Recently I was a guest on a podcast on PhotoNetCast.com discussing stock photography licensing models with Rich Legg, a primary iStockPhoto contributor. The discussion was wide-ranging covering how to get into the business, how it is changing, expected revenue and returns and why certain buyers and photographers choose RM, RF or microstock for image licensing.

In the larger photographic world there is seldom conversation between “traditional” stock photographers and “microstock” shooters. It was refreshing to put all that aside and discuss the rapid changes that are taking place in the industry (and the economy). The two camps certainly seem to be moving towards each other with RM photographers seeing steep declines in average prices recently while iStockPhoto contributors are seeing steady increases in prices.

It was interesting to me that Rich was planning a shoot the next day with five models, and running the numbers to estimate ROI and RPI, while I was doing the same calculation for a recent shoot in Argentina. Hopefully we’ll revisit the conversation in a year and see how things have changed.

Thanks to Antonio Marques, Jim Goldstein and Martin Gommel for hosting the progam. Listeners can add comments or questions here or on their site.

Tagged as: business of photography, how to