GUIDELINES FOR PJD DIGITAL STUDY GROUPS

Welcome to the monthly PSA PJ Study Group on the Internet. I’m sure you will learn from your fellow group members and establish a good camaraderie. Please have fun with this it shouldn’t be work!

John Larson, Study Group Administrator

STUDY GROUP PARTICIPANTS:

• Must be a member of the Photographic Society of America
• Deadline of the 10th of the month to send image to Study Group Administrator
• Deadline of the 25th of the month to send comments to Study Group Administrator
• Must pay the $5 annual dues in September of each year.


DEFINITION OF AN ACCEPTABLE IMAGE

The only digital editing that can be allowed must fit with the PSA definition for acceptable Photojournalism images. “In the interest of credibility, photographs which misrepresent the truth, such as manipulation to alter the subject matter, or situations which are set up for the purpose of photography, are unacceptable.” “No elements may be moved, cloned, added, deleted, rearranged, combined or changed in any way that affects the integrity of the image content. No manipulation or modification is permitted except resizing, cropping, selective lightening or darkening, and restoration of original color of the scene. No special effect filters can be added or applied, and any sharpening must appear natural.”


PREPARING THE IMAGE

• Height and width with a maximum of 500 pixels for either dimension

• Image should be edited on a non-jpg photo file and then saved in the jpg format with a medium
compression level (Use the Save As or Save for Web command for Photoshop users).

• Maximum file size of 75 kb, preferably less than 40 kb

 • Give the image a title

 • Write a brief descriptive explanation about the image, how it was taken and the particulars, where,
    what, how, when, with what lens etc.

 • Send the explanation and image’s title as part of the e-mail message to the Administrator

 • Send the image file as an e-mail attachment to the Administrator


TIPS FOR COMPRESSING THE IMAGE

• Complete all digital editing before saving as a jpg and selecting a compression amount, because
   it is said that repeated saving as a jpg results in multiple compressions with subsequent degradation
    of the image quality.

 • In Photoshop 5.5 and later versions, use the Save for Web option.

 • Before sending the image file to your Administrator, check the file size: for a Windows PC user,
    right click once on the file’s icon, select Properties, and make sure the file size is less than 75 KB.
    For a Macintosh user, highlight the file’s icon and choose Get Info

 • If the file size is more than 75 KB, go back to the finished original, non-jpg image and do a Save As
    a jpg with a lower compression setting.