Enhancing a press release with photos

One of the best features of using readMedia’s Newsmaker platform to distribute your news releases is the ability to add attachments. Whether it’s a photo, video, a full-text document of a speech or a .pdf of a PowerPoint presentation, these additional assets can give your news a lot of context and help reporters tell a better story about your organization.

Photos are a great way to enhance your press release and make your story more memorable, like this release from the New York Army National Guard that includes three images from a parade.

If you want the media to run your photo along with a story, however, it’s important to make sure that the images you include with your release are of the correct size and format. We’ve all either taken or received a fantastic photograph and then printed the image to discover that the hard copy is blurry or pixilated. A photo’s size and resolution can drastically affect the chances of your image appearing in a printed news article.

Here are a few tips to keep in mind when preparing photos to include with your readMedia press release:

Dots Per Inch

When you take a photograph or create an image in a software program like Photoshop you can set the image’s resolution or dots per inch (DPI). An image’s DPI measures how many dots fit into a linear inch. Photographs with higher DPIs show more detail than ones with lower DPIs.

Here’s an image that compares a 300 DPI photo against a 72 DPI photo:

You’ll notice that the higher resolution produces better results.

Screen vs. Print

When you look at your photograph on your computer screen, the size of the image changes to match your monitor’s DPI setting. Images on computer screens are generally about 72 pixels per inch. They cannot display the extra levels of details that would appear in a printed 300 DPI image (for example), so your computer simply enlarges the image so that it takes up more space on your screen.

You’ve no doubt clicked on a large online photograph at one point or another. While it’s sometimes inconvenient to view these online, these images generally have higher resolutions and look much better in print.

Bigger is Better

Don’t worry about shrinking these large images when attaching them to your press releases. Generally speaking, most web browsers let users resize the image so that it fits properly on their screen. Setting the size of a photo is a lot like going to a barbershop or hair salon – if you go too short there’s often no way to go back. While it’s easy to make a large photo smaller and still capture a similar level of detail, it’s difficult to do the opposite. For example, here’s an enlarged version of that 300 DPI photograph from above:

You’ll notice that as the photo goes from 150 pixels wide to 250 pixels wide, the image becomes blurrier and less defined.

Even though readers can view the photos attached to your readMedia press releases online, you’ll also want the images themselves to look good when printed in a newspaper or magazine. Most publications prefer images with a resolution of at least 300 DPI. To improve the chances of your photos appearing in print, attach large, high resolution images to your news releases.

Click here to learn how readMedia makes 
it easy to enhance your press releases.