How to get published in the Bowler

We welcome contributions to the Bowler magazine and offer a dedicated clubs section in every magazine so that your club can be showcased.

To give your club the best chance of appearing in the Bowler, please follow these guidelines:

Images

  • Images MUST be at original size. All images should be at least 1MB in size. Phone photographs are accepted, but only at original size. We can only print high-resolution images (300dpi) or simply follow the guideline of each picture being a minimum of 1MB in size (most phone photos exceed 1MB).
  • Focus images MUST be accompanied by names from left to right. Please double check the spelling. Group photos or team action shots with many people, for example a ‘Come & Try’ event need not have accompanying names.
  • Images sent to us MUST have the subject’s permission to be published. It’s your responsibility to ensure that any photos you send to us have the permission from all concerned.
  • Images MUST be original. It is plagiarism to take photos from the internet with permission from the photographer, which includes Facebook, Google images, etc. Please ensure that any photo you send to the Bowler magazine is original and has not been plagiarised.

Send your article and photos to media@bowlsqld.org

Tips on taking a photo suitable for publishing

  • Try to take photos in natural light. It makes a big difference!
  • If you have to take photos inside, consider the background of your photo. Are there cables hanging from a TV? Are there messy bags, food wrappers or untidy tables in the background? Are there people sitting in the background who shouldn’t be in the shot?
  • Get closer, take a step forward. The best zoom option is your feet.
  • When photographing a group, a wide shot taken from afar never looks good. Arrange people in rows, encourage them to stand close together, so that your shot isn’t too wide.
  • Make sure everyone is looking at your camera before you take the shot. Often, other people push in and “steal” the shot you’ve lined up and the subjects look at them, leaving you with a photograph of people looking elsewhere.
  • Remove sunglasses if at all possible.
  • Lift the peaks of hats if they must be worn for the photo, otherwise you risk losing half of someone’s face to shadows.
  • Frame your photo. Resist the urge to put your subject in the centre of the photo, instead, imagine a 3×3 grid laid over your image and place your subject’s head at one of the parts of the 3×3 grid where the lines intersect. Please note: make sure you give your subject some space in which to look. Their eyes shouldn’t be close to or look right at the edge of the picture.
  • Take more than one photo. Usually the subject relaxes by the time you’ve taken a few shots and it shows in the photo. Send us the best photo, or send them all and we’ll pick the best for publishing.
  • Images should be in jpg or png format only. Not pdf.
  • Send images separately. Do not embed them in a document, we cannot use them this way. Images should be sent as attachments to an email.
  • Clearly label each image.

Words

Send articles and photos to media@bowlsqld.org

  • Club news articles range from between 200 to 600 words. Bios can be around 600 words, depending on the nature of the story. Quotes from winners, the subject or the president of your club can add some interest to the story.
  • Articles should be sent as an attachment in Word, or as plain text in the body of the email.
  • Attach articles and images to your email. Do not embed images into documents. Images should be sent as seperate jpgs with the article, attached to your email.
  • Send all stories and photos to media@bowlsqld.org
  • We will contact you should we require more information. Please do not ring us multiple times to check if your email has arrived, we will let you know once we have read and processed your story. Our contributions calendar is updated on Tuesdays and Thursdays – those are the days you will hear from us unless it’s urgent or near our deadline time.

Obituaries/Vales are a way to celebrate and honour a person who has passed away.
The Queensland Bowler receives numerous submissions from clubs about much-loved members who have passed away. Unfortunately, we are unable to publish all of them, much as we would like to. We recognise how important these people were to their club and how much club members would like to see them acknowledged in the magazine. However, we are often very limited for space and if we published every contributed Vale, we would have little room for event coverage, club news and other stories.
We make exceptions for past/present State representatives and officials, past/present BQ Board and committee members.
Please continue to submit your news to us on your (living) life members, events held, club volunteers, club anniversaries, achievements and special occasions.

DEADLINE FOR CONTRIBUTIONS: 15TH OF EACH MONTH FOR THE NEXT ISSUE

We may not be able to get your story in the next issue due to space limitations, but we will try our best. Sometimes, stories get held over to the next issue.

Please note that stories are sent through for possible publication and are subject to editorial approval. There is no guarantee that your story will be published.