A little Disappointed with Demotix.

I had a look at your last story and while your pictures are ok (and good enough for publishing, as you sold them yourself), but your story and especially the keywords leave a lot to be desired.
You have only two keywords (candle light vigil, Society) and the captions don't tell too much.
So it might just be the case that the editors couldn't find your pictures or didn't know what they were about (and didn't had time to do more research). So if the editors can't find them or don't know what they are about, demotix can't sell them.
If you would have put the information you sent to the news organisations who bought your pictures into your captions and keywords, you probably would have sold them via demotix as well.

You're right - this has been a big oversight on our part. Unfortunately, there's a combination of factors that meant your story fell through the cracks in sales terms:

1. Our duty publisher on Saturday didn't flag your images for automatic distribution to our reselling partners and our clients. There could be a number of reasons for this - maybe they didn't think the images were exciting enough, or they weren't aware of the local significance of the story.

Our publishers are based all over the world, from New York to Bangkok, so you have to make it clear to them in the Media Summary, captions, and article text (if there's time to write one) what it is about your story that stands out - they can't be expected to know everything that's going on in every country.

Something you could have done to avoid this (although this is far from the only reason why your story wasn't picked up on) was to explain a bit more about the context. I had to Google some of the keywords from your story to find out why people were gathering at this house and what exactly had happened to the baby - our publishers don't have time to do that for every story.

Had we known that it was a story attracting so much interest and for which you had obtained exclusive pictures, we would have been able to market them properly.

2. Number 2 is the place where we really fell down.

We didn't have a system to notify us of just how popular your story was becoming on social media or search.

This has now been rectified - if someone's story starts getting unusually large numbers of pageviews, we'll be notified and Sales will be able to jump on it straight away.

I'm sorry that the system hasn't worked as it should this time around, but when you give us feedback like this it gives us a chance to make improvements - thank you for taking the time to ask questions and point out problems.

Thanks to your taking a few extra minutes to complain, there won't be a next time!

To be honest, I thought the picture quality was bad, and that was why I had no luck on Demotix. With regards to the descriptions and keywording, I just didn't have time, I was squatting against a wall with my laptop trying to upload the pics whilst getting moved on by the police!!!!

Next time i'll take a little more time (maybe try to get home first!) and keyword better and try to explain the importance of the pics to the editors.

Hey ho, you live and learn! I'm just pleased with the huge number of views. Another 500 odd since last time I looked! Hopefully my Coldplay pics from this coming Friday will do just as well :-$

I'm glad my comments may of helped myself and others in the future!

Wayne

I too came across a hot story with the sinkhole in Georgetown county SC and got 800 hits in a couple days but no sales, for which i'll go out on my own selling the pic's.

The story's getting a bit fluffier with the recent subpoena of Health and Environmental officials by a U.S. panel on another issue concerning dredging the Savannah river.

All serious photographers should considerpersonal marketing of pic's along with Demotix. It's good exposure.

Tom, maybe this note shouldn't be here, but maybe in the new upload page you could have a button that we can select if we think the story is hot - or/and maybe the self life of the story: eg 2 hours, 3 days (for Sunday media), one months (for mags) or open (editorial stock and general interest. ) best Lawrence

@Ken and Wayne.

There is a reason why we have an international team of publishers on site - not just there to provide you with marketing to many but to better push them to clients.

This may be hard to swallow but western reporters assume too much in their stories. Most USA reporters don't put 'USA' in the Media Summary..some UK reporters don't add keywords when its a story of a big news event ie: Assange, UK Cuts protests.

You have to always be clear to the publishers and sales team. A publisher based out of Jerusalem won't know the specific story, so it aids by adding keywords and keywords within the captions. Title, MS, Keywords and captions are the only text areas being pushed out to clients. The less you have, the less publishers have to work with.

Yes I know its hard on the front line pinned between police and story, but extra time taken can work wonders. You can sell to The Sun and others on your own, great - but if you want the long tail of sales, again and again, for them to pop up in an editors feed in Indonesia in four years time - when they are thinking of a story to run, they will only see it with keywords. The Sun may not even remember, and if it has none of this, it will be buried. Your stories are live and searchable on our site.

Images don't say a 1000 words. They say around a million when text accompanies them.

Help us help you.

Stephen - Head Publisher

Can be tricky.

"With regards to the descriptions and keywording, I just didn't have time, I was squatting against a wall with my laptop trying to upload the pics whilst getting moved on by the police!!!!"

Tom on Saturday I files a story which was only relevant for Spain, but had the word Spain removed from the heading. I always put the name of the place I am reporting from to help readers and buyers. Best Lawrence

"With regards to the descriptions and keywording, I just didn't have time," Then don't post the pictures. It is that simple.

News pictures are pointless without keywords. It is how picture editors find images.

In another place a discussion on keywords a *minimum* of 20 appropriate Keywords was considered the norm.

As important as the number of the keywords is what they are... English and American spellings, plurals etc variations on words. You should get familiar with ITPC metadata and also try controlled vocabularies like
http://www.controlledvocabulary.com/

I think your missing the point here.

The story has had over 11,000 views. I've seen it all over facebook, these people have found it, why not media buyers?

The small amount of keywords that are on there have been enough to attract huge views. Demotix themselves have stated that they missed it.

But I learnt something else today talking to a reporter from one of the local rags. Lots of picture editors will not use the pics as they are a little 'dodgy' they kinda show where suspects live, the trouble is at this moment in time they are currently innocent so press can not use the pics.

I am not missing the points. Effectively there were 3 key words.... candle, light, vigil. Which mean nothing. When you called the BBC, Sun and Mail did you say only that you had "pictures of a candle light vigil"? Or did you say more than that one sentence? I am not surprised that the media completely missed the story on Demotix.

Learn from it and move on. (and keyword and caption properly next time).

Mr PIc, I had another look at the story - would it be possible to give some technical details: eg, were you shooting raw, were you prevented from getting closer, was it possible to get closer where the candles were. Apart from what the local photographer told you, I was thinking maybe the pics needed more processing, - maybe too much colour cast, could have been fixed if you were shooting raw, focusing seems to have been a problem as well - colour cast and focusing go hand in hand at night. Could you have done more with the sections full of candles or was this out of bounds for you. This seems to be a lesson for all of us: the images, the sensitivity of the story, and the filing of the story. Don't forget what's ok for facebook, is not necessarily acceptable for a newspaper.
Best Lawrence

"With regards to the descriptions and keywording, I just didn't have time, I was squatting against a wall with my laptop trying to upload the pics whilst getting moved on by the police!!!!"

What helps in this case, is to prepare the keywords and (to an extend) the captions, before you leave the house.
For most of the stories I shoot, I have nearly all of my keywords and at least 50% of my captions ready (based on what the story is about and what I think I will see there). I then just need to add some detailed data after the shot and can send the pictures off faster.

re "didn't have the time... " If you were able to sell the images *the following day* to the BBC and newspapers then clearly you did have the time. Also had you spent 20 minutes captioning and keywording you are far more likely to have had a lot more sales.

By saving time you got no sales.

Lovely friendly guys in here!

Look, I made my comments, Demotix semi agreed with me, I've taken there points on board.

What's a matter with you guys? Pick on the newbe? Won't bother with the ever-so-friendly forum again!

@Michael: "prepare the keywords and (to an extend) the captions, before you leave the house." I like this I must try very hard to learn.

@Mr Pic: personally I am still interested in the technical background of the pics, and the opportunities you had. I have a f1.4 50mm for my nikon but it is not really helpful under the same conditions you were shooting. The problem is focusing more than anything else.

best Lawrence

"What's a matter with you guys? Pick on the newbe? Won't bother with the ever-so-friendly forum again!"

Quite.

Mr Pics if you want to lean and make sales take the advice. You were given advice and you argued about it.

We explained about keywords and you said:

"I think your missing the point here. The story has had over 11,000 views. I've seen it all over facebook, these people have found it, why not media buyers?"

We did not miss the point. The social networks spread the story like chatter amongst friends. You only need a couple of interested local people to look and it spreads on social networks. Picture editors are not part of that.

Picture editors search on keywords and captions. Without good captions and keywords everyone, Demotix and Picture editors will miss the story. Most places I know say it is usually a minimum of 20 relevant key words.

If you don't have time to do the keywords and captions there is little point in posting the images as no picture editors will not find them. Neither are Demotix likely to pick up on the story.

That is life. This is a hard business. Take the advice and learn from it. Don't complaint to the messenger. If you throw your toys out of the pram and storm of in a huff you are less likely to get help again.

Freelance Photo Journalism is a hard comparative industry so getting any help is getting difficult. Take what is offered.

Mr.Pics, my suggestion is to ignore the unfriendlyness and take whatever's useful to you.
My other suggestion in this and any forum is to go check the work of those who comment. You'll quickly learn who to take seriously and who to ignore. Internet is great, but it's also paradise for those who want to show off...
Anyways, captions and keywords are important, and I think Michael's advise is useful whenever possible. As a matter of fact, it's common practice among many pros, have the basic captioning and keywording done in something like Photomechanic and applying it to the batch of pictures as you download them to the computer.
As of editors not looking at places like Facebook, I disagree. I've just sold a picture because someone saw it on Facebook. It was actually a photographer that called the editor's attention, but haven't I posted the pictures on Facebook also, I wouldn't have sold the picture.

I agree with Patricio and Richard, folks - a little less hostility would be more than welcome.

We're here to help each other out, not put newbies down and make them feel stupid.

Maybe we're missing the good news with MrPIc experience: the media organisations are prepared to do business with us (independently or via demotix) and they still look at the content and not the technical specs when it matters. And for demotix it highlights the area where they can improve the service. This suggested to me that there is a huge difference between breaking stories and normal stories. Maybe we need to find a away to get the braking to the top of the pile so they can get attention ASAP. And despite the good advice abt pre planning the tagging and captioning I fully understand MrPic's dilemma abt not having the time. best Lawrence

The point that is being missed is that pictures without keywords are as much use as keywords without pictures. IF you can't do both there is no point in doing either. Picture editors search on keywords.

Re the breaking news whilst Lawrence's idea looks good on the surface I am not sure it will work in reality. I think Demotix would get swamped with everyone miss use the breaking news button. It comes back to good keywords and captions to indicate the worth of the story.

BTW Patrocio re looking at Demotix profiles, where they are not anonymous (another can of worms with it's own threads elsewhere) is not going top help that much..... For the past two decades I have published in other places far more than I am ever likely to publish though Demotix. This is stories, features and pictures. This month I have an article and pictures in a magazine that is not connected with Demotix. I also have a regular column in a magazine. I was working at an event on Tuesday that will not go though Demotix. The stuff that comes to Demotix is a side line.

Though anywhere I use the Demotix card for identification comes to Demotix.

@Chris et al -We established a long time ago that tagging and captioning are the holy grail. The question here is who is doing the extensive tagging and captioning? The other question is what is a breaking story? No doubt Mr Pic did have a breaking story what we don't know, because we haven't been told, is whether this was a scoop or a first-to-market. A scoop would have a longer shelf life, and if this was a first-to-market, I would have said the value of MrPic images could be measured in minutes, or the time for someone else to file better images. If this was first-to-market, I agree with MrPic, he really did not have time to tag himself. However, a scoop is different, one can take more time - it took me 12 hours +/- to file a scoop without any negative effect, I think. cont/next post .....

@Chris cont/ I agree that my suggestion is open to miss use, but this could be counter measured by having guidelines and maybe sanctioning those who abuse the grading. The question is what is a breaking story. MrPic had a breaking story, but only for a short time, if it wasn't a scoop. Another (hypothetical) example would be: PM address conference (normal news with 24hr shelf life+stock) - PM addresses conference, then falls and breaks nose (Breaking 1hr shelf life -many photographers reporting - unless you have the scoop, then stock value). Without checking what stories I have filed, I would say that so far I had one scoop (which sold) and one breaking 2hrs max (which sold). best Lawrence

If you are not going to tag the pictures your self who will tag them?

If they wait in a queue for a Demotix Editor (who may be on the other side of the world and not know anything about the story) they will be slower and come out with fewer keywords than some one on the spot with good keywords and captions who can self publish.

Mr Pics needs to invest in something like Photo mechanic, light room etc and remember the old proverb "more haste less speed"

For Photo Journalism it is the"journalism" bit that separates us from the average snapper. Keywords and captions are part of that. It is a discipline that is well worth learning. Last week there was a LONG discussion on this in a closed pro tog's forum.

As mentioned there are many tricks to this. A decent key word (controlled vocabulary) in Lightroom so you can drop whole strings of keywords in at a single mouse click. At the really basic level partially write up the captions and keywords in a text editor (note using Word or a.n.other word processor can screw things up and they use all sorts of non visible control characters that don't half screw up web pages)

Then just add any detail and new keywords to the text file before cut and pasting when you upload.

Again it really comes done to planning and most important "more haste less speed"

Lawrence. I disagree. When Mr Pics images were not picked up due to lack of keywords it was many hours later he called the newspapers and made the sale. Had he used proper keywords and uploaded say 30 minutes later he would more than likely been picked up by the newspapers and ironically got less money as Demotix would have taken half (just like any other agency.....)

So by saving time and not doing the key words gained nothing. It in fact lost sales though Demotix. Though in the end in this case he may have been financially better off going direct.

It really was a first to market. This is an on going story, but from different angles, my pics are now not worth anything nationly, but Sunday they were.

they are doing ok locally though, couple of front pages, but this is becuase I've been pushing them. Our local press do not use demotix.

Hi Chris, I take your point, although I did say -extensive tagging and captioning- and not no tagging or captioning. But as you say an alert system must not be abused. Indeed there are many ways of pre planning captions and tags. And even when the new system is up and running,. OTOH, we might even be able to save the info as draft in advance if the new upload system has this feature. But whoever does the tagging, or what tags are included I still think that there should be an alert system for real breaking stories. But yes I agree with you about the importance of tagging and captioning. Lawrence

Mr Pics I agree the first to market... But picture editors search on key words so you need to have the first pictures correctly captioned and key-worded. (can't stress this enough).

You don't want to rely on a hard pressed Demotix editor on the other side of the world (who is probably receiving dozens of stories an hour) to look at your very short captions, story and three key words to try and work out if it is important or not. It certainly does not look important to some one not already familiar with the the story. Also at this time of year there are THOUSANDS of candle light vigils around the world.

You need a full set of keywords, good captions and enough in the story to the editor a fighting chance.

BTW you are lucky if your local newspapers pay for images. In the midlands where 6 around Brum were closed last quarter they don't pay for pictures.

Local press are generally owned by larger companies that own lots of local papers and they tend to have a deal with AP etc. I had some unique images a couple of months ago but 90% of the local UK newspapers used the AP story with an old library image.

Thanks MrPic, that puts real context to what we are discussing here. Maybe, your case was one of those perfect storms. Sunday evening, minimum tagging, editor on the other side of the world, local press don't use demotix, local angle to a breaking story, etc etc. best Lawrence

This comment won't be lost on Chris Maybe in similar circumstance we ought to just load four or five images but caption and tag them very well. !! Lawrence

I did exactly that and earned a couple of 100 GBP on demotix last month.

Much better to have a few good well keyworded and captioned images ant a lot that are not.

Good keywords and captions mean the editors are likely to find the images in the first place.

This is why I pointed to the suggestion of a closed forum (i.e. available only to members logged on) some of the comments on this public forum are embarrassing.

Peter, as far as I know, the Forum is open only to members, you can't comment if you don't log in. All the messages in this thread are from active members with several stories uploaded to the site.
I've read the whole thread, and fail to find any embarrasing message, though. Perhaps, for the sake of the discussion, you may want to point out what you think is embarrasing.

Two points to make: first I realise I'm pretty late on the scene here and, secondly I offer these comments based purely on my own personal experience of taking and selling pictures and stories to newspapers and magazines for more than 45 years, I am semi retired now - you'll never ever retire fully from photojournalism! I have worked for national newspapers and photo agencies on the staff, but most of the time I've freelanced - and I have little in the way of regrets.

I would offer the following advice for what it's worth. Never ever, rely, upon an agency to as a sole method of selling your pictures and stories (indeed my recollection is that Demotix makes it clear they do not seek sole representation) you must actively seek to market your own material. As an example I will use those stories and pictures I have submitted to Demotix. In the time that I've been here there has not been one single sale made by Demotix but over the same period I have grossed a four figure (very low four figures I would add) from the pictures you can see here. That's not a criticism of Demotix, I use it simply to emphasise the importance of getting out there and selling your own stuff, don't sit back and rely upon the agency!

Personally I also try and steer clear of hard news stories because I know that I shall be facing the might of Getty, PA, AP, AFP, etc. etc. I know I can't beat those guys so why beat myself-up in the process? I will look for stories they either don't know about or are not interested in because they judge them to be unsuitable for syndication.

I don't want to bore anyone so I'll shut up, but before doing so and to emphasise my point that you must take on the responsibility of marketing your work. The first story I offered Demotix was rejected, I offered it to The Daily Telegraph the following day (it wasn't all that time sensitive) who used it and paid just over £200, not a fortune but helps pay the petrol bill!

Peter,

Coming from the publishing side of things - the story was rejected before Demotix had a publishing team in place, certainly not like the global 24 hour team we have now that I manage. You are always free to re-submit, even more so now we have Corbis, a major stock player distributing your images.

Sales have skyrocketed for contributors in the last year http://www.demotix.com/blog/975206/sales-blog-december-2011 You only have to look here.

You can't rely on an agency selling your work, your work in all honesty, may not be good enough. An editors eye at The Telegraph saw a story from that stock image, while another may have seen 'just a window'. I wouldn't criticize Demotix now regarding publishing standards of Summer 2010 infancy.

I would never 'try and steer clear of hard news stories' either, editors and publishers are always looking for the other angle. We have many hard hitting photojournalists who make money with us, but their shots cover different angles and approaches to the news story.

Hope this helps
Stephen

Re key words I note from the spec of the new Nikon D4 pro camera (launched 6th Jan 2012) they have this:-

Also, IPTC (International Press Telecommunications Council) data can be automatically added to the images within the camera. In addition to input with a camera, it is possible to add information to a series of images at high speed using an IPTC file created on a PC in advance.

Now that should give you some idea of the importance of keywords for press photography.
In short if you are not going to keyword the images properly there is no point in uploading them.
In another professional forum 20 (relevant) keywords was considered the norm.

@Chris - Exactly, think of the engineering involved! It wouldn't have appeared on the new camera if it wasn't necessary and important to your photography.

Have a look at the Controlled Vocabulary website http://www.controlledvocabulary.com/ for assistance in key wording. I have just started using it and it is really simple. I use PhotoMechanic to upload the images and they have a structured keywords panel which uses the data from Controlled Vocabulary to make key wording much simpler. It costs around $70.

I looked at the controlled vocabulary recently and intend to use it. I have just ported all my SW to a new MAc and upgraded most of the SW so I need to get all that sorted first. Also I need to overhaul my own keywords setup before I add any more.

I would be interested to know how you get on with it.

@Patricio, you are correct, but I mean from reading the forum also!

@ Peter, you're right. And I agree, it would be best if the forums were only visible to members.

I agree too..... also I have suggested that those with less than 10 stories can only access a "newbies" section so they can get help from the rest of us. Only getting access to the rest after 10 stories. This will be an incentive to them and will make it harder for spammers to get into the forums.

We have had people join with zero profile information, no images or stories just to flame a particular story.

Also as I have often said you should need a full profile with ID picture and 10 stories to get access and a Press Card. To have no ID or anonymous profile you would need to apply to Demotix for dispensation.

As Chris implies there is no room for anonymous profiles on Demotix anymore. There is no question now that Demotix needs to attract talent. However, as I have always maintained, the number of stories for a press card should be much higher than ten; maybe ten stories p.a. to keep card. However, people should always have the opportunity to argue their case for a press card if they don't have the minimum number of stories. Or at the very least have a provisional card after ten stories. best Lawrence

interesting read. i sell stock photos and if they are great images with bad titles and keywords its a waste of time. we need to see that correct and succinct titling and and key-wording is a marketing skill in this type of business. it must be noted that it is the measure by which search engines index stories.

Tom replied:

"You're right - this has been a big oversight on our part. Unfortunately, there's a combination of factors that meant your story fell through the cracks in sales terms:

1. Our duty publisher on Saturday didn't flag your images for automatic distribution to our reselling partners and our clients. There could be a number of reasons for this - maybe they didn't think the images were exciting enough, or they weren't aware of the local significance of the story.

Our publishers are based all over the world, from New York to Bangkok, so you have to make it clear to them in the Media Summary, captions, and article text (if there's time to write one) what it is about your story that stands out - they can't be expected to know everything that's going on in every country.

Something you could have done to avoid this (although this is far from the only reason why your story wasn't picked up on) was to explain a bit more about the context. I had to Google some of the keywords from your story to find out why people were gathering at this house and what exactly had happened to the baby - our publishers don't have time to do that for every story.

Had we known that it was a story attracting so much interest and for which you had obtained exclusive pictures, we would have been able to market them properly."

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Well, nice points - but as we discussed yet, the explanaitions about the event are restricted to 250 characters. So it´s hardly possible to let there additional informations for Your editor, why, where and when the story is hot.
The here discussed "breaking news" button would be helpfull, but of course only, if these basics can be transmitted. They are not only required to send the pictures selected to the newspapers / partners, who´re interested in, but would also reduce the probability of misuse.

Another point is the question, which stories are revised by who editor. It would be helpful if possible, to give the stories almost to editor with a cultural background close to the photographers - to reduce the need explaining basics. But in fact neigher the photograph can outwork a widespread story about obviousnesses in a foreign language, nor the editor has time to read them - because the time spended for that would be missed in the revision of other stories. If he get 30 stories an hour he cann´t spend more than a minute for every of them.

So I would like to get an explanaition, how to enable Demotix-editors to market my stories appropriate. The hints given by some members, not to focus on an (once) agency are of course useful in general, but off topic here - pictures destinated to be sold directly aren´t uploaded to Demotix.

*******************************************************************************************************************************

Tom continued:

"2. Number 2 is the place where we really fell down.

We didn't have a system to notify us of just how popular your story was becoming on social media or search."

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Of course not and it´s also not required.

Sorry, if I widespread a little bit to explain that by an example. A few years ago happened a local whirlwind at the airport Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel, meanwhile a passenger airplane arrived. The airplane was going out of the flightline and touched by the end of its right wing the runway, so it was close enough to a crash.

Just this moment was perfectly registered by a hobby-filmer, who had nothing else to do than upload the video to Youtube. The story became at Germany the exciter of the day, all television stations had this video repeatly in the evening news.
THE AUTHOR of the film EARNED NOTHING !
Of course this fact became wellknown and the television stations were widly blamed for their avarice. But they argued (and of course they were right) that the video was published on Youtube under Creative Commons license and the author allowed to use his work without any payment for every reasons. And they declaired, if he would sent it to one of these television stations exclusively, the station would have been willing to pay him 35.000 Euros for it.

Even if it´s an outstanding case, remains the question, why any photographer should send his content to social-media-companies, which even reserves to themselves the right to sell it without get the author participated in the earnings? To get the newsworthiness tested? Not really?
Youtube, facebook, Flickr and also fotocommunity.de became very common sources of newspapers and journals, looking for content for free. They neigher doesn´t ask nor inform the photographer, even not, if he reserved (at the fotocommunity) all rights. If the photographer or his friends find out the cases by fortuity, they´re so generous to pay them. If not, so luck for the editors. Frauds became common enough at this market.

So why should I spread my pictures there before uploading them to an agency?