Posts Tagged ‘Facebook’

Creating a Facebook Cover photo – Tech Thursday

Sunrise Tidal Basin and Jeffeson Memorial - ©TimeLine Media

The use of a good cover photo in Facebook is something I have underestimated in my social media marketing. I do not change my profile photo very much. However, I am thinking that the cover photo can be changed more frequently. Hopefully it will not change how visitors recognize and remember my photography site. Recently, I used some images from my cherry blossoms photo walks to create a new cover page for my personal Facebook page. Here are the steps I used to make it.Looking through the Facebook help files on cover photos, they give the exact dimensions that the application uses:

At this time, cover photos are 851 pixels wide and 315 pixels tall. If you upload an image that’s smaller than these dimensions, it will be stretched to this larger size. The image you upload must be at least 399 pixels wide and 150 pixels tall.

Looking at this ratio, I know that it will be a panoramic photo – one with very long dimensions left to right compared to the dimensions top to bottom. Consequently, there were two photos that immediately came to mind:

Social Media Templates

Sunrise Tidal Basin and Jeffeson Memorial - ©TimeLine Media
Sunrise Tidal Basin and Jeffeson Memorial – ©TimeLine Media
Sunrise Tidal Basin and Washington Monument - ©TimeLine Media
Sunrise Tidal Basin and Washington Monument – ©TimeLine Media

These two were taken with the X100s which has a fixed 35mm lens. It is not very wide, and I wanted to get the entire Tidal Basin from the Washington Monument to the Jefferson Memorial. However with all the other photographers setup there at the time, I needed to work quickly. So I just made some photos looking straight ahead to the Jefferson first, then panned my camera to the left to get Washington Monument. I checked the camera to make sure there was a lot of overlap between the two photos before moving out of the way. After processing the photos in Lightroom, I brought them both into Photoshop CC which has some nice automated tools for combining photos into a panorama. This is the result:

Photos combined by Photoshop CC - ©TimeLine Media
Photos combined by Photoshop CC – ©TimeLine Media

The crazy bend in the perspective comes from the movement of the camera focal plane with respect to the horizon. Photoshop combines all the important elements seamlessly in the middle of the frame. I then brought this combined PSD file back into Lightroom because I like how the crop tool works there.

Cropping in Lightroom for Facebook cover photo - ©TimeLine Media
Cropping in Lightroom for Facebook cover photo – ©TimeLine Media

For cropping, I entered in a custom dimension of 8.51 x 3.15 to match the settings from Facebook. When you do this, your photo will look its best as a cover because there is no stretching or converting being done before it is displayed.

Cropping settings in Lightroom - ©TimeLine Media
Cropping settings in Lightroom – ©TimeLine Media

After uploading, it looks great on both the PC and mobile versions! Let me know if you have any other tips for making these.

Cherry Blossom Facebook cover photo - ©TimeLine Media
Cherry Blossom Facebook cover photo – ©TimeLine Media

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
703-864-8208

Photography and Social Media – Tech Thursday

Social-Media-collage-www.timelinedc.com

My career as a photographer has grown leaps and bounds with the explosion of social media. I first saw the power of social networking in reconnecting with old school friends and previous job friends. Also I have family that reside across the globe. The next step was the ability to connect with other photographers that I admired. With photographers linking directly into their Facebook pages and their Twitter feeds it became easy to reach out and connect. As it became normal to communicate this way, I was able to introduce myself. Additionally I was able to let people know what I do. I asked them for business tips, photo technique tips, and ideas for other shoots.

Connected Marketing

Social-Media-collage-www.timelinedc.com

Facebook and Google Plus in particular make sharing photography a top priority. These are the best way that I have used to show off my photos and current projects. Posting to these pages let not only my friends, but their friends that are not directly connected to me view some awesome images! When their friends view, like, and comment on images, my contact information will be easy to find. I have connected with clients this way and have been invited to shoot events this way too.

Event Marketing

As you have seen, I do shoot lots of ballroom dance events. I get so  many action shots from these weekends, that I can keep posting images on this blog for a long time to come. These shots can be used by the organizers to promote future events, by judges that are marketing their services to other events, and to the teachers that use events as recruiting for new students and studios.

The organizers of the New Jersey State Open held in Atlantic City, NJ have used lots of my images in their routine postings on Facebook. Adding some of my photos that show their event as it was held has helped them to get over 4000 subscribers to their web page!  They will be the first to know about any developments on their event, and the visual images helped to keep them at the top of mind for dancers planning their competition schedule this year.

There are so many resources available for small businesses that allow them to market their services to targeted audiences on social media. Having good head shots, environmental, and other promotional photography is important to convey your company on the internet. Show off your products, your culture, and your style through photos. If you have any need for these, contact me. I can be reached on social and traditional means below –

TimeLine Media – www.timelinedc.com
TimeLine Media Facebook Page
Rassi’s Twitter Page
Rassi’s Google Plus Page
Email: rassi @ timelinedc.com
Phone: 703-864-8208