Seeking gymnastics photographers

Dear Gymnastics Fans,

My name is Blythe Lawrence, and I write about gymnastics for the web news service Examiner.com (my work is here. I’m posting because I’m looking for a gymnastics photographer — or several — who would like their work featured on Examiner.com’s website. Here’s the kicker: I’ll pay for it (it won’t be much, but it will be something. Please read on.)

My focus on the site is elite, NCAA and very occasionally level 10 gymnastics. In looking at statistics (that is, number of clicks) for articles, one thing that has proven especially popular are photo galleries of competitions. Examiners have rights to Associated Press images, which takes care of larger meets like Nationals and Worlds. But I’m at a loss for other elite competitions and NCAA meets.

(You can be an Examiner for just about anything, by the way — gardening, sailing, printmaking, whatever you have some knowledge about. The editors like it if you have some writing experience and there’s a local angle — for example, “L.A. Fashion Examiner” or “New York Restaurants Examiner.” It won’t pay your rent. But if you’re a dedicated blogger, it’s a great way to earn a little extra cash.)

Being an Examiner is straightforward — Examiners write articles about their topics, which are posted on their subject page at Examiner.com (which, again, is here. Shameless self promotion, I know.) People click to read the articles. Examiner.com, which acts as a middleman for finding advertisers, pays on a per click basis (the amount seems to be about $0.85 for every 100 clicks.)

This year one of my goals is to broaden the content of the gymnastics page with more photo galleries, and contributing photographers are needed to do this. For example, if you live in Georgia and could photograph Georgia’s home meets, that would be amazing. Ditto anywhere else that has an NCAA gymnastics team. For recent good examples, please see the photo galleries of UCLA vs. Stanford with photos captured by San Francisco Sports Photography Examiner Michael Eng. (They’re here and here.)

One caveat: Photographers must have permission from universities or host gyms (for J.O. meets) to take photos. I can provide more information about credentials and how to get them if necessary.

Here’s the payment part of it: Through Paypal, I’ll pay you 50 percent of the earnings for the articles with the photo galleries during the first seven days those photo galleries are displayed. Given the way articles are buried after about a week on Examiner.com’s site, they don’t seem to accrue much revenue afterward.

Again, this is a very small amount, probably somewhere around $5-15 per gallery at the very most. But it is something. I’d be happy also to link to a photographer’s website and of course, photographers retain full rights to their images.

If you’re interested, please shoot me an email (blythe.lawrence@gmail.com) with some of your photography attached and/or a link to your website. It does not matter whether you’re an amateur or a professional — the quality of your work will speak for itself.

Thanks for taking the time to read this!

Best regards,

Blythe Lawrence
Gymnastics Examiner, Examiner.com
blythe.lawrence@gmail.com

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