Inchiquin

It's not an easy question to answer. Back in those days you couldn't easily view images at a large size (other than projecting on to a screen which lost a lot of detail anyway) so both photographers and publishers had to rely on lightboxes to judge whether a slide was of sufficient quality for the desired purpose. I'm sure that camera shake played a part because there was no IS back then, but I think in my case it was probably mostly down to my preferred technique which was to use shutter priority to avoid shake and just let the aperture take care of itself. This often resulted (especially with K25) in the aperture being wide open a lot of the time, which meant not only that the lens was not performing at its best but also that focus (which was of course manual in those days) was critical. I don't think it was an issue with the glass because I used good lenses (Canon 28, Canon 50 macro, Tamron SP 70-210). Because I could never see the images at a high resolution (and because they were quite acceptable to photo libraries) I was blissfully unaware of the shortcomings of my method until I started scanning them. I've had a decent number of Ektachromes and a smaller number of Kodachromes accepted by Alamy so I don't think it's anything to do with digital v. film. Alan Edit: It may be relevant to the above that nearly all the Ektachromes that have passed QC were taken after I got my first auto-focus camera.

Just a couple of final points in response to Michael's comments. I don't know if they're of historical value but they're sitting there doing nothing. There are hundreds, possibly thousands, of slices of life across Europe in the 70s and 80s. And I already have a Coolscan 5000 and a well-established scanning workflow, including a scanner profile for Kodachrome which is quite important since the vast majority are Kodachrome. Alan

Unfortunately ICE doesn't work on Kodachrome (unless you have a Coolscan 9000 which I don't and can't afford a mortgage to get one). and most of my older slides are K64. Luckily the vast majority of the sharper ones were on Ektachrome so I was able to scan those with light ICE and upload them without further ado. Alan

Most of my slides are horribly unsharp. I got a huge shock when I first digitised them and looked at 100%. I've already extracted and uploaded the ones that I thought would pass QC (a tiny percentage) which is why I'm only looking at the archival route for the rest. Alan

I've been thinking for a long time that I should investigate the possibility of uploading some of my 70s and 80s scanned trannies via the archival route. As a matter of interest, if you're making use of this facility how much effort do you put into preparing the images? Many of mine have accumulated dust over the years. Do you remove them from the mounts and clean them before scanning? Do you laboriously spot them before submitting? Or do you just upload them as they are and take the view that at small reproduction sizes the dirt won't be noticeable anyway? Alan

Liverpool has a strong historical connection with Neptune. He appears on the city's coat of arms, and in the past was also featured on Liverpool FC's crest. The Epstein Theatre was originally called the Neptune Theatre to reflect this connection. I think you're on safe ground with this identification, Edo. Alan

And the willpower to resist the temptation to try to slip a dodgy one through just because you like it. Alan

There's probably nothing wrong with the ones you've already had approved. Alamy judge images purely on technical details, and they always inspect at 100%. If it's not totally sharp where it should be it will fail. If there are dust specks it will fail. And in terms of over-processing, there may be tell-tale signs of interpolation artefacts that are not easily spotted at less than 100%. Don't get unduly worked up about it at this stage - most of us have had to go through a learning process via a few QC fails until we get the measure of things. Once you're fully confident that you know what will pass and what will not you can start to send multiple submissions at the same time again. Alan

The OP has not told us which camera he's using. Alan

Not as angry as Alamy would be if they had to look through all your other submissions and find another one that needs rejecting. If one image does not meet the standards it suggests that your technique may not be perfect and there could be more failures among your other submissions. We would all prefer it if they concentrated their efforts elsewhere rather than hire more QC staff and reduce our commission. All businesses require suppliers to meet their standards time and time again. It's up to you to prove that you can do that. Alan

Perhaps you could tell us which model of Canon it is? Alan

I've just had my second Alamywhack zoom in the space of about a year. This proves that there are still, even among 180 million images, opportunities to take unique shots that give meaningful results for buyers. Alan

This one is a world away from the skunk cabbage picture. I think it would stand a chance of passing as it is, but if you downsize I think it would sail through. Alan

Sorry, but this is not correct. If you view the picture at 100% (which Alamy does) the whole image is VERY unsharp. As described earlier, if one fails the whole batch automatically fails. It's exactly the same as QC in any other industry - if you supply a supermarket with apples and one of them is rotten, the whole batch will be rejected. This is why the batch is shown as a failure but the email only listed one image. This doesn't mean that all the other images would have passed - it's up to you to implement your own pre-QC quality control to ensure that all submitted images are good enough. You could try downsizing it as suggested above, but you must still check it very carefully at 100% and I'm inclined to think that this particular one is so wide of the mark that downsizing will not help. Alan

I've got a house full of retro kit (14 at last count including a Dragon32 but mostly Acorns) but I haven't used any of it for years. I'm partway through a project to refurbish them all with a view to selling but have difficulty finding the time. Alan