The event happens, a link to 400 JPEGs arrives, and it gets forwarded to whoever handles design with the word "assets". Two days later they are asking whether there is a version with more space above the heads, and whether these can go in a printed report.
The takeaway up front: almost every problem at this stage was decided before the shoot, by nobody. Resolution, crop room, colour space and rights are all cheap to specify in a brief and impossible to add afterwards. Five lines in the brief saves a fortnight of asking.
What designers actually need
Full-resolution files, not gallery exports. Client galleries often serve images sized for screen viewing — perfectly good on a phone, useless at print size or for a hero crop. Ask for the full-resolution export as a separate delivery. This is the single most common gap.
Crop headroom. A photograph composed perfectly for a 3:2 frame has nowhere to go when it becomes a 16:9 website hero, a square social post and a tall story. What designers need is a subset of images shot deliberately loose, with space around the subject. It costs the photographer nothing if they know; it is unrecoverable if they do not.
sRGB for anything going on screen. Files delivered in Adobe RGB or ProPhoto look correct in professional software and visibly dull in a browser. If the images are for web, ask for sRGB. If some are for print, ask for both — this is a conversion, not a reshoot, and our web export guide covers what happens when it is skipped.
A naming convention with something in it. IMG_4471.jpg tells you nothing in September. 2026-conference_keynote_wide_012.jpg is findable. Any consistent scheme beats none; ask for one.
A small selected set. Twenty to thirty images chosen by the photographer, separate from the full gallery. Selecting is a skill and they are better at it than a tired marketing manager scrolling 400 thumbnails at 6pm.
Crops: the thing to plan for
Modern placements need the same photograph in shapes it was never composed for.
| Placement | Aspect | Needs |
|---|---|---|
| Website hero | 16:9 or wider | Wide, generous side space |
| Social feed | 1:1 or 4:5 | Centre-weighted subject |
| Story / reel | 9:16 | Vertical room above and below |
| Print, half page | 3:2 | Full resolution, sRGB not assumed |
| Email header | 3:1 | Extreme crop room |
One frame rarely serves all five. The practical fix is asking for a handful of deliberately loose shots of the key moments, plus a genuinely vertical set — not the horizontal one cropped, which throws away most of the frame and usually the subject's head.
Say "we need vertical versions of the five key moments" in the brief. It is thirty seconds of extra work per moment on the day.
Rights, in one line
The question that arrives too late is always the same: can this go in a paid advert?
Get one line in writing covering who may use the images, where, and for how long — internal, organic social, website, print, paid advertising. Internal-only is cheaper, and it is a fine choice if that is the plan. It is a bad surprise if the plan changes.
If people are identifiable and the image will run as advertising, consent is a separate question from the photographer's licence. Handle it in the joining instructions.
Putting it in the brief
Five lines, before the shoot:
- Full-resolution files delivered separately from the viewing gallery.
- sRGB for screen; flag anything destined for print.
- Loose framing on the key moments, plus true vertical versions.
- A consistent naming convention.
- Rights stated: where these may be used.
Any competent event photographer will read that list and say yes. What they cannot do is apply it retrospectively. In the DC and Northern Virginia market that means talking to someone whose ordinary work is business events — Event Photojournalism covers conferences, galas, award ceremonies and headshots across Washington DC and Northern Virginia, and a supplier who works corporate events routinely will have been asked all five of these before.
When the images arrive
Half an hour, once, and the set stays useful for years:
- Check resolution on one file before doing anything else. If it is a gallery export, ask for the full-resolution delivery now rather than in three months.
- Pull the thirty you will actually use and put them somewhere separate. The 400 stay archived.
- Tag by subject, not by event — "team", "room", "hands", "speaker", "signage". In nine months you will search for a subject, not a date.
- Make the crops once. Hero, square, vertical for each of your thirty. Doing it once beats doing it under deadline five times.
- Write the rights note into the folder. A README nobody has to remember.
The same instinct as a proper design handoff: the person receiving the work should not have to reconstruct the decisions that produced it.
Frequently asked questions
What resolution do we actually need? Full sensor resolution for anything that might be printed or cropped hard. For web-only use, large exports are fine — but ask for the originals anyway, because you cannot go back up.
JPEG or something else? JPEG at high quality is right for almost everything. Ask for TIFF or the RAW file only for images destined for large-format print, and only if someone will process them.
Can we ask for the RAW files? You can, and some photographers include them. Most do not, and unprocessed RAWs are of limited use without someone to process them.
How many images should we expect? It varies enormously. The more useful number to agree is how many edited images, and how many of those are selected.
What if we only find out later we need print files? If the originals were delivered, it is a conversion. If only gallery exports were, it may mean a reshoot. Which is why line one is line one.
Put the delivery spec in the brief, not in a follow-up email. Resolution, crop room, colour space, naming and rights cost nothing to ask for beforehand and cannot be added afterwards. For more on getting files that survive the workflow, browse the design guides at My Design Tool.
