Stock Photography Keywording Guide
TITLE & DESCRIPTION
You are a contributor of stock photos, when you want to submit images to stock photography sites You will be asked to provide a Title, and Description, for each of your images. All your titles and descriptions must be accurate . Title: Try to keep this short, accurate, and interesting. For example, a photo of the sun rising over the horizon of the ocean taken at a beach in Phuket could be titled, “Sunrise over Water”. But that would be quite boring. A better title would be, “Golden Daybreak at Phuket”. Description: Describe the subject of the photo as simply as you can in one sentence. Using the example above, the description could be, “Beautiful sunrise over the blue waters of Kata Noi beach in Phuket, Thailand”. Remember that buyers will be reading your title and description carefully, so they should be both accurate, and interesting! KEYWORDING What are Keywords, and Why are they Important? Keywords are words that describe your image. If you upload a vertical photo of a dog sitting on a grassy hill with a blue sky in the background, you should include the keywords: ‘dog, sitting, hill, grass, blue sky, vertical’. When someone visits photokore.com and searches for an image, they will type in keywords describing what they are looking for (for example: ‘dog, sitting, hill, blue sky’). Our search engine then checks our database, and returns a list of images that match the keywords that were typed in. In this case, your photo of a dog would appear in the search results page. Keywords = Sales: Keywords are essential to robust sales of your images. Each image uploaded to Photokore must be accompanied by keywords that describe the subject matter as accurately as possible. For example, an image of a woman with curly hair reading a magazine lying on a towel on a beach should have the following keywords: ‘curly hair, woman, beautiful, magazine, reading, towel, beach, leisure, pretty’, etc. Accurate Keywords a re a must: Don’t make the mistake that many amateurs make by thinking a photo is so good that it will sell regardless of keywords. Keywords are necessary to find your photo. If a buyer can’t find it, obviously it’s not going to sell. The importance of good keywording should not be underestimated, and an appropriate amount of time should be taken when adding keywords to your photos. Hint: Avoid keywording JPEG images in Photoshop, because each time you save and resave a JPEG, you run the risk of degrading the quality of your image by adding noise, artifacts, or additional compression to it. If you use Photoshop, open your RAW files for keywording, and then save them as JPEG images. Think about the buyer: The people who buy images are usually employees working for design companies, or ad agencies. They know exactly what type of image they’re looking for, and are working under a deadlines and must find it as quickly as possible. Keywords that accurately describe your photo make it that much faster and easier for them to find your image. Keyword in batches: Keywording your images can be tedious. One thing you can do is keyword a batch of photos from the same shoot session using the same set of keywords. No one enjoys keywording, and it is easier to cut a list down than it is to build one up. You will save time by learning to save and re-use keywords, but ensure that the irrelevant ones are deleted and replaced with more appropriate keywords. For example, if you have a batch of 50 images of a female model that were taken during the same shoot, you could select all of the images in whatever keyword setting tool you are using (Adobe Bridge, for example) and apply the same keywords to that batch of images. These ‘batch’ keywords would just cover the subject, description, and information such as model release, etc. Then, after you have keyworded the entire batch, you can open each individual image and add keywords that are specific to that image. For example, on a close-up you might include the keywords ‘close-up’ and ‘portrait’, while on a full-length image you would add the keyword ‘full-length’. Singular & Plural Keywords: Photokore’s search engine automatically ensures your images appear in the search results when someone searches for the plural version of your keywords. However, a search engine is never perfect, and sometimes it may make a mistake. If you submit a photo of two babies, use the keyword ‘babies’ as well as ‘baby’ to ensure that your image is found. KEYWORDING STRATEGY You should have a plan when it comes to keywording, so that you can keyword each image efficiently and accurately. The following will help you brainstorm keywords to add to your images: Description: As simply as possible, describe to your self what’s in the photo – for example, ‘a woman wearing dress using a mobile phone’. This description should help you decide to include keywords such as ‘woman, mobile phone, dress’, etc. Objects: After doing the simple description (above), list everything else that is in the image. Look at what’s in the foreground and background. You already used the keywords ‘woman, mobile phone, dress’, now add the other keywords (for example, if the photo shows the woman sitting in an office at a desk in front of a window, you should add the keywords, ‘office, desk, window’, etc). Lighting & Colors: what lighting and colors are in the photo? If the image is in a dark office, you might add the keyword ‘dark’. Is the office dark because it is nighttime? Then you should add the keyword ‘night’ or ‘nighttime’. Action (i.e. what's happening): This is actually an extension of the description (above). If the woman using the mobile phone is crying, then the keyword ‘crying’ should be added as it describes ‘what’s happening’. Location: Only include specific location names (i.e. country, city/town) as keywords i f the location is easily recognizable in the image. In the example above, if you could see Tokyo Tower (or streetsigns written in Japanese) through the window, then you should definitely include the keywords ‘Tokyo, Japan, Japanese’. However, if you c an not tell from looking at the photo which city or country the photo was taken in (even if it was actually taken in an office in Tokyo), then you should not include the keywords ‘Tokyo’ or ‘Japan’. However, if you c an easily tell from the office décor in the background that the setting was obviously an office in Japan (i.e. charts written in Japanese on the wall, documents on the desk with Japanese writing, etc), then you would include ‘Japanese’ as a keyword. Hint: Use keywords such as "interior" and “exterior” when submitting images of buildings, this also helps buyers to quickly find what they are looking for. Concept (or Mood): Does your image convey a concept or mood? In the example we’ve been using (the woman crying while using her mobile phone in a dark office), the image could be conveying the concept of ‘depression’, ‘sadness’, or ‘loss’, etc. Synonyms: Add relevant synonyms for any keywords you have included. In the example above, for the keyword ‘office’ you could also add the keyword ‘workplace’. And for ‘mobile phone’, you could add ‘cell phone’. Abbreviations and Slang: Although we commonly use abbreviations and slang in daily conversation, when you are adding keywords to your images, you should always include both abbreviations/slang as well as the proper term. For example, if your photo included an automobile in the background, besides the keyword ‘car’, you should also add ‘automobile’ as a keyword. Don’t Go Too Far: A photo of fireworks in the sky would obviously include the keyword ‘fireworks’. Depending on the photo, you might even include ‘explosions’ as a keyword. But, i f you added ‘war’ as a keyword, that would be going too far! Our Keyword Inspectors would delete the keyword ‘war’, so adding it would just be a waste of everyone’s time. |