A full page (A4) in a magazine or book requires a file of 26MB. Ideally your files should be double this size to allow for larger use.
Digital camera users should provide pictures at the maximum resolution of the camera. That means if you have a 2500x3500 chip we want a 2500x3500 file not an interpolated file twice the size.
When supplying on disc it would be extremely helpful if all the files could be numbered in such a way as to keep pictures of the same subject matter together in a normal Windows file list as this will make editing much simpler.
Supply as TIFF, if size is an issue then highest quality JPEG is perfectly acceptable. Do not save in any other format, if you are supplying to a third party, TIFF and JPEG are pretty much the only formats that every computer, Mac or PC, should always be able to read.
If you are using a Mac, please remember to save all files with the correct file extension. PC software, including Photoshop, usually requires a file extension so that it can apply the necessary filter to open it. Macs have an option in the Photoshop preferences to add the file extension automatically. Possible extensions would be .TIF for a TIFF file or .JPG for a JPEG. If you do not do this then clients, including Collections, who use PC’s may be unable to open your pictures directly from the disc. It is possible to get round the problem by copying the file to your hard disc then adding the extension yourself, but you do need to know what format the file is in to start with and most people would not know to do this.
The industry preferred colour profile is Adobe RGB (1998), all pictures should be saved with this profile, though digital camera users may prefer to shoot to the sRGB colour space. There are big advantages to doing your colour correction at 16 bits per pixel, but pixel depth of the pictures you send us should be 8 bits per colour, in RGB mode. If you forget to convert your pictures they will be automatically changed during processing.
If you use Photoshop you may prefer to make your adjustments on layers. You are welcome to send layered files if you want, but they are considerably bigger and take longer to process.
We will correct images for rotation, distortion, converging parallels, poor colour balance, poor cropping and over/under saturation as we see fit, this obviously takes time so we would rather you got it right yourselves, but if you object to us altering your pictures please make it clear in advance. If you do object and we think the picture is not of an adequate standard, we will not use it.
Don’t save the file as a JPEG and then open it and save it as a TIFF to send to us. Each time a JPEG is opened, edited and saved again some picture information is lost. You should always save your pictures uncompressed or using a lossless compression method. Once you have sent out the TIFF, if you need the disk space, then save them as JPEGs and delete your copy.
Photoshop is an expensive piece of software and I don’t expect you all to be able to afford the full version, Photoshop Elements can be bought for around £70 and will do many of the things you are likely to need to do to a picture. I have tried it, but was not impressed, the file info is now similar to the full version but some of the colour correction tools are not available. If you already have a photo editing programme you are happy with then that is fine, keep using it.
Mac users with CD writers. Always write your CDs in a PC readable format, usually referred to as ISO 9660. Macs can read PC discs, but PCs can’t usually read Mac discs. DVDs are also acceptable, but be careful that you use a suitable write speed when you copy to the disc as too high a speed can make the disc difficult or impossible to read.
Don’t stick labels on your CDs, they spin at up to 15,000 rpm in modern drives and labels can unbalance them making them difficult for the drive to read. Labels specially for CDs are circular with a hole in the middle to spread the weight evenly.
Finally, please number your discs and put your name on them and supply a printed index with the date and a full file list or a contact sheet including the file names, so we can match the disc to its contents. Keep a copy so we can refer back to you if necessary. Avoid just numbering 1, 2, 3, 4... if everybody does this there is a danger that files will be overwritten by your later discs or by other photographers files. You should develop your own file numbering system so you can find files easily and refer back to them if we come back with any queries. Separating subjects into different folders is OK as the copied file will be renamed with the folder name. If you do divide your submission up into sub-folders it is essential the folders are only one level deep. And please take care not to send the same picture twice, I may remember each picture as I process it, but I will not necessarily recognise duplicates and it makes the site look messy if the same picture comes up more than once.
You must make sure that it is obvious within the digital file who the picture has come from, either in the file name or in File Info. I may be processing submissions from several contributors at the same time and do not want to mis-attribute pictures, just writing your name on the CD is not enough!
However you supply your pictures it is important that you do supply accurate and complete caption information as we do not have the time to go hunting through books or on-line for ourselves and if the information is not there the picture will not come up in searches!
There are attempts under way at the moment to standardise the format, content and calibration of image files, both as they are submitted to libraries and as they are submitted to publishers, the current recommendations can be seen online at www.updig.org and I suggest you all look at them.
Media
Submissions can be made on CD or DVD and we can also provide an FTP site if you want to send pictures over broadband, contact us for the login details.
