It goes without saying that editing is key to making your visions come true, but this notion rings even truer when it comes to stock photography.

As a photographer, you have to be super meticulous about the details to sell your photos online on famed marketplaces. With standards to meet and rules to follow, stock photo marketplaces come with a built-in handbook—if you want your photos accepted, no stone should be left unturned.

It should be noted that, for the most part, editing stock photography is quite similar to any retouching job you've done with a photo editor. However, if you want your images to meet the standards of world-famous marketplaces, you're going to spend a little more time improving image quality.

This guide will focus on the specific steps you can take to minimize rejection, increase sales, and get your images selling on marketplaces in no time.

Uploading to Marketplaces: A Modern Guide

Requirements for micro-stock photography have always walked with the times, so it is safe to say that the editing process has seen a significant shift over the years. With camera technology improving so rapidly, there are fewer and fewer imperfections in images that have been originally taken.

Plus, there is a noticeable rise in the number of content marketplaces, meaning it's not so hard to break into the world of stock photography anymore; this serves definitely serves to the advantage of the photographer.

Nevertheless, rules and guidelines are there for a reason. Stock content marketplaces, though increased in amount, still demand certain quality for the images they decide worthy of featuring—ignoring their guidelines is the last thing you'd want to do.

This is where you might be thinking, "do I really have to learn all the guidelines for all the marketplaces I wish to be featured on"?. And, true, requirements may vary from one agency to another, but they're definitely common things to look for in your photos that might hinder their acceptance. So let's get into them.

Common Stock Photo Requirements

Again, you should never forget that each and every one of your photos is going to be thoroughly checked when uploading to stock content marketplaces.

Most employ a content review team that will assess your work through parameters set and approved by their company. If luck shines your way, the team might occasionally provide you with feedback that'll either help you resubmit your photos or improve your work in the future. However, not every marketplace does this.

You'll notice your editing skills grow as you familiarize yourself with the standards. And even though the bar is not as high as it was before, you're always safer presenting the highest quality possible for your work instead of going back, re-editing, and doing the whole thing all over again.

Here are eight of the most common things content review and curation teams reject images for:

Problems with exposure
Too much noise
Chromatic aberration
Artifacting
Blemishes
Incorrect cropping
Problems with alignment
White balance problems
Copyright infringement

To avoid these issues as you're moving forward, we advise researching them thoroughly and individually. In the meantime, here are some things you can do while editing to meet industry standards.

Set Good Exposure

Having pre-set and decent exposure cannot be understated. You're going to have a much easier time going into a shoot with good exposure than you are editing it in post. Plus, editing exposure is no easy feat; working on photos that are poorly exposed brings in a bundle of other problems.

It can be extremely hard to keep the digital integrity of your image intact when working on an image with bad exposure, so it is best that your original work already has decent to good exposure.

Clean Up the Noise

Shooting in low light is not as difficult as it used to be—most (if not all) modern cameras possess this capacity. Raising your ISO too high, however, is an unfortunate byproduct, creating an amount of digital noise that is not usually acceptable by stock content marketplaces.

Here's how you can clean up the noise in your photos:

Zoom in 100% and inspect the level of digital noise
Find the noise reduction slider
Find the correct balance within the noise reduction slider
Start cleaning up the noise

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Get Rid of Chromatic Aberration

Ever had too much contrast in a scene? That's chromatic aberration (also known as purple fringing). When it comes to stock photography specifically, this problem cannot be overlooked; it's often the lead cause of rejection.

Here's how to effectively remove chromatic aberration from your images:

Thoroughly check the edges of the objects shown in your photos
Check for the contrast these objects have with the background
Upon seeing a band of color along the edge, correct it

For reference, the color you'd usually notice will either be magenta or green.

Look Out for Blemishes

If you've ever been pleased with a photo and then zoomed in to find a sensor spot, we get your disappointment. Sensor spots are never a welcome surprise.

The best way to avoid this is to, of course, keep your camera sensor clean; however, we understand that it's not always possible. It might get a little dirty mid-shoot, or you might not have sensor cleaners on hand…these things happen.

Plus, dust and other types of blemishes are near impossible to predict, so the next best thing to do here is to master editing them out.

Here's how to edit out sensor spots, dust, and other blemishes most effectively:

Use clone tools
Zoom 100% on all your images
Inspect thoroughly
Check for sensor spots specifically against clear spaces in your images

Align and Crop Your Images

Shooting certain objects with angels means double-checking if things are properly aligned. This goes for architecture, nature, and landscapes; shooting them at a bit of angle is not ideal either, since the horizontal and vertical lines might look a bit odd.

Cropping is probably the best editing tool you can use for proper alignment—using it correctly can definitely be key for your photography to pass inspection.

Correct White Balance

If you want to produce the correct color, editing is the second-best thing you can do. But a sure-fire way to be on top of this step is to have your camera set to auto white balance. Having your camera set to save RAW files is a literal life-saver, especially when you're doing color correction.

To achieve the much sought-after natural coloring in your images, make sure to take advantage of the eyedropper tool and/or color correction sliders.

Edit Out Copyrighted Items

Oh, copyright…one of the most frustrating aspects of stock photography. The sheer amount of things that are copyrighted in the world is so mindboggling that it is actually often safer to avoid anything with a logo or branding when you're taking photos.

But we understand that it's not always possible; the next best thing to do is to remove any shreds of copyrighted material from your photography.

It is worth noting that editorial licensing works a little bit differently, as the requirements for photo copyright are going to differ from standard commercial licensing.

To get a better understanding of this, you'll need to check the terms and conditions for each stock content marketplace; make sure to research separately, as a lot of times, editorial requirements vary from one marketplace to another.

Editing for Editorial Stock Photos

You might know that editorial licensing is a different ball game; what's allowed and what's not allowed is differed as compared to commercial content.

While photos that fall in the standard royalty-free category can be edited at the whim of the photographer, editorial photographs operate under a higher set of standards. The most vital thing to keep in mind is that the use of the clone tool is never going to be accepted; this goes for most alterations, in fact.

Unless you are cloning out sensor spots, any changes made to your editorial content otherwise is very unlikely to be accepted. Your safest bet here is to check and read the rules for each stock photo agency you are submitting to.

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