photo agencies

[Fireblade]

Hi,
I am looking for advice from the sports photographers here. I go to most of the motorbike road racing here in Ireland. I was wondering how to submit my photos to the photo agencies that sell photos to the newspapers and magazines.

I did a search and came across 4 agencies.

I don't plan on making a living from photography but it would be nice if I did get a good shot to have an outlet for it.

What format do you use, tiff, jpeg, raw? do you email photos or burn a cd / dvd.

Thank you for your time and apologies for the simplistic questions.
Shay.

[primoz]

It might be different for you, but for me it's always jpeg only and it always goes over ftp. Cd's are to slow if you work for agency which is supllying photos for daily papers, since it will take a while before they get cd, and that might be to late already. Email is usually not sure enough (it almost always comes but you have no control when it comes) and it's too much of trouble anyway. Most of servers have some limits how big attachment can be, and those few MB is soon not enough when it comes to 20+ photos :) But in worse case if nothing else works email will do too.
With ftp it's so, that when you are done sending, you know photos are on other side for sure. And all bigger agencies are having things set up like that.

[KennyG]

Shay, ask the agencies. Some insist on quite large files depending on where their target market is. This could mean you have to shoot in RAW and convert to TIF. The only way to find out is mail them or call them and then you can adjust workflow to suit.

Check each agency out very carefully. Go through their terms and conditions with a fine tooothed comb.

[Fireblade]

Thanks for the advise, appreciate it.


Shay.