Two Bright Lights Puts Your Photos in Magazines
Have you ever dreamed of getting published in a magazine? There’s nothing like seeing your very own photo featured in a double spread to boost your business and keep fresh clients coming.
With SmugMug’s new partnership with Two Bright Lights, it’s easier than ever to send your photos out for consideration.
What’s Two Bright Lights?
They’re your personal publicity platform, the folks that do the hard work for you.
Think about it: When you want to submit your photos for consideration, you have to contact each publication individually, find out what they’re looking for, customize your submissions to their specs, in addition to actually submitting your work. And how do you know which magazines are worth your time, anyway?
With Two Bright Lights, all you have to do is tell them what you’re looking for, upload your images and click a button to get your photos onto the editor’s desk. Easy!
How it Works
1) Sign up for an account at Two Bright Lights. They have a free trial so it’s easy to give it a whirl.
2) Once you’re in, create an album depending on what you’re shooting. Example: If you’re submitting wedding photos, they’ll ask for details like the bride and groom’s name, venue and wedding date. For travel photos, tag the location.
Confused? No worries – Two Bright Lights guides you through every step and tells you exactly what the editors want to see.
3) Choose your SmugMug photos. You’ll see a built-in uploader that will help you slurp your pics right from your existing galleries into the album you just created.
4) Pick which publications to shoot for, fill out a few details and voilà! Your job is done.
Tip: It pays to do a little research about your target publications before you submit. Some may have specific requirements or styles that work better for you than others.
Is it just for Weddings?
No! While Two Bright Lights originally started to help wedding photographers get noticed, they’ve expanded to include many other categories like:
- Events and Parties
- Family/Lifestyle
- Home and Decor
- Food/Culinary
- Travel
- Styled Shoots
- Detail Shoots (e.g. Invitations and Tabletops)
- Fashion
- Animals
- Architecture
- Nature/Landscape
- Sports
- Thematic/News
- Weather
So if brides aren’t your thing, it’s still worth checking out.
Try It With 20% Off
Ready to start? Go here to start your trial at Two Bright Lights and start getting published now. They’re offering an exclusive discount to SmugMuggers, so try this code to get 20% off your first month’s membership: SMUGMUG20
Good luck and don’t forget to tell the world where they’ll see your photos next!
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Neat business concept. Wish I would’ve thought of it. There’s an endless supply of photographers wanting to submit stuff. And once there’s enough album, flip a switch and start a stock service as well. Brilliant.
They need to put Smugmug into the list of “How did you hear about us”
A
Seems to be only for Wedding photographers or am I missing something? This would be a great concept for other types of photography, too.
This platform works for all types of photography:
# Weddings
# Events and Parties
# Family/Lifestyle
# Home and Decor
# Food/Culinary
# Travel
# Styled Shoots
# Detail Shoots (e.g. Invitations and Tabletops)
# Fashion
# Animals
# Architecture
# Nature/Landscape
# Sports
# Thematic/News
# Weather
Where did you find that info, all I can find is Weddings. I have not found any mention of any other type of Photography just weddings
Salam,
Is this only for wedding photography?
Nope, all sorts of photography too! See my comment above.
Two Bright Lights isn’t just for wedding photographers! It started out with the wedding industry, but has since expanded to support all different types of photos – check out more info about what they accept on the blog here – http://donebrilliantly.com/2011/08/big-improvements-smugmug-integration-new-categories-and-more-2
They say it’s free forever if I’m an image provider. So, If I’m a photographer who just wants to make some money with his pictures, all I have to do is sign up anda share them, and I’ll make some money as well as the site. Is thta it? Or I have to pay something even if I’m just an image provider?
It only asks about your wedding photography business…
Yeah, in the “abour your business” part there is only wedding photography business…
My problem is that I can’t upload anything from Smugmug…
“Password required to load all images in this Album. Please change the settings in smugmug to access all the images in this album”
I can’t find where should I change it…
Hi Mindless, you probably have your SmugMug galleries protected with a password. Please log in at SmugMug and check the gallery settings for the gallery you’re trying to import. You can always change it back after you’ve uploaded the images to TBL.
No, I’m not. That was the first thing I checked….
It sounds like your best bet for troubleshooting would be to ask their support team: http://twobrightlights.com/aboutUs_ContactUs.php
They also have a support forum linked at the bottom of the page to search for any other questions you’ve got.
Thank you! Going to try..
trying to find more information and getting 404.
http://twobrightlights.com//pdf/Getting-Started-Guide-PHOTOGS-8.24.11.pdf
I managed to create an account and import some pictures from my albums, but the “create editorial submission” part of the site seems not to be working. Also, the whole site’s images and words look oriented only towards wedding photographers. They should do something to make clear they are also looking for other stuff. I already told them using their support email, just writing it here in case some fellow Smugger is getting confused
After looking around the site it looks like it is geared more towards weddings
It says it is for all types of photographers but in the “partners” section they are all wedding related. What is the point in submitting other categories of work to only 1 channel?
Have tried unsuccessfully to upload photos from my smugmug galleries. When I go to the drop down menu of my galleries, only 2 of my 25+ galleries shows up. I changed all my settings to YES on External links and have taken off password protected galleries. Still, only 2 galleries show up on the drop down menu and they’re NOT the ones I need!!! Smugmug doesn’t know what is going on either. Please help!!
I’ve spoken with the Support team, they are already trying to fix the problem. This is their first day with Smugmug.
Hi Everyone! Two Bright Lights here. To clarify a few things, we are DEFINITELY very excited to expand our platform beyond weddings. This option went live 2 days ago and we opted to launch the functionality as we transitioned the language. We are neutralizing the images and taking out the wedding centric text, its just going to take a few days. We have a growing list of non-wedding editors (which you can see in your Two Bright Lights account in the Editorial Bios section) and are actively recruiting more so suggestions are welcome. We add new editors everyday so keep your eyes peeled for more non wedding editors. (Today we added 4 one in entertaining, one in family, one in crafts/DIY/decor, and one in food). We are in the process of working with SmugMug to allow you all to see ALL of your events – and that should be up in running shortly. Thanks for all of the feedback and we are excited to be working with some of you! If you have any questions please email us at support@twobrightlights.com!
dont do it……. dont pay them to sell your photos….. your photos will sell them self…… say they have 500 photographers and say 25 editors looking at your photos. how much do u think your going to make…. how do we know who is looking at bright lights site…. i can say send me $150. and i will tell everyone to look and buy from me and not Getty…. what do u think is going to happen.. they need to pay you IF they sell any of your photos…. YOU dont pay them to sell your photos…………. whats wrong with that………….. ill keep my $150. …….. good luck to everyone that sends photos to bright lights….
dont forget when u send photos to bright lights to sell u cant sell them yourself or send them to anyone ealse to use… u give up your rights…………. think about it…..
looks like the same thing i have i have smug for……. just send your link to all the mags…. you see..
why will anyone pay someone to sell their photos………. i hope this is not smugmugs way of helping the customers they have………… wow…… u paid someone $150. to sell your photos u sold 10 photos and made $100. ……… wow …… whats wrong with that…………..
smug should have never put us on to this site till bright lights change the site to fit all photographers not just wedding photographers.. this is one we to look at bright lights. they cant even update the site they r telling us to use and trust………………………… and if u email them they never get back to u in 24hrs. no support……….. smug can do the same thing think about it. why pay $150… to bright lights…
look at who works at bright lights what do they know about stock photography no back ground at all….. and u r sending your photos and your money to them… wow lol… even theeditorial and marking manager. has no back ground… evens brags about how twitter is going to change to world… and she looks for new apps for her phone…… lol … this site is only for wedding photographers…… good luck everyone…………………. send me $150. and ill sned you $145 that way you just lost $5 ….. not $150
looks like the same thing smugmug does.
You don’t have to pay the $150, that only gets you 3 extra editorial features compared to the free. one.
If they are changing from weddings to general, then good luck to them. If they happen to sell some of my photos that I have advertised for free, then that would be excellent.
If you don’t have anything good to say then don’t say it.
Especially as the last seven comments appear to be from the one person who apparenty holds a grudge against Two Bright Lights.
i dont think they have said anything bad. it looks to me to be true as said. this co. has no back ground in selling stock photos.. your odds of selling any photos by them are very low. and as for the back ground for the staff at two bright lights everyone needs to read the bios. they have listed. what editor is going look to them for photos before going to Getty of some other stock media. you can make more selling your photos in the UK. i can make more money selling my bad photos for one dollar each then selling my good photos with two bright lights. if you think you need to give up your rights to your photos and let two bright lights sell them go for it. has anyone ever seen anything two bright lights has ever sold and has been used. your better off sending your stuff to flicker. more people will see your work. the problem is every one that has the money to buy a digital camera thinks they are a photographer. they start a site with a few photos and start taken money from people. i think this place needs to stick with the wedding stuff. and tony is right they move to this to bring in other photographers they never take the time to update the site. all it talks about is wedding photographers and that is a total diff kind of platform that they are for.
and by the way Getty will sell photos for ten dollars just so they will move the photo and to keep or get a new vendor. and has any one asked what editors or vendors has used two bright lights for photos. and dont think people have said something bad about two bright lights its a comment. all comments may not be to your liken. some people may just need to get out and push there photos and stop sitting at home and thinking work is going to come to them. you need to get out and market yourself better. you sit at home and some one will show up and shoot what you should be shooting.
So your’re going to pay to give your work away for free?!? Why would you give it away at all?!? People who do this are idiots!