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Reach millions by getting your photos featured on Yahoo's gorgeous Weather app

Reach millions by getting your photos featured on Yahoo's gorgeous Weather app

By Kunal Dua | Updated: 1 October 2013 16:12 IST

Yahoo released its Weather app for iPhone earlier this year. The app was very well received, winning plaudits for its great design, crisp typography and, most of all, gorgeous photos that serve as the background while the weather information takes centre stage. The app later also became available on Android, retaining the same design and visual appeal.

Anyone who's used the app would've noticed that the beautiful photos associated with each weather location not only represent that city or town, but also the time of the day as well as current weather conditions. So, for example, if you are checking out the weather for New York, where it is currently daytime and raining, you will see an image of the Empire State Building, or indeed any other famous, or not-so-famous New York landmark, clicked during the daytime while it was raining.

The pictures are coming from Flickr, as is evident from the little badge at the bottom right of the screen, but how is the app sourcing these photos, and can you get your own photos featured? The short answer to the second question is yes, and to explain how you can do that, let's answer the first question.

The Yahoo Weather app is getting its photos from a special Flickr group called Project Weather that has been setup for this purpose. While anyone can submit photos to this group, there are a few considerations that you must keep in mind if you wish to have your entries accepted.

1) Photos can belong to any country or city in the world, but must be geotagged as per Flickr's guidelines. More details about geotagging are available on the Flickr website.

2) The photos must reflect the state of the weather in the sky, in day or night for any of the following weather conditions: Clear, Cloudy, Rain, Storm, Fog, Snow.

3) Photos in landscape orientation must be of size 1024x554 pixels or bigger, while photos in portrait orientation must be of size 680x1024 or bigger. Square photos must be 1024x1024 or bigger.

4) The photos should not have people as the focal point. In other words, the image may include people so long as they are in the background and/ or not recognisable.

5) No borders, signatures, watermarks, logos, overlaid text or camera time stamps should be visible on the photos.

Follow these simple guidelines and submit as many photos as you want to the Project Weather group. Of course you'll need to be a member of Flickr (free to sign up) to submit your photos to the group. Most people will hear within 30 days of submission if their photo has been accepted. If you are confused about what kind of images to submit, Yahoo says it wants images "rich, captivating images from across the globe, from a vibrant, clear day to a dark, stormy day", which "get people excited about weather."

Once your work is accepted, your image will be displayed for that location when the weather condition and time of day match your photo. How frequently that image is displayed would of course depend on the number of existing photos for that combination in the Project Weather Flickr group. So, pictures of your sleepy hometown are likely to be featured more frequently, than, say, pictures of London during rain, that everyone and their grandmother may have clicked and submitted. But then many more people are likely to be interested in London's weather, than a small town, so your London photos, if accepted, will likely have more exposure, even if you are one of several in the group.

Yahoo guarantees equal rotation, such that if there are three photos in the Project Weather group representing the same city, weather condition, and time of day, each photo will show one-third of the times that a user views the app for that weather condition, time of day, and city.

While Yahoo will not pay for using your photos in the app, your Flickr screen name and a link to the photo will be shown on the screen of the app as, giving people a chance to explore more of your additional work. You also get to retain all rights to your photo.

So what are you waiting for? Submit your photos now and earn bragging rights amongst your friends. If you still have questions or doubts, head over to this page for more details about the process.

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