Photos are photos and not computer renderings

This assumes that the raster illustrations/3d illustrations are tagged in the database as something other than photos.

To implement something like this it would likely mean that all the contributers would have to disambiguate their file types.

me too.

This is not a solution, but you can always add


NOT 3D


or whatever term you don't want to see, to avoid an awful lot of the rendered images. Not all the renders are tagged 3D, but many are, so you can avoid an awful lot of them by just typing that in after your specific search term i.e.


house NOT 3D


produces much better results for you.


Also, you can save your preferences in the advanced search panel to avoid seeing, audio, illustrations & flash etc

(Edited on 2010-05-13 17:38:39 by kelvinjay)

that is if everybody added that as a keyword. I didn't.

I have lately....hasn't helped.

I don't think anyone disagrees.

I think I did read it back when it was first posted, but admitedly, not lately. I just re-read it and it really doesn't give the kind of guidelines we all need as to when to add this keyword. Seems to me for this to be useful we need guidelines and a mandate.


I realize there are some very easy cases, but if I take a photograph of a watercolor, do I add Photograph? If it includes the frame as well as the painting, and the answer was "no" to the first question, does it become "yes"?


I don't do much of this sort of thing for iStock any more, but others do - a raster file that's a collage of various photographic elements and some Photoshop work. Does that get the Photography keyword? If the answer is no, what about an image where I comp in a fake sky? Photo-illustration is a term often used by newspapers and magazines to describe this sort of creation.


When a 3D render gets touched up in Photoshop, does that still get the 3D keyword?


I could go on, but I think that for these terms to be useful - and I wholeheartedly agree that we need to make it easier for buyers to focus in on the stuff they want (even though default should be everything) - we need to (a) get everyone following the same rules and guidelines, (b) find some batch way to do the best fixup possible on the existing collection and (c) add some more terms to cover the full range of content types (Photo composite, photo illustration, raster illustration, digitized traditional illustration/painting, 3-D render, etc.)

I don't see why they would go to the trouble they would have to in order to make 3D its own category. where does the categorizing stop? I see very heavily photoshopped images under photos, combined 3D/photo composites, where does the line get drawn between real photo and surreal photo including 3D?


I regret that some customers would like to eliminate 3D from photo searches, especially given that 3D is a genre of image I also submit. but I primarily submit photos and I see no reason whatsoever to spend development time on separating the two when the lines defining what is a true PHOTO would be so blurred.

nice post ismproductions, as a Buyer, I too, have had trouble with this. I have absolute respect for 3D artists, but renders do have a plastic quality. Period. There are times when they are acceptable for what I need and times when they are not. It would be nice to have an easy way to remove/include in a search. (The times I have needed a photo and I was searching, using the search terms + or - did not help as you've all suggested.)

It seems to me that to help clear things up in the time before the NEW WONDERFUL PERFECT SITE TO COME is released that the catagories checkboxes (That Should only have ONE on by default) should read RASTER/.JPG IMAGES and VECTOR IMAGES. But I think in the future there should be more choices as others have mentioned. 2 cents.

++ Jo Ann and Stacey


My definition of TRUE PHOTOS is: The Real Unaltered Editions (of) Pictures (which then) Have Other Than Original Stuff (done to them). Meaning "whatever the artist (whether photographer or illustrator or painter or whichever) thinks s/he saw the instant prior to the initial instant when 'image creation' began - regardless the tool or medium to capture it".


OK, silly. But I think true. Because after that, it's ALL creativity - no matter what the medium, the tools or the processes. An image of any type can't exist - other than as perceived in that instant on the fly - until it has been "processed" in one way or another, by one tool/set of tools or another. Or more likely these days, by multiples sets or combinations of any of those.


The obvious problem is it used to be there were just a relatively few - relatively easily differentiated - tools/processes to affix an image to a surface. And only a few relatively easily differentiated types of surfaces to affix images to.


But now that (IMO) even "purists" (of any persuasion) can't easily separate one image creation process or tool from another, nor draw a distinct line between where any one formerly perceived to be distinct process or tool ends and another begins - ESPECIALLY as "real surfaces" like paper or canvas or stucco walls inexorably give way to virtual pixel panels of all sorts - then definitive "image type" categorizing becomes an intriguing academic exercise, but an ever-increasingly frustrating folly to try to nail down.


This is a "whack-a-mole" game on steroids in my view. Anymore, asking "What is a photo?" vs. "What is something else?" has way too many darkened alleys and wayward detours for logical people to try to debate effectively enough to agree on a slippery working definition - never mind a precise set of rules that always work for programming into a computer which at some level insists on absolute yes or no answers for every question.


Maybe I'm overcomplexifying the discussion (wouldn't be the first time!), and of course I also agree it should be easier for buyers to find exactly what they are looking for. I just don't know that there can be an easy way to accomplish it anymore.


(My 2 cents - on steroids)

^ interesting points, but way overcomplicated and far too complex for a drop down. seriously, where do we draw the line? it is a heavy philosophical question in some ways, because so much manipulation is involved as part of the photographic process. I personally have never subscribed to the 'straight out of the camera' definition of a photograph.


to me, a true photograph is a composite---a capture of the subject, a moment in time, environment, light, emotion, various complementary or contrasting elements and the attitudes of both the subject and the photographer conveyed successfully. a photograph is a creative representation of all those elements.


a 3D is a realistic rendering of objects designed to emulate conditions normally captured in a photograph. 3D images can have a very plastic and false perfection to them, but some 3D artists like mevans create incredibly realistic 3d renders that sometimes are indistinguishable from real objects. I don't see any realistic or appropriate means of first--defining what is a photograph here, and second--technically finding a way of grouping it with similarly defined images.


I understand why it would be easy for photographers to suggest that 3Ds should be put in their own group, but it isn't that simple, at all.

(Edited on 2010-05-13 22:54:08 by stacey_newman)

The interesting thing is that this seems to be the objective of some (quite a lot of) photographs, too.

We've hit this from the other side so to speak in the Illustration world, we have to upload raster based files as photos not illustrations right now. I'd love to have them branded as 'raster illustrations' or something like that. I worry they get lost a bit in searches because people can just search with illustrations ticked so they don't appear and I guess it also causes issues like this, so sorry to the OP I understand your concern but there is an issue too from the contributor side. Unfortunately not an easy answer tho.

The difficulty is if people download an 'Illustration' they expect an Illustrator EPS and if they find just a JPG they'll feel there's been a mistake even tho it was created in Photoshop or a 3D package or wherever so just dropping these into the Illustration section won't work. I'm not a 3D artist myself just a cartoonist but thought I'd make the point.

I Strongly aree with the OP. As a buyer, adding a "rendered" check box would be very benificial to me. I have been looking for a photo in the past and settled on a rendered image, but it would be much more convienient to be able to tick two boxes, Photo and rendered, to include renders in my surch results.


As a contributor, It was only receintly that I learnt about adding keywords like "photo" to an image search and I know that if i did add that keyword i would be missing out on potential purcheses (as jsnover said).


To me, a purchaser should have to do as little work as possible to find the correct image and have an easy time doing so. By selecting "photo" in the check box that is what i expect to find.


To me, a contributer should put in the extra work needed to make the buying experience as easy as possible


I also think that Istock has the responsability to make life easier to both contributor and buyer.


in short, add a rendered check box.

I don't like the term 3d at all and 3d rendering is not much better. There is nothing 3 dimensional about any of the images here. Images are all 2 dimensional by nature. But that is not the fault of istock or the artists. Its just imprecise language in popular use. I do think such renderings should have a check box, even though some images may defy strict definition.

No, it's a proper term. It is a rendering of a 3d scene.

There's no real need to split them out from any other type of raster image, any more than we split people images out, or scans of paintings, or anything else. Proper keywording, descriptions and the image zoom should provide any buyer with the data they need.

I've had a client choose a photo that upon download had really poor stitching/cloning. It was a XXL image. I called customer service - and they refunded the purchase.

Images that are not up to par need to be reported.

My point is that quality has nothing to do with medium.

To address the OP. I agree that it is difficult, especially when "3d" or "render" is not in the discription or keywords. But, sjlocke has offerd a good way to exclude most from a search.

(Edited on 2010-05-14 07:35:29 by Pixel-Pizzazz)

I tag my computer renderings with the terms "Digitally Generated Image" and "Computer Graphic". I'm not sure if these are proper terms for 3D renderings. Any one have any other suggestions? I would like to suggest "Ray Traced Image" as a new term to add to the search list.

I agree with the OP about this, I would like my 3D renderings to be separately searchable from photographs although I know there are gray areas where some images are mixtures of both.

My 2¢.

bingo