Licensed Photo For Book Cover

[bmattock]

People have been discussing various online photo sharing services recently, and in particular, Smugmug versus Flickr.

I licensed this photo to the RAND Corporation recently:

They just sent me a copy of the book. Very nice!

I'm not the world's best photographer, and don't claim to be. I'm not getting rich from my photography, but I've sold quite a few photos, and gotten magazine covers, textbooks, and now this book cover. My photos have appeared on museum advertisements in Seattle and a deck of playing cards put out by the state lottery in Michigan.

I post my photos to Flickr. I use lots of tags to describe them. I upload in high resolution.

Sometimes people contact me about them.

I find it all really rather gratifying, since I don't really shoot in order to sell or for recognition.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/wigwam/

I can't say about Smugmug, but Flickr has been very, very, good to me.

 

[rhl-oregon]

Good for you. It seems like a smart choice for the editors/publishers, given the demographics implied in the title. The original is an attractive candid portrait in any case.

I imagine some of us (more than just me) would be happy to know more details about your experience with licensing, communication, and so on.

On another note, visiting your Flickr reminded me how much I enjoyed your series on the outsider artist's home. Great documentation of vivid, unpredictable, challenging work. I'm sure I must have seen it here on rff originally.

 

[bmattock]

I imagine some of us (more than just me) would be happy to know more details about your experience with licensing, communication, and so on.

Thanks for the kind words!

I kind of stumbled into the licensing of photos on Flickr. Basically, I upload my shots, full size, and use lots of tags.

In the Shadow of the Power Plant by Wigwam Jones, on Flickr

Here is an example. If you click on the photo, you will see the tags and such that I used.

I took this photo with a Kodak 6MP point-n-shoot. Yet I licensed it for a college textbook. They didn't care that it wasn't the best lens or the best camera or that it wasn't a gazillion megapixels. It helped them illustrate a point, I guess.

Most of my photos that I've licensed have been fairly low-resolution in terms of digital camera gear (or scanned film). It doesn't seem to have mattered. What I have found matters more is subject matter and the fact that people can find it. I also seem to have a documentarian approach to a lot of my photography, and that seems to appeal to some folks.

Some of the photos I have licensed for magazine covers, posters, etc, seem to be wanted because they have some 'white space' to the side or bottom or whatever where an editor can put text; so in that case, it's just luck on my part that my photo fits their needs.

Traditional Dancer by Wigwam Jones, on Flickr

I licensed this one for a magazine cover. Note the space to the side - that's where the text went. Again, only a 6MP photo, but it was sufficient apparently for a full size magazine cover. They sent me a copy - looked pretty good to me. That one, by the way, bought me a new DSLR, so it was really nice to have been able to license it.

Anyway, I don't get as many sales lately because I don't shoot as much as I did a few years back. But for awhile I was averaging an offer a month or so; very gratifying to the old ego, you know?

The 'rules' I came up with were basically by experimentation.

1) Upload full size.
2) Use a 'Creative Commons' license so that non-profits can use the photo for free, with attribution. (Just a personal choice)
3) TAGS! Tag your photo with every attribute that seems to fit. Note the tags I used in my pow-wow photo above.

What I think happens is this:

Editors scour sites like Flickr looking for photos that fit specific needs. They are not just looking around for pretty photos, they're on a mission. So if you want them to find you, make your photos findable.

Then they send me Flickr mail. I keep an eye on it and respond promptly and professionally. When they tell me they're interested in a photo, and they are commercial (meaning money for me), I immediately let them know that I'm very pleased, thanks, but what are your rates? They tell me what they want to pay and I either go along with it, make a counter-offer, or say no thank you. Typically I take whatever they offer, I'm not a pro trying to make a living from this.

So you could say I have succeeded without trying. I just upload my work and I'm patient; they come to me. But the tags I think really help, as does the licensing, and the prompt response if they reach out to me. Probably does not hurt that I like event photos, vernacular photography, everyday type photos, and I tend to be a documentarian. Just my 'style' I guess.

I don't think talent really has as much to do with it in my case as simply having something that someone wants to use for some specific purpose, and doing my best to help them find it!

Hope that helps!

 

[rfaspen]

Thanks for the "scoop" on your approach. Very interesting and heartening.
And congratulations!

 

[Trius]

Bill - that is awesome, and really really helpful. Thanks a gazillion.

 

[rhl-oregon]

Yes, that is a helpful, generous testimonial + examples.

 

[xyz3450]

People have been discussing various online photo sharing services recently, and in particular, Smugmug versus Flickr.

I licensed this photo to the RAND Corporation recently: ...

Congratulations! Echoing the sentiments of others here, thank you for sharing how you publish photos and how the process works ....

 

[bmattock]

I searched, but alas could not find any definitive information on what to expect when selling. Obviously Joe "bought me a new DSLR" so there is reason to pursue this.

How are prices set?

I don't really know. When I sold the pow-wow photo for the magazine cover, they offered $400, which is what they said they paid for a cover. I gratefully accepted and bought a refurb Pentax K200D with it.

I don't know how they established that as the fee for a cover, I'm afraid.

 

[FrankS]

Well done, Bill! And thanks for sharing.

 

[rhl-oregon]

Here is a modest example.

On 12/31/12 I made a casual dinner portrait of an old friend to test my then-brand-new XE1/35 1.4 wide open in candle-light at ISO 6400. It turned out well enough to show her; she didn't mind me posting it; I tagged it with her name, for she is not only a friend but a reputable sociologist.

The following year, a French publisher contacted me via Tumblr, asking my fee for using the portrait in a textbook. (Clearly, someone there had done an image search for my friend the sociologist.) So I had delightful time researching a fair fee for an image sized X in an edition of Z copies, proposed it, and they accepted. They corresponded in English, I corresponded in Google French, and I was happy to get a credit and cash, and honor my friend while testing a new toy.

Here she is.

It isn't why I do photography (I had an earlier careerist life in a different art, and spiritual and psychic problems dogged that careerism; photography is a later-life art/craft/pursuit of seeing for its own sake) but it was a delightful surprise, like being bonked with a little golden apple. But I had planted the seed, as Bill testifies, with the proper tags, et voila.

 

[robert blu]

Thanks Bill for this report of your way of doing it, it's always interesting to know.
robert

 

[Paul T.]

Well done Robert (and Bill); that is a much nicer byline photo than just about any that I've seen.