Suppose you have some interesting nature footage (not necessarily time lapse.) It could be wildlife - like two fiddler crabs arguing over a burrow or an antlion subduing an ant in a sand trap etc. And you wanted to make some money off it. Do you think the best bet would be licensing the clip out as stock footage or monetising it through youtube?

Sure, there have been some success stories on youtube with some people even making a comfortable living out of their online videos but they're the minority. You'd need millions of views to get good money. My highest viewed video on youtube has over 200,000 views and it took at least about three years to make $115 from that. That's what I call slow money. I guess the stock footage route would be the better option if you want to make more money in a shorter time period? Though of course that all depends on if the footage actually sells.

The other thing to consider would be the restrictions in place if you chose to monetise a video through youtube. I vaguely recall reading that when I signed up to youtube's partnership program a few years ago, there were certain conditions in place like - you couldn't edit the video and you couldn't use the video commercially outside of youtube. Just recently, I tried searching for these rules again but couldn't find them - don't know if youtube has made any changes in this area?

not sure why your youtube return is so low... I have a mildly popular youtube channel with just over 6k subscribers... the content is not photo related (http://youtube.com/buffcleb)... I checked one of my videos that has around 300k views and my lifetime revenue off that one video was $800... I average around 70k views a month and earn $200-$400 depending on the time of year... fall leading up to christmas pays the best... this time of year the lowest...

I didn't create the channel to make money... started it before monetization was opened up to everyone but the extra $3k-$4k a year is nice play money... and without having another venue to sell the content I don't see a reason to stop...

Sounds like you have had quite a bit of success with youtube's monetisation.



I just assumed that was the norm since I didn't know any different. Though then again, your quoted video has higher views than mine plus you have a lot more subscribers than I do.

The other thing to consider is that I did not start monetisation when the video was first uploaded. The video may have had something like 17,000 views (I really can't remember) when the monetisation process started. Of course in those days, you accepted an offer from Youtube to join their partnership program, based on the numbers of views you had.

My current balance is a bit over $40. I suspect that it might take another three years or so for that to reach $100!



Neither did I. I simply wanted to share my video with others around the world. I'm not sure if the monetisation thing even existed when I uploaded my first video years ago.

As for actually making money from videos, I'm more tempted to try the stock video option.