Photography guidelines
Quality
It is very important that images prepared for printed publications are of a high enough quality to work well with modern print methods. Volunteers very often save their images at 72 dpi resolution, when for sharp reproduction the printer outputs at 2,400 dpi. The images may be fine for emailing, look good on a computer, and occasionally useful on the web, but they are well short of the quality necessary for print reproduction. Size is important too. A 3” x 2” image may be a great shot but cannot successfully be enlarged to fill an A4 page or to use on a poster.
Traditional Cameras
Print your images by traditional methods at a decent size i.e. 10” x 8” for scanning. Scan your negatives, prints or slides yourself and burn to a CD. The resolution setting should be at least 300 dpi. Remember that if your images are to be printed then they should be saved to read on an Apple Mac computer.
Digital cameras
When taking shots make sure you are using high resolution settings on your camera. You can change these settings to low resolution on your computer when you want to use images for email or for the web.
We hope everyone taking pictures for CISV use finds these simple guidelines helpful. We would encourage any CISVer to carry on taking pictures for local use and to forward copies to us. We are building a large Image Bank of CISV images that can be accessed for local use through the web and we would love your images to become part of that. Send your images as traditional prints at a decent size i.e. 10” x 8” for scanning or scan your negatives, prints or slides yourself. The resolution setting must be at least 300 dpi. Burn your scans to a CD and post to the IO (Mac format preferable but not necessary) for the attention of “Publications.”
If you are emailing photographs to us then send high resolution versions only, a few at a time for ease of downloading. It is still preferable to load your images to a CD and post. You may even know professional photographers willing to help out. Indeed, many NAs have hired professionals or are considering doing so for photo shoots – the guidelines should give helpful advice to anyone new to CISV. In terms of safety and security, we never attach full names or addresses to photographs used in CISV International publications or websites ( a typical photo caption would be “ Participants at a village in Egypt”o o or “Lisa, aged 11, from Costa Rica ”o o ).