I fully expect that a lot of folk will bypass this review thinking that this is a service they don't need or want - so thank you to those who've come for a look. I (almost) guarantee that however sceptical you may be, I will persuade you that this is a site you need and can use. I have recommended it to lots of friends and colleagues and they all love it - I hope you will too.
What is istockphoto?
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It's a US-based website which contains (in their words) "the world's fastest growing collection of royalty-free images at the world's best prices". Photographers from all over the world - both professional and amateur - submit their photos and earn a small fee every time someone
downloads a copy.
In effect, it's like a giant downloadable photo album where you can buy images for as little as 50 pence a time.
Why would I want to do that?
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For work - need images for a presentation? A new website? To illustrate a document? For a company brochure, flyer, advert?
For home - tired of the
cards in the local newsagent and think you could do better? need images for a more creative
birthday card? A party invite? Your blog? A picture to frame for a friend? How about some really good photos for your album because you forgot your
camera on that once in a lifetime holiday?
How I found this site and how I've used it?
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In my pre-redundancy days I was head of marketing for a food ingredients company. I was working on a new website and my web-designer came up with a fantastic photo to illustrate one of the pages and introduced me to istockphoto.com. I spent a couple of days on the site and for a grand sum of less than $30 sourced all the photos for my website. These included geographic shots for each region, industry ones for each application, and a fabulous picture of some cows noses that I sadly had to pull before we launched (I pulled the photo - not the noses).
A few weeks later, the
designers I was using sent me a quote for some
stock photos for a new brochure. Just 4 photos were going to cost us £1650. In 40 mins on
Istockphoto.com, I found substitutes for 3 of the photos for just $3 - I think that makes my work worth about £2000/hour. (how on earth could they have thought they didn't need me?).
I've used istock photos in powerpoint presentations. A lot of my work was with people in other countries whose English wasn't always very strong. I'm a believer that a picture speaks a thousand words so for a presentation to a foreign audience (e.g. 700 Indian bakers in a hotel ballroom) I used about 40 different Istockphoto images. They may not have understood my words but they got the message.
So how do you use the site?
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If you've read this far, maybe I've tempted you a little bit. Go and have a look at the site. If you aren't sure it's for you, don't worry - you can do some searching and exploring before you need to register.
If you fancy some photos you will need to register - this is quite straightforward although I have found that they allocate you a password that's impossible to remember and I never figured out how to change it.
Once you are registered you can start setting up 'lightboxes'- these are like folders where you can allocate the photos that you are considering using. You could set up one for your home projects and another for work or individual ones for each thing you are doing. You can make your lightbox accessible to others and send a link to a friend or colleague so they can help you choose the images.
How do I buy?
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You will need to set up some credit on the site and for this you will need a credit card. The cheapest credit package is 10 credits for $10 dollars. 300 credits will cost you $250. I bought 125 credits for $100 about 6 months ago and I still have 25 left. (note - the rates have changed slightly and you now get just 115 credits for $100).
So now you have money in the bank and can start downloading photos. Click on the image you want to download. You will be offered different resolution options. The cheapest - at 1 credit - is good enough for a webpage or a powerpoint slide. Higher resolutions - up to a resolution suitable for poster size - will cost you more. I have never done higher than the basic dollar image and this would probably be fine for most of what you need unless you are a professional user.
Choose the size you want and click the download button. This brings up the contract license agreement which specifies what you can and can't do with the picture - it's unlikely that you are planning anything that breaks the agreement but if it's your first time, give it a good read through. Basically you are buying a personal copy and you can use it in certain ways. You can't give it to someone else but you can use it in a brochure or advert subject to a maximum number of copies. You can only
make one copy of the file and one back up - all fairly standard stuff. Click the ACCEPT button and then click the big download button again. If for any reason you mess up the download, you can try again as many times as you need within the next hour without being charged again.
I'm a photographer, what's in it for me?
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I have only used the site as a buyer of photos but I believe that there are good opportunities for photographers to make some money supplying photos to the site. I suggest you have a look at the site and investigate this further. You don't get much for each image but if you list something that people really like and download in great numbers, the little fee for each download could add up. And even if it doesn't make you rich and famous, it's a chance to have your photos accessible to potential buyers worldwide.
Consider yourselves honoured
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This site has been so valuable to me that I've always been careful to only tell people I REALLY like about it - and they all love it too. I'm sharing something very precious with you - please go and give it a look.
Need images? They have millions. 
