Note: These calculators are not officially supported by the agencies and may not be accurate for all settings. They are provided only as an aid to understanding and discussing how microstock agencies calculate royalties.

Why Don’t the Rates Match?

Fotolia calculates royalties differently to other microstock agencies.

The credits they use to pay contributors have a value fixed at $1, €1 or £0.75. The credits customers use to buy content vary in value depending on the size of the package purchased, ranging from 1.30 USD to around 0.74 USD, and equivalent amounts in other currencies.

Because the price and royalty are calculated from different values, the rates rarely match up.

If you set the Credit Package to one of the packages above 1,000, the Real Royalty Rate is actually higher than Fotolia’s advertised royalty rates. But whenever a customer buys fewer than 1,000 credits at a time, the Real Royalty Rate is lower.

Things to Note About the Fotolia Royalty Calculator

• The calculator assumes you’ve set your prices to the maximum allowed for your level
• The calculator converts all currencies to USD for the calculation, but Fotolia may calculate currencies directly, for example a GBP purchase to EUR payout, rather than converting both to USD
• Fotolia offsets currency fluctuation risk with margins for non-core currencies (customers pay more if they buy in other currencies). The fixed value of contributor credits means Fotolia retains the full benefit, and full risk, of this margin. That’s why changing the purchase currency doesn’t affect the royalty amount but lowers the real royalty rate.
• For maximum flexibility and calculation of theoretical royalties, the credit pack size doesn’t automatically increase to cover the cost of the license you’re calculating. Do so manually for realistic calculations.
• Fotolia calculates royalties to four decimal places and sums them in your account. As this calculator only calculates single purchases, a standard rounding is done on the royalty figure.

Discussion for this calculator is here. Read more about Fotolia here.

Note: These calculators are not officially supported by the agencies and may not be accurate for all settings. They are provided only as an aid to understanding and discussing how microstock agencies calculate royalties.

Things to Note About the Dreamstime Royalty Calculator

• For maximum flexibility and calculation of theoretical royalties, the credit pack size doesn’t automatically increase to cover the cost of the license you’re calculating. Do so manually for realistic calculations.
• Dreamstime offsets currency fluctuation risk with margins for non-core currencies (customers pay more if they buy in other currencies). From my observations it appears that Dreamstime always calculates contributor royalties as if the transaction occurred in US Dollars. That’s why changing the purchase currency doesn’t affect the royalty amount but lowers the real royalty rate.
• From my observations it appears that Dreamstime rounds ‘down’ to the nearest full cent, so that’s how this calculator is programmed.

Discussion for this calculator is here. Read more about Dreamstime here.

[Update 2012-07-20: Following Dreamstime’s reversal of its policy to share referral costs with contributors I have removed the Referred Buyer and Referred Contributor fields from the calculator]

Note: These calculators are not officially supported by the agencies and may not be accurate for all settings. They are provided only as an aid to understanding and discussing how microstock agencies calculate royalties.

Things to Note About the iStockphoto Royalty Calculator

• For maximum flexibility and calculation of theoretical royalties, the credit pack size doesn’t automatically increase to cover the cost of the license you’re calculating. Do so manually for realistic calculations.
• From my observations it appears that iStockphoto rounds ‘up’ to the nearest full cent, so that’s how this calculator is programmed.
• XSmall size is not available for Vetta and Agency collections. If you choose these settings the calculator shows zero for all amounts.

Discussion for this calculator is here. Read more about iStockphoto here.

FX data courtesy openexchangerates.org