the bestsellers of 2018

It is almost the end of January, but I think we can learn a lot taking a look at what files sold the most in the year of 2018 on stock agencies like Pond5, Shutterstock, Adobe Stock, etc. This includes stock footage & stock photography.

I want to show you a bunch of the best selling video & image files in 2018 and some conclusions I learned analyzing them. This should give you cool insights into how successful contributors approach topics and visual references as well.

For a better experience, I strongly suggest you watch the video above. It’s made after the exact same content.

You might also enjoy reading about my own personal bestsellers.

Trendy vs. Evergreen

The main message I’m trying to communicate is: there are two significant types of content you could work on – the bestsellers of 2018 will make that clear. There is the trendy content and the evergreen content.

  • The trendy content includes photos, footage, illustrations of topics that have a growing interest. For example, the latest iPhone, Amazon’s Alexa, Self-driving cars, etc. Topics that are strong now and might get you good sales fast but may get old in the fast.
  • The evergreen content is made of perpetual subjects, that may not get you sales instantly but should take longer to become useless.

I’m not saying one is better than the other. I’m also not telling you to pick one. I’m just showing you two alternatives to work on.

My Brazilian flag video, for example, was a big success in 2014 during the WorldCup and in 2016 during the Olympic games (trendy content), when both happened in Brazil. However, it is still useful these days to anyone searching for the topic “Brazil” (evergreen content).

I hope this trendy and evergreen stuff makes sense to you…

2018 Bestsellers on Stock Agencies

Now let’s talk about the 2018 bestsellers on Stock Agencies. Unfortunately, no stock agency discloses decent data on which files sold the most during a year.

The best resource comes from Pond5. A list of at least 20 videos and 20 images that they post every month. I won’t show you this 500 files here, but you can check each month’s best selling files here:

There’s also no way to find out the order of which stock photos/videos sold the more. So I’m organizing them in categories.

1.Aerial

2018 was the year of aerial shots. At least 45 of the best selling video clips were made with drones. The category is growing so much that DJI and Pond5 partnered to curate and promote the best aerial shots made by drone operators.

The competition is enormous too. If you search for “aerial” on Shutterstock, you will get way more than a million results.

Having aerial shots doesn’t mean you’ll have sales. So try to explore what subjects or what locations still lack good aerial options.

And if you think drones are the only way to produce aerial shots, then you’re wrong. Take a look at this bestseller zooming into the Pentagon. Do you really believe one would be able to fly over the Pentagon?

I mean, this guy deserves it. He probably took a screenshot from Google Earth. Applied some zooming. Blurred out the edges and added some cars in After Effects. This probably took him less than an hour and there he is. One of the bestsellers in 2018.

2. 2D & 3D Animations

At least 33 bestsellers are made with 2D or 3D animations. Some of them are extremely realistic and probably done by a team of 3D professionals. A few others are quite simple to reproduce and still communicate the concept very well.

I personally like this one of the Mona Lisa painting. A very creative way to animate a famous static image. This is editorial, of course.

3. Portraits

Portraits are a perfect example of evergreen content. They have been among the bestsellers for a while and should stay for a good time. One common thing among these files is how well they communicate cultural diversity. It might be age, the activity, the profession, the clothing, the background, etc. This kind of shot can be used in innumerable ways.

I like this one with the girl putting a VR headset. The background has a guy walking with a paper and a team sitting by a desk which makes it clear that they are game designers. The colors, her clothes, and her style are all very well selected. This is surely produced by a team.

4. Objects

The objects category is another example of long duration content and quite easy to be reproduced. The bestsellers in this category are all flawlessly focused on specific subjects and concepts. Creative angles and isolated background seem to be the key to make your files stand out in the crowd.

I’ve seen this video with the showerhead in many other agencies too. The way the camera is positioned is pretty creative and makes the shot unique. Also, notice how the subject is isolated with nothing in the background.

5. News

We can not ignore how much the news affect sales on stock agencies. Poverty, wars, politics and even sports events have a strong influence on what is selling. The multiple storms during the year, the wildfires, and other natural disasters were responsible for some bestsellers too.

This kind of content is usually submitted as editorial. So it might be a good idea to work on creative ways to explore this content under commercial usage.

This one is among the bestsellers and was submitted as commercial. It’s not visually appealing like the others. But the fact that you can’t recognize the place makes it possible to be used for other storms too. I don’t doubt the author of this clip changes the title every time there is a new hurricane, no matter where.

6. Vintage

In the same line, the vintage category is growing stronger every year. I believe most of them are made after public domain content adding some effects on top. Pond5 seems to bring better results than the others in this category because they allow multiple takes in the same clip. This is a dangerous area because the rules are not clear about what is public domain and what you can really make with it.

Some contributors are also making good sales by reproducing these old shots. This astronaut, for example, is clearly not Neil Armstrong.

7. Self-driving Cars

Self-driving cars was a strong subject last year and will keep getting stronger in the future. You can’t easily get one of this cars, but you can definitely reproduce the concept.

This example among the bestsellers is my favorite. If you look closely, you can even see a glimpse of what should be the arm of a person turning the wheel. This proves how you don’t need a self-driving car to work on this subject.

8. Other Categories

And here are some more categories that were always in the bestsellers and will only get you sales with high-quality files or very specific shots. They are Sports, Family, Technology, Business, Nature, and Education.

A good part of the best selling files is made of these categories. There are already thousands of excellent options for the buyer, so you have to be smart if you plan to explore them. One way to do it is getting very specific like this one explores Paralympic race and this one shows a man using technology in agriculture, a unique background.

There are actually way more bestselling files and categories than the ones I showed you. Just to mention some of them:

What about you?

And now I want to know about you. What were your bestsellers in 2018? If there’s a good number of people participating, I guess we can do a video with our own bestsellers and the lessons learned.

After all, this is how Creative Income works. We’re a community learning to achieve financial freedom together.

Blackbox Footage vs. Shutterstock

Which method is the best to submit your stock footage?

As we wrote previously, Blackbox is taking over the Stock Footage market – and well deserved. In June of 2018, the number of users grew amazing 700%.

BlackBox is not only attracting the old experienced stock filmmakers but is opening the doors for thousands of new contributors.

And though there’s a big hype around it right now, it’s prudent to carefully take a decision if you’ll go exclusively with them or stick in the traditional way (uploading straight to Shutterstock, Pond5, Adobe Stock, etc).

This isn’t a company comparison overview. After all, Shutterstock is one of BlackBox’s partners. This is actually a comparison review with pros and cons of selling footage in the traditional way or the BlackBox way.

I hope this comparison helps you take your own decision.

What is Blackbox?

Stock Footage is just the starting point of BlackBox. The platform is revolutionizing the process of making content and getting paid the long tail money creators really deserve. If you listen to Pat McGowan’s interview, you’ll agree this is just the beginning.

This article covers the stock footage process, but you can check our BlackBox focused article here.

Blackbox is a digital guild that connects video creators and curators. With their platform, film creators can focus on shooting/filming new footage and leave the “boring work” on them (metadata, descriptions, keywords). The video content will be submitted to 4 major stock agencies at once:

  • Shutterstock
  • Pond5
  • Adobe Stock
  • Storyblocks
  • more to come

For stock filmmakers, it means you can now be free to work on what you really like, while you let other users take care of writing metadata and keywords for you.

It is also an opportunity for editors and copywriters to work on files of other users so they can get a share of the income.

If you haven’t subscribed to BlackBox yet, you can do it clicking here. By using our referral code, you help us keep the work on this blog and YouTube channel.

Choose your side: the BlackBox way or the old-fashioned way

While many new users are going exclusively with BlackBox, it might be a good idea to analyze the traditional way before going full speed on the decided direction. The whole idea explains the hype around BlackBox but your decision should be based on real information, not just hype.

Since you can’t upload repeated footage files to the agencies Blackbox submits to (Shutterstock, Pond, Adobe Stock and Storyblocks), you have to decide which way you’re going to submit your footage files.

There are pros and cons on both sides. It will really depend on what kind of user you are. The following comparison might help you take your own decision.

Pros & Cons of submitting files exclusively to BlackBox

Still not a BlackBoxer? You can become a stock contributor right now registering here.

I’m personally in love with BlackBox and its community. Still, I’ll put my emotions aside and will write you neutral pros & cons.

1. Pro. Submit to multiple websites at once.

I’ve been working on my own multi-agency spreadsheet for years and no matter how good it gets, the whole process still takes several hours.

Each agency has its own way of doing things. The categories names, the maximum of keywords and file formats are just a few given examples.

That struggle alone makes BlackBox worthy of attention. As for today, BlackBox submits your files to 4 major agencies: Shutterstock, Pond5, Adobe Stock and Storyblocks.

Check out my 2017 earnings report and notice how those were my most profitable agencies.

2. Pro: More time doing the work you love

I’d say this is the biggest advantage of BlackBox: being free to focus on producing more footage.

Writing metadata, uploading your files to multiple agencies… All this while trying to fit the stock agencies requirements is a hard and tedious work. Upload your files to BlackBox and they’ll take care of the dirty work.

It gets harder if English is not your native language, which is the case for me and 60% of Creative Income YouTube Channel.

If needed, BlackBox gives you the chance of letting other users curate your files (from editing to keywording) in exchange for a small share of those files’ income.

I’d say this is the biggest advantage of BlackBox: being free to focus on producing more footage and earning more with that.

3. Pro: Better rates

The power of being part of a big community is that together we preferential commission rates from the stock agencies. So even though BlackBox takes 15% on net sales (that would be ~5% on the gross value) you will still get more money than you would alone.

You just have to be aware that if you’re taking help of other users you will also share your earnings with them. We call it the curator’s share.

In fact, it is totally negotiable. You’ll choose your curator among many users and will let BlackBox know the share that specific user is going to have. BlackBox’s platform will take care of paying each user through PayPal.

For Metadata only curation, BlackBox recommends a share of 20% rate. That means 20% of that file’s net income will be paid to the curator.

For Full Curation, which means someone is also writing metadata for you, BlackBox recommends a share of 40%.

4. Pro: Sell more than you would be working alone

At this point, some of you might be thinking you will make more money if you just do it by yourself. You may be right, but let me ask you a few questions first:

  • Do you still have files laying on your computer and external HDs waiting to be edited?
  • Do you think you would get better metadata if someone else writes it?
  • Do you believe you would get better-looking footage if someone else edits it?

If you have answered yes to any of the questions above then you’re probably losing money right now. You should never have files laying on a hard disk when they could be making you money instead.

Although you’re getting a smaller share, there’s a big chance you will be selling way more than you would alone. Especially if you’re a bad keyword writer.

It’s a better idea to get a smaller percentage of something than 100% of nothing.

Having experienced BlackBox users to write and submit your work to the 4 big agencies will probably make more sales than your own keywords would. So there is a big chance you’ll sell better with their help.

The platform offers collaborative work and takes care of the revenue sharing process.

COLLABORATION will always beat COMPETITION.

5. Pro: Rank better on search results

Given that we’re all contributing to the same BlackBox seller profile, you should probably get better search rankings for your files.

That means your footage will probably appear on the first line of results and, consequently, sell better.

It’s the size of our BlackBox portfolio that makes every member’s content more searchable to buyers.

6. Pro: Stock Footage is just the tip of the BB iceberg

I had the opportunity to talk with Pat McGowan and got amazed with all the plans the company has for the future. They are totally centered on creators and their financial freedom.

Stock Footage is really just the starting point for them. Being part of this community means giving power to the creator’s community.

7. Con: You’re contributing to BlackBox profile

As I just said, we’re all contributing under the same BlackBox profile. So I believe you got it that your name is not going to publicly appear on the stock websites.

Though you still got all the rights for your files, they will all appear under the BlackBox profile.

Some people might see it as a downside. But let me be honest, is Shutterstock really the “social network” you want to get famous on?

From my point of view, this is even better. Some of my files do embarrass me, but they still sell. So I’d rather keep them there.

Pat’s argument is that “in our experience, the concept of personal branding is not a factor in buying decisions on agency platforms.” I would say the same.

You still own the rights over your footage. Use it on your YouTube channel or something like that. Youtuber Jeven Dowey that in a pretty amazing way.

8. Con: Blackbox process

The team behind BlackBox is really working hard to make it better every day. It’s a promising future.  If you’re already a member you’re probably getting weekly news of their improvements.

BlackBox 2.0 should be launched soon, but for now (June 2018), BlackBox portal is still a little hard to comprehend and might be difficult for beginners.

You may also be experiencing a delay on some files. But hey, this is totally explainable. They just grew 700% on a month!

If you want a better understanding of the microstock market, I suggest you register at Shutterstock as a contributor and go through the process to submit a bunch of pictures. Shutterstock’s process and user interface are really user-friendly.

I see this as a temporary downside. I’m still sure BlackBox will get there soon. I receive constant emails of weekly improvements they’re doing.

9. Footage only

As of today, Blackbox is only allowing stock footage contributors and shows signs for Stock Music. So photographers will have to wait.

If you’re a photographer, I still suggest you give it a try to shooting footage. You’ll probably raise your earnings by doing that and it probably can be done with the same camera.

Pros & Cons of going the old-fashioned way (straight to Shutterstock, Pond5, Adobe Stock, etc.

If you didn’t start submitting your stock photos/footage yet, I’d suggest you start with Shutterstock. It is normally the most profitable stock agency and has the best contributor interface so far.

1. Con: Fewer sales (in case of poorly written metadata)

You’ll definitely get more money per sale – but that doesn’t mean higher overall earnings. BlackBox curators are good at their work, so there’s a big change you won’t write as good metadata (title, description, keywords, etc) as they would. So you might get a smaller amount of sales in the end.

2. Con: Requires discipline to edit, curate and write metadata

Why did so many filmmakers and photographers give up on Stock Photography/Footage?

Simple. We all hate writing metadata. We’re creative people, after all.

In my case, I found the discipline to work on a batch of files every 6 months. It’s a very boring week but pays out in the end.

3. Pro: Process is easy and quick to understand

Shutterstock is on the market for many years. So, of course, their contributor interface is still better and simpler than BlackBox. But I’m sure it is just a matter of time before BlackBox comes up with new improved tools.

4. Pro: Better understanding of the whole process

The experience of contributing to Shutterstock (and Pond5, Adobe Stock, Storyblocks, etc) at least once will make you better understand the process. I see a lot of new users uploading files to BlackBox and asking people on the facebook group why is it taking so long.

The experience of submitting your own file will give you a complete overview of the process and market.

5. Pro: Your own portfolio

Submitting your footage and photos straight to the stock agencies will also allow you to create your own portfolio and track specific data (each agency gives you a couple of different insights).

6. BONUS: Choose your thumbnail

Shutterstock, Pond5, and StoryBlocks let you choose a specific snapshot of your video to be used as a thumbnail. Strong thumbnails are strong when it comes to footage files.

This is small, but a considerable obstacle for BlackBox.

My personal advice

As a 6-year-experienced contributor, my advice is that you subscribe to both platforms: Shutterstock and BlackBox. Try to upload a dozen different footage files on each of them and check how comfortable you feel.

On the other hand, if you hating writing your own keywords and description, then stick with BlackBox and focus on producing more footage.

If you can’t wait a few days for approval, prefer to choose your thumbnails and believe you can do a good job writing your own metadata, then go forward and try to sell your files by yourself.

 

What is your opinion?

What are your thoughts on this? Are you moving your footage to BlackBox, staying on Shutterstock (and other agencies) or mixing both? I believe this is a strong subject for our community to discuss!

If this article was helpful I’m sure you’ll enjoy liking our Facebook page and following us on Instagram. We would strongly appreciate that!

my stock footage earnings (2013-2017)

Stock Footage – What I earned and what I learned.

On this article, I’ll bring you a full report of my earnings from 2013 to 2017 and the participation of each agency on the total income as well. I’m definitely far from being a big contributor, but I’m sure this data can help a lot of people choose the right direction.

Full 2013–2017 earnings Report

I sell my footage online since December 2012, when I only had a Canon T3i. Most of my files were refused, so I started with a very small portfolio (30 video files) on Shutterstock and Pond5. The info I had at that time showed me these two would be a good way to start my stock earnings.

Since that time I used to work on my stock portfolio once a year, I slowly started uploading my files to other microstock websites: Storyblocks (former VideoBlocks), DepositPhotos and iStock/Getty were the next ones. This is how my portfolio grew on the last years:

I reached 240 video files in February of 2017, so I believe it’s fair to say that was the official portfolio size for 2017.

Total Earnings for 2017

So by the end of the year, the sum of all my stock footage earnings was: U$1.690,80.

 

My 2017 earnings by each agency.

Alright, no complaints about that. Definitely, a good revenue based on a small portfolio. But I have to admit I was expecting a little more earnings when compared to 2016. I thought the increase of files in my portfolio would directly impact my sales. Take a look at my year over year growth.

 

My personal yearly earnings when summing Shutterstock, Pond5, iStock, Storyblocks, and DepositPhotos.
My personal yearly earning when summing Shutterstock, Pond5, iStock, Storyblocks, and DepositPhotos.

My big mistake

I did a mistake by betting all my chips on Shutterstock. If you go back to the first graph I showed you’ll notice Shutterstock was the only stock agency on which I really uploaded new footage/photos. Since I had never analyzed these earnings as close as I’m doing now, I thought Shutterstock was the main and only source of this “creative income” (I was also very lazy)— but I couldn’t be more wrong.

Take a look at my 2016 income share, when Pond5 and Deposit had my total portfolio, StoryBlocks had 75% and Getty/iStock had 20%.

earnings per stock agency in 2016 (footage + photography)
What each stock agency represented on my 2016 earnings.

On that year, Pond5 was even better than Shutterstock! Videoblocks and Deposit also had better impacts. So that’s a big lesson I learned — I will diversify my portfolio to other websites.

There’s still a lot of lessons I learned when analyzing my best sellers, but this will be a subject for the next time.

If you would like me to keep writing/recording this reports/insights, please let me know! This is something I love doing, but knowing there’s someone reading and interested is the gasoline I need to keep making it public!

My 7 Personal Bestselling Stock Footage Files 

On this the second article (and video), I will showcase my 7 best selling files, the earnings of each one, and all lessons learned as well. I’m writing this to attend a request on my last video.

If achieving creative income through Stock Footage and Stock Photos interests you, be sure to subscribe to our newsletter and YouTube.

I’m sure every microstock contributor with at least a few sales already noticed there’s no correlation between his/her favorite files and the ones that sell the most. While I was doing the analysis I noticed how wrong my first predictions were.

Many of the files you believe will sell a lot may never bring as many sales as many files you despise.

My 7 Top Sellers on Shutterstock, Pond5, iStock and other microstock sites.

01. Space travel

This group of Space Flight simulations made on After Effects is by far my best seller. So far, they made me U$1.898. (50% from Shutterstock, 40% from Pond5, 10% from DepositPhotos, approximately).

You can start selling your photos and videos today with this link: http://bit.ly/newcontributor

These are actually the only files I got that were entirely made on After Effects (and makes me want to that again). They were originally made for a church service opener that later I adapted to sell. It’s quite a nice effect, but I never expected they would do so well and I’m so happy I did submit them.

This is a precious lesson for me: leave no file behind.

02. The Brazilian Flag

On second place I have this slow-motion shot of the Brazilian flag. This file alone made me $914 (approximately, 90% from Shutterstock). It was shot on a Canon 60D and is not even in Full HD. So there’s a second lesson: start with what you got.

It was shot in 2014, a few months before the World Cup in my country. This is a strategic one, of course. So learn to identify this kind of opportunity that happens close to you. I also submitted other soccer related files in that year that made good sales.

03. Curitiba Bus

In third place comes this editorial pack of my city’s public transportation. 5 files combined made me $714. Storyblocks brought 20%, while Pond5 and Shutterstock represented 40% each.

Apparently, the city where I live in, Curitiba, is a historical reference in public transportation. So these ones might work very well for documentaries.

Lesson to learn? Explore unique subjects close to you. Many other clips of local touristic points also sell well. Maybe I don’t get to sell the famous Rio de Janeiro landscapes, but I can definitely build some authority on my city’s icons. This works well if you live in a city that’s not so mainstream.

04. Aerial Amazon

Next, we have this aerial shot of the Amazon forest. With this shot alone I was able to sell $602. This one is strong on Pond5 (80%), while Shutterstock had 13% and Storyblocks had 7%. If I combine the other images I made on this trip to the Amazon, the total would easily go over $1000. Which I believe is enough to cover the trip costs I had.

Lesson: Make good use of your travelings.

05. Labrador Dog

Here’s a funny one. These were my first approved files and were actually nothing but a test I made with my dog. $357 earned. 40% came from Pond5, and 30% from Shutterstock and iStock each.

Lesson: Commercial value can be found much closer than you think.

06. Car Mirror

Another interesting case. A shot of a sunset on a car mirror. No sales on other agencies, but $230 on Shutterstock.

Lesson: Take your camera with you.

07. Public University

This is a public university in my city that for some reason sells a lot. $228 earned on this file alone. Also one of my first files (Canon 60D, I guess). I have no idea what people see on it. It’s one of those files I was almost giving up on. There’s even a shake on the end I forgot to cut.

The original file was shot during the night with a very bad camera and conditions. So I tried it again with a better camera and lens a couple of years later. No sales. Go figure…

Once again, start with what you got. But start!

I’ll stop here but there’s still a lot of curious cases I could talk about. It’s interesting how many files I despise sell better than the ones I am proud of.

What about you? What are your funny best sellers? Feel free to put them in the comments below. I guess this is a way we can learn a lot from each other.

If you would like me to keep writing/recording this reports/insights, please let me know! This is something I love doing, but knowing there’s someone reading and interested is the gasoline I need to keep making it public!