85148838, Floridapfe from S.Korea Kim in cherl/Flickr

The Flickr Collection on Getty Images has been up and running for a few weeks now and while we hope you like what you are seeing, we want to know the truth — what do you think?

Do you like the images in the collection?

Is there a theme/keyword idea that we are missing in the collection?

Have you found a favorite image on Flickr that you want added in the collection?

Let us know! Leave a comment on this blog and we’ll make sure to take all of your comments and suggestions into consideration as we continue to build this one-of-a-kind collection.

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85322330, Old Dog Photography/Flickr

It is fascinating to see the in-depth coverage of wildlife and nature on Flickr.

Let’s take butterflies for example. There are thousands of Flickr groups sharing butterfly images. Why do I think this is so exciting? Because this means thousands of butterfly species from all over the world are being photographed by people with a passion for the little creatures!

This is a great source of imagery for all the textbook publishers worldwide – so keep shooting! And add the name of the species in the keywords along with locations and include the Latin name in the title whenever possible.

And of course it’s not only butterflies we’re looking for, but all wildlife and nature out there.

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85119012, Julie A. Ziesemann/Flickr

It was just a short two weeks ago today that we launched the Flickr Collection. The response has been great, and in that time we’ve more than doubled the size of the collection and logged nearly 100 sales! (The images in this post are among the recent sellers.) There are images of everything from street corners to castles, puppies to portraits and even (and we’re not quite sure why) underpants full of spaghetti!

And we’re still in high gear! We’re adding more new, fresh, creative images every day. Plus we’ve got some big plans ahead for an even bigger splash in the next few months.

85132759, By Eleonore Bridge/Flickr

85154252, Photo by Vilhelm Sjostrom/Flickr

85423346, amanda vivan/Flickr

85202162, Ellen van Bodegom/Flickr

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One of the most amazing pieces of this collaboration for us here at Getty Images to watch has been the incredible reach of the Flickr community, and how that expresses itself through the location of the artists who are signing up.

So far, Flickr members from 84 countries have joined in the Flickr Collection on Getty Images.

From Australia:

85186754, Leah Consunji/Flickr

to Croatia:

85321912, photographer artist/Flickr

From the Philippines:

85153912, Fresh amazing pictures make people look!/Flickr

to Tunisia:

85485280, Mar?a Aguilar Calero/Flickr

There are already around 100 artists (in some cases a lot more) signed up in places like Italy, Japan, Germany, Spain, the US, the UK, Netherlands, Canada, and so on…

And numbers are climbing in other spots like Brazil, Norway, Romania, Switzerland, Taiwan, Finland, just to name a few.

The most amazing thing of all is that this partnership is just getting started!

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85206885, Siobhan Connally/Flickr

The Flickr Collection has been live less than a week, and already we’re seeing a tremendous amount of interest both here on our site and over on Flickr. Those of us who spend time in the Flickr forums have seen some really good, interesting questions come up over there as well as from our customers. We thought we’d share a few questions and answers here. Starting with the big one:

Q. So, have there been any sales yet?

A. Yes! We’re happy to report that just within the three/four business days we’ve been open, we’ve already seen a number of sales. Not only that, but the sales are from several different countries. The image below is officially the first one sold. Others in this posting are also among the sellers.

85151902, Photo by Tedfoo/Flickr

Q. You’ve said the collection will be growing. How’s that going?

A. Great! Since we launched early last Wednesday, the number of images for sale has nearly doubled. Hundreds more are coming online every day.

Q. I’ve submitted my images and they aren’t up on the site yet, where are they?

A. We’re working through literally tens of thousands of images that have been submitted for the collection. We are getting them inspected and up on the site as fast as we can. Since the day we launched, we have already added nearly 4,000 more images. So hang tight, they’re on the way!

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There is the age old question of photo journalistic integrity… at what point is an image’s integrity compromised by doctoring and where do the lines of doctoring fall?

Clearly when you manipulate an image in Photoshop after the image has been captured, that is clear doctoring and therefore unethical.   However, what about the question of posing and lighting your subjects in the realm of photo journalism?  Clearly the photographer no longer is an observer but rather a participant - the effects of playing a more active role in a journalistic setting could pose a number of ethical questions… is the photographer manipulating the story to tell his story? Is the photographer exploiting the subject? How far is too far? …

Yet with the advancement of technology (and therefore the influx of user-generated imagery saturating the market) and the shifts in the photography industry as a whole, where do the boundaries of creativity and artistry in photo journalism come to play? There are a number of awards in the industry for photo journalists, how does this added factor of competition affect a photo journalist’s need to stand out and how far are we saying they can go?

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We’re all exposed to a huge amount of advertising everyday, things that are seen as challenging and shocking one day are passé the next (or at least the following week). What consumers want and how they relate to the world around them is now more than ever driving brands to think more laterally, be more inventive and demand more interactivity from us all.
The Radical Advertising exhibition http://www.radicaladvertising.de/ currently on show in Dusseldorf’s NRW Forum explores the visual and social conditions that have dictated the direction of advertising over the last 3 decades

The nineties: radical shock – advertising as a means of attack

The noughties: radical life – advertising as a means of making contact 

2010 onwards: radical moral – advertising as a means of co-operation

Along side this drive by consumers is the influence that digital technology has had on how image makers approach making pictures. For a long time the technology has dictated the visual look of the image, but I think now, there’s a shift towards a much more creative attitude of ‘just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should’

This animation could have been created the obvious way using computer animation but instead it was painstakingly rendered one frame at a time by hand, I think it’s the imperfections that give it it’s humanity.  

http://www.blublu.org/sito/video/muto.htm 

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