Dear Reader,

Tomorrow’s e-letter includes an interview with fellow reader Kathy Burns-Millyard.

We interviewed Kathy last year when she started selling her photos to online stock photo agencies. (If you missed that interview, you’ll find it here.)

A few things have changed in the stock photo world since then, so we’re interviewing her again tomorrow.

In the meantime, I thought I’d share with you a cool new website that’s great for stock photographers...

When you sell your photos on stock sites, you never know who’s buying them and what they’re going to do with them. But this site can take a “fingerprint” of your photo, compare it to billions of photos on the web, and single yours out in a few seconds.  

It won’t find EVERY photo in your portfolio (and it can’t find photos that are being used in print, obviously) but it’s fun to look up the ones you CAN find.

It’s called Tineye.com and here’s how it works…

** 1. First, you have to create an account on their website (it’s free)
** 2. Then, you can either upload a photo or copy its location on the web and paste it into the Tineye “browser.” (Tip: If your photo already exists online in a stock photo agency, just right click on the image and choose “copy image location.”  Then go back to Tineye and paste in the address.)
** 3. You’ll get a list of websites where Tineye has found your photo... even if it’s been altered.

It’s still in beta mode, so it doesn’t check the whole web, yet, but it does scan almost one billion sites.

Shelly, as you know, agreed to take pictures at my wedding last year in Paris in exchange for model releases from myself and my husband. She put those photos in her portfolio on iStockphoto and they’ve been selling well.

Just for fun, I plugged the image location of a few of them into Tineye.com, and I found one at the top of the page here and one over on the right of the top banner here.

You can even find photos that have been manipulated. One of Shelly’s most popular files on iStock is this photo of her nephew:



And Tineye.com found it down in the lower left corner of this army site, even with that (pretty hairy) alteration.


-- Lori
 
Lori Allen
Director, AWAI Travel Division

P.S. Tineye.com won’t find any of your photos online if you don’t HAVE any photos online, yet.  Selling your photos as stock is easier that you may think.

Why not get started this month? Fall is the perfect time to head out and capture the dramatic light, the changing colors, and the decorations and festivities of the season. AWAI’s professional photographers have special techniques saved up for holiday season shots... and we’ve put them all together for you in our Holiday Photo Guide.

It’s on sale now for readers of this e-letter only! You’ll find it hidden behind the photo of the boy in the pool at http://www.thephotographerslife.com .

P.P.S.  And don’t forget about our upcoming travel writing and photography workshop in Panama City this December.  The next 17 people that register get a free vacation in the San Blas islands.  Details and photos here.

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