I am doing an assignment for my professional photography class and am looking for information on stock photography. I would like to know, from a photographer's point of view, how the process works. Does the photographer get paid by a stock photography company for their images? Also, would anyone happen to know of specific calendar or greeting card companies that use images from stock photography companies? Thanks

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Stock photographs are photos taken by photographers who choose to release the use of photos to people. The photographers retain the copyrights and may set the conditions of use. Some release them as royalty free, where you buy the image once and you may use it however many times you want, without having to pay a fee each time you use it (royalties). Some let you use them only under certain circumstances, such as in digital formats only. Some release them under the Creative Commons license, where you may obtain and use them for free as long as you follow certain conditions, such as notifying and/or crediting the photographer in use. Always be sure to check the license agreements for the photo you're using.

Ok. It works like this. You take some photos, depending on their quality they might be accepted by the stock photography website you are submitting them to. Some have higher standards than others. They then sell the images on your behalf. They pay you a percentage of the money they receive from those downloading your image - sometimes a very small percentage. How much they charge will depend on how the image is being used, what size it is, what kind of licence the user has paid for, etc etc.

Stock photography involves selling licenses to use images for various purposes including advertisements, websites, and news articles. There are a few different ways a photographer can license their images. They can either do it themselves, or use an agency. When an agency does the licensing, the buyer pays the agency and the agency pays a royalty to the photographer in turn. There are also microstock and royalty free agencies like istockphoto.com. Buyers pay istockphoto and in turn they pay the photographer.

go to istock.com it will answer all your questions. your instructor should also know.