Alamy Reviews 313

A ton of rules and confusion loading and tagging and then they don't pay the photographer once a picture is purchased. I have a thousand pictures online and 3 have sold for a measly 15.00 and they will not pay out for this in over 3 years because you have to make a specified amount before they let go of your money and hold on to all of your photos that they sell for pennies. It is a truely shameful experience.

What a complete waste of time!!!!
You can not use a Bridge Camera or your mobile.
This is backwards!!!
The tech in top end mobile camera phones enables the sensor to stay small but they add lens to compensate for this. Leica are just one of the pioneers of this and the tech is not that new.
Bridge cameras can outperform low and medium slrs and again this is down to the tech not the sensor size.
It is complete BS that they don't know the type of camera when uploading images, it even says to you if it was taken on bridge or Mobile.
Out of date photo snobbery.
So in summary if you have all the gear and no idea,
Spend €10,000 on dig SLR and lenses.
And you want to carry all of your gear with you all the time.
You will miss every action shot lugging and setting up all your gear around, and in the event yoh do get that great shot, you will never sell it, by the sounds of things.
Complete marketed rubbish!!!

I have been contributing to Alamy for a few years now and after the initial rejection, I left it for a while until I felt that my photography had improved sufficiently. I check and recheck my photos at 100% and sometimes if I am not sure, I don't upload them for fear of them rejecting one and then you get put on hold for about 10 days. I think I will give it the miss as the time that it takes to prepare and then waiting for QC is not worth it. I have never sold a photo in the time I have been with them. I don't think i have even had any zooms which is disappointing as I am a reasonably good photographer. Maybe it is the subject matter. I don't know the answer but I will be going elsewhere I think.

Photo Error.
Searching the web I came across an Image taken in
the Tarra Bulga NP. The image states the Fungus in the Image is Mycena leaiana. The ID is incorrect this is
Galerina patagonica this species has an annulus which is obvious in the image.

Alamy is a crook site. They do sell images that are protected by a copyright (i.e. images from the British Museum, the MET, etc). I do not understand why the relevant institutions do not take any measure to stop this.

I have been submitting images to Alamy for 11 years but recently their service levels have become intolerable.
Six weeks ago I submitted four separate batches of photos over a two day period. One photo in one batch failed QC, but all photos in all four batches were rejected. My account was frozen for this one-off oversight. I understand the need to maintain standards, but rejecting perfectly good photos in unrelated batches is unnecessary, vengeful and causes resentment.
I submitted another batch which has now been languishing in QC for three weeks. This is beyond the joke, and I doubt I'll be using Alamy again. They don't seem to want our photos and it's no longer worth all the hassle.

Why are Alamy badging photographs as their own which are clearly not. I am a historian currently producing work which uses Nineteenth Century images. There are many drawing, painting and photographs available online from the period, produced in the Nineteenth Century, often coming from local archives which are now appearing with the Alamy badge. These are images produced by long dead artists and photographers, any copyright expiring decades ago, and yet they appear time and time again with Alamy emblazoned across them.
Alamy are not alone in this, there seem to be an epidemic of web based organisation claiming historical image as their own. Many show the same images, taken from originals or printed in publications of many types, yet they are all claiming ownership. I appreciate these organisations holding images for us all to share, however, given the increasing cheapness of internet storage and the ability of anyone to upload images to a web page, and the ability of search engines to find these images, I hardly think it necessary for this type of image to be placed on these stock image sites.
And Alamy actually want me to pay several pounds for an image which is out of copyright and has no clearly attributable source... Please stop doing this, I know that you want to become internet billionaires but you cannot own images that were never yours, or your clients, in the first place. Rant!

I've not had any images stolen like others are alleging. However, their review time for images and the draconian ban that you get when they don't like one of them is very off-putting.

I can understand that they don't people continually uploading low quality images but they discount any in the queue after one they don't like. For me, there are usually many in the queue since it takes them a very long time to review any. This means that after some subjective dislike of one image, they discount many more without considering them. I then cannot upload again for 10 days, then have to re-upload all the images that they discounted without looking at.

If you want to waste a lot of time with stock site the Alamy are top of the tree.

MISREPRESENTED STOLEN IMAGES FOR PROFIT?
I am a musicologist researching early music, including nineteenth century sheet music. I have noticed on a few occasions Alamy charges for high resolution pictures of decorative sheet music covers which can be found at library sources online at the same resolution FOR FREE! Have they stolen these images? I have to wonder. One might argue that they come from a different copy than the library — then why do they have the same pen/pencil notations and stains in the exact same places? Would understand if they were honest about their source but they are not. Would never order anything from Alamy.

I don't have very many images with Alamy but noticed one of my images was sold yet I show no sales. There's some flimsy verbiage on their FAQs about having to wait on the customer to get the funds. And it can take up to 3 months! Do they really ever pay out? I am skeptical. Who can investigate whether or not they're fraudulent?

Alamy started as a stock photo agency that Picture BUYERS trusted. I licensed thousands of dollars of images during my years as a photo editor for a large publisher. Now that I'm retired, I sell my own images on Alamy. I really can't understand the bad reviews here. I'm happy with the results of my sales - not a lot, but I only have 500 images on their site. Alamy is a site for professionals! They do not allow photos shot with a phone! They have strict standards for QC and I've had few problems. Almost all my images are accepted with the exception of a few that I knew weren't the best quality. Their rates have gone down over the years, because that's the business these days! The days of ASMP rates are GONE folks!

I’ve been on here for a few years and have to agree they’re an absolute waste of time in every sense.
The length of time it takes for images to be graded is ridiculous! I’ve never received not one sale in the years I’ve been contributing and it makes no sense for the grades I receive.
The only thing they use to be good for is the scoring if you are new to photography and to be quite frank if they’re not selling then you have to question the grading quality.

Speaking as a supplier and a professional photographer for over 30 years.They sell images for peanuts and take forever to pay you, plus you have to have reached certain level on monies outstanding before they pay you which, can take a rather long time given the paltry sums they sell them for in the first place.
Some of the terms they allocate to a purchaser are are somewhat open ended & rather dubious to my mind and therefore easily able to be misinterpreted.

They stole my likeness and are selling pictures of me that I never authorized, nor do I receive any royalties.

I have been a stock photo contributor to a number of websites for a while now and while doing so I have found that sometimes the odd photo slips through with a minor blemish (e.g. a leaf may be ever so slightly soft). This company will absolute destroy you for that. If you make any error at all, you will be locked out for 28 days. No ability to correct, no ability to make the change during the 28 days. They just hold you in "Quality Control" until the time is up. Compare this to other high quality stock photo websites like Shutterstock, which is an immediate turn around to let you process through everything as quickly as possible. Their excuse of a reason behind this policy is laughable too that it "makes you check your work extra carefully before uploading", seeing as the reasons for failures are often arbitrary and nonsensical, with a not insignificant number of images I have uploaded to other sites that were accepted being rejected by Alamy for no reason.

You have to contact them to close your contributor account and they just ignore you and don't respond. I don't know what to do any more and will have to waste my time and money hiring a lawyer just to do something as simple as shutting my account. Absolutely pathetic.

THESE PEOPLE STOLE MY MARINES PICTURES AND ARE SELLING THEM FOR MONEY THEY ARE EVIL!!!!!!!

They steal the pictures of dead veterans and profit from them..

I wouldn't trust this company at all. I've found my own public domain work being resold on this company, and heard this same story from others.
Very shady company.