Pond5 partners with Adobe in new stock footage deal

More footage and more variety is coming to Adobe CC

The first fruit of Pond5’s Global Partner Program is almost the definition of a win-win, and should see Adobe CC users gain access to an enhanced library of video clips, while clip creators themselves get to access a fecund global marketplace.

While some have questioned the real use of micro stock over the years, there is no doubt that it is a booming market. And for some shooters with a bit of dedication and resolve, it can offer a nice stream of pocket money along the way.

Pond5 has quickly become one of the most popular repositories for both supplying and obtaining micro stock. From humble beginnings as a lesser known alternative to sites like iStock, it has quickly ballooned, with credits on everything from television, even to feature films.

A long while back, Adobe integrated its own stock footage repository into its Creative Cloud suite of apps. Meanwhile, Pond5 has also supplied separate plugins, which allow users to access the Pond5 library from directly within Premiere Pro. So far, so dandy. Until now.

Recently Pond5 announced its Global Partner Program. In effect, this is an additional way for Pond5 to distribute contributors footage to a wider set of industry customers. All Pond5 contributors are automatically enrolled in the program, but they can opt out of they like. However, the program has the potential to lift the sales of contributors footage at premium prices. The potential for which can now be seen with a newly announced partnership between Pond 5 and Adobe.

Instead of requiring separate plugins, users of Creative Cloud will now be able to access the Pond 5 library as an integration with Adobe Stock. It is important to note that users will not have access to the entire Pond5 repository but selected (presumably the highest quality) sets of clips.

Pond 5 claims that such integrations will bring about exponentially higher sales for contributors. It will be interesting to see how this works out in practice. Pond5 will not be stopping with Adobe, however. It plans to roll out the Global Partner Program to many more partners as time goes on, which can only be good news for contributing artists.