IPTC and Annotations standard

[ksum]

This may seem a dumb question but I am becoming frustrated in trying to find a 'standard' for assigning annotations.
Have been creating IVMP catalogues as an amateur photographer for some time but recently travelled overseas and now have pics available for either stock or media publication.
While the previous annotations were OK for my personal use, I am now dealing with commercial agencies and need to ensure they are professional in terms of info.
Have spent some time trying to find examples on the net, including XMP, metadata, IPTC sources and while lots of info and technical data, and havn't found any simple solution.
The IVMP manual sort of covers it with 'Annotation mapping' and screen snaps, but no official or practical examples.
Also there are some explanations with PS/File/Info dialogue boxes and found following site which may be of interest to forum members:
http://www.iptc.org/std/Iptc4xmpCore/1.0/documentation/Iptc4xmpCore_1.0-doc-CpanelsUserGuide_13.pdf
Realise its probably dependent upon the business, but if there are any pros out there who can assist an amateur with IVMP annotation examples, it would be appreciated

[little big man]

I'm in the same boat - I'm starting to think that you would have to find someone who works at a news organization to answer this type of question.

[Phil]

The truth is that the standard aspect of annotations is in the format in which the annotations are stored. So applications can work together and we are not reinventing the wheel. So keywords assigned in iView MediaPro will show up if someone opens your image in Photoshop, for example.

The trouble is that the client/customer has their own take on what they require. Stock agencies, news organizations, publishers, whoever you deal with, has probably been in the business for a while and it's easy for them to invent some requirements without looking at the bigger picture.

The best way to deal with it is to ask the client/customer what their requirements are. Keywords and Caption/Description seem to be the lowest common denominator, make the best bet as annotations that will prove useful as standards evolve.

I think the simplest rules are to let the need dictate the annotations you use and concentrate on annotations that will prove useful rather than completing as many fields as possible for the sake of it.

Stock agencies are mainly interested in Keywords (but do check with the agencies you are interested in). So people submitting to Stock agencies tend to put a lot of thought into this, more keywords equals a better chance of your image being found. I'd browse a few agencies and you quickly get the idea.

What form those keywords are in is something to ask the agencies. Some will want embedded legacy IPTC or IPTC/XMP, some will want the keywords supplied as a list with the images. They makes the rules because it's their business. So find out the agencies requirements and then check that iView MediaPro is something that will help meet them. If anyone wants to start a thread on individual agencies requirements and how to meet them I'm sure people would be interested.

BTW shouldn't this be in the iView MediaPro forum?
_________________
Phil. iView Multimedia Ltd.