Sample archive entry
Oreo
Park Slope, Brooklyn · Bodega Cat Visit
A polydactyl Park Slope cat whose extra toes made him impossible to forget.
Photographed by
Gulce Kilkis
Lead archive photographer
Archive contributors
Contribute to the Archive
For photographers helping document New York's working bodega cats. Credit, rights, and future paid-use terms are clear before the visit, not argued about later.
What this is
A selective contributor page for BCNY archive visits. It is not a general photo upload.
What you make
A documented cat entry: photos, store context, contributor credit, and rights status.
What changes hands
You keep the copyright. BCNY gets a nonexclusive license to use selected work for the archive.
What you make
A real entry, with your name on it.
Your photo doesn't land in a stock folder. It becomes a specific cat's entry, tied to that store and that visit, with your credit attached. Here's exactly where your name shows up.
Open the live entry
Entry byline
Your name sits on the cat entry, beside the record.
Photo caption
Your credit follows the selected images on BCNY pages and in press.
Contributor page
Approved contributors get a short profile with portfolio and Instagram links.
Paid-use record
If a Visit photo earns money later, the agreed split stays attached to that image.
Contributor lanes
Three ways work can enter BCNY.
Assignment, personal-work review, and future paid use each work differently. Here's the difference, so none gets mistaken for another.
Unpaid archive work
Archive Contributor Visit
A BCNY host guides the outing and brings the photographer to three or four confirmed cats when possible. The archive visit itself is unpaid.
Review first
Existing Personal Work
Already photographed a bodega cat? BCNY can review it for possible archive use. Nothing moves without your approval.
Payment trigger
Paid Use Later
Book inclusion, exhibit use, licensing, and print sales are separate from unpaid archive participation and trigger their own payment terms.
How it works
No mystery between application and publication.
BCNY reviews the photographer, then the visit, then the entry. Nothing publishes until the work is ready.
01
Apply
Send your portfolio, where you're based, your availability, and why this work fits you.
02
Review
BCNY looks at documentary fit, store sensitivity, and whether the timing works.
03
Brief
If it's a fit, you get the store context, expectations, credit rules, and rights terms before the visit.
04
Visit
A host guides you to three or four cats in one outing when possible. You photograph patiently, with the owner's context and the location respected.
05
Publish
Approved photos run as an official entry, your credit on the record.
Fit
Who should apply.
Documentary, street, editorial, portrait, or neighborhood-focused work
Comfort working quietly inside small businesses with real customers around
Respect for owner consent, animal welfare, and sensitive location context
An eye for the store as much as the cat
Terms
Clear before anyone shoots.
Written to be clear, not to be legal theater. You should know the line between site publication, a paid visit, and later commercial use.
Archive contributor participation is unpaid unless BCNY confirms a separate paid use in writing.
You keep the copyright to your photographs.
BCNY receives a nonexclusive license to publish selected work in the BCNY archive, related site pages, BCNY social, and press materials, always with your credit.
If a photo is selected for a book, the photographer receives a flat fee.
If a photo is used in an exhibit, the photographer receives either a flat fee or an agreed print split.
If a photo is licensed to a third party, the photographer receives 40% of net licensing revenue and BCNY receives 60%.
If a photo is sold as a print, the photographer participates in the split after production and fulfillment costs.
Application
Send your work for review.
Send a portfolio and a short note. If there's a fit, BCNY follows up with the details before anything is assigned.
Applying starts a review. It isn't an assignment or a promise to publish.
Approved contributors get a connected profile page with their portfolio links.