A week in the life of a picture researcher

By Lorraine Beck

Monday

I spent most of my weekend working on what I call the ‘Art Book’ – the history of a well-known art school published by a small university press, featuring photos of works of art by its many successful staff and alumni. Clearing photos of works of art is tricky, as there are twice as many permissions to clear. First you need to obtain a good image of the artwork and clear that, and only then can you apply for permission from the artist or their estate to reproduce the work.

There has been great support for the book with former staff, alumni and their families/estates/galleries all interested and willing to supply images, in many cases for free, with only a relatively small number coming from image libraries.

Today I find myself engaged in a brief email conversation with an artist who has been nothing but helpful – but who was once perceived as a bit of a bad boy of British art – about his memories of his time at the school…

I found out on Friday morning that the deadline for high res photos is tomorrow – so I have been working hard all weekend to tie up as many loose ends as possible, resulting in a huge flurry of emails to answer. I don’t make a habit of weekend working, but this time, I’m happy to put in a few extra hours to finish the job, so as many high res photos as possible can be included in the first proofs, as in the long run, I know this will make my job easier.

Tuesday

Deadline day – a flurry of last-minute approvals, including several for photos I initially thought would be impossible to clear: I need a signed permission form/written agreement from all picture sources and artists before I can supply the high res images. Much of today was spent updating my master spreadsheet to keep track of agreements now in place or still outstanding, plus labelling and filing permission forms and images ready to send to the client. I wrote the image credits, clearly indicating which wording can’t be changed, adding a note to suggest they will need a thorough copyedit. As there are so many different image sources in the book, the credit style varies significantly, but I do my best to make this straightforward for the copyeditor by ensuring details are in a consistent order and with consistent punctuation.

I hit my deadline of 5pm after a brief phone conversation with the author to discuss the two or three images where final permissions have not yet been obtained. An email arrives from an educational publisher I work with regularly asking for a few new images for an ELT workbook.

Wednesday

Catching up with other projects today. I send in a few new images requested for the ELT title – the editorial team are still chasing an unreleased image featuring children that they found online but I’m pretty sure the publisher won’t agree to this, so flag it up as a reminder when I send the new image selections in.

I receive a flurry of email questions about captions and credits from the Art Book publisher. They decided to clear some local archival images themselves, to save costs, but at this late stage realise they need to check some copyright issues and need advice rewriting credits. I direct them to the excellent DACS summary of copyright.

I make a start on a new job – reclearing text permissions for an Italian publisher for three ELT textbooks for which they have bought rights. I recleared some images for them a few years ago and although I work mainly on picture research, I’m happy to clear text permissions if I can fit this in.

Thursday

Continue working on Italian text permissions job. In a world where we face the freelance dilemma of ‘If I say I can’t make the schedule will I lose the job?’ I’m glad I told them when they emailed last week that I wouldn’t be able to turn this around in the week they had originally requested – mostly because I wasn’t free to start work until yesterday, but also because past experience suggests permissions departments for large publishers frequently take longer to reply. Sure enough, today one warns me when I fill in their online form that they can take up to 6 weeks to reply to an initial query. Hopefully it won’t take that long! Two of the permissions are proving to be tricky. They are biographies of well-known children’s authors from websites that have since been updated, rather than extracts from books, which means lots of emails between permissions departments/agents/the authors themselves/the previous publishers to try to obtain permission.

Friday

Unusually I find myself in the car at 7.45am wearing smartish clothes and driving up the A34 to Oxford for my first ELT Freelancers’ Community Awayday. From my initial arrival into a room buzzing with over 150 people, I was made to feel most welcome. The varied programme included presentations from large publishers about how they work with editorial freelancers and an open discussion about rates and fees, as well as a series of springboard talks with the opportunity to discuss issues raised in breakout groups afterwards. Lunch and refreshment breaks provided plenty of opportunities for networking with colleagues and potential new clients, and although some sessions were aimed more at freelance ELT project managers, copyeditors and proofreaders, there was plenty to interest me and the other picture researchers who attended. By the end of the day I was struck by the huge amount of expertise in the room – something it can be easy to lose sight of when you work alone. The day ends with a glass of wine and me agreeing to write a blog post for the CIEP!

Lorraine Beck is an experienced freelancer picture/clip researcher currently working on a variety of schools and ELT titles, but is happy to turn her hand to any subject. She’s a member of the Picture Research Association and listed in the ELT Publishing Professionals Directory.

 


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Photo credits: Hanging photos Brigitta Schneiter; images on shelf Annie Spratt, both on Unsplash

Proofread by Alice McBrearty, Entry-Level Member.
Posted by Abi Saffrey, CIEP blog coordinator.

The views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of the CIEP.

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