Charles Darwin once proclaimed: “It is not the strongest of the species that survives, but rather, that which is most adaptable to change.” Actually, I can’t find any substantive evidence to prove that he said this but let’s pretend he did so that I can use it to drive this narrative.
Photography has changed so much since its inception. For decades, it has been reserved for fanatics and pioneers. Then the advent of digital photography meant the format was extremely accessible and stock photo agencies were being flooded with images. And now, the rise of mobile photography is creating a second wave. Only this time, literally everyone is a photographer.
Alamy photographer Rolf Richardson has survived all of this disruption since starting out in the 50s where he landed at British Airways with the glamorous job of being paid to visit weird and wonderful places (I’m not bitter…) with his camera. He said: “In those days, stock libraries dealt in medium format trannies [transparent film], which occupied a lot of space so they could only afford to accept the big sellers.”
And Rolf is certainly a big seller. Having been a member of Alamy since 2001, he’s recently passed the $250k milestone. But with so much change to the industry over the years, Rolf has had to adapt to keep up. So what was the main difference when digital photography came to the fore? Rolf explains: “Whereas most film-era agents had dealt mainly with their own local area, digital now offered a world market.”
This is all great for image buyers as the choice of images grows in breadth and depth. But they are testing times for photographers. Maybe some advice from Rolf will help.
Advice from Rolf:
Unlike film-era agents, Alamy accepts everything, so make that work for you. These days one of my best revenue streams is statues and memorials; not a huge market you might think but someone might want it and now the competition will be minimal.
Once that shutter had clicked on a film camera there was nothing more you could do. The reason I love digital is that now every image can be turned into a work of art, photoshopped way beyond what emerged from the camera, if you care to spend time on it.
However, you can’t usually afford to spend too long over individual images because they say only about 2% of photos on file will sell in any one year. You need both quality and quantity. I’m nudging 12,000 images with Alamy, a paltry figure compared to some and not nearly enough. So, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be off…to take some more photos.
Check out Rolf’s images here.