I am confused about how to tag assets

[Haunterrr]

I've seen discussions here that after submitting an asset as an "Illustration", it appears in the portfolio as "Photo" after moderation. This doesn't bother me, but I'm confused about what is considered a photo in examples like:

"A koala giving a thumbs up while lying in a hammock" is listed as a photo in the portfolio after being submitted as an illustration. Yes, it looks like a photo, but is it realistic for a koala to do that? I doubt it can anatomically do that. How would you tag, say, "a turtle surfing on a surfboard" (first thing that came to mind)?

I'm also unsure how to tag 3D renders. They look realistic but not completely. Futuristic but photorealistic product presentation podiums—how to tag them?

"A robot eating ice cream on the beach"—photo?

If you open the search, check "illustrations," and select "recent," you'll likely see even portraits of people that a layman couldn't distinguish from real photos. About naming, where authors list keywords without commas and still make the weekly leaders, I have questions too (is this some cheat code for high sales that I'm afraid to use?).

I've received no warnings that I'm tagging images incorrectly, just about 10 assets (noticed only about a week ago) were moved from illustrations to photos, but now I'm paranoid I'll mix something up, tag it wrong, and get banned. I didn't catch the times when all AI images were tagged as illustrations, but I think that was cool.

Experienced contributors, do you think it's safer to tag as illustrations only those assets that look cartoonish, watercolor, oil, digital art, 2D flat, etc., and tag everything else (unreal things that look like they were taken with a camera) as photos?

I really don't want to have problems with Adobe Stock just because of incorrect tagging. At least send some notification like "Incorrectly tagged image, rejected."...

Sorry for the long text.

[bravo six]

Interested to know this too, I was also under the impression that "unreal" type images should be tagged as illustrations 

[daniellei4510 · Accepted solution]

I'm not sure why something tagged as an illustration would end up in photos during searches. But I'm sure it's nothing you need to be worried about with respect to being banned. As per your examples (e.g., A koala giving a thumbs up), I would label that as an illustration. If it ends up in Photos, that's on Adobe, not me as a contributor doing my best to label assets correctly.

100% of my submissions are Ai. Whenever I'm in doubt about a particular image being either a photo or an illustration, I tag it as an illustration. This includes images that are photorealistic but depict situations or subjects doing something unrealistic (e.g., a robot eating icecream.). 

[Haunterrr]

Thank you for the response, it's a bit reassuring now.
Anything that's naturally impossible, I'll continue to label as an illustration.
I really like images where realistic 3D renderings depict real and static objects. I've always labeled them as illustrations because it's clear they're not real items... but now I'm reconsidering.
Could you please advise on what to do with 3D renderings of items/objects that exist in nature but don't look as realistic as those from an author who doesn't specify 'Rendering'? I don't even erase metadata from the image, even if it just contains my prompt with the job ID. I hope the moderator occasionally checks there and sees that I'm not breaking any rules, that it's my image, and I'm not using '--sref' to copy another author's style. That's how much I want to avoid that ban...

[daniellei4510]

Glad to be of help.

[Jill_C]

The illustrations you described should definitely NOT be classified as photos. Here is Adobe's guidance:

1. Only submit images as file type "photos" that look like they could have been taken with a camera and feature photo-realistic subjects that exist in real life and respect human and animal anatomy. Submit all other generative AI images as illustrations. Generative AI videos can only be submitted as file type "videos" and generative AI vectors can only be submitted as file type "vectors".  
   
   

 To avoid future issues with the integrity of your account, I would suggest contacting Adobe using the contact us link on your Dashboard page and ask them to change those incorrect assets back to illustrations. 

[Haunterrr]

Thank you for your response and advice.
I would like to hear your opinion on how to label images that are '3D Rendering' depicting objects that exist in reality but do not look authentic.
For example, to make the question clearer: A graduation cap on an infinity symbol. Meaning it looks more like plastic rather than fabric. Should similar images of objects be labeled as 'Photographs' where some object is 3D rendered but captured from above with a 'real' camera or as 'Illustrations' where the essence and outlines are like those of a real object but it is not real? I apologize for my meticulousness, but a potential client is looking for a real graduation cap by checking the 'Photograph' checkbox, and he is presented with my 3D render with a plastic texture in the search results...

I understand about unrealistic anatomy or actions of animals, robots, etc... the question remains only about rendering.

Once again, thank you for taking the time to read this.

[daniellei4510]

Without seeing actual examples, I can only make guesses. But based on the examples you gave, I'd say they should be labeled as Illustrations.

[Haunterrr]

Here's an example (please don't judge too harshly on the idea and quality, please).
In any case, I wrote them a long letter with a detailed explanation of the question, and also asked about "--sref" in Midjourney. I'll label similar type images according to their response, I don't mind.
Most likely, during the times when all AI images had to be labeled as "Illustrations," a lot of very realistic portraits of people and more appeared in the search, making it difficult for clients to find the desired type of images. I don't think they will be able to re-label old images from "Illustration" to "Photograph," but they are definitely working on it.

[daniellei4510]

Illustration. As I've mentioned elsewhere in another thread, when in doubt, Illustration.

[Jill_C]

I agree that, given how you've described the asset, they should be classified as illustrations.