updated 12/10/07
Questions on any of the material below can be directed to the editor, Dave Bunnell.
As an all-digital publication, material may be submitted to the News in virtually any form. No handwritten copy, please, except for brief announcements, short letters, or calendar items. Text may be submitted via e-mail (to davebunnell@comcast.net) as either an ascii (unformatted text) file in the body of the message or as an attachment in its native word processor format, which is preferable. Please put an extra return between paragraphs in material submitted in the body of an e-mail message. This is not necessary in word processor files sent as attachments, which are preferred for longer features as it preserves attributes such as bolding and italics. Microsoft Word is the preferred format (Word 2007 or earlier), but I can work with Word Perfect files as well. Please let me know which version word processor you are using, especially if you have no file extension on your file. Please do not embed any photos in your document file, as the program shrinks them and renders them useless.
If mailing material, send your word processor files on PC or Mac-formatted diskettes (see media, below), along with a clean laser-printed or typewritten copy. Unless specifically requested, CDs or diskettes will not be returned since postage costs to do so are usually more than the cost of a disk! When composing your files please do not put two spaces after periods, or extra spaces or tabs to create indents (see style sheet below).
I have a broadband connection, so don't hesitate to e-mail digital images to go with your article. Some folks do some processing on them in advance, but if I see a way to improve a photo, usually by lightening shadows or dark areas, I'll try to make it reproduce as best as possible. Even though most images end up as black and white, always send them in color so I have the option to run them that way.
Please send images as attachments when e-mailing, rather than in the body of an e-mail. Also, please don't send me photos embedded in a document file!! The program reduces their size and renders them too small for print.
You can attach about 7 mb to an e-mail with no problems. If you have a lot of images, split them across e-mails, send a CD or consider using www.yousendit.com, a free web-based service that lets you send a file of up to 100mb. You can only send one for free, so make a zip file of your images and upload them there giving my address as a reference: davebunnell@comcast.net.
Digital formats should be TIF or JPEG formats. I use 300 ppi (pixels per inch) as the resolution for the press, which means that a digital photo must be at least 700 pixels wide to print the width of a news column (2.33" x 300 p.p.i = 700). I often run vertical images at one column width, but horizontals often run 1.5 to 2 columns, so 1500 pixels wide is a better size for horizontal images. Note that images are displayed on your monitor at 72 dpi, so an image will print at roughly a quarter of that size on the press. When in doubt just send the image in the full size that your camera captured it.
For more information on the issues of picture size and print resolution, here is a handy tutorial: http://www.adobeevangelists.com/pdfs/pscs2/imagesize.pdf
These days most submissions are already digital, but I can also scan original slides or negatives, or prints. Please put your name on each of your slides or prints, and a number that corresponds to a caption list that you'll want to provide (or else, write the caption directly on the print or slide mount).
If e-mailing TIF images, you can use LZW compression in Photoshop before e-mailing, or ZIP it. When creating JPEGs, try to keep compression levels low, at 10 to 1 or less. Please don't use any Macintosh compression such as stuff-it, as I work on a PC-compatible. But I can read uncompressed image files created on a Mac with no problem.
Please package photos securely between stiff cardboard, and indicate whether you want your prints or slides returned. I'll always assume this about original slides or negatives, but submissions of three or fewer small prints will not be returned unless specifically requested. The cost of returning a few small machine prints may be more than the cost of producing them, and return postage costs the Society money. Including an addressed return envelope, either stamped or unstamped, guarantees a speedier return.
Most photos are sent as part of articles, but we also accept random photo and art submissions. Photos which will run on their own in a "reader's gallery" are held to somewhat higher standards than those accompanying articles. They should be well-exposed, sharply focused, well composed, and with a general appeal to cavers.
For line art, digital submissions often work best as well, but if not, send a PMT, laserprint or clean xerox. Most vector drawing packages also allow conversion to bitmap TIF files, which is preferable since it avoids font problems (see above guidline for TIFs and image sizing). EPS formats work well when made properly, with fonts embedded. Acrobat format (PDF) works well if you select "print optimized" instead of "screen resolution" when you make them. Also make sure the fonts are embedded when making a PDF. I can also accept maps or illustrations in Adobe Illustrator (AI) format (version CS2 or before) or Corel Draw (v. 9). Check with me on file formats you're unsure of.
Note about black text on maps: black type on maps should be 100% black only, rather than CMYK. As a general rule, black type should be 100% black and nothing else if your map is in CMYK format.
Materials may be submitted on 3.5-inch floppies, CD-ROMs, DVDs, or memory sticks in either PC or Macintosh formats. Unless specifically requested, media will not be returned (to keep our costs down, since the cost of returning them is more than the value of the media! in most cases other than memory sticks)
Please adhere to as much of this as you can, as it makes the editor's job far easier! Some of the suggestions only matter if you are sending the article in word processor format (preferred), as any formatting such as bolding, italics, etc. is lost once placed in the body of an email message.
Abbreviations
Formatting:
Internet
Numbers:
Calendar Section:
Preferred spelling for terms used a lot by cavers:
Book Review Bibliographic Info should ideally include: