On November 6th 2014, a few of us from emc design attended the BookMachine event held in London with guest speaker Rebecca Swift.

It was an informal event and an opportunity to meet, socialise and network with other people from within the publishing industry, including designers, editors, writers, publishers and general book lovers.

Sophie from emc said:

“It was a great opportunity to hear from Rebecca of Getty. emc design has worked with them for a number of years so it was good to hear how they have been growing and developing in that time. One of the areas that fascinated me the most was the changing nature of search terms used on the sites to find images. Something I’d not really considered but has a big effect – from how people use the site, how photographers meta tag their images to understanding what the searches are reflecting in real cultural contexts. For example last year on the site the most searched image term was “selfie”!”

Lily from emc also said:

“It was an excellent opportunity to meet with the people I’d already been communicating with, building better relationships with people I speak to on a day-to-day basis and making a more personal connection with the photo library teams. I also found it really interesting to learn about the diversity of people’s occupational backgrounds and how the company had developed from such a small service into a global photo library.”

During the event, Rebecca of Getty Images gave a talk. The talk covered all manner of things but in particular Getty Images’ latest project, which they have curated along with LeanIn.org (founded by Sheryl Sandberg). The project is called “Lean In” and is a “library of images devoted to the powerful depiction of women, girls and the people who support them.”

The collection contains over 3,500 images and its aim is to promote female empowerment and leadership.

As Rebecca was speaking about the Lean In collaboration a projector was showcasing some of the 1000’s of images from the body of work. They are stunning and we’ve since enjoyed looking at more of them. It’s a great initiative and we hope it helps women feel more empowered.