Deadlines

Yeah I know you said the deadline was ten o’clock but it’s only five past!

The papers have a deadline. This deadline is passed on to all photographers for a reason. YOU HAVE TO HIT IT.

What happens if you don’t?

Well nothing really.

The fact that another 20 shooters managed to hit the deadline means that the papers will not lose out. They will still have images in their paper tomorrow. They just won’t be yours.

Oh, and you lose credibility with the papers and the agency you are shooting for

Oh, and you run the risk of not being commissioned again.

Oh, and you may as well not have turned up because the others did a better job with fully captioned images supplied ON TIME!

Who is it?

Pick up the nearest paper. Have a look at the sports pages. Who is in the picture? I bet the first thing you did was look at the caption.

That caption has to come from you.

You may have the best image in the world but if you or the picture editor does not know who is in the image or where it was taken it may well be worthless.

Make life as easy as possible for your clients. When on deadline they are not going to call you to see who is in the frame. And anyway if you knew you would have captioned the image.

Anyway one day by chance they call to see who is in the picture. You don’t know and say you will get back to them and put the phone down. In the meantime a guy desperate to get his name in the paper sends them an average image from the same event. It is captioned, it is the right action and it’s free.

Sorry but you lose out!

He is a happy chappy and it cost you your freelance fee because you did not spend 2 minutes captioning the image.

Do your homework

What makes a picture saleable? Why would a publication want to use it?

Have a look at the sports pages every day. Read the articles and LOOK AT THE PICTURES. Those images have already been selected they are SOLD.

Many people think they have a new angle, a better perspective and a great shot. If it does not suit the publication you are targeting then they will not use it.

It is great to experiment and to develop new ways of shooting but, when a publication is on deadline then they will go for an image that suits their target audience.

You must do the same!

Read the Papers! Listen to the news!

What is flavour of the day? What happened today that will make the news tomorrow or even the late editions today?

Kaka being sold for £100m – gee end every paper has a picture of Kaka the next day. I wonder why?

Luke Watson speaks out. And yup you guessed it the papers all have pics of Luke Watson.

JP Duminy has the innings of his life and saves the test. You can bet the papers will be full of it the next day.

So, why send a picture of something that is not newsworthy? Don’t waste your time and more importantly the time of the picture editors who have to sift through your “amazing” pics of someone else when all they want is Duminy, Watson, Kaka……

Tell a story

Take a look at this picture:

What does it tell you?  Is it a great sporting moment or is it just another picture that could have been taken anywhere?

The above pic could well have been taken anywhere.  It is simply an image of Stiaan van Zyl batting and tells us nothing.  It may be OK as a file image or stock for an article but it is definately not worth sending as a news image filed from an event.  Your image must tell a story.  It has to be different. Remember you are competing with every other freelancer and ALL the agencies and even the muppets who give away FREE images just to see their name in print.

Think about the following when filing images:

What was the event?

How is your image going to get that message across to the readers of a paper or magazine?

Why would a publication use this image?

Is the action in the pic the right action that tells the story so far?

Are you sending this image just because you have to file so many pics from the event?

Struggle to answer these questions?

Then don’t send the image.

Every time you send a weak image you lessen the chance of being published or being commissioned!