I’m not a photographer and I don’t claim to know much about photos. Many of you think I should. Good news, I don’t care. Bad news, we’re wasting time by batching and sharing useless photos.
If we send our higher headquarters or the public a haystack and tell them that there are likely a few needles in the stack, we are wasting time and making it very unlikely that our audiences will engage.
Here is a summary of photo guidance I got from a great PA leader months ago:
Photos must be attributable to an official source – on the battlefield today, photos and photographers are as abundant as hipsters at Starbucks. Unless the Department of Defense can attribute the photo, it’s fairly useless no matter how great they are. In this great guidance, the leader agreed to even attribute to non-DoD/Coalition forces with permission.
It is the source’s/sender’s responsibility to search images and review metadata to ensure it is public domain. Don’t want to reveal the specific/grid location of the photograph? Clean it first.
Image must be high enough resolution to publish. “Our partner forces took these great photos that were included in the J3’s storyboard and the boss wants them released.” Good. Too bad you can’t cut and paste these from the PowerPoint slide and send them for release.
The picture must demonstrate messaging requirements. Cool photos are cool but not to be added to the haystack unless they further the mission. Save the cool, non-messagy photos for your scrap book.
Remember propriety. The battlefield is messy. Partner forces often send graphic images. No thanks, not for publication. Propriety is a judgement call and applies beyond battlefield carnage. Should your mom or 7 year old kid see these photos? If not, probably keep them for the storyboard.
Consider adverse perspective. Before you hit send, ask yourself, “What’s the worst possible context and cutline Time Magazine could associate with this image?” You may know the right thing is happening but is that apparent in the photo? Could it be misconstrued? I like to consider how the Vietnam era anti-military protester would look at these photos.
Send packages. Tell a story with a set of photos while ensuring each stands on its own. There is no good in batching and sending photos one disjointed send at a time. Be patient and send your higher headquarters the set, together.
Use these guidelines to save everyone time and make your photo sets more effective. Just cull down your sets bro. Only send the photos that pass the test. Tag and catalogue the others so you can find them in a pinch. Now go get ’em. You do great work.
(Photo by Sgt. Ed Silence)
