A lot of people are very curious about the possible earning that they can obtain from stock photos or videos. The amount depend on a lot of factors like:
- number of photos and videos you have in the portfolio
- the number of agencies you are submitting to
- the type of content you are submitting
- the period of year, certain months will give you better results than others
- quality of the content you are submitting
As you can see there are a lot of factors that can influence the income from one month to the other. But please consider that the more content you have the more likely you will sell the content as well the number of agencies you are submitting to.
Also please notice that the amount of income I earn each month is only valid for the content I have uploaded. You can easily achieve more, it is not a general rule
Earnings for June 2018
June wasn’t the best month to be honest. I have summarized the earnings for June in the table bellow
| Agency name | Earnings | Image count |
|---|---|---|
| 123RF | $3,14 | 1105 |
| Alamy | $0,00 | 1362 |
| Bigstock | $0,25 | 837 |
| Canstock | $0,00 | 477 |
| Dreamstime | $0,00 | 1067 |
| Fotolia | $7,37 | 953 |
| Shutterstock | $24,40 | 1357 |
| Stockfresh | $0,00 | 39 |
If you like graphics more than numbers below you can find the chart for the above numbers. The total revenue for June was only $35,16. That doesn’t seem to be much. But please consider that stock photography is only a hobby for me. It doesn’t pay me any bills, all the revenue is re-invested. Whether we are speaking about gear or something else it is contributing to my little hobby.
Additionally it is a great way of learning. I consider that aspect way more important than the money I earn. In my eyes learning new things motivates me more. Also this way you can improve yourself. Once you make it only for money that means you are going for quantity and may lack quality.
Image count
As mentioned earlier it is important the number of portfolio that you have. For the moment I am submitting to the 8 agencies
- 123RF
- Alamy
- Bigstock
- Canstock
- Dreamstime
- Fotolia
- Shutterstock
- Stockfresh
The number of files varies from agency to the other because some images are accepted on one stock photo agency’s website while on the other it might be rejected. On average the I have 1000 images, vector illustrations and videos.
While I shoot mainly photos, lately I wanted to try out myself in video content creation. For this purpose I use After Effects and hopefully from next month I will be able to jump into aerial photography / videography with the new DJI Mavic Air that I have ordered recently.
Conclusion
While the earned sum might not seem to be much for some of you, it still is a residual income and will generate money. You can achieve way more than you have seen in the above table, so don’t get disappointed from the beginning. It takes time to build a quality portfolio. After all I am doing stock photography from 2014.
