More pics shot with the Sony RX100 Mark VI

I know a few photographers who would bock at using a point and shoot camera.   Apparently it’s not professional enough.  Can’t control any of the settings on the camera.  That is nothing but snobbery and purely uneducated B.S.  You can control your ISO, f stop and zoom.  The camera has internal stability to take care of camera shake at 200MM.  Yeah it’s not an interchangeable lens camera but it’s not meant to be.  The Sony RX100 Mark VI and VII both come with a 24-200MM lens which is great for wide landscape and up close and personal.  If you need to get closer to a subject, use your feet.  If you want a more panoramic shot, take 2-3 shots and stitch them together in Affinity Photo.  Don’t make excuses for your photography.  Work with the equipment you have.  Adapt and change.  Photography is not static.  Shoot out of your comfort zone.  A few years back, I would not even shoot video because I thought I just wanted to be a photographer.  One day at Parc Omega, I shot a video, edited it and uploaded it to Shutterstock.  It sold within a week for $120US.   That is when I started shooting footage as well.  Money.  Money.  Money.  

Year in review of Micro stock sales

So last year I had 72 downloads for a whopping $64 on Shutterstock in January.  In January 2019, I've had 4 downloads for a whopping $94.68.  So far, 2019 has been much better.  I hope it continues this way for the rest of the month and rest of the year.  2018 sucked as far as sales.  I sold $1178.76 worth of photography and footage just on Shutterstock alone last year.  I had 741 downloads alone on Shutterstock.  In 2017 I had 1153 downloads for total sales of $1638.17.

In 2018 I had a rough a 28% decrease in dollar value sales and downloads were down roughly 36%.  So I made $460.31 less on Shutterstock last year with 412 less downloads last year.  I increased my portfolio by about 3000 photographs and clips.

In 2017 I was selling on average of $136.51 a month of footage and photography.  In 2018, it dropped to $98.24.  An average loss of $38.28 a month or roughly 28% drop in revenue per month.  This I think is due to me not shooting as much as last year and the increase in competition since Shutterstock now accepts 1 out of 10 photographs rather than 7 out of 10 photographs when I first joined in 2014.

This is just one site that I use.  Pond5 and Storyblocks are two of my other sites.  It's much harder to sell on those two sites as I think they're much smaller stock sites and sales are less frequent.

On Pond5 I had $618.63 worth of sales with 7 sales all year.  On Storyblocks I had 3 sales worth a total of $99.03.  All sales are in U.S dollars so I get a slight conversion bonus when I convert to Canadian dollars which helps.

	2017 Sales	2018 Sales
Shutterstock	1639.17	1178.86
Pond5	587	618.83
Storyblocks	330.1	99.03

	2017 downloads	2018 downloads
Shutterstock	1153	741
Pond5	7	8
Storyblock	10	3

So as you can see, the only place sales and downloads increased is on Pond5.  Basically I only photograph and take footage of wild animals and landscapes.  99% of my portfolio is editorial free.  I don't like photographing people much.  I think for this year I will go to the Ottawa market more often and start photography people more.  Do some more editorial work in black and white and see if that starts selling more.  Thankfully I can be more inconspicuous with the Sony RX100 Mark Vi and its 24-200MM lens since the Sony RX100 Mark VI is an awesome pocket camera. 

Shot some new video today.

Went on a walk today at lunch with my Canon Vixia HF R62 1080p 60fps camcorder.  Shot some video of stuff I never knew Ottawa had.  I kinda like discovering new stuff in my own city.  A lot of my stuff is getting approved on the various micro stock sites but some of it isn't.  Some is selling.  Some is not.  Just gotta keep shooting and uploading and hope for sales.

Another walk around the hill

Another nice day and another nice walk around Canada's Parliament Hill.  Photography seems to be the only thing that brings me joy.  Not just lately, but the last 5-6 years.  Considering I went through a battle with cancer and a divorce, you can imagine I was not in a very good place mentally.  The only thing that kept me going were my camera's.  I felt like I had no support anywhere else.  Everything seemed distant and remote.  Except for my cameras.