One of the occasional tasks that I have in my business is doing a stock photo search for clients (stock photos are collections of photos of all different subjects that can be used in communications for fees that range anywhere from $1 to over $1,000, but are generally cheaper and easier than hiring a photographer). Yesterday I was doing a search for pairs of people looking at each other: couples of different ages, moms and babies, granddads and grandkids, even a woman and her cat.
I had managed to find almost entirely photos of white people, and the client also wanted to depict a diverse clientele. She’d specifically mentioned a young latina, and an african-american man. So I did searches on “latina” and also on “african-american couple.”
It was difficult to find a photo of a latina that was not a “sexy latina.” And most of the photos of african-american couples were a bit too steamy for a fund-raising brochure.
So I shifted my ethnic search to “asian couple.” None of the asian couples were standing with their hips thrust together, or lying in bed, or half-dressed, like the african-american couple search. In fact, the opposite was true: the couples seemed almost devoid of sexuality.
I wasn’t looking at the work of one photographer displaying his prejudices: I was viewing the work of dozens, if not hundreds of photographers who contribute to two different stock photo services.
Most of my clients, like this one, are sensitive to the notion that they should show photos that look like the people they see in their business. As a woman, I certainly notice collateral such as a conference invitation I received recently, where the focal point of each photo was a young white man, women were in the background or entirely absent, and there were no non-white people. But if the photographers who are supplying the photos are not equally sensitive, then those of us who design the collateral are stuck with the choice of wholesome white people, sexy black and latino people, and homely asian people.
I ended up using a young but homely asian couple, and a pair of african-american children.
10 responses so far ↓
1 Toastie // Nov 6, 2007 at 3:36 pm
Please don’t take offense if and when I mock stock photos. A new one just showed up on a main work website today that’s ripe for mocking.
2 Phil // Nov 6, 2007 at 4:01 pm
I feel your pain. In more ways than one.
On a practical note for future efforts, I wonder if any multicultural marketing groups (or specialty agencies) could point you to better sources?
For semi-related commentary on growing up Asian in the south, see this old essay about my young (and maybe homely?) years.
http://archerpelican.typepad.com/tap/2007/05/the_answers_to_.html
3 cd // Nov 6, 2007 at 5:14 pm
My search was somewhat truncated in that I was only looking at people who were looking at each other. That may have skewed things a bit…but maybe not.
Stock photos can indeed be pretty bland, Mr. Toast. I’ve seen some hilarious satires of the standards: shaking hands, smiling perky young woman at call center, etc. The latest crop of stock photo services are pretty amazing, though, in that almost anyone can submit photos, and the range of images and creativity is not only wider than I’m used to but cheaper by hundreds of dollars.
4 dana // Nov 7, 2007 at 3:26 pm
try gettyimages.com
Their search engine is pretty good and I found lots of photos of people looking at each other that didn’t perpetuate the stereotypes you mentioned.
5 cd // Nov 7, 2007 at 3:44 pm
Getty is great, and I used them exclusively for years when I had a corporate budget. To my knowledge, the most expensive stock photo service around. Last time I priced a photo for a client there it was over $800 for one photo.
6 dana // Nov 7, 2007 at 5:00 pm
Hmm. Well, they’re pricey if you want Rights Managed, but if you’re willing to buy Royalty Free, you can get a nice image for about $50. Admittedly, that’s not as cheap as swiping some other services, but for the quality, it seems reasonable to me. I also found their collections of RF disks to be quite useful…if you could had projects that required a theme of several images, it often worked out to be less costly than buying individual images.
7 dana // Nov 7, 2007 at 5:59 pm
Wow, I’m not normally that illiterate. That post read like a lolcat.
“that’s not as cheap as swiping some other services” means not as cheap as swiping an image or using some other services…
“if you could had projects that required a theme of several images,” should have read “if you had projects…”
Sorry for my inattentive typing!
8 Lenore // Nov 8, 2007 at 9:41 pm
Would using the creative commons licensed photos on flickr (or elsewhere) be an option?
9 Roger Green // Nov 9, 2007 at 12:28 am
I’ve been reading a page called racialicious.com; they might find your conclusions interesting and might lead you in another direction.
10 cd // Nov 9, 2007 at 7:50 am
Interesting comments all. I glanced at racialicious and will have to give it a closer look (and maybe a link if I ever get around to updating my blogroll).
I’d be wary of creative commons, especially for photos of people, because of legal issues of releases, which are handled by the stock services, and also of quality, because most non-professional photographers don’t take photos in high enough resolution for print. Also, the stock services (at least the better ones) have robust search engines specifically for looking for certain criteria: so I can do a search on “asian middle-aged smiling horizontal grayscale” for instance. I do know of a stock photo service for gay and lesbian subjects, and I’d wager that there are others out there for specific ethnic groups…time to expand my search.
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