Submitting to the magazine

[skyblue]

Could you please clear up a little confusion? In the past to submit to the magazine, whether for Hotshots or Your Mission you were asked to email your shots, one per email to the usual address. Now in the magazine it asks you to upload to the website and send a link to the email address. However on the forum mission threads it still says to email directly.
Can you tell me which is the best way to submit images? Are both ways ok? I would prefer to email images directly rather than upload to the website as if not successful with Digital Camera magazine I would like to use elsewhere and would rather not have them appearing on the internet.
Also, do you reply to Hotshot submissions if they are not successful? Just a quick standard email that could say, thanks for your submission, however on this occasion you have been unsuccessful for example. What is the general timescale to hear back if you are successful? Just wondering as like many readers I enter my pics into different competitions and intend to send to different places and it's nice to know when you are unsuccessful, just so that you know you can use the images elsewhere as soon as you hear back.
Thank you.

[shadowlight]

this confused me too... I assumed it just to be a misprint or something and ignored it, but to be honest your approch of asking is far better

[Amy Davies]

Hi Skyblue,

Apologies for the delay in getting back to you. I have just spoken to Digital Camera and unfortunately there was an error with the forum posting, which I can only apologise for. I can confirm that you do need to upload your images to the PhotoRadar gallery system to enter the competition.

Sadly, because of the volume of entries received, it would be impossible for the team to reply to every email received, but, winners should be notified within one week of the closing deadline for the competition.

I hope that answers your questions, but if you have any more feel free to drop us a line.

Best wishes,

Amy

[skyblue]

Thank you Amy for that clarification. Is there some information somewhere on the website that explains the image size you should use for uploading to the website? Do you still email for a hi res image should you be successful?

I understand you wouldn't be able to reply to every email sent for the competition, however I was wondering about replies to Hotshot submissions. As if I send a selection to Hotshots, I may also like to send them somewhere else should they not be successful with you. However if I have no response one way or another, and I don't know the timescale you generally take to reply to Hotshot submissions, then I do not know when I can send them somewhere else.
Also I am a little concerned about putting all my images online to be judged for Hotshots, because isn't there some clause in terms and conditions that gives you the right to use all images uploaded, yet if I then want to use the images elsewhere they will no longer be exclusive to that use, plus they can be viewed on the internet the whole time.
I have to say that changing the entry procedure for Your Mission and Hotshots from email to web based has put me off entering somewhat.

Since the Your Mission forum posts have been incorrect for a few months now since the entry procedure changed in the magazine, have the entries that have been sent the old way as asked for in the forum posts, still been entered into the competition? Or have they been disregarded due to being submitted incorrectly?

[Amy Davies]

Hi skyblue,

I will ask Sophie from Digital Camera to answer your questions in more details for you.

In the meantime, our terms and conditions state that we can only use your images on the website, advertisements promoting the site, and our newsletter. You would be well within your right to remove any image you then wanted to use exclusively elsewhere should you need to.

You can upload images of up to 5MB to the website, which should give the judges plenty of scope to see if they would like to select the image. As I understand it, should you upload a low res image they would then ask you to send in the printing version.

I'll get back to you asap about the other questions though as I'm not sure of the answers myself.

Thanks,

Amy

[Amy Davies]

Hi again,

I've just had a quick chat with Sophie and she has filled in some details for me. They will still email you for hi-res shot if you are selected, along with caption info and headshots to appear in the magazine. For this reason, if your picture was to be used exclusively elsewhere you would be able to let the team know that you no longer wished to be included in the magazine.

Timescales are a little trickier with Hotshots. They can't specify timescales because often they need to find a group of images that work well together, and some images will be held on file for future issues - again though, you would always be contacted before the image was used.

The rules regarding emailing in only changed with the redesign issue, 101, all images entered in the old style would still have been considered though.

Hope all that helps and if you need anything else just let us know.

Thanks,

Amy

[skyblue]

Hi Amy, thanks for the detailed reply. I can understand all your points.
With regard to Hotshots, I can completely understand that you would want to keep things on file and create pages that work together. This being the case I would have thought it would be better to send files direct attached to emails, rather than upload to the website, as then you have the files to keep on record. Whereas if only uploaded to the site and link emailed, then users may change what they have uploaded to the site, and delete some images etc during the time it may take to decide to use them. Or do you download images that have been uploaded to keep on file for future use? Sorry for such indepth questions, it will just help me to decide what to do with my images.

[Amy Davies]

Hi Skyblue,

If you look at it a different way, if they keep the link on file, and you've deleted the image in the time being, they know straightaway that you no longer wish to have it used - there's absolutely 0 confusion and they don't have to wait for you to tell them that you're not interested anymore.

And it's also much easier in terms of labelling, if your photo is on our gallery it will never be without the correct author, caption and we have quick and easy access to your contact details to let you know straightaway if the image is for use.

Does that make sense?

Amy

[fraggle101]

One other thing. what size JPG do you upload to your Gallery for submission? iv uploaded 800x800px..

Thanks..

Tony..

[Amy Davies]

Hi Tony,

That will be fine - the Digital Camera team will ask for a higher res shot should you make it through.

Thanks,

Amy