Flickr and Getty Images buy your photos

One of the biggest photo libraries in the world is hoping the work of amateur photographers can reinvigorate its collection and help to create an edgier persona.

Getty Images, the world’s largest distributor of still imagery, has teamed up with Flickr, the photo-sharing website, to allow keen photographers around the world the chance to make some money out of their regular, everyday snaps. Over the past 12 months, Getty has had 30 art directors scouring Flickr’s archive of three billion images to find the ones that will “sell” and have commercial appeal.

So far, the team has identified 100,000 images it would like to add to the “Getty Flickr” collection, which can be accessed by consumers and customers alike via www.gettyimages.com/flickr. There is also a supportive Facebook application called “PictureMe”. This allows Facebook users to attach photos from the collection to their status updates to help them visually express their mood.

The collection contains only 20,000 images at the moment, as the team is still waiting to hear back from the photographers responsible for the other 80,000 cherry-picked photos, or for rights clearance. Flickr users can “opt in” to have their photos considered by the Getty art directors by clicking on a designated tab once logged into their accounts.

The rest is up to Getty, which will then email the Flickr users who have a minimum of five photos which interest them. If they consent, a contract follows and the photographer has to set about ensuring each that any photo that includes a person or piece of property has the appropriate permission from all concerned parties. Once all the formal processes are completed, Getty can go about selling the images.

One person who received such an email is Anna Creedon, a digital collections developer at the London Transport Museum by day, and an avid amateur photographer in her spare time.

“I only joined Flickr last October, after doing an Open University photography course. Someone on the course set up a supportive Flickr group and I progressed from there,” she explains.

“I opted in to be seen by Getty and one day I received an email from them asking me to upload seven of my images ... one of which [a close-up abstract shot of an iris] has now been bought for use in a brochure. It’s given me a new zest for taking photos.”

Creedon specialises in macro photography, which means taking extreme close-up shots and she usually only uses a compact hand-held camera. Her choice subjects are flowers and nature.

However, there is no pattern as to what the Getty team are looking for.Often the chosen photos are very regular daily scenes: a baby playing in a swimming pool or a someone smoking a cigarette. But it’s more the spirit and the way these imagesare taken that attracts Getty.

However, not every Flickr user views the “Getty email” as a prime opportunity to gain market exposure. There is a big debate going on across the photo-sharing site about whether Getty’s plan is compromising people’s artistic integrity and just another example of a big market player abusing user-generated content for mass gain.

The man in charge of bringing Flickr content to Getty customers is Andy Saunders, Getty’s vice-president of creative stills and footage. His job is to try to introduce new content to the Goliath collection and keep it fresh. He recognises that commercialising a personal photograph collection isn’t for everyone and admits some people have refused Getty’s offer.

“I understand that when you reach out to a community whose original intention was not to sell content, but simply to share images and experiences, there will be some negative feedback, but that’s up to the individuals. They can opt in or opt out.”

Getty Images decided to sign the five-year exclusive deal with Flickr expressly because it wanted photos that hadn’t been taken with a commercial purpose in mind.

“It is because the Flickr images haven’t been taken with a view to being sold, that a lot of passion and emotion comes through in the shots.They can be more original than traditional photography and offer that emotional connection which our customers really value,” Saunders explains.

Users take, typically, a 20-30 per cent cut on any images that are sold; how much a user can hope to make varies, Saunders says, from as low as $10 a shot to as much as $100,000. So you won’t know what publication or campaign your pictures of your grandmother snoring or your baby swimming could end up being part of, but you do become elevated to the same status as a professional photographer just by clicking a tab. And you get paid, too.

Five tips to get your pictures noticed

• Keep your approach original and fresh.
• Think about whether you will be able to contact any people in your photo again in case you need to obtain their permission. Possibly take down their contact details at the time, just in case.
• Regionality is always attractive – especially in areas such as the Far East, where the economy is booming. Photos of your travels which show off an area’s culture are very useful to us – this is something which we hope to build upon in the future.
• Humour always sells and is something to bear in mind.
• Don’t get into stale patterns. Keep snapping only what matters to you and not what you might think will sell.