09 Dec 2015 Shutterstock Launches Photo Editor Tool
Stepping confidently into the territory of online design startup Canva, today Shutterstock has released a new photo editor tool.
Shutterstock Editor, released in beta, is free and accessible from photo detail pages on the website for anyone with a Shutterstock account.
Shutterstock Editor
Similar in both concept and design to the Canva interface, the initial beta version of the editing tool is quite basic, providing only crop and filter tools. The edits can be applied to any image from the Shutterstock library prior to download by clicking the new ‘Edit Image’ button in the image’s detail page.
The cropping can be done to a custom size as well as a variety of preset sizes for popular social media and presentation standards. There’s a set of 10 different filters, named after elements of the periodic table, to modify the final look of the image. The final image can then be downloaded with an option to download the original too.
In the near future the tool will include more design features like free-form cropping, resizing and text overlay.
Competition for Canva?
Canva’s early success has clearly caught the attention of microstock agencies. Canva chose to build a stock photo collection rather than partner with an existing agency, despite every agency offering.
Microstock agencies with money in the bank and diversification on the agenda will logically try to move into this space by building something like Canva.
As the most profitable microstock agency, Shutterstock is the first to take a step. And one would presume they’ll continue following Canva’s lead in the space.
It’s also logical to expect other microstock agencies would follow suit too, but I’m not too sure who’s in a position to do so.
Fotolia is now part of Adobe who have their own integration with Adobe’s professional design products and seem relatively content in that space. For now.
iStock as part of the Getty Images family has bigger problems to solve, and is likely too big and slow to build something so different to what they already have.
Dreamstime is languishing, and Depositphotos is still heavily focussed on growth. Pond5 could put some of their $61m funding we haven’t seen much from yet into building a Canva competitor, maybe focussed on video – that would be interesting.
Or maybe Shutterstock’s photo editor will just be a stand-alone tool like Sequence, their video editing app, and I’m getting excited over nothing. Time will tell.
Paul Mlecher
Posted at 17:59h, 09 DecemberI think the key here is their pre-formatted editor. They are not so much trying to replicate Canva but rather offering their clients the ability to immediately download the right size to fit their project, eliminating a tedious step. The other functions are just cherries on the top. If they see a large usage or a strong demand, then they will certainly expand. In other words, they are testing the waters ( thus the Beta).
Lee Torrens
Posted at 13:03h, 10 DecemberI don’t think they’re trying to replicate Canva directly, which is why I said it’s a step in that direction. Right now it’s a value-add, for sure, but they’re promoting at the top of their homepage, both the logged-in and not-logged-in versions, so they’re “testing the waters” very enthusiastically. If it doesn’t fly with that promotion, maybe they’ll rethink, but I think it’s more likely that they’ll continue following Canva’s path with some variation in the details.