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blahsum
Joined: 18 Sep 2011
Posts: 52
Location: South Africa
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 3:35 am
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Thanks for all the help from everyone. I have run the lines through illustrator, then cleaned it in Photoshop. It's still edgy, but cleaner. Hopefully SS doesn't expect actual anti-aliasing, which makes no sense from a designer's perspective. Not unless they start allowing layered files that aren't vector. |
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theohrm
Joined: 16 Aug 2009
Posts: 457
Location: Ireland
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 4:49 am
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| blahsum wrote: | | alexronay wrote: | | If you have other work that you can submit, I'd try that in its place and upload these later once you are in. |
Except I am already 'in'. Instead I am having no luck with acceptance after the fact (a theme I notice across several forum posts here). Why was I approved if my style is not accepted at all? 24 out of 24 images were rejected! And, no, sadly this is my style. It would have been nice for SS to have just rejected me off the bat instead of wasting my time like this, since if these 24 images didn't make the cut, none of my work will.
Sorry, I'm just really disappointed and upset right now. Also, I have absolutely no faith in the approval system, since it appears to be totally subjective. For all I know the reviewer was jealous. |
Grow up.
I remember how frustrating it was when I first began submitting to stock agencies and met with near constant rejection. My DT approval rating was 16% by the time I had submitted 50 images. I understand how upset you are, but having a mini tantrum because SS do not grasp your genius is not a great way to get us to help you. Neither is saying SS is stupid because they don't accept your preferred format. Their file requirements are exactly the same as everywhere else.
Start inspecting your images at 100%. The lines need to either look smooth or clearly look stylised. At the moment they look pixelated and this is probably what is causing the rejection.
Make sure your images are saved at 300 dpi. I don't know if that's your problem, but if somebody told me they had a pixelated image, the resolution is the first thing I'd check. And there should be an Anti-Aliasing option available when you open or save the file - ensure that box is ticked.
If you created this as a vector in illustrator (which is the best way to do it because vectors sell far better than jpegs), I don't know why it's pixelating in PS. You shouldn't need to do any work to sort out the lines.
It may be that you are simply putting too much deliberate jag in the lines. Simplify the lines a bit.
If you are entirely happy and entirely confident that this is how you want them, try putting a note to the editor that this is deliberate and give the file an appropriate description. It will still be their call, but you may get it past them. IMO, I think they are too jagged at the moment. I like the style you're going for, but it needs winding back a bit.
At the moment your images aren't showing in your gallery (they can take up to 72 hours to appear once you have been accepted as a contributor) so I can't make any comparisons between what you're showing here and what you've already had accepted, but once they do we'll all get a clearer idea of why those were and these aren't.
Stock is a balance between personal style and generic
imagery. If you want to create artwork, SS is not the place for you. If you are able to use your artistic skills to create images, welcome aboard.
Have a cup of tea and take a few deep breaths. It is frustrating, but we'll get you there. |
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blahsum
Joined: 18 Sep 2011
Posts: 52
Location: South Africa
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 5:27 am
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No, my problem came from the inconsistent nature of having images approved, then disapproved. I had 9 approvals, which were unfortunately layered TIFFs. All 9 were disapproved in the second batch. For the record, the tenth was disapproved for being a wrong category. That also was then disapproved because of the line issue.
Had SS highlighted the line problem during the FIRST approval process, it would have saved me a lot of trouble. This is why I mooted on whether the approval process is subjective or not. |
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subarashii21
Joined: 12 May 2011
Posts: 436
Location: Czech Republic
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 5:33 am
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I dont understand one thing - you said you run the lines through Illustrator, then cleaned in Photoshop.
If you have Adobe Illustrator, why would you need to use Photoshop for this kind of a relatively simple illustration? Just lines and color fill - a nice simple vector. I dont understand why you need to involve Photoshop in that? |
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blahsum
Joined: 18 Sep 2011
Posts: 52
Location: South Africa
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 6:18 am
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| subarashii21 wrote: | | If you have Adobe Illustrator, why would you need to use Photoshop for this kind of a relatively simple illustration? Just lines and color fill - a nice simple vector. I dont understand why you need to involve Photoshop in that? |
It's a personal preference. Unless one is very adept at working with vectors, the mathematical curves tend to sap fine detail from the line work (the art is hand-drawn, not digital). It's nothing big, but I always feel my work looks sub-standard when converted to a vector.
I'd not have used Illustrator at all, but Photoshop 7 has no way to smooth out lines, unless you use glow effects (which look terrible).
That said, the more I look at this problem the more I realize I will have to move over to vectors. It solves both the line consistency and layer problems. |
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subarashii21
Joined: 12 May 2011
Posts: 436
Location: Czech Republic
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 6:49 am
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I also had mixed feelings about Illustrator at the beginning but once you get the hang of it, you will love it. Morever - vectors sell much better than rasters.
When using pen or brush tools in Illustrator, you can set the fidelity and smoothness to such level that will fit to your needs and make almost a perfect copy of your sketch, not at all substandard. It requires a tablet and a firm hand but I think you have both, just dont become discouraged by the rejection even though you might find it unfair and subjective. |
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blahsum
Joined: 18 Sep 2011
Posts: 52
Location: South Africa
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 6:57 am
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Thanks. Rejections don't bother me - inconsistency does.
Unfortunately I hate working with a tablet, so my source will always be scanned work. Thankfully Illustrator has the nice Live Trace feature! Now if only I can get it to understand white spaces... |
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subarashii21
Joined: 12 May 2011
Posts: 436
Location: Czech Republic
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 7:11 am
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Never say never. If someone took my tablet from me, it would be like losing my right arm, I couldnt do without it :) but seriously, it saves awfully lot of time.
There is a tick/untick field "Ignore White" in the Live Trace Options dialogue, at least in Illustrator CS4 but probably not in the older versions. You may yet consider tablet in future :) Anyway good luck to you here at Shutter! |
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blahsum
Joined: 18 Sep 2011
Posts: 52
Location: South Africa
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 7:52 am
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I worked on a tablet for several years. It's just not my thing. I like watching the brush tip move and then manipulate its direction and flow.
Thanks for the hint, but the 'Ignore White' dialog is great until you work with white itself. no problem, though - I just make it a different color and then change back to white when it is a vector layer.
Sadly I didn't prep any of the layers with vectors in mind, so I'm doing a lot of reshaping first! |
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alexronay
Joined: 23 Nov 2010
Posts: 83
Location: http://alejandroronaydesigns.blogspot.com
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blahsum
Joined: 18 Sep 2011
Posts: 52
Location: South Africa
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 11:16 am
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That's pretty cool. Wacom has been doing some good stuff of late. Just a pity the new Bamboos still don't rival Apple's Magicpad. |
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theohrm
Joined: 16 Aug 2009
Posts: 457
Location: Ireland
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Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2011 2:33 pm
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| blahsum wrote: | No, my problem came from the inconsistent nature of having images approved, then disapproved. I had 9 approvals, which were unfortunately layered TIFFs. All 9 were disapproved in the second batch. For the record, the tenth was disapproved for being a wrong category. That also was then disapproved because of the line issue.
Had SS highlighted the line problem during the FIRST approval process, it would have saved me a lot of trouble. This is why I mooted on whether the approval process is subjective or not. |
As the approval process is performed by really real human beings, of course it is subjective. I can't tell you why they accepted the TIFFs first time round but if you wing an electronic mail to support@shutterstock.com they should be able to explain the matter (although be aware they are not noted for their swift response times).
According to the FAQs, TIFFs are converted to JPEGs by the system so maybe something went awry then. Perhaps try uploading JPEGs rather than TIFFs.
You should be aware that when LiveTracing, you will still need to do a manual cleanup on the image (which isn't a problem if you are only submitting the JPEG rather than the EPS) or risk getting rejected. Consistent rejections for the same reason can lead to a warning being placed on your account, so be circumspect with the amount you upload until you have a feel for what is accepted and what isn't.
You may also find http://vector.tutsplus.com/tutorials/tools-tips/quick-tip-transform-any-plain-font-into-a-grunge-font/ useful. You could trace your scanned image with the pen tool in Illustrator, then apply this technique to give the rough edge look you like. |
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alexronay
Joined: 23 Nov 2010
Posts: 83
Location: http://alejandroronaydesigns.blogspot.com
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Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2011 1:36 am
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I saw you have accepted images, did you have to redo them or did you comment to the reviewer?
Congrats. |
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blahsum
Joined: 18 Sep 2011
Posts: 52
Location: South Africa
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Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2011 2:25 am
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I redid them. The point that vectors make more money makes sense - I always used to look for vectors first as well. Also, with Manga Studio I can export to PSD, which Illustrator happily accepts. Then I apply Live Draw (after creating custom settings), do a little clean-up and viola!
I still prefer my original work, but I'd rather be working on new stuff than try to negotiate with a content system.
Thanks to everyone for all the help! |
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blahsum
Joined: 18 Sep 2011
Posts: 52
Location: South Africa
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Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2011 2:30 am
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Except... this is odd. I just had a look and some of these are the rejected images. Also, the vector images that were approved are now not there anymore (though they were the CS3 files).
Basically, I am not entirely sure what is going on. I'll just wait it out and then swap images if necessary. |
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