hadn't seen most of these, a very enjoyable browse - great selection and nice work on the collage.... and thanks for including one of mine too!  =)

as Christo mentioned above, one of your options is selling via stock sites. funnily enough, now might actually be a good time to get into it, at least microstock.... haven't personally seen any sales on macrostock sites (such as Alamy) recently, but designers and publishers are increasingly turning to microstock during the recession as a way of cutting back on their costs, unable to support assignments and staff photographers as they once were. I think I remember reading somewhere recently that there has been something like a 40% increase in sales via microstock sites since the recession hit, due to the relative low cost of per-image sales and the fact that more subscription buyers are actually likely to make use of their allocated number of downloads (example, Shutterstock's 25-a-day package)...

it's not for everyone, and what you may consider your best shots may not indeed be suitable for stock.... it also requires a large portion of time pixel-peeping with a critical eye, and keywording the images uploaded... after which they still might not make it through quality control.... but if you think it might be of interest to you, the best sites to check out are probably iStockPhoto, Shutterstock, Dreamstime and Fotolia. probably your best chance of a regular paycheck selling online..

having only started a couple of months back it's early days, but have already made a couple hundred sales, so it can be done ;) ... also a couple of sales on DeviantArt but I wouldn't recommend that as the artist royalties are pathetic.. somewhere around 10% when you get down to it! you could also try RedBubble, though I have no personal experience of this site myself, a friend sold a single print for over $200 recently...

hope this is of some use..

Adam

bump... so this doesn't drop off the boards...
probably going sometime towards the end of this week and would like to be able to refer easily to the great advice above, cheers hope you don't mind ;)

very cool selection, thanks a lot for including one of mine too!

ok ok I've been a bit slow updating on here, but now it's the weekend here we go..

Anthony - thanks very much your help/advice/links ... having a look at both yours and Eddie's websites I don't think I could have asked for much more qualified aid! Inverpollaidh sounds great, gonna read up on that a bit, but long walks may be out of the question due to time constraints. I've certainly made a mental bookmark though..

If I only make it to one place, it's likely to be the Glenfinnan viaduct, but I'll factor in whatever else I can on the way there and back. I checked the train times and figured I should aim to be in position sometime around 11am or 1:15pm assuming it's about 1/3 of the way along the line from Ft William to Mallaig. It's likely to be a spur of the moment journey based on the weather forecast..

Speaking of which, Rich decided to postpone his expensive train ticket given the showery forecast on the west coast this weekend, but it's not such a long journey for me so I'll try and get "oot and aboot" sometime soon regardless... with plenty of midgie spray in tow ;)

almost drove down to the Forth bridge yesterday as the light was so nice and I'm yet to photograph it, but decided it'd make more sense to stop off on my voyage home in a couple of weeks. I'm guessing it's easier to get a good angle from between the bridges in South Queensferry than from the north side.... Rich? input?

anyway there's my little update of sorts, thanks you guys for the help, you rock!

Adam

had a look at that and seems very useful... I guess really lazy = time constrained, and that's definitely us ;) so a nice read...
thanks for all the help I'll check back tomorrow with some plans!
Adam

Eddie I'm blown away by this, thank you so much for your detailed help! I'm going to immerse myself in a bit of research and report back with a plan of attack when I've looked at maps/places/forecasts.... I'm driving on this occasion so I'll make a note of the places Rich should be keeping his eye out for.

Those pics you linked to are stunning, I can see why they might act as a great source of inspiration. I 'did' Eilean Donan on my trip early last year to Skye, although admittedly the light wasn't fantastic and I think I could do it better now, but if we're swinging by the area and the light is interesting it'd be worth jumping out for a quick half hour. At the time I took it I was relatively happy with my panorama of the place: http://www.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/full.php?member&image_id=1652561

Thanks again, I think we now have easily enough ideas, it'll just be cherrypicking the best and cramming them into a full 2-day schedule... west coast is looking a general favourite though =)

thank you everyone for your replies, Rich and I spoke last night and are thinking of heading in the general direction of west coast, with a few places earmarked depending on how we do with time/weather. don't think there will be time to make it over to Skye or up to the north coast on this occasion, but we'll see what the west has to offer.

great tips Eddie, and very nice photos on your website.... I remember the area around Fort William was very beautiful but I didn't have enough time to explore it fully last time. Loch Linnhie sounds useful to know about given the possibility of overcast weather/ rainy spells, so will definitely check that out a bit later.... today I'm planning and researching for a 2 1/2 day trip so I guess we're more along the lines of being selective than incorporating everything going. I'll note everything mentioned here and amalgamate it with the few places I've come up with so far.

In my notes at this point as possible places/ places I need to research:

• Dunkeld Falls
• Luss (Loch Lomond)
• Scourie (count that out for this time, too far north)
• Glencoe
• Kilchurn Castle
• Five Sisters of Kintail, Loch Duich
• Bruar Falls
• Rogie Falls (with susp. bridge)
• Buachaille Etive Mor
• Clyde Falls

Input most welcome ;)

Cheers,

Adam

cheers Christo

just thought I'd add this link in: http://www.photospots.co.uk/

I've always wanted for something like that... but it seems a little sparse in Scotland (and generally actually, at the moment)

looks good Tom, congrats on getting it all together, and for the early sales!

seems an ideal location.. when I had a few of mine available for sale last year they were located in a bar and part of a larger event... really nice during the day, when people are more likely to sit and look around them at the decor, than at night, when there's music going, and people are definitely more vocal in their appreciation of their surrounds, but in all honesty are looking more at the people trotting their stuff than the walls around them..! I doubt many people would sit down without noticing your works, they make a nice impact.

as for the paper, I'd try and find out what the print-run/ circulation is and base your decision on that.... if it's not that big they may not have much of a readership and I'd take the publicity to get more people along on basis of a small, one-off licence fee. If that means you might lose the publicity, then I'd do it for free (again on the basis of one-off use for publicity).... after all people can see larger versions of it without buying if they come along anyway, but if they don't know where to come to then you're still in the starting blocks ;) .... just some thoughts....I'd be well happy to be at the stage you're at, nice job and good luck for the coming weeks!

Adam

Indispensible keywording tool created by the top selling microstock photographer Yuri Arcurs:

http://arcurs.com/keywording/index.php

Only found it yesterday but I can already see how it'll save me hours, maybe days in the long run. If you do stock, use this tool - it has been cleverly designed by someone with hundreds of files to upload weekly but who doesn't want to live at a keyboard.

=)

no experience with cs3/cs4 or lightroom I'm afraid so can't offer any advice stemming from on-hands experience but.... apart from whatever new tools though I heard cs4 is essentially a 'faster photoshop' - it has inbuilt graphic acceleration which apparently means you spend a lot less time waiting for screens to load/commands to complete.... also instead of only being able to properly judge an image at (for example) 12.5%, 25%, 50%, 100% due to anti-aliasing applied at other values, cs4 now shows a crisp image in spite of the zoom ratio.

Rich mate, even THAT wouldn't strictly be a reason for upgrade - my 40d raw files aren't recognised by Bridge/Photoshop cs2 but I get around it by batch-converting them all to .dng files as soon as they're on the machine, then wipe the original RAWs. admittedly my average .dng file (lossless, with RAW embedded, just in case) is just shy of 20mb, but I guess it makes me more selective which ones I keep and I end up with a more satisfying selection at the end having gotten rid of everything just taking up space.. 

thanks for the selection guys, some real corkers in there this week!

nice contribution SFGfx, I do quite like the idea of a vertical pano crop.... can't believe I didn't actually remember to take a vertical frame - usually pretty good about getting both variations of a scene!

thanks also for the comment Garlor, glad it made you think and I think aside from turning it upside down most of the useable crops have been 'taken' already anyway ;)

Adam

hehe - funny... yep its all about the angles, if you can shoot with the field of view parallel with the ground I think it does a pretty good job, as soon as you start tilting though you're looking at a painful half hour in photoshop warping and distorting everything back into shape! ... have to say though, it doesn't irritate me enough to consider shelling out for a tilt/shift lens, and I always find something slightly odd about trying to stitch vertical panos of buildings.. just seems like too much bother for most subjects imo... so um.. hurray for wide angles..!