First and foremost, 'stock art' is art posted for the use of other people on Deviant art. People who use stock art tend to fall into three distinct groups. The first, and probably largest group, are those people who use images for 'manips', or 'photomanipulation' - creating art from a montage or collection of photos, textures effects etc. The second group are those people who use the stock as reference - whether it be for digital or traditional painting, sculpture etc. The third, and probably smallest group, are those who use the images simply as inspiration - for literature or other pieces of art.

So who should you aim your art at?

The simple answer is that you should aim it towards the first group. This is not predjudice towards the other groups, but that manippers tend to require the best quality and range of images that they can get. If you can cater for them, you are automatically catering for the other two.

HOW TO TAKE A STOCK IMAGE

This is the most important part of stock art. Taking a self-portrait photo with a mobile phone and posting it on DA is NOT stock art. Far too many 'stock artists' have their galleries full of these sort of poor quality, grainy, dark images.

First thing - choose your camera. It is possible to take stock photos with an old point-and-shoot digital camera (heck, that's what I use!) but the higher the mega-pixels, the better. I would advise nothing below 3 mega-pixels. (Mine's 3.2)

Two - choose your subject. Try to think if you want to fill your gallery with all model-shots, or all object-shots, etc, or if you want a mix. Personally, I prefer a mix (though once you get more images in your gallery, you might want to start categorizing it).

Three - set up your subject. It might do to think about lighting - remember, most manippers are going to want to put your image into their own collage - so bear in mind that the more experienced manippers will want to put their own highlights and shadows in. Try to find a place where you have even, balanced lighting, where neither the shadows or highlights are too strong.

Four - set up your subject (cont). Whatever you do,don;t forget the background. Photomanipulators in particular are probably going to want to get rid of the background. A plain wall behind a subject is much easier to cut out than a messy bedroom. If you don't have a plain wall, hang up a bed-sheet or two. Even folds are easier to cut out than an awkward pattern.

Five - camera settings. Most digital cameras will provide you with an option to change the image size. This is a rule of DA when it comes to stock art - IMAGES UPLOADED TO THE STOCK SECTION MUST BE A MINIMUM OF 600X600 PIXELS. The higher the resolution of the image, the better.

Six - Posting ettiquete. So you've taken thirty or fourty excellent images, and want to upload them as art? Fine. Just remember that other people want to upload stock to, and if you have watchers, all those images are going to appear in their dev-watch at once. Be paitent! Upload in batches, and give it an hour or so between each batch. It'll still appear in one lump in your watchers dev-watches, but it'll give other stock artists a chance to upload and get their stuff seen as well.

Who am I to say all this?

Well, I'm a stock artist and a photomanipulator myself. I've learnt some of these tips through experience and practice, and through knowing what a manipulator looks for in a good stock image. I've made mistakes, but I'm willing to pass on what I've learnt from them to others.