Using Photoshop Masking to Save Money

Hanukkah is coming up, and part of the holiday is lighting candles in a menorah for eight nights, starting with the helper candle and a single candle to the side, and ending with a total of 9 on the last night.  Stock photographically speaking, I could upload 8 different images to represent the holiday, each with another lit candle, but here’s a different tact, giving a little more flexibility to the buyer.

I’ve actually uploaded two images.  One with just the helper, and another with the helper and all 8 candles.  In Photoshop, you can make any number of nights you wish.  Check it out.  (By the way, these images will be here and here on iStockphoto.com when active in a day or two.)

So, to do this magic, we start with the two open images, as above.  Select the “move” tool in Photoshop (hotkey: v) Click on the tab of the lower image to make it active.  Hold down the shift key (this will lock it into the same location in the upper image) and click on the lower image itself and draaaaag it into the top image.  Now, since you have both versions in the same workspace, you can close the lower one.   Open your layer editor to see that you have both versions in the same file (hotkey: F7).

You’ve got “Layer 1″ selected (if you don’t, click on it).  Now, create a mask for it.  A mask is an “image” attached to that layer that tells Photoshop which part of the layer is opaque (solid) and which is transparent (see through).  White represents opaque and black means transparent.  Just click on the grey square with the white circle inside at the bottom of the layer editor.  It will make a white rectangle next to the thumnail of “Layer 1″, indicating the entire image is opaque.

Also, notice the extra black border around the white rectangle?  That means it is selected, and any painting we do now will go into that “image” to define opacity for the full menorah.  You can only paint in this layer in black and white, because you only need black, white and grey to define opacity.

What we will do is use the selection tool to draw a selection around the candles that we want to get rid of.  For example, we want an image representing 4 nights of Hanukkah (be sure to remove the ones from the left because you put candles in from right to left as the nights go on).   So, draw a box around the leftmost 4 candles.

Now, all you have to do, is fill (hotkey: Shift F5) the area with black to reveal the empty menorah that is stacked below the full one in the layer editor.

You can see we now have a perfect image representing four nights of Hanukkah.  In the layer editor, you can also see the black area in the opacity mask which reveals the empty menorah below.  So, basically, you get nine images for the price of two, for a few minutes of work.

Opacity masks are used all the time in Photoshop, but this is a very specialized example.  Hope this was useful to you.

Interview with… me!

A few weeks ago, one of my iStock buddies, Thomas_EyeDesign, asked me to do an interview for his blog about my stock photography work.  In case you missed it, and are interested , you can find it here: http://eyedesign9.wordpress.com/2009/10/24/sean-locke-interview/

Top 5 iStockphoto Articles

Along the path to where it is today, iStockphoto found, that by educating buyers and contributors on topics related to design and photography, they could increase both the quality of the content offered, and the knowledge of the buyers to use and appreciate said content.  There are a lot of good articles in their database, but here are a couple of my favorites.

1. Tips on Lighting And Isolated Shots – One of the classic articles, oft pointed to in the forums when discussing how to do the infamous “isolated on white” shot.  Good for designers because it gives a basic overview on what “white” means to a camera
2. Know Your Type – A good primer on typography, written by an outside company.  Good illustrative graphics accompany the text.
3. A Very Important Message For Everyone at iStockphoto – Founder Bruce Livingstone announces the sale of iStockphoto to Getty Images.
4. “K” is for Tags? – Buyers often run into roadblocks when searching the image database.  This article explains how the controlled vocabulary system works.
5. I Resolve to be More Resolute – Answers the hows and whys of dpi.  Why pixel resolution is what really matters on the front end and the final use is what you make from that.  A definite “must read” for newbie buyers.
6. Evolving Intellectual Property Standards at iStockphoto, pt. 2 – This series addressed concerns of what content is safe to portray in commercial royalty free imagery for sale.  This article was heavily read because it addressed some popular topics – NASA imagery, autos and especially the use of model releases.
7. Any of the “Points and Paths” articles about vector creation.  I’m just a beginner when it comes to illustrations, and these how-to’s can benefit everyone, from creators to integrators.  Like “RGB CMYK Q&A“, “Layout, Cutout, Knockout” and “Develop a Personal Palette“.  Even if you don’t use the software, it’s neat to see how the magic is done.
8. Top 5 License Faux Pas – This article echos a lot of what I’ve written in my blog about safe and correct ways for the buyer to use their licensed files, but it’s nice to get it straight from the officials.

Ok, that was 8.  Not 5.  But a catchy title does not an exact list make… There’s a lot more in the article morgue, so page back and check them out.  Some from a few years back are timeless, and some are tired, but there’s probably a little something about everything you didn’t know in there.

Get iStockphoto Keywords Tool

Last week, a buyer posted on the iStockphoto forums about the trouble he was having easily getting a list of keywords for an iStock download.

How could I easily get (copy through clipboard) keywords for bought images?

When I go to image detail, there is for example “Vector, Men, Child, Little Girls, Family, Illustration and Painting, Human Hand, Love, Human Hair, Blue, Red …more”, so I cannot copy all keywords easily. When I click “more”, the table with keywords is much more unfriendly for getting keywords.

I need these keywords for cataloguing my images.

So, apparently, this buyer downloads an image, and wants a keyword list to insert into the image in some form so that he can search his hard drive later for that image.  Makes sense.  However, with a recent re-design of the image details page, the keyword list comes up in a fairly uncopyable format.  You first need to pop up the keyword layer by hitting “more” and then if you try and copy and paste that list, it will be full of white space and have to be edited.

I had some spare time this week, so I scripted a little tool on my iStockTool page to return a list of keywords when given a list of iStock image numbers.  For example, entering 10855173 here: http://digitalplanetdesign.com/index.php?page=istocktools gives you this back:

Description: Royalty Free Stock Photo, Over the Shoulder Christmas Smile, copyright Sean Locke, iStockphoto LP
Keywords: Adults Only, Young Adult, Only Women, female1, Female, Women, Adult, People, Long Hair, Beauty, Beautiful, 20s, 30s, Caucasian, Studio Shot, Holiday, Cheerful, Smiling, Happiness, Red, Red Background, Defocused, Selective Focus, Focus On Foreground, Head And Shoulders, Hope, Dress, Copy Space, Shiny, One Woman Only, Toothy Smile, Christmas, Christmas Lights, Palm, Hands Cupped, Human Hand, Holding, Waist Up, Portrait, Looking Down, Christmas Present, Gift, Wrapped, Horizontal, Looking Over Shoulder, Rear View, stock images, royalty free images, stock photography, stock photos, inexpensive, istockphoto

It’s basically a php grab of the meta data in the html page, but could be very useful in a situation like this.  Note, that this list of meta data is the disambiguated keyword list.  ie., I had entered “blur” as a keyword, but this list includes the official controlled vocabulary keyword “defocused”.

Also note, if you have “Grease Monkey” for Firefox installed, user theasis offered this up:

you could install this script: http://www.theasis.co.uk/iStock/show_keywords.user.js

Hope you find this useful.  Have a good week!

Portfolio Update

Trend studies are showing growing markets in the US for different ethnic groups, including the large and increasing Hispanic population.  Living in the Mid-west, it’s proved challenging to find non-Caucasian models in the past for my stock work.  However, I am attempting to increase the ethnic variety available in my images.  Including this new iStockphoto.com series, with a handsome Hispanic male in some casual and business poses on white.  This model is a singer/promo model and has some great expressions:

Lots more images of that model coming through in the next weeks, with a variety of poses.  If you have any ideas you’d like him to illustrate, let me know!

Also, recently, I’m trying to filter in some Christmas imagery.  Both photography and 3d renders:

Vimeo Rights Update

Way back in March of this year, it was noticed that the video sharing site Vimeo had what seemed to be veeery flexible language in their terms of service.  I still get a lot of blog hits on “vimeo terms” or “vimeo rights grab”, so I thought I’d go back again to see if they had tweaked their terms as promised.  Last time I checked, no luck, but today I found they’ve added some new bolded wording to their  page.  Here’s the old terms:

By submitting your Submission to VIMEO, you hereby grant VIMEO and its affiliates, successors and assigns a worldwide, perpetual, non-exclusive, irrevocable, royalty-free, sub-licensable (through multiple tiers) and transferable license (with a right to create derivative works) to use, copy, transmit or otherwise distribute, perform, modify, incorporate into other works, publicly perform and display your Submission or any portion thereof, in or through any medium, whether now known or hereafter created. VIMEO shall be entitled to unrestricted use of any Submission for any purpose whatsoever, commercial or otherwise, without compensation to the submitter.

Well, I’m happy report that they seem to have finally made some changes to their wording, restricting the usage (commercial or otherwise) of your videos to the Vimeo site:

By submitting your video(s), you hereby grant VIMEO and its affiliates, successors and assigns a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free, sub-licensable (through multiple tiers) and transferable license (with a right to create derivative works to the extent necessary to make video content compatible with any Vimeo Services), revocable upon removing the video from Vimeo, to use, copy, transmit or otherwise distribute, perform, modify, incorporate into other works, publicly perform and display your videos or any portion thereof, in or through any medium, whether now known or hereafter created. VIMEO shall also be entitled to use clips of any video that has not been designated “private” for the purpose of promoting the Vimeo Site or Services, without compensation to the submitter; however, Vimeo will not use your videos for any other commercial purposes without obtaining your prior approval.

So, check it out.  They are including language that states the license is revocable by you upon removal of said video, and, more importantly, a statement that they will not use your videos for any commercial use (aside from promotion of their site) without checking with you first.  Any commercial purpose.   Nice.

I think they made a good attempt at the next part:

You also grant each user (or specified users, if a video is designated “private”) of the Vimeo Site or Services a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable, personal and non-commercial license to access and view your video through the Vimeo Site or any other access point authorized by you and/or VIMEO. This right to access and view your video shall include, solely to the extent necessary, the right to copy, transmit or otherwise distribute, perform, publicly perform, create derivative works of, and display your video.

This part is a bit confusing.  The first sentence makes sense.  You’re allowing the user to access and view the video.  The second sentence should say something like:

Included in Vimeo’s royalty free license of your work is the right to copy, transmit … etc… and display your video, solely to the extent necessary to allow the user to access and view your video.

I think we know what they meant, and just got tripped up a bit in the wording.  We don’t want to imply the user has the rights to make derivitive works or distribute the video, but that’s kind of how it reads.

So, I think they made an honest attempt to limit their terms of use a bit.  I wouldn’t have a problem uploading to Vimeo now.

October Portfolio Update

Sorry for the quietness recently.  My wife and I took a Royal Caribbean cruise last week to celebrate our 15 year wedding anniversary.  No internet for me for 7 days!  Ouch

Of course, while I was gone, lots of new imagery into my iStockphoto.com stock image portfolio to keep things fresh, so here’s an update on the new stuff.

Football Player

Fall means … football!  Got a great looking, athletic, new model for this series of an American Football Player.  Official and authentic football helmet, uniform and pads – cleats too!  There’s some great expressions in this series, along with some humor.  Oh, and some beer and wings – good for advertising bar parties or tailgate parties – whatever.  I cleaned out the local supermarket of 4 lbs of hot wings to put this set together.  There are also some more dramatic images in the series on a blue background.

Thanksgiving Turkey

Next on the plate, a great humor-based series for Thanksgiving (USA).    Two of my popular models, a golden, roasted turkey for Thanksgiving dinner, the fixings and … brussels sprouts.  Some funny expressions in here, and the series is isolated on white, making it easy to drop into a website, blog or newspaper article.  In addition, there are some more realistically lit and set images in the series.

3D Man

Lastly, this week, I have a new 3d rendered series.  It features a “stand out” orange colored 3d guy, in a variety of situations, holding a variety of props.  If you have ideas or needs for this series, please let me know!  I enjoy doing the modeling and texturing for these.  It’s a conceptual series, representing “everyman”, so it can be used for all kinds of things, and it is on a white background for easy dropping in to reports, brochures, magazines, etc.

That’s it for this week. Again, if you have any iStockphoto questions, as a buyer, feel free to get in touch with me, and I’ll see if I can blog to help you out.  Thanks!

iStockphoto’s New Logo Marketplace

Today, iStockphoto.com announced that it will be selling contributor created logos in the near future, possibly around the start of 2010.  See this forum post with the announcement: http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=119471&page=1

We’re excited to announce a whole new product coming to the iStock collection. Clients will soon be able to download a unique logo to brand their business or organization right here at iStock. This is a huge opportunity not just for existing iStock contributors, but for our community of designers as well. If you’re a designer, you’ve probably created hundreds of different logos over the course of your career and we’re offering you an outlet to start selling logos to the world’s largest community of creative buyers.

This hearkens back to the early days of microstock, where you might as well be selling your images instead of letting them sit on your hard drive.

Selling

The most important thing to note right off, is that these logos will be sold only once and then disabled.  The price range for logos will be 100-750 credits, and the contributor receives %50 of that.

I repeat: 100-750 credits.  The contributor royalty (%50) on that figures out to $96 – $562.50 US, based on the cheapest to most expensive credit price.

Regardless of what you read on twitter, they are not selling logos for $5 or $10 or $1.  The wording in the email sent out to designers was a bit confusing to some:

If you create one of the first 10,000 approved logo designs for iStockphoto by January 1, 2010, we’ll pay you $5 per approved logo and another $5 if we reach 10,000 approved logos by that date.

That $5 is a bonus, in addition to whatever price the logo may sell for.

Is this the end of the world?

Designers who have never posted in the forums are voicing their opinion in the thread above.   Some are for it, some are against it.   The people I sell my images to are designers at various levels, so I certainly take their opinions very seriously.

I understand that some feel that this “cheapens” the notion of design work.  That “I can get this for $100 on iStock, why should I pay you more”?  That is a valid first reaction, but what I sense from some other designers is that it is not just the creation of an iconic symbol that makes a successful branding for a company, but the interaction and research into that company that a designer does.  A whole marketing campaign.  This is a valid selling point that a designer has to use to gain clients anyways – iStockphoto isn’t the first to sell logos online.  Designers must already have a bag of tricks they use to win over a customer.

Admittedly, that kind of campaign isn’t cheap.  Experience and education play into the hourly or project rate of a successful designer and can be out of reach for small businesses or community groups.  Regardless of their need (or not) for an expensive campaign, it may just be out of reach.  This iStockphoto initiative may be an attempt to woo these groups into the market with a unique identifier, instead of a pinched bit of a vector illustration, which is against the legal terms anyways.  In that sense, 100-750 credits may be just the right price for someone who just needs a professional edge to step up their business.

There is a feeling among the posts that some designers feel threatened.  However, there are also comments along the lines that what will be bought will be “a generic, worthless logo that says nothing about the consumer”.  If the product ends up being so undesirable, then there truly is no need to feel threatened, is there?  Or will it be necessary for those doing below average design work to step it up?  Much like the photographer, who was used to making thousands of dollars off of an average image of a tree, laments the good ole’ days, perhaps there will be a new line as to what defines good useful quality, at least at the low end.

One poster said:

As designers, we pay the same amount of money on education as many other professions. We struggle to find that first job in an agency, studio or corporation to get the experience we need and to feed our creative souls. We require expensive computer equipment. We purchase legal fonts, new design software, and constant upgrades. We pay taxes, rent office space, pay accountants, and pay for overhead. We spend years learning marketing, target audience, branding, RBG, CMYK, vector, ppi, tracking, kerning, fonts, retouching, and much more. We are skilled professionals, yet why should we practically give away our work? Young artists should learn about the value of their work.

Replace “designers” in the first sentence with “photographers”, and you see the same argument that professional photographers were making a few years ago.  Yet buyers have been using iStockphoto and others to save money for their clients.

Now, I’m not saying I am for or against the intiative at this point.  It seems like there is still plenty to iron out.  Whether interaction with the client is part of it (I hope not), fonts, legal responsibility, etc.  I also like that other content can be licensed repeatedly.  Selling a one-off isn’t appealing to me right now.  Anyways, I’m just throwing some thoughts out there.

Keep in mind that turning away from iStockphoto in some sort of protest also hurts those who have been providing you with quality imagery these last 6 years.  Both exclusives and independents.  Maybe this will provide a new opportunity for the designer they weren’t expecting.  We’ll just have to see where it goes at this point.

Feel free to discuss here.

Portfolio Update

Autumn is my favorite time of year.  I like the changing of the leaves, the chill in the air, Halloween and wearing jeans.  I also enjoy getting the kids back to school.  Buying new supplies, meeting teachers and fun activities.  So, I’m slightly late for getting this new series into the iStockphoto.com collection, but they’re applicable for year round use, not just “Back to School”.

Set in an elementary classroom, we have:

• Asian American Female Teacher
• Caucasian Male Teacher
• Caucasian, African-American and Hispanic students, ages 7-11 (elementary aged)

Bright colors, shiny desks and chairs and big smiles make this a positive educational series, great for any school related usage.  Topics include studying, reading, computers, flu/swine flu prevention and personal interaction.   Check out the images below…

iStockphoto to Warranty all Content

In various forum posts around the net, people have posted that their company will not buy content from iStockphoto.com because they do not offer a warranty against legal action, like some of the larger stock houses.  Times, they are a changin’.

Today, iStockphoto.com has announced the “iStock Legal Guarantee”.  From the forum post:

Beginning Wednesday, iStockphoto promises that files purchased and used in accordance with the iStock license, will not breach any trademark, copyright or other intellectual property rights or rights of privacy. We’re calling it the iStock Legal Guarantee and if a customer does get a claim, iStock will cover the customer’s legal costs and direct damages to a combined total of $10,000. Here’s the best part: it’s on us. Starting Wednesday, every iStockphoto file automatically comes with a free Legal Guarantee.

This is truly a first for the big names in micro.  A smaller company was offering such a warranty, but I don’t believe they made it out of Beta.

Amazingly, this announcement come of the heels of my blog posting yesterday “Keep an Eye on your Content Sources“.  Now, you can feel perfectly safe, and legally covered (up to $10,000) when sourcing iStockphoto.com for your content.

In addition, there is an extended licensing option for more legal protection, up to $250,000, available for 100 credits.  I haven’t yet determined why you might purchase this option.  Maybe, for a huge national campaign with lots of visibility.  Anyways, the option is there.

Why shop for image, video, audio or flash content anywhere else?