Hit Us With Your Best Shots!

With all of the events that the Marin Scuba Club members participate in, there is always the opportunity to take great photos so we can all share and remember the good times.

Our Media Team would like to post your most memorable photos on our website and newsletter. So to make sure your photos from our dive trips, club events, and monthly meetings look their best, please follow these guidelines.

Photo Submission Guidelines:
How to Capture & Share Great Shots

Whether you’re submitting photos for our website galleries, social media, or event presentations, following a few simple guidelines ensures your photos look crisp, professional, and clear.

Composition: Good Practices vs. Common Pitfalls

1. Frame Your Subject Properly

• DO: Keep people and subjects fully in frame with comfortable breathing room around the edges.
• DON’T: Cut off heads. But if you must cut off hands, feet, or fins, please be judicious where you crop! We’re looking for great composition!
• Pay close attention to the edges of your frame before pressing the shutter button—especially when taking group shore shots or boat gear-up photos. When in doubt, shoot wide and crop later!
• DO: Use one of several organizational principles to frame subject(s) on the screen:
  • Center: It is perfectly fine to center your subject in the photo for a more static, grounded image.
  • Rule of Thirds: You can put subjects at third points on the screen for a more dynamic composition.
• DON’T: Put your subject on one side of the screen and put nothing to balance it on the other side of the image!

2. Mind the Lighting & Sun Position

• DO: Keep the primary light source or sun behind you (or off to the side) to illuminate your subject’s face and equipment naturally.
• DON’T: Shoot directly into the harsh sun (unless you are intentionally creating a dramatic underwater silhouette). Shooting into direct sunlight usually results in dark, washed-out silhouettes with blown-out backgrounds.

3. Keep Your Horizons Straight

• DO: Level your camera with the horizon line on topside and boat shots.
• DON’T: Leave horizons tilted at odd angles. A crooked ocean horizon can make land and boat shots look unbalanced. Tip: You can easily crop and rotate slightly in standard phone or desktop photo tools before submitting!

4. Underwater Focus & Clarity

• DO: Get reasonably close to your underwater subjects (sealife or dive buddies) to maximize color and reduce water haze.
• DON’T: Back off too far—the more water between your lens and the subject, the more backscatter and loss of vibrant colors you’ll experience.

Basic Technical Requirements

• Resolution (HD Minimum): Please submit photos at high resolution (at least 1920×1080 pixels / 1080p but 4k is best!). Standard high-res images directly from your camera, underwater housing setup, or modern smartphone are perfect. Avoid uploading low-res screenshots or images compressed through messaging apps like WhatsApp.
• File Formats: JPG or PNG files are preferred.
• Orientation: Horizontal (landscape) images work best in our standard post layouts. Vertical (portrait) images may be used, although not preferred, and it some instances may have to be cropped.
• Aspect Ratio: 16:9 or 4:3 preferred.
• File Naming Convention: To identify your photo with your name, subject, date, and photo number (if more than one photo is included), please use the following file naming convention:

name-subject-yyyymmdd-number.format

miller-wolf-eel-20230414-1.jpg

If you are not able to name files, we will automatically name them for you based on our best guess.

Permission to Edit

• Because of the format of our website and newsletter, we may need to crop or adjust color balance, contrast, and other parameters to make an image more viewable.
• If you do not want your image edited in any way, please let us know, and we will not do so. However, as with all images submitted, we reserve the right to use or reject them.

A Quick Checklist Before You Submit

Before sending your images over, ask yourself:

• Is the photo crisp and in focus?
• Is the image high resolution (HD or better)?
• Is it properly exposed?
• Is the horizon level?
• Is it pretty good or maybe even a great photo?

Thank you for contributing your shots and helping showcase our active diving community!

• To submit one or more photograph for the website or newsletter, please fill out this form with the following information:
• Add the event (trip, activity, party, other) for which you are submitting photos
• Write a short description of each
• Let us know the number of photos you’re submitting

After you submit the form you will receive a response within 2-3 days with information on how to upload the photos.

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