Cloudy sports photos

Shooting Action Pictures on a Cloudy day: It's a mixed blessing, don't have to worry about keeping the sun on your back but color is flat and blue. Here's what to do: Set your ISO on 1600, Set the exposure mode to A (Aperture Priority). Attach your longest lens and set the aperture wide open. This will force the camera to choose a very fast shutter speed and stop the action. Set the White Balance to Cloudy and the saturation to High or Vivid. This will correct the color for the clouds by adding some yellow and add snap to the colors.

Maybe the most important thing to do: upload the results ASAP. Sports photos sell best when they are available before the next game. 

Sell Your files?

Readers often want to purchase the digital version of the photos they see in your paper. Should you sell them? Our experience is a qualified yes. Unless there is some reason to believe the image will have value to more than one person like a team picture there is usually little opportunity lost in selling the file as long as it is clear that the image is for personal use and not for resale. We recommend to our clients switch on high resolution and low resolution downloads. They are proven money makers and save your staff from having to find files and email them outside of the photo reprint system. That is the real lost opportunity.

5 Quick Ideas for Your Photo Assets

1.  Make online albums featuring the "Best of..." staff photographers.
2.  Add "To see more photos go to OurPaperURL.com" in cutlines.
3.  Upload photos before they are published in the print edition so they will be waiting.
4.  Add more links to your online photo gallery including one "above the fold" of the homepage
5.  Photo gifts are hot. Turn them on for your paper (or ask your Region Manager to do it for you)

How Many Readers Care About That?

Every editor thinks about it. Every newsroom discusses it. But there are precious few ways to measure it. What is it? Reader interest. Do more readers follow this high school or that one? Do they like this sport more than that sport? The bigger question is: how do I know? One way is to look over the page views in your photo gallery. Albums with lots of views indicate lots of interest. If you need help finding the page view information in your MyNewsPhotos gallery we've made this 1 minute training video on how to access page views as well as to how to delete photos or albums that need removal.

If your paper is not a MyNewsPhotos client consider this my invitation to start the new year off with a new revenue stream for your newspaper or to upgrade your current photo gallery to the ONLY photo gallery software and service built from scratch for the newspaper industry.

See you next week.

PMA Launches CLIQworld.com

The Photo Marketing Association International launched CLIQworld.com today. "...a community united by the passion of photography, images and motion."

PMA hosts the world's largest annual photo convention. (Photokina in Germany is bigger but only held every other year)  CLIQ is in September in Vegas this year and what's new is the emphasis on photographers as opposed to photo stores and labs in the past. Check them out at http://www.cliqworld.com/

Facebook Readers Uploaded 750 Million Photos Last Weekend. WHY?

Why so many pictures? Because people love seeing photos online and the holidays have always been the most popular time of year to take pictures. If your paper is not capitalizing on the massive opportunity that photo galleries on the web represent lets get started. If you are currently showing and selling photos on the web but not getting the results you think you could write to me and we'll send you a copy of the ebook "Secrets to Online Photo Reprint Success for Newspapers".

If finding new revenue streams for your paper is part of your New Year resolution, contact us for some no obligation information.

Til next time,
Allen

The Countdown Begins. We'll drive readers to your gallery.

Thanks for all the nice emails while we took a few weeks away from the blog. The "Secrets" book is now available for download. We'll talk more about that in the future.
With 11 days to go until Christmas many procrastinating readers will want to know just how long they can wait to order photo reprints. For current clients we'll keep the readers posted with timely emails asking them to visit your photo gallery and order prints right up until December 22. Here's the rundown for Christmas delivery:
Dec. 15 last day to order with regular handling and shipping.
Dec. 16 last day to order with Express handling and shipping.
Dec. 22 last day to order with Express handing and Next Day shipping.
The Buy One 8x10 and Get One Free offer is still running through December 31.
Its not too late to run a house ad from the house ad library in the next edition.