As someone who creates online content daily, and has worked in social media for the last decade or so, I've seen a LOT of stock photography.
I work with it every day - and honestly I've wondered more than once how the model would react to knowing how their picture was being used.
One Reddit user asked:
Stock Photography Models: What is the Strangest/Most Unexpected Place You've Seen Your Photos Used?
Stock photography models kind of know their images are out there for whatever, but sometimes that "whatever" gets really interesting.
R.I.P. to the college brochure guy's social life. It's going to take him decades to live it down.
But Can I Get Hired?
I ended up finding myself on one of those "Now Hiring" posts on Facebook... for a company I was trying to get hired at.
- Pandrome
You should tell them that means they have to hire you, or it's false advertising.
"Have you previously worked as an employee for [company]?"
"Well, it's complicated..."
Also Used
One of my friends did a shoot for a university showing him sitting with an advisor looking confused/concerned.
It was to be used for the financial/debt advice brochure - and it was used there. But it was also used in the sexual health brochure!
It's a good one to roll out on special occasions!
- djaw1
Similar thing happened to a guy I worked with.
He was an older, very put together attorney. One day I was watching TV and saw him sitting with his head in his hands looking terribly distraught.
It was a commercial for ED medication.
I asked him about it the next morning and he said he had done some stock video shots for commercials years back and often pops up in all kinds of ads.
I'm A Painting
Imgur
When I was 17 a friend of mine asked me if I could help him model in some pictures he was working on for a project for college. We used our other friend's attic and he took a couple of pictures of me in a suit in front of a typewriter.
He really liked one of the pictures and he ended up asking me if I would be okay with him having it be part of a small gallery show he was doing at the local coffee shop.
They often had a small show and then put up the work to decorate the place and if people were interested they could buy them. I told him that I didn't mind and it was cool seeing my picture up at a place we went to so often.
Well, my picture ended up actually being bought ... which we did not expect at all.
So, there is someone out there that has a framed picture of me possibly decorating their wall or mantle, which is strange for me to think about.
- -eDgAr-
In Every Wal-Mart
Not me but my best friend: He did a photo shoot in some construction-worker garb and a hard hat.
We live in North Carolina USA. I'm on a business trip in Chicago, and I stop by a Walmart for some supplies.
I'm in the men's work clothes isle and there's my buddy prominently on the wrapping of 50ish packages of work shirts.
It was a weird "wait, where am I?" moment. I knew he did some modeling, but not specifics.
I sent him a pic, he had no idea it had been used. The guy is in every Walmart in the country and had no idea.
Homeless Youth
Not me, but a friend of mine.
Her boyfriend was a photographer, and he took several pictures of her standing against a wall wearing a blue windbreaker. I should mention, this woman was in her late 20s/early 30s, but she could easily pass as a teenager.
One of her boyfriend's pictures of her ended up on a billboard in Russia somewhere advertising a charity for homeless youth.
Keep The Contract
This question reminds me of the guy who sat for a picture, and then forgot about it.
Years later, he recognized his picture on a jar of freeze dried coffee, which was not in the terms of use for the picture.
He ended up suing after the company tried to lowball him and winning a crazy amount of money.
Holy sh*t! I looked it up! That's a lot of money. And f*ck nestle for trying to lowball him!
"A legal dispute with Nestle USA ensued, during which Christoff, 58, declined the company's $100,000 settlement offer, and Nestle USA turned down his offer to settle for $8.5 million. "I never gave my consent," he said to Chen. "We had a contract that spelled out the terms of the agreement, but there was just no follow-up on it. "I filed it away, and the contract sat there for 18, 19 years and -- I save things, which I guess is obvious. And no. They never had the permission." Last week, a Los Angeles County Superior Court jury ordered Nestle USA to pay Christoff $15.6 million for using his likeness without his permission and profiting from it. The award includes 5 percent of the Glendale-based company's profit from Taster's Choice sales from 1997 to 2003."
A Smoky Eye
fashion makeup GIFGiphyI had a girlfriend who modelled part time.
Most of her work was for specific things and I only seen it because she showed me. But she did have a few model release generic headshots so when I was travelling Asia I saw a few makeup ads with her face on it.
It was just a picture of her with smokey eyes and I seen it before so I had a pretty big wtf moment seeing an at least 6 year old photo of my girlfriend on makeup ads on the other side of the world
Had They Contacted Me In The First Place
Not a stock photo (as I didn't upload it to my account, only on my website) but years ago a shot I took of my nails ended up being lifted off my site and used in a manicure brochure from China. I'm still wondering why... it was professionally shot and edited, but the nail art was hardly that!
Another time, a model I shot for a girly site (think suicide girls but more on the burlesque side) found our photo on a designer t-shirt, sold in stores internationally... we both sued separately, myself for the image rights and herself for personal damage due to what was written on the shirt. Don't know about her but I ended up getting a decent amount -definitely more than I would have asked if they had contacted me in the first place.
Action!
A coworker of mine was a firefighter in his earlier life (I worked with him after he was retired).
At one point the station he worked at did a photoshoot for something (he doesn't remember what, I've always hoped it was a calendar but can't find proof). Years later a friend of his was in a toy store and found his photo on the packaging of a firefighter toy.
He posed for a photo shoot, and years later ended up being an action figure!
- dbdew
Slack Party!
Not the same, but as a remote teacher (long before quarantines), all of our teaching material includes stock photos.
One teacher pointed out that the same girl appears in many of the stock photos. Here she's a scientist. Here she's at the beach. Here she's riding a bike in a park.
It became a game to find her in our materials and we'd have a little celebration on Slack every time she was discovered.
Clearance
There was also this guy in Germany or somewhere in Europe, who ended up on packs of cigarettes. Like they have the smoking kills and rotten lungs etc. on the packs. So this guy was lying in a hospital bed, passed out with tubes in his mouth and I think he posted this pic of himself on facebook or something. Some designer stole that photo and put it on the packs. The guy himself said he had never smoked in his life and it was some unrelated medical operation. I think he sued and got paid.
Tailspin
My dad was a professional photographer back in the '80s & '90s and would do a small amount of commercial work. He would sometimes get me and my sister to 'model' in some of these pics. He did a job for a new small video game store called GAME that just opened in SE England back in the early '90s. He used me and my sister in a bunch of pics for their original advertising which at the time was just for this small shop. Obviously, the company hit it big time and opened up all over the country. A few years later while at Uni, me and my mates are in shopping in our local store. Low and behold there was a picture of a younger me playing Sonic the Hedgehog on the in-store display. I'd completely forgot about the pics and was slightly in shock, while my friends thought it was the greatest photo ever.
Hairy situation
My nephew did some stock modelling when he was younger and ended up in an ad for a drug that delays early-onset puberty. That was certainly a surprise when I came across his face in a magazine.
Muddy morals
A plumbing company used a picture of my muddy boots on their website. It was a picture I posted on Facebook years ago. The company is half a country away and never contacted me. They just found my picture online and used it. Huh.
Pop(off)corn
I once was offered free popcorn and movies for a year if I did a shoot for a movie theatre in Maryland. I was 16, so I thought "heck yeah!". The theatre closed down three months after that, so I never did get to use my year of popcorn and movies.
BUT I did move to Florida for college and a few years in went to the local movie theatre..... and there I was. Passionately munching on some popcorn, pretending to laugh at a movie. I guess one movie theatre company bought the other theatre out, which included image rights.
Thifty gifty
Early last year (pre-serious COVID) I was at my local thrift store and found a picture frame with a picture of my sister and brother in law. Apparently, they had donated it without removing the picture.
Naturally, I bought it and gave it back to them as a gift.
I'll ketchup later
not me, but my dad is a photographer who spent quite a bit of time in stock photography. I remember one day we were taking a walk around the village together when he just stopped and whipped out his camera. There was a big splodge of ketchup on the floor, and apparently, that required photographing. He told me a few years later that that photo had sold quite often, become one of his most popular. Of course, being an indescribable splodge of ketchup, we've not managed to actually identify it in use anywhere yet.
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RedditorEzucraAaAa wanted to wax nostalgic about the good old days of technology and its humble beginnings.
"Redditors, what's something the internet was crazy about but is now forgotten?"
I miss the simplicity of not having a thousand apps. I'm simple.
Ah Memories...
the messengers aol GIFGiphy"Search engines before Google existed. Alta Vista, Lycos, Web Crawler..."
deenali
Bad Downloads
"Downloading custom cursors for your computer. I gave my family computer so many viruses back in the '00s trying to click things with a lightsaber."
TW1103
"Amazing. I had totally forgotten about all the virusy stuff I downloaded to my home computer, purely so the cursor would disappear and reappear. My parents had zero knowhow with computers either, so likely had no idea wtf I was downloading. Cursors were cool though, despite all the malware."
AdderWibble
Collections
"During the early days of the web, when most websites weren't plastered with advertising... Website view counters."
over_clox
"Back in the day of counters, one day I went to my website and the counter was in the thousands. I just thought it malfunctioned and ignored it. Years later I learned that my website, which had a MIDI collection, was published in a newspaper in another country. I couldn't say for sure if that was true and whether it aligned with the counter change."
pupeno
The Look
"Yea the internet was simpler too, layout style I mean. I like old style HTML webpage layouts. I personally don’t like hyper modern logos and designs on interfaces. Something about old slightly pixelated designs about them home screens and app logos really made them satisfying. I’ve even went as far as seeing if I could install some extensions that could change the layout of sites, make them feel older, give them that 2000’s html look."
Original_Ad_1103
Found It
Looking The Loud House GIF by NickelodeonGiphy"Stumbleupon.com"
idont*uckwithstupid
"I used to waste so much time with stumble upon."
lilbroccoli13
What a strange and crazy place the internet was.
notification
Baby Love GIF by LINE FRIENDSGiphy"Poking on Facebook."
lamspartacus
"I had a friend that poked me and I never noticed the notification. He died. I now have this unreturned poke as a reminder that I’ll never be able to poke them back."
Klaus0225
Playtime
"Flash games."
mc_mike810
"Many flash games are not dead. BEHOLD! The flashpoint project. They have saved thousands of the old flash games in a playable format. Go forth and relive your childhood Also paging u/The_Middler_is_Here"
Jayccob
I will find you...
"There was a rhythm game that I don't remember the name of that me and some friends would challenge each other in, and it had the song Guitar vs Piano 2 which introduced me to Envy, who was a pretty big newgrounds artist at the time. I wanna go check out their stuff again now, I'd completely forgot about them till now."
Silvervirage
GroupMeet
"Forums. There used to be so many, incredibly active and dedicated forums."
FromJavatoCeylon
"A lot of the forums I visited were ruined by photobucket when they decided they wanted paid a lot of money from their users. So many build threads and tutorials ruined."
jus_like_at
"IMDb had the best message boards back in the day. Chatting with your internet friends around the globe about every nuance in your fave movie. Man I miss that. Reddit is close, but nothing beats the olden days."
FeFiFoMums
Fun
Egg Hatch GIF by The Roku ChannelGiphy"Do you guys remember those egg things that hatched little creatures after a while? You'd put one on your website and then the artist would update the source url with images of it hatching? There were all kinds of little fun things like that."
Sapiencia6
Those were the days!
Do you have something you'd like to share? Let us know in the comments below.
Redditor BarooTangClan wanted to compare notes on all the entertainment we've said "that's enough" to.
"What will make you instantly stop watching a movie or show and why?"
I hate bad acting, writing, storytelling... I hate bad anything.
Stop Jumping
Fight Scene GIF by Operation FortuneGiphy"Fight scenes with a million visual cuts. Gives me motion sickness. Contrast the absolutely masterful work in John Wick. long cuts, realistic use of weapons (mostly), 100% skill."
StabbyPants
Louder
"When the actors whisper the whole movie and you have to crank the volume to hear what's being said - but the soundtrack or some other misc noise starts blaring at a higher volume directly after."
Blaze*itch
"I basically had to watch Stranger Things up in my attic with the windows and doors closed. I was worried the neighbors would think something was wrong or be annoyed if I watched it downstairs in my single family home. It was ridiculous."
ForecastForFourCats
"spice things up"
"Love triangles out of no where in a second or third season to 'spice things up' because studio writers are hacks and their idea of relationship drama is 'potential infidelity' at all times. It's the most tired trope on the go**amn planet and the second I see it rear its head I dip right the hell out."
amalgamas
"The whole concept of a love triangle to begin with an incredibly juvenile. Any healthy functioning adult who found themselves in a love triangle would soon choose to find themselves single."
Ouch_i_fell_down
Save your lips...
"When couples in a movie/show have a fight and one of them instantly goes to a friend and end up kissing her/him after talking for 5 minutes. I cringe so hard i turn it off and never watch it again."
Dry-Mycologist3966
"This pissed me off so much in Manifest. Girl is desperate to get back her ex-fiancé, he finally breaks up with his wife to get back with her and she's like 'nah, it's not fair to your wife, let me do this other dude I just met through a calling and be pissed at you for being jealous.' Michaela was the worst and everyone acted as if she were a saint the entire time."
gingerisla
Talk to Me
In Love Flirt GIF by OriginalsGiphy"Shows where a single polite conversation could fix everything."
Horror_Librarian_133
We are going overboard with the witty repartee. Talk normal...
Shut Up
Scared Home Alone GIF by FreeformGiphy"Annoying main character, especially if it's a kid."
abananation
"Kids who have a quippy, sassy retort to everything, and everyone just kind of crumbles before their wit."
CarpetPure7924
Speak Good
"Shows where kids in high school talk like they are 30 years olds who have done everything, been everywhere, know it all and use a ridiculously flowery and extensive vocabulary in every conversation. Like, have any of these writers ever been to high school? Literally no one talks like that. Even worse is when, in addition to this, all the adults talk normal or are just plain stupid, like so weird parallel universe."
StretchArmstrong74
Nonsense
"If the movie is too dark. Not graphic, just literally dark. I lose all sense of intensity in dark scenes and I'm not straining my damn eyes trying to figure out what the hell is going on."
TheShadowOfKaos
"I've seen about 10 percent of all DC movies recently. I've seen all of the individual films in full, just actually saw 10% of each of them."
Mortlach78
"Movies in the late 80s had a lot of dark but you could see the depth because of different shooting techniques. Now you cant see crap because its a CGI fest drowned in black color so you can't see crap because you have no depth in a scene. Compare night scenes in dark alleys in 80's movies and movies now. Utter crap show in the new ones."
Bombzey
Pay Attention Storytellers
"Bad editing would be a big one. A lot of modern horror movies can't help but edit the movies like they're trailers, with added noises to scare the audience because they are afraid the script alone isn't enough to keep people watching."
ThisIsCreation
"I remember this is where the first transformers movie lost me. When the transformers are fighting at the end, it's all a big, jumbled mess of metal and I can barely tell what's going on or who is who."
1840_NO
Drama
will devry soap opera GIF by General HospitalGiphy"When they go straight to relationship drama right away when it wasn't the selling point of the show."
LightInthewater
Do better, Hollywood. It's not that hard.
RedditorCallMehRiverwanted to hear about all the ways none of us what to leave this life.
"What Do You Think Would Be The Worst Death Imaginable?"
My list of the worst deaths is long. My imagination runs amok.
Trapped
season 6 friends GIFGiphy"For me? Being trapped in a small tube or cave (like the ones you have to wiggle through) and getting stuck to where you can’t move your arms. And all you can do is wait to die. I’m getting chills just thinking about it."
Stuck
"The more I hear about cavers that get stuck, the more I think that's a crap way to go."
- braydenmaine
"There’s a great YouTube channel called Ask a Mortician and this was her #1 worse way to die. I can’t remember the exact details or their names, but two well-known divers went into an underwater cave."
"One of them became entangled and died. Years later, his friend dives back down there to try and retrieve his body, the body itself is rotten and his head comes off and the other guy also becomes tangled and dies. Really sad."
- melancholybuzzard
A Long Process
"Believed to be in a coma but coherent through the whole 20 year process until they pull the plug."
weebeardedman
"Oh man this just reminded me of a story I read on here about a guy who lost the ability to move and speak but was completely conscious. Had to just lay there and be awake but trapped in a useless body. His family thought he was brain dead or something and he couldn’t communicate to them that he was 'all there.' Crazy"
habeeb51
Slow & Steady
"Being slowly impaled by a growing bamboo. It was a form of torture probably used by the japanese during WW2 against Allied prisoners."
JazzySocrate
"My uncle who served back in the day said that people would have the bamboo slipped under their fingernails because it would continue to grow still. It would just continue growing into the body."
Payness0826
Excruciating
"Rabies."
Santolmo
"The scariest part is that once you have symptoms, you 100% will die. A 100% mortality rate has to be a psychological torture in itself."
RonaldRawdog
"Not only that, you feel irrational fear. Your brain is literally being eaten apart by the virus and it fu*ks up everything on it. You can't drink water because it hurts you. You feel dizzy, present a fever, excessively salivate, everything hurts and it only gets worse. I'd rather take a bullet and die when the symptoms are still tolerable."
Santolmo
Why can't we all just go engulfed in calm and quiet?
Suspended
"Some pulpy sci-fi book I read a while back had one of the best deaths of this real piece of crap bad guy. Left to die in a drowning sea lab under the Antarctic ice, he freezes himself in a state of the art suspended animation pod with some kind cold fusion power source that would keep it running for millions of years."
"But he forgot to inject himself with the drug that would put him to sleep. So basically he is in suspended animation at the bottom of the Antarctic ocean while his mind is perfectly awake and conscious in a near unbreakable machine that won't run out of power for millions of years and nobody knows about it."
DubiousAlibi
No Cure
"As an RN I have always thought that the worst way to die (natural process) is ALS. Lou Gehrig's Disease."
randymn1963
"My mom and grandmother have Huntington's disease, which is essentially ALS, Alzheimer's, and Dementia combined into one really messed up genetic disease. I have a 50% chance of inheriting it and if I hit 40 and there's still no cure I can't promise I'll feel like continuing on with my life because that disease is absolutely freaking miserable."
DevTheDummy
Agony...
"Radiation poisoning."
binhan123ad
"The fact your chromosomes can be so destroyed your body basically lost it's genetic code and with it the ability to make any new cells. It's literally a 'dead man walking' and you slowly rot away in agony. Stuff is so unimaginably f**ked up."
yea_nah448
"What's also bad about radiation is that it affects your nerves and brain cells last, so you have everything in place to feel all the pain of the rest of your cells being destroyed."
nosmelc
Goo
Not Listening Season 2 GIF by The Fresh Prince of Bel-AirGiphy"I want to believe anything that slowly kills you painfully to be the worst. Such as slowly being crushed or something where the pain is beyond compare and yet not enough to throw you into shock or unconsciousness."
Beardless_Man
"Alternatively, being rapidly crushed into goo would probably be the least painful. I'm talking one of those massive industrial hammers they use for large steel work. Basically smooshed before the nerve signals make it to the brain."
Bannon9k
Now I'll never sleep again without nightmares of death.
If you or someone you know is struggling, you can contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
To find help outside the United States, the International Association for Suicide Prevention has resources available at https://www.iasp.info/resources/Crisis_Centres/
