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Participant
January 18, 2021
Answered

More Diversity Needed for Stock Photos

  • January 18, 2021
  • 4 replies
  • 1249 views

I am a black designer & student. While searching for images of African-American people for my projects, I noticed that there are VERY few. For instance, I have a project coming do pertaining to sexual disfunction caused by pornography. I searched "sexy black female" and the results returned white females in black lingerie or with black hair. I then decided to search for "black models" in several different categories and received similar results. I ended up having to purchase the images I needed from another provider, which cost me a lot more money. I am sure Adobe can let contributors know that there is a need for more diversity.

This topic has been closed for replies.
Correct answer Nancy OShea

Adobe are committed to bringing more culturally diverse and inclusive images to Stock. To that end, they created the Stock Advocates Fund.  See below for details.

https://community.adobe.com/t5/stock-contributors/adobe-stock-artist-development-fund-is-now-open-for-applications/m-p/11604151?page=1#M25710

 

4 replies

jacquelingphoto2017
Community Expert
Community Expert
September 14, 2022

Hi @Nathan5E07 ,

Did you remember to disable safe search?

Regards

Jacquelin

Nancy OShea
Community Expert
Nancy OSheaCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
Community Expert
January 21, 2021

Adobe are committed to bringing more culturally diverse and inclusive images to Stock. To that end, they created the Stock Advocates Fund.  See below for details.

https://community.adobe.com/t5/stock-contributors/adobe-stock-artist-development-fund-is-now-open-for-applications/m-p/11604151?page=1#M25710

 

Nancy O'Shea— Product User & Community Expert
Participant
January 21, 2021

This is awesome. Thanks.

Ricky336
Community Expert
Community Expert
January 20, 2021

Hello,

This is a user to user forum. So users helping users.

Adobe Stock relies on people who contribute assets - photos, illustrations, vectors, etc. There can only be more diversity if people contribute to more diversity.

As for using search terms, one has to be specific. And the keywords that people use to label their photos have to be specific. 

 

Participant
January 20, 2021

Thanks! Yes, I realize that. I saw something on the community home page that seemed to be a form of communication to the community from Adobe. I was trying to help raise awareness of the issue in hopes that they would encourage more diversity by whatever means they currently use. It has always been hard to find quality images of black people, but things have improved. Four years ago, when I did a Google search for simple terms like man or woman, black people would not show on the first 20 to 30 page results. That has changed now, thanks to the efforts of the community as a whole. I am confident that will improve here as well. But not if we don't speak up.

Thanks for the help!

Abambo
Community Expert
Community Expert
January 18, 2021

Please start contributing. If you see a missing link, contribute that one...

ABAMBO | Hard- and Software Engineer | Photographer
Participant
January 20, 2021

Im sorry if this is too direct, but that's not the answer. I contribute by paying. If I wanted to take my own photos, I would not need Adobe Stock. I am not a photographer. I do projects for school and personal use and I pay $30 to search for usable content. If this community is run by Adobe as a service, it should be a service to everyone. If you do not understand this concept, then you are not the one who should be responding.

 

Now, that being said, thanks to others in the community who atually offered real solutions, I did change my search term to African American and it did return more black images. It had a pretty good selection, but there is still room for improvement. If you search white, Indian, or Asin woman, you get what you search for. The same should be true for black women.

Thank you to everyone who have chosen to help correct this issue.

Abambo
Community Expert
Community Expert
January 20, 2021

I contribute by paying.

Yes, but the database is filled by contributors who are independant photographers. Everybody can contribute. So you can too. You don't need to, however. But the stock industry is not driven by Adobe hiring photographers swarming out to take pictures. It's driven by contributors uploading their pictures here.

 

Adobe recommends doing this or that, Adobe can refuse pictures, if they do not meet quality standards or are to abundant represented in the database. But Adobe does not pay contributors to contribute. Contributors are paid because their pictures get acquired by people like you.

 

However, if you take my example, I could not contribute Asians or Africans because my environment is not that diverse.

 

Have a nice day!

ABAMBO | Hard- and Software Engineer | Photographer