I think there is already an avenue for this kind of work but it requires collaboration to work in it's current form (Ie: if a writer uses your image, out of courtest should share their payment because they get "paid more" for articles with images)

I also think an image repository/morgue for Devtome writers to access might prove useful in addition to this for those who want to focus on images. Traditionally images in a morgue are only paid for when they are used, so this could work here:

As all the Devtome raters I have seen award additional ratings to articles with appropriate images there is already an avenue for determining the "worth" of an image.

All that would be needed is some kind of tag/scrypt that records when an image from the morgue is used on a Devtome article and whatever that rating equates to as percentage of share is awarded to the photographer/artist. (who would probably have a profile page on Devtome like a writer does and their address is scraped from there for payment.

Just my 2cents in a random moment between shifts x