Introduction to Microstock Photography – Other Rejection Reasons
Table of contents for Microstock Photography
In this post I will finish with the main reasons a photograph will be rejected. I will start off with the Not Stockworthy category and its very similar category – Too Many on Site. There are certain subjects that microstock sites have far too many of and don’t sell that well in the first place. Some of these types of photos will even anger the reviewer – who likely has to sit through endless pictures of seagulls and ducks at times. Most sites – IStockPhoto in particular – have long lists of types of photos that they do not want any more of. The most common ones are
- Flowers – Most sites have every type of flower you can imagine now. Certainly if you send an image of a flower and put in the description “pretty flower” it is almost sure to be rejected. However, if you take a picture of a flower that is not very common (such as a rose or rhododendron) and you include the species name and location of the flower it may be accepted. Even with roses – I suspect if you include the variety there is a chance it will be accepted.
- Fruits – There are endless pictures of apples, pears, and other types of fruits on the microstock sites today. They come in baskets of fruits, isolated fruits, fruits on sale, fruits falling, eating fruits, and every possible thing involving fruits. Do not bother submitting pictures of fruits unless they are a rarer tropical variety that is not already covered well.
- Sunsets – Pictures with descriptions of ‘Gorgeous Sunset’ are almost sure to be rejected. However, I have found that if I am very specific about the location of the sunset – and it’s a good sunset – it has a chance of being accepted. Some locations – I suspect Hawaii – are still overdone here and no matter how great the sunset is it will still likely be rejected.