Is 20D good enough for stock submission?

[howard smith]

That's "couldn't" tell an origianl from a dupe.

[gtal]

Howard,

Some guidelines I've seen specify their digital requirements in uncompressed file size (usually TIFF format, in megabytes) rather than megapixels.
This serves to normalize things somewhat. At a given file size different cameras will require different amounts or "rezzing", if any, and therefore hold varying amounts of detail depending on the source file used to create them. A photo editor will usually be interested in amount of detail at a given print size (in inches, usually at 300dpi).
Some images can be rezzed up better than others, but rezzing up doesn't add detail, it only interpolates what's available.
Presumably you could stitch together a bunch of captures from a lower-resolution camera and still meet the file size requirements with enough detail to meet or beat a single-shot capture from a higher end camera.

Guy

[EAD]

I believe the original question was if stock-agencies will admit/buy files from a 20D. As far as Im concerned that very much depends...

I know of local agencies that work with 4MP files from 1D. I know agencies that(as someone sugested before) will only admit large format negs.The final use of the image is going to determine which files are "sellable", and that is something that will have to be checked with each agency and that may vary from one assignement to another..

...but generally speaking:   MO is BETTA !!!

No sane editor is going to reject an image because of an excess of resolution.

My 2 cents of an Euro.

[Jonathan Wienke]

Gee Jonathan, im NOT published. But thanks for your interest.

Hybrid RAW Conversion

Workflow Technique #20

You're welcome.

[didger]

because they look at many more high quality images a year than most of us, maybe they have a slight chance of knowing what they are talking about

Well, since they refuse to even look at digital images at all, I'd say that the chance they know what they're talking about is very slight indeed.  In any case, digital photography at the high end is still relatively new and somewhat experimental, so us pioneers will just have to be a bit patient about becoming universally accepted.  I've already been through the whole process with electronic music and digital recording.  Now every pop group has a synthesizer and almost all recording is digital and hardly anybody gives the issue a second thought.  Digital photography is still a lot earlier on the curve, especially professional landscape photography.  The die hards may die hard, but they won't live forever either.

[JasonK]

"My hunch is they do some homework sometimes."

That's the second time you've said something like this in this thread, Howard.  Could you show me what kind of credible homework they might have done that leads them to exclude any image captured with anything less than a 1Ds?  Or that Arizona highways won't take digital images period?

I see many magazines (even non-digital generic photography magazines) that are publishing beautiful images captured with prosumer digital cameras that show beautiful quality even on two page spreads.  What does that indicate to you?

[Lin Evans]

Unfortunately, the letter mentioned in the Dpreview thread was a little belligerent in its tone.  The mag is wrong to exclude digital capture, in my view, but none of us will get them to change their minds by being rude or aggressive to them in correspondence with them.

Probably few really care about AH "changing their minds," excluding digital is neither "wrong" nor right but simply an issue which is a business decision and one which they have every right to make. Most have no qualms with their decision to exclude digital files. What is truly the issue here is the use of a very public forum to spread false information.

Some of us have taken our very valuable time (over five years in my case) in attempts to educate the public including AD's and other decision makers about issues concerning digital capabilities and limitations. We've made great strides and have overcome many objections based on wrong concepts and misinformation. A number of highly respected and prominent professional photographers such as Melvin Sokolsky, have demonstrated conclusively that digital works wonderfully for major quality publications and have joined public forums such as dPR to help inform people. Still, the film bias is strong but the world is learning. However, when the Director of Photography for a respected magazine such as AH goes public and knowingly spreads false information, for whatever purpose, it's time to be a little "belligerent." Being aggressive with comments gets their attention while being "nice" and attempting to use persuasion gets the brush off as was the case with numerous previous emails and correspondence to AH about their position by a host of protesters.

AH expressed the view that "we are experts and we know what works and what doesn't" - they used an argument from "authority" to knowingly spread false information and misinform their readers which constitute a sizable number of people. The email and public condemnation of AH's Director of Photography on a world-wide photography forum for publishing this misinformation served its purpose by drawing them into a public discussion that served to reveal their bias and demonstrate the flaws in their commentary.

Personally I have no interest in whether AH ever accepts digital files, but I do have an interest in seeing that people know the facts and that years of hard work to educate the public about digital photography is not undermined by their spreading false information. Sometimes persuasion and reason works well to get one's attention: sometimes it takes a stick between the ears. This was one of the latter cases.

Lin

[didger]

Hey, Quentin, it never came to my attention before that you actually have a stock business.  I very briefly checked out your site and it looks like you do quite a variety.  I've been told several times that Sierra Nevada photographers have little hope of selling stock to a way oversaturated market; not that I expect to do nothing but Sierra stuff forever, but for now my priority is to do my 4 seasons of the Sierra Nevada book.  My unique take is that I go to considerable extremes of cross country backpacking with very high quality gear and I also expect to truly do a big coverage of all 4 seasons, including serious winter high country backpacking; a bit of the fanaticism Galen had (I used to go bouldering with Galen when we were both young back around the late Pleistocene).  Could this hopefully sufficiently novel Sierra approach possibly be viable for your company?  I don't expect to actually have anything to submit for some time (though I already have thousands of raw images), but once I start really getting into the processing phase I should be getting quite a few things.  I assume it would be possible to use the same images for stock as for a book I publish myself?

[EAD]

Didger,

get a life...(and stop monopilizing the threads)..

No offense intended!! :cool:

[howard smith]

BJL, again, you are right there.  When I was a kid, I hated "Because I said so" as a reason.  But, given a health respect for my parents, I learned to accept it.  When I got older, Butch Warner made the baseball rules because he had the bat.

Well, a magazine has the press and a stockhouse has a lock on the door.  They "own the bat."  If it is no digital, that's it.  It may or may not be rational.  It may or may not be stupid.  It just IS.

Michael doesn't critique submissioms anymore.  Did he need to justify that, or just say to quit sending them?

We need to get over this.  As you said, some places do, some don't.  Some take 1ds only, some take whatever.

[didger]

yuppies with the latest equipment drinking Chardonney on the tailgate of their Land Rover

Being a "backpacking" mag, the Land Rover part wouldn't work, but the rest fits exactly according to what they want and what they print, whether it happens to be an "article" or a straighout ad.  It's often hard to tell which is which.  We all define BS in our own ways; one man's favorite whatever is another man's BS.  Come to think of it, I'm sure Backpacker would love an article on the classiest ways to get to the trailhead, as long as it featured one of their advertisers' cars.  This sort of total comromising of the editorial content for the sake of promoting products qualifies as BS for me, however differently you may define what "deserves" to be called BS.

you need to know the market

Oh, I think I know the market well enough.  I just don't want to go there, thank you.  I don't think Playboy or Mechanics Illustrated would want my article either.  So what?  Is there a point?  I've managed my entire life getting by (or better) marketing the output of my creativity doing things that truly turn me on, without compromising for the sake of a lot of what I perceive as bullsh*t necessary for many kinds of commercial success.  That's not my Holy Grail.