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Interview with Lanny Ziering, CEO of SuperStock

John: Lanny, I know as a founding member of Blend Images. Now you are CEO of SuperStock. Can you share with us a little about your background and how he became CEO of SuperStock?

Lanny: Well, it's a kind of narrative abducted by aliens. I got my first camera when I was about 8 or 9 and had a hand in almost all the way to school. I was the photo editor of my school yearbook and decided to go to the Art Center, but I looked at pictures taken by people like Irving Penn, Richard Avedon and David Bailey. The more I looked, the more I thought to my own images were Total Crap and never better. So I sold my enlarger and my Nikon F, abandoned any hope that the meeting of Jean Shrimpton and went to UCLA, where I finally got an MBA.

After school I had many jobs, including Working right after the launch of MTV. Over time, I went to work at a television station in Los Angeles as director of the program. This is the part where foreign hostages and I spent seven years working in consulting PricewaterhouseCoopers global energy companies and long distance. Fast forward to 2002: IBM buys PricewaterhouseCoopers Consulting business. They pushed me right or I miss (depending on who you believe) and before touching the ground, I decided that wanted to go back to the summer I graduated from high school.

I could not do much about all the gray hair, but I decided to pursue a career in photography. In retrospect, appears as a concept crazy. But something very strange happened. A friend of the production program for a short cable network, Fine Living, hired me to shoot still images and the use of Avid editing software to animate still images in a sort of Ken Burns' passing. I bought a new Canon D60 and never looked back. It was not long before he met Lawrence Manning, a stock photographer with great talent. We work in partnership outbreaks in a bunch of shares and soon to get royalty checks in the mail.

Long story short, I went with Betty Beauty Lorenzo (Mallorca) to a small gathering of about 30 shooters values in Las Vegas. Mixture was born at this meeting and Rick Becker-Leckrone me asked to assist in the formation of the company. I spent the next four and a half years of working with Rick to realize your vision. Then begin to ask: "What do we do now?" Start a small group of us around ideas kicking at the meeting New York PACA and Gustavo Baez launched the idea, why not buy Superstock?

Why Why not, indeed. Alan Bailey (from Rubberball) and I took the plane to Jacksonville. We woke up from sleep walking outside the federal bankruptcy courts offer Steve Pigeon Superstock. At a ceremony without bloodshed has been anointed the new CEO of SuperStock. It was all a bit unreal. In the best tradition of the securities firm, we all went for dinner this evening with Steve, drank too much wine, and has agreed to distribute content. Is this a big industry or what?

Juan SuperStock was purchased in bankruptcy court. Can you fill the ramifications of what has been SuperStock and how it affects photographers and clients?

Lanny: Superstock experienced trauma. Employees are an amazing group and, despite what they have experienced, still believe in the company. Almost all photographers, customers, partners and image distributor has decided continue to work with Superstock.

The ownership of the company is back in the hands of aa photographers and Morgan Stanley have been purely Financial. Superstock is again a place which is on the photographic image and those who create these images and those who use these images to communicate.

John: What do you think are the strengths of SuperStock?

Lanny: Superstock has three major advantages. First, taxpayers hundreds of photographers worldwide who provide photos to us. This has produced an extraordinary collection art, vintage, travel and landscape, and contemporary imagery. Second, a large base of loyal customers in the publishing and advertising. Third, a very talented staff that works daily to Photographers and customers as well.

Juan: What are SuperStock areas of vulnerability?

Lanny: I could tell you but I should kill you.

Juan: What is your vision for where you want to have SuperStock?

Superstock Our plan is very simple. We stabilize the company as we maintain content, customers and staff that make a big agency Superstock. We almost completed this phase. Now, we optimize the assets of the company's image and relations.

It is no secret that the Superstock has not been well treated in recent years and there is much we do to get more photos on the market and easier for customers to find images you need. We will continue to compete by offering customers a unique collection of works of art, vintage, travel, and imaging contemporary with a deep understanding of how images are used.

John: Do you plan Micro to incorporate into the mixture?

Lanny: We are studying several options but I do not think Micro will be the first thing to do.

John: You see the eventual sale of shares in expanding beyond traditional buyers of shares?

Lanny: Consumers are the Holy Grail, I suppose. Consumers seem to have an endless fascination with celebrity, to what will undoubtedly be new ways to upload photos of Miley, Madonna, Rihanna, and next week is small. I can also imagine consumers who want to see art images, remote locations, and historical events. Here we are well positioned to serve this market.

Juan: There are many rumors in the photographic community about the lack of concern for large agencies the individual photographer. Is the economic viability largest individual SuperStock Photographer? Should it be important for agencies?

Lanny: I can not speak for other agencies, but Superstock attaches great value to the individual photographer. After all, the owners Superstock are photographers. It is in our DNA. Mix has undoubtedly shown that an agency can succeed by worrying about the success of photographers. We can not succeed unless our success photographers. So we create a close relationship between people who speak our sales to buyers picture everyday and our editors who talk to photographers that they know will sell issues.

John: Agencies such as Getty constantly reduce human resources interaction with photographers and clients. Is this something that is inevitable and necessary, SuperStock same?

Lanny: We think a lot about how to increase interaction between the editors and photographers.

John: A subscription offers SuperStock is. Is the subscription model works for photographers and agencies?

Lanny: different clients have different ways to buy paintings. Some have no problem paying $ 20,000 for the perfect image to go on a can of beans and others need to download hundreds Picture a day to put on a blog for collectors of butterflies. Photographers and agencies must find ways to make money from any client.

Juan: I have the impression that the market short film is moving away from print and over the Internet as the world shrinks and printing is increasing in the world Online. My impression is correct? If so, does this present a problem Low prices for Internet use?

Lanny: It is true that there is a change from paper to pixels. I think is too early to accurately predict the future shape of the Internet market for the images. The public Internet is now very fragmented, but they become more concentrated may be able to charge more for fascinating images.

On the other hand, the nature of the printing and the Internet are different. A striking image is probably the key to attract a customer to buy a magazine or stop and see an ad on a page. But Web browsing is, ironically, less visual and more text-oriented print images that can not have the magnetic power (or the economic value) not the publisher.

John: In what sense do you think of the price structure for RF image file, and I assume that the microphone you need to change? Do you think this will change?

Lanny: The price is alchemy. Do well and make lead into gold. Do it evil and turn gold into lead. RF nominal prices may seem that they are increasing, but there is much evidence that prices are down overall RF (I dare say the words "Premium Access"?). At the same time, prices are up in the area microphone. Macro and micro appear to converge, but the prices do not respond not always. Indeed, the ratio of 1-100 price two years ago continues to decline.

John: Is the use growing in the video market risk for still images?

Lanny: Video will increase, it is inevitable. But there is nothing that has the power of an image. My generation has been formed by television, but every important event in our lives are defined by a still image. When people think of the Vietnam War they think the image of the man who was shot in the head the guy in shirt sleeves or short-girl napalm scars along the roads.

When you think the revolution of students on Tiananmen Square is the image the man with plastic bags to the tank. I think he was actually killed in the video but I remember him as a single framework. And the definition of the image of Barack Obama blow flies used in the hope "posters. I did not think anything will ever replace how an image sets allows us to make that life denies us: to stop time.

John: Do you think SuperStock offers video?

Lanny: Yes.

John: Some are predicting a world radically different images Archives in just five years. Do you see any major changes on the horizon?

Lanny: One thing is certain: Look no not work very well for someone to search for innovations in the way agencies allow customers to search for images. I also expect convergence between still images and sequences, perhaps the packages for integrated campaigns.

John: Have you advice to the veteran photographer photo agency?

Lanny: Talk to people who buy photos see what you want, go kill him.

John: Do you have any advice for photographers who enter the field of photography stock?

Lanny: As William Goldman said about the film industry, "nobody knows anything." Learn everything you can about photography and advertising and journalism and publishing, then drop everything and listen to their instincts.

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