Call For Member / Local Photography

photo © Paul Cowell

Our website could use some sprucing up as regards photographs. I’ve added some of mine and will continue to as time passes, but am sure there’s much more to be found on everyone’s hard drives … and waiting to be taken with your cameras! We could especially use shots of members in action, both fishing and during club activities. Anything of nature could be useful though.

Also, fly tying photos are a must – especially if we are posting fly recipes.

Requirements: While the image size itself can be fairly small (it’s for web), it must be a “good” photo. Clarity, focus on the subject, law of thirds, etc … ultimately there’s no rule to what makes a good photograph but everyone knows one when they see it. Try to judge your own photos objectively. That said, an underexposed shot of you holding a monster steelhead is acceptable 🙂

What photos to use? It would be best if we use our own work, or at least that of a friend who was on the trip with us. Photographic copyright laws are fairly clear but there is legal wiggle room that would cause trouble, so it’s best to have explicit permission before using an image. I do have model and other legal forms we could use if necessary, but it’s best to keep it simple and stick to our own stuff.

It’s been suggested that we use images from the DEC website. After long consideration I can’t agree with that. Ideally, yes, the public should be able to use any image generated by a government agency – after all we paid for it. But the DEC isn’t NASA: NASA makes it very clear that images generated by Hubble and their various agencies are open for public, non-commercial use. I haven’t seen anything that says the same on the DEC website, and while most photos are probably taken by on-the-job agents and biologists I suspect many are submitted by individuals without any thought as to copyright on theirs or DEC’s part. That could get sticky.

This entry was posted in Call For Action. Bookmark the permalink.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.