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tonyv · Joined: 17 Apr 2011 Posts: 7

I'm a contributor for about ten months and struggle with the very random review. There isn't a consistent line identified in the Shutterstock assessment policy. It seems there is no standard and the automate rejection messages doesn't make it clearer for contributors. Currently it's that counterproductive that I consider stopping submissions. I\m wonder or other people have similar experiences.

hhltdave5 · Posted: Wed Apr 11, 2012 6:48 am

Reviewing has always been a source of complaint and it always will be. There have been more posts than usual about the review process and things seem to have leveled out over the past couple of months but some still complain that there are problems with it.

With all of the images that they review they cannot give a detailed critique of each image, that would be impossible so they use special rejection notices to give you the general idea of what the problem is. It is much better than some sites who give 6 reasons in 6 different areas of problems.

If you like post the rejected ones in the critique forum with the reason for rejection and we will take a look and give some suggestions.

tonyv · Joined: 17 Apr 2011 Posts: 7

Given the enormous volume I understand that it's not workable to give a detailed comment to every rejection. I can live with the current system. The problem is more the randomness. One of my good selling photos is a Nike logo (portrait proportion) which I’ve submitted as editorial. Last week I’ve shot the same in landscape and it was rejected. The same batch contained images of a walking crowd. Though, similar images are among my best sellers these where also rejected because of composition matters. I can’t avoid the feeling of a lack of consistency in their assessment and that makes it hard to align your shooting style to their requirements.

wiml · Joined: 10 May 2011 Posts: 896

I agree tonyv, on top of that when you complain about it on the forums or via support or write a note to the reviewer your images will stay in que for a longer period, talk about revenge.
I wonder sometimes if I joined a kindergarten instead of a stock agency.
What most forget is that they are getting paid for this, a lot more then the pennies we get for our images, meanwhile they do just whatever they think is right to fill their daily quota. It all depends on the reviewer, not the agency's policy.
My policy? The more they reject for unvalid reasons, the more I will redirect my uploads elsewhere. The reviewer will not suffer from this, the agency and contributor will.

Good luck to you and everyone who suffers from this.

tonyv · Joined: 17 Apr 2011 Posts: 7

@wiml
I’ve doubted before I decided to express my frustration in this forum because I realize I’m playing with fire and besides that nothing will change. Shutterstock is a power stronghold who dictates. We contributors simply have no voice. Frequently I tried to communicate my concerns about invalid, randomly rejections but they don’t even respond. It’s needless to tell you how frustrating this is. We have probably no idea of how much contributors are burdened by this. But Shutterstock simply don’t care because it’s profit what matters. But it’s a big miscalculation because a policy like this works devastating in the long term.

wiml · Joined: 10 May 2011 Posts: 896

No worries Tony, my better work is already going elsewhere. That's Wim's policy ;)

At first I had my doubts about posting these kind of messages but now I couldn't care less. Respect has to go both ways and so far it has been a one way street.

Plenty of options for us photographers/illustrators. I'm done discussing this.

Alright Tony, good luck to you my friend.

royster · Joined: 19 Apr 2009 Posts: 279 Location: England/Greece

woodyone · Joined: 24 Sep 2009 Posts: 430 Location: Here

I don't mind a good conspiracy theory but can you imagine the logistics involved in putting folks who "speak out of turn" into a slow queue with the number of images and suppliers here? :)

maxim1110 · Posted: Wed Apr 18, 2012 2:16 pm

Yeah, I've had issues with this as well. A few months ago I submitted about 5 or so landscape images, who were rejected for the sole reason of being out of focus. So I went to Lightroom, zoomed in at several points in the images (foreground as well as background) to see if they were in focus. They were, so I exported them to jpg at maximum quality and checked the jpg images again. Still in focus. Submitted again with note to editor that they have previously been rejected due to being out of focus and that there is no way they can reject them for that again since they are in fact as sharp as images can get with a 14 mp camera (I used a tripod, rather short shutter time and self timer). They were rejected again, even though I have several images that are way less sharp than the batch that was rejected for unsharpness (my best selling image for example).

royster · Joined: 19 Apr 2009 Posts: 279 Location: England/Greece

tonyv · Joined: 17 Apr 2011 Posts: 7

That's exactly the problem I'm talking about. I've had frequently of these experiences. For example with panning photos. Before I decided to submit I ensured myself there are panning photos on Shutterstock and yes they are. Even their captions mention 'intentional blur' and 'panning'. So, I decided to shoot a nice panning series downtown.

The images are properly shot with moving subjects tac sharp, nice background blur and spinning wheels. But the entire series was rejected because of 'the use of filters' or something. IMHO this is an invalid review because because it's crystal clear that there is no filter use.

I've asked twice or they would reconsider their rejection and effort to explain that the background blur belongs to panning technique to express velocity. But they simply don't respond.

I can live with rejections because finally it makes you a better (stock) photographer. But this kind of experiences only frustrate me.

maxim1110 · Posted: Thu Apr 19, 2012 2:35 am