or Jack Lemmon in Days of Wine and Roses.

I just don't think I have the skill and feel for what they want (yet), and I suppose it'll come in time or it won't ... didn't seem to be anything I could intentionally bring about in in my work at the time. And besides .. you gotta have a lot of work out there, it has to stand out, and it has to stand out as yours. If I'm having to spend two days shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and shooting and editing and editing and editing and editing and editing and editing and editing and editing and editing and editing and editing and editing and editing the same stupid apple and grapes until I'm ready to call in an air strike ... that's gonna maybe maybe earn me $25 best case ... ? Not worth it.

For now I've just just decided to relax and shoot some more, be an artist, find my style ... maybe it'll be fine art, maybe portraits, maybe just cranking out sit-n-grins for $50 a pop.

 

[GWWhite]

And is the pay you would have got if the image were taken by the stock agency worth it KD?

 

[Designer]

I suppose I was referring moreso to the style of the image, than the actual aesthetics.

Well, here goes. Seems like I'm always the wet blanket around here.

I vote "no".

What you've got is just some berries and no context. If I were looking for an image of berries, I might be looking for berries in a basket, or berries spilling from their basket, or berries just after washing, or berries with some kind of human interest included.

Incidentally; I like Derrel's edit which shows the natural color better.

Also incidentally; are the current stock offerings lacking a shot of just berries? If so, then you have potentially fulfilled a need with your shot.