3.

ANNUAL PHOTOS

Photos are an essential component of a sponsorship program. Annual photos allow sponsors to
see their sponsored friends as they mature and allow the sponsors to “know” their sponsored
friend in a way that cannot be expressed through letters.

The initial photo of an individual is often the first thing that a potential sponsor sees when
considering sponsorship. These photos coming from the Philippine Project are sent to Unbound
Kansas to look for potential sponsors. High-quality photos that show an individual’s personality
play a role in whether an individual will be chosen for sponsorship.

All individuals (sponsored, change of sponsor, and available) are required to submit an updated
photo every year. Unbound project workers (social development workers, subproject
coordinators and correspondence staff) facilitate the annual photo taking of each individual in
their area of designation.

The annual photo is one of the ways that Unbound is able to verify that the sponsored
individuals are still in the program. For this reason, annual photos from the Philippine Projects
must be submitted to Unbound-Kansas within 3 months of the date that they were taken.

All subproject keeps a copy of these photos in digital storages annually for records purposes.

Process

For annual photo taking the CaRD, Subproject, Family (Parents, siblings or relatives), service
scholars (SSP), Correspondence Committee Officer and parent leaders can facilitate the process
using the available devices they have such as smartphone and digital cameras.

The Project has the following options to adopt in processing digital photos

Option 1 – Correspondence Department

1. The communication and records department set schedule in the community for annual photo
taking that is usually scheduled on the most available day of sponsored members.

2. The staff-in-charge in the digital photo process takes the actual picture taking. The remaining
sponsored members that were not able to attend the set schedule will be taken care of by the
sub-project.

3. The photos are processed through editing (cropping and resizing).

4. The digital photos of each individual are then uploaded in Portal meeting the standard photo
guidelines.

5. All digital photos including those that are directly uploaded by the sponsored members are
reviewed and approved at the project level with pending Kansas approval. Kansas sends report
in Portal indicating declined photos and are communicated to subproject and must be re-
uploaded within the month.
Option 2 – Subproject

1. The subproject set schedule in the community for annual photo taking that is usually
scheduled on the most available day of sponsored members.

2. The SDW may take the actual picture taking and forward those photos to the coordinating
unit. Sponsored member, Service scholar and Correspondence officer or Leaders may opt to
send their photos directly to their respective SDW.

3. The SDW processed the photos through editing (renaming) or in special cases where the SDW
are not able to process the photo, it is required that these photos should be immediately
forwarded to CaRD Department.

4. The digital photos of each individual are then uploaded in Portal meeting the standard photo
guidelines.

5. All uploaded digital photos are subject for approval by CaRD who holds the sole
responsibility in forwarding digital photo of the project to KS. A report in Portal is available
indicating declined photos and must be re-uploaded within the month.

Option 3 – Sponsored family

1. A text message is received by the sponsored families with a link along with the OTP (one time
pin) as a notification that their photo is already due.

2. The link provided will direct the sponsored families to the website where they will be required
to enter their CHID and their OTP (one time pin) that will enable them to successfully upload
their annual photo.

3. A confirmation message will be received after the photo was successfully uploaded.

4. It is encouraged that the sponsored member informs their assigned SDW of their digital
photo submission.

5. All uploaded digital photos are subject for approval by CaRD. In the event that their photo is
declined, a text message will be sent to their individual mobile number explaining the reason for
disapproval and are advised to re-upload new photo within the month.

Monitoring the Annual Photo

The following two reports can help project workers to manage when photos are due for each
beneficiary:

● Beneficiary List: The “Next Photo Due” column indicates the date that the next photo is
due for each beneficiary. This date is calculated based on the following:
● For all beneficiaries and available persons, the “Next Photo Due” date is calculated by
adding 12 months to the date the most recent photo was received.
● For example, if the last photo received date was 29July, 2020, the “Next Photo Due” date
is 29July, 2021.

● If a photo is declined by Kansas, the “Next Photo Due” date is calculated by adding 4
months to the date the photo was declined
● For example, if the last photo received was 10 June, 2020and the photo was declined on
12June, 2020, the “Next Photo Due” date is 12October, 2020.

● If the first photo is declined and a subsequent photo is uploaded and declined by
Kansas, the next photo due date will remain as the date the first photo was declined + 4
months.
● For example, if a photo is declined on 12 June, 2020, the photo due date would become
12 October, 2020. If a new photo is uploaded and declined on 04 July 2020, the next
photo due date will remain as 12 October, 2020 until a photo is uploaded and accepted
by Kansas.
 ● Photo Reminders: Beneficiaries and available persons who have not submitted a photo in
11 or 12 months will appear on the Photo Reminders report under the “Next Photo Due”
category. The sponsored member will appear in “Late Photo” after 13 months, and in
“Retirement Warning” after 14 months. After 15 months, the person will be retired from
the sponsorship program for ‘no photo.’ It is important to review this report each month.

Subproject Timeline Compliance. The table below shows the stages of intervention for
pending photos submission in the Project level.

3.2 Annual Photo Guidelines

● Photographs may include the individual’s entire body OR can be from the waist-up
(head, shoulders and torso): whichever is more natural and shows the individual’s
personality.
 OR

● Photos must be taken in a portrait (vertical) orientation, not landscape (horizontal)

● Smiling in photos radiates positivity to its receiver or viewer. If a sponsored individual

does not have a pleasant expression or a smile, some sponsors may become concerned
that the individual might be ill or is unhappy.
● Backgrounds which show the area where the sponsored member lives are preferred.
Photos taken in a studio are not permitted.
● Photos should not have borders.
● Digitally modified photos, Camera filters, Artificial bokeh features, Mirror selfie will not
be accepted. If it is necessary to crop a photo, be sure to maintain the original
dimensions or the photo may appear altered.
● Each photo should show only the sponsored individual. When siblings or other children
are present in the photo, it may become unclear which person is the sponsored
individual. If a sponsored child, youth or elder is unable to appear alone in a photo due
to age or special needs, a family member or another caregiver may appear in the photo.
● The individual should be modestly dressed without offensive/double meaning words,
pictures, signs or gestures in the photo – Avoid shirts with statement or prints that have
inappropriate or double meaning; Avoid wearing white and black shirt, jewelries, or
eyeglasses as they reflect light that causes overexposure. Do not use clothes that you
already wore for your past annual photos as this can confuse the reviewer on whether
your recent photo and discouraged cosmetic products and hair color.
● Hand gestures can have different meanings in different cultures. It is not necessary that
hand gestures be used in a photo, but if the sponsored member would like to use hand
gestures, the only acceptable hand gestures are the peace sign (with the palm of the
hand facing the camera only), thumbs up or heart hands, as are shown in the examples
on the next page. Unbound Kansas will decline photos for any other hand gesture.

● T h e i n d i v i d u a l

(with the exception of individuals who are blind). For those wearing eyeglasses,
facemask, Cap/hat, the photographer must ensure that the eyes and face are clearly
shown in the photo.
● Please omit seasonal items, such as Christmas trees, sponsor gifts or sponsor pictures
from the photo because these photos may be used to find new sponsors when
necessary. It is acceptable, however, for an individual to hold items such as flowers, fruit
or vegetables, pets, etc.
● Photos should be taken from the same level the child is standing on. The photographer
should not be at an elevated or lower ground than the child.
● An individual’s face should be clearly visible. When taking photos, please be sure their
face is not covered by shadows or over exposed (too much light). In the photos below, it
is difficult to see the faces of the children.
 ● Individuals should not hold certificates/diplomas or wear clothing/name tags that
include identifying information such as an individual’s full name or the name of their
hometown.

PLEASE NOTE

● If possible, Projects should pre-set the image size/dimension of the camera to 480 x 640
pixels before taking photos (some cameras may refer to the image size as dimensions or
resolution). Presetting the camera’s image size before taking photos prevents the need
to resize and/or crop photos manually using computer software. Each camera is
different, so please refer to the camera’s user manual or contact Unbound-Kansas if you
have questions.

● Test the settings by taking 10-20 test photos per camera. After downloading these test
photos to your computer, review the image size/dimensions and file size of these test
photos in Windows Explorer. Adjust the settings on the digital camera(s) to ensure they
meet the required parameters above.
 ● Make sure the “Date and/or time stamp”, camera watermark for some camera phone
feature is turned OFF before taking photos.

● The Communications and Records Department (CaRD) processes all the Digital Photos of
each individual and ensures the standard guidelines of Digital Photos are met. They are
responsible for reviewing and approving Digital Photos from the subproject workers.
● Subproject workers have their own access accounts in the Unbound Portal enabling
them to submit the annual photo of each individual by uploading these photos in the
Digital Photos Page of the Portal.
● Once the photos have been uploaded, the Communications Department staff review and
approve each individual’s photo in Portal Photos Page to make sure that the photos are
complying the standard criteria.
● If one or more of these criteria is not met, the Communications Department staff will
decline the photo

3.3 Annual Photo Submission on Portal

3.3.1 Required Parameters

● The digital photo processing system at Unbound-Kansas is highly automated to allow a

small number of staff members to process a very large number of digital photos each
year.
● Projects must submit 100% of their annual photos according to the following parameters
in order for the photos to be uploaded successfully to Portal.
 File Format: .jpg / .jpeg

480 X 640 (width of 480 pixels; height

Image size/dimensions:
of 640 pixels)

Each photo file should be between 80 -

File size:
200 KB (approximate)

Photos must be taken using a portrait

Orientation: (vertical) orientation, not landscape
(horizontal)

The file name must be the CH ID

File name:
number only, for example, 123456.jpg

The CH ID in the file name must belong

CH ID: to the subproject selected when
uploading the batch of photos

The CH ID must not have had another

Last photo received: photo uploaded and accepted in the
last 90 days

3.3.2 Beneficiary Identification

● Each photo must be saved as a .jpg file and named according to the CH ID number of
the individual in the photo. For example, a photo file would be called 123456.jpg when it
is a photo of a beneficiary with a CH ID number of 123456. If a photo file is named
incorrectly, the photo will be rejected.

3.3.3 Creating a batch of photos in a zip file

● After the photos are taken, downloaded to the PC, identified with the CH ID, and resized
or cropped as needed, they must be made into zip files to simplify processing. Place a
maximum of 200 photos in each zip file.

3.3.4 Naming protocol for zip files

● The zip file must begin with ‘Photo,’ then the name of the Project, subproject (if
applicable) and date. Please also include a unique group number if submitting more
than one zip file from a subproject on the same date.

For example, the first batch of photos from Unbound Zamboanga Project and subproject
ZWB that was sent to Unbound-Kansas on September 3, 2020 would be called
Photo_Zamboanga_ZWB_20200903_01.zip. The second batch from that same project and
subproject sent on the same day would be called
Photo_Zamboanga_ZWB_20200903_02.zip.
3.3.5 Responding to Declined Photos

● Photos that are declined by the Project will appear on the Photos Declined by Project
report while photos that are declined by Kansas will appear on the Photos Declined by
Kansas report. To send a corrected photo, to Kansas, please upload it through the
Photos page of Portal. Once the photo is reviewed and approved by the project, it will
no longer appear on the current month
● Report within one hour.
● If a photo was declined in error by the Project, Social Development Workers should
inform the staff of the erratum and the photo needs to be re-uploaded by the
Communications Staff or Social Development Worker to the Photos Page of the Portal.
● If a photo was declined in error by Kansas, the Communications Department staff sends
an email to CSUpdateRequests@unbound.org with the CH ID to explain that the photo is
accurate (a separate email must be sent for each case).
● If the photo was declined for being the “incorrect person” and the photo is the correct
person, the Communications Department staff verify it with the social development
worker in-charge so that the latter can explain and point out the change in appearance
that may have caused the photo team to determine that it was not the same person as
the previous year’s photo. The Communications Staffs, in turn, explain to the Kansas
photo team the change in appearance which may have caused them to determine that
that it was not the same person as the previous year’s photo. Please state this and, if
possible, explain the change in appearance that may have caused the photo team to
determine that it was not the same person as the previous year’s photo.
● If the previous photo was incorrect, the social development worker in-charge should
identify who is pictured in the original photo and submit the correct photo for the
individual. This will allow the Communications Department staff to communicate with
Unbound Kansas for UKS to contact the sponsor to explain what has happened.
● If the photo is declined for “Does not match family record”, the Communications
Department staffs verifies the information to the Social Development workers and
reviews the record in Portal and make any changes, if necessary (incorrect gender, year
of birth, etc.), the Communications Staff then and includes in their email to Kansas Photo
Team what changes have been made. (If it is not possible to modify the record, the
Communications Department staff please request the corrections in the email.)