Submission Guidelines
Writer's Guidelines
Purpose | Features | Boats & Gear Stories
Front of the Book | Artwork | Handling of Submissions
Some Important Points | Jump to Photographer's Guidelines
Purpose: Our primary goal is to publish a lively and informative magazine
that provides detailed and accurate coverage of all aspects of commercial
fishing and the construction of commercial fishing boats.
We are a hybrid: We are a trade publication, but
we are not the "nut-and-bolt monthly". The fishing industry
has a very real pulse from the grass roots up and our readers expect
material that is as lively as they are. Over the years, our ability
to produce compelling, well-illustrated stories has to led us to
great success on the newsstand.
If most of our readers are fishermen, we nonetheless
have a sizable audience of academics, politicians, bureaucrats,
sport fishermen, environmental advocates and armchair mariners.
As a result, our features must be appealing and comprehensible to
people who are interested in the fishing industry but who are not
be directly involved in catching fish.
We try to accomplish this by publishing stories
about people. Yes, there are boats and fish and regulators and nets
and engines and all the rest, but they must be part of stories that
are engaging, honest, and unpretentious accounts of the people,
equipment, and events that make commercial fishing the exciting
and very human business it is.
^ BACK TO TOP
Features
Features usually run from 1,500 to 2,500 words. Basically, our front-of-the-book
stories fit into one of these categories:
• At-sea Writer makes a trip
on a fishing boat and comes home with story and pictures, including
one of him/herself with the captain and crew. (2,000 words plus
fact box)
•Profile Profiles can address individuals or communities. They should include
at least one "vintage" photo, i.e., subject when he
was young, town in days of old. The people do not need to be icons
of the industry and the community doesn't have to be a top-10
port. If you're interested in someone or someplace and write well,
we'll be interested too. (1,500 to 2,000 words)
•History History pieces are akin to profiles, with a greater emphasis placed
on the subject's evolution. A history piece can focus on a boat
or a dock, though, as well as a community or fishery. (1,500 to
2,000 words)
•Analysis Our analysis stories look at current events in the fishing world.
Warning: We look for subjects of interest to a national readership,
which generally means writers must pitch stories that would interest
fishermen from coast to coast, and they elicit comment from sources
around the country. Grass-roots looks at local management issues
are unlikely to cut it for us. (1,500 to 2,500 words) Other areas
of interest for analytical features:
•The
business of fishing Given what they're given, how can fishermen
use efficiency, ingenuity or market savvy to make more money.
•The science of fishing Habitat and weather issues come to mind.
We are not interested in sport fishing (with the exception of
articles on conflicts between sport and commercial fishermen),
pleasure boats, cruising stories, pleasure boat equipment, or
boat racing.
Last,
but by no means least: My job as editor
is to find a way to get good stories into the magazine, not keep
them out. If you have a good idea that you don't think fits any
of these categories, think again. Figuring out what would it take
to make it fit could be the difference between getting an assignment
and not getting one.
In any event, query us first (Senior Editor Linc Bedrosian at
or Editor in Chief Jerry Fraser at
,
and read several issues of the magazine before you try to pitch
a feature-length story.
^ BACK TO TOP
Articles in the Boats & Gear section are about boats and equipment
used by commercial fishermen, not charter-boat, workboat (tugs,
ferries, etc.) or pleasure-boat owners. Though the readership is
a professional audience that usually has owned more than one boat
and has spent several years on the water, the article shouldn't
read like it was written for a technical journal. Take the story
elements and weave them into a narrative with local color, history
and anecdotes thrown in to keep the story moving.
A boatbuilding story includes design information,
construction details on how the boat was build, important equipment,
something on the owner and builder, and a mention of the fisheries
the boat is being built for.
Gear stories cover any of the equipment
that a fishing boat utilizes. It might be sonars, gillnet haulers,
trawl design, or developments in diesel engines. If it can go on
a fishing boat - any kind or size of fishing boat - it's eligible.
But no matter how good your writing is,
we need photographs and illustrations. So, think about how you can
take photographs - with people in them - that explain the article.
Please query Michael Crowley, Boats & Gear editor at mscrowley@gwi.net.
^ BACK TO TOP
Front
of the book
The "Around the Coasts" section in the front of the book
is a new writer's best chance to break into National Fisherman.
Each month we run about 20 "ATCs," which
are commercial fishing news briefs from across the country (including
the Great Lakes). Remember, though, that we are a monthly with
a fairly long production cycle so breathless news leads aren't
we're
looking for. Ideally, we want briefs with a news element and that
have a "voice" or a "take" on the news. Quotes
are essential. Tip one: Read some ATCs. Tip 2:
Consider the definition of an ATC as 250 words. If the story
absolutely positive
must be longer, pitch it as a feature or forget about it. Nor do
we want anything shorter. Please query Senior Editor Linc Bedrosian,
,
before submitting material.
Artwork
If you're writing a feature story for us, you must supply us with
accompanying artwork. Art will also help sell us your ATC. For more
information, please see the photgraphers
guidelines.
^ BACK TO TOP
Handling
of submissions:
E-mailed submissions are best. I recommend that you attach your
document to an e-mail, as well as paste it into the body of the
e-mail. You should consider floppy disks as a last resort, but if
that's all you've got, send it - along with a clean, hard copy.
(Manuscripts that are typed should be double-spaced with I-inch-minimum
margins. Do not use erasable typing paper and please don 't type
over errors that have been covered with liquid or paper whiteout.
If you choose to send us a photocopy of a story, please make sure
that the reproduction is of good clear quality.)
Please don't fax submissions to us as we do not
have the time to retype.
We try to acknowledge all editorial submissions
as soon as possible, but don't worry if you don't hear right away.
Material does pile up at certain times each month, especially when
we are on deadline. Payment is generally made upon publication unless
otherwise arranged.
National Fisherman buys first and limited reprint rights to all
copy and accompanying photographs. Limited reprint rights permit
us to approve the occasional request from a company or nonprofit
institution to reprint an article. These rights in no way interfere
with the author's ability to sell an article to another publication
after it has appeared in National Fisherman.
We frequently find ourselves with a backlog of
material on hand and competition for the available editorial space
can be fierce. It's always a good idea to query us before submitting
a story. Usually we can give you a fairly good idea of the article's
chances of running in a given issue.
^ BACK TO TOP
Some
Important Points
Use your imagination when thinking up story ideas, but not when
preparing facts. Be absolutely sure of what you re writing. Double-check
the spelling of all names as well as technical information. No matter
how well a story is written, its credibility - and its chances of
being published - rest on its accuracy.
Unless you're reporting on an event that clearly
occurred in the past, try to use present tense. This makes a story
more dynamic. Also use the active rather than the passive voice.
("I caught the fish," instead of "The fish was caught
by me.")
Unless other arrangements have been made, send
all feature submissions to
,
all Boat & Gear submissions to Michael Crowley at
,
and all ATCs to
.
Finally, please let us know how you'd like your
name to appear in a byline. You might also send along a brief outline
describing your background as a writer and your involvement in any
other activities that relate to your area of expertise.
Don't hesitate to ask us for help if you have
any questions about our requirements or editorial style. We'll be
happy to help in any way we can.
Jerry Fraser
Editor in Chief
Photographer's Guidelines
If you're writing a feature story for us, you must supply us with accompanying artwork. Art will also help sell us your ATC.
All photos should be marked with a credit line and should include the sender's full mailing address. Captions are required for all submitted photographs. The best way to provide this information is to type out each caption on a separate piece of paper and index it to the appropriate photo. (If you're submitting prints, do not write on the backs of photos with grease pencils or felt-tipped pens. Grease pencil invariably smears and ink from felt-tipped pens is readily transferred to the faces of photos that are stacked for mailing.)
We generally prefer color slides taken on 100 speed Elite Chrome or equivalent film, although film shot with medium- or large-format cameras also works for us.
Please send duplicates when possible because of the risk of losing originals during shipping.
Digital Images:
Scanned images can be e-mailed or sent on Zip disk or CD to art director Jennifer Finn at the address below. Images should be at least 300 DPI (resolution) at 100% of final print size. Final print size varies. 5X7 images will meet most magazine layout criteria. Images from many digital cameras do not meet these criteria or have a final print size about that of a postage stamp and low resolution. Scanned images are preferred, in jpeg, tiff or eps format. If you cannot tell if your image meets the criteria, don't hesitate to call.
Jennifer Finn, Art Director
National Fisherman
121 Free St.
Portland, ME 04101
207-842-5669
^ BACK TO TOP
|
News & Events 
