Photography Standards and Guidelines

Agricultural Communications Photographer James F. Parker is the preferred resource to use for capturing CAES images and can be contacted via the Ag Communications Project Planner. If Ag Communications services are not used, standards-compliant images may be submitted. Images on CAES web pages and social media sites add value. However, professionalism and presentation are important when choosing the images because they are a reflection of the CAES, its programs and departments.

Photography Standards

  • Photographs should be consistent with the university brand. When presented with well-written captions, the best photos are ones that encourage an action or communicate a message consistent with the college’s mission and vision.
  • Photographs must display the department and the work of its students, faculty and staff in an engaged, professional and relevant manner.
  • When possible, photographs should be captured in a natural photojournalistic style as opposed to posed staging.

Quality Guidelines

  • Photographs serving both print and web applications are the most desirable use of CAES resources. High quality images are preferred, to allow for resizing and cropping for maximum visual impact. Cell phone images can be shared on our social media websites, but are not appropriate for CAES web pages.
  • Photographs should be in focus, well-lighted for the subject matter and properly processed for color correction.
  • Images that contain excessive amounts of high ISO noise (grainy images) or have been post-processed incorrectly will not be used.

Resolution and size

  • If possible shoot and save the photo in a RAW (preferred), TIFF or JPEG format.
  • Images taken are recommended to have a minimum capture size of 3000 x 2400 with a resolution of 300 dpi
  • Website images should be used at 100 percent of their size at 72 dpi to provide the best loading time for the page.
  • Resizing images in HTML is unacceptable as images may be distorted and increase load times.

Transmission

  • Email the digital photo to Ag Communications from a regular email account, preferably one at a time. Do not use photo sites such as iPhoto or Picasa, which often minimize images for ease of transmission.
  • You may be forced by size constraints to send the photo in a JPEG format.
  • Be sure contact information for each photo is included in the email, in case there are questions.

Captions

  • In most cases, a photo without a caption doesn’t convey enough information to be useful to your audience. Please record as much information about the photo as possible, including when and where it was taken, along with a description of what is happening and the year and date.
  • In most cases, especially photos of awards, students should be identified. Include their majors and their status, such as graduate student, sophomore, etc.
  • Please ensure that all names in photo captions are spelled correctly.
  • Include contact information, particularly if the photo depicts a recurring event that you want to encourage others to participate in, such as a photo of an activity conducted by a student organization. For example: “Students in the N.C. A&T chapter of Minorities in Agriculture Natural Resources and Related Sciences (MANRRS) observe Earth Day by participating in a stream cleanup on Lindsay Street, adjacent to the main campus. MANRRS meets 7 p.m. the second Thursday of every month in the Carver Hall auditorium. For more information, contact (name) at (email).”
  • The name of the photographer must be included. If the photographer is a professional, a letter of permission to publish at no charge must accompany the submission. By your submission, you acknowledge that you are the author and copyright holder of the photo.