Snapped a great photo on your iPhone and figure it might be worth trying to sell into a stock photography market? Foap is a new stock photography market that curates good images from iPhone users for commercial use.
If you’ve taken what you think is a particularly impressive photo, you can upload it via the Foap app. If it’s approved for sale via Foap’s team, it will get added to its own market. If a business or publisher uses the photo, they pay $US40; you get half of that ($US20) via PayPal, and Foap gets the other half.
There’s no shortage of stock photography suppliers out there and thousands of photographers supplying content for them. Foap’s aim, according to co-founder David Los, is to ensure photos are more natural and varied by accessing a wider base. “We have learned from the market that there is a huge need for more variation in photos,” he said. “If you make a search, like for instance on smile, or students, at some of the largest online stock photo companies, you will see that there are always the same type of photos, everywhere! And they may be of great quality, but totally unnatural, with many of them missing out the local feeling that many photo buyers are looking for.”
While Foap is a Swedish company, Australia is the first market it is fully launching into. It’s too early to say if there will be sufficient demand and if the company can find a niche amongst existing stock photography players, but it’s a relatively low-risk option for photos you might otherwise share rights-free.
If you give Foap a try, tell us how it works out in the comments. An Android version is also in the planning stages.
Foap [iTunes App Store]
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