Photographer Meredith Andrews has taken Bermuda-specific stock photography to new levels.

Miss Andrews, who is a former Royal Gazette photographer, has set up a website called Bermudastock.com.

She decided to take her archive of photographs and make them available to media houses, advertising agencies and companies who were after high quality digital photos.

"I had a lot of pictures that I kind of wasn't using and often I'd have clients that would ring me up and ask do you have pictures of this or that, but very specifically, so I started to create an archive of my work," she said.

"Then I thought to myself, why don't I just have this out there for people to use as opposed to having to call me every time they need their hurricane picture.

"So I built this website with the help of a couple of people, which is pretty basic and it is an easy, reliable and fast way to get pictures.

"It's a custom-built, unique service that is the direct result from the growing demand for ready-made photography. It will go a long way to serve advertising, publications, annual reports, as well as a host of other uses."

The website was more than a year in the making. It was born from the belief that when someone needs, say, a simple photo of a Bermudian sailboat, a cruise ship or Somerset Bridge, they shouldn't have to spend too much money on it or to do much work.

"If a graphic design team or an in-house marketing department of one of our financial companies require a quick turnaround for good imagery, without sacrificing quality, they now have an easy way to get it in only a couple of minutes," she said.

"There is a database of several thousand professionally-shot images available for immediate use, and more are being added continuously. And, as Bermudastock.com, grows we are adding more photography of Bermuda as well as from the rest of the world too. After all, many of our clients have an international outlook and have expressed an interest in worldwide imagery too."

Miss Andrews added that she has been surprised by the great support and excitement that they have received so far.

"Word-of-mouth has been overwhelming, despite only being officially launched now, Bermudastock.com has already done business with most of the Island's ad agencies as well as several foreign ones," she said.

In return they've worked hard to make the site very user-friendly.

"You can put a keyword in or you can search by category," she said.

"If you are looking for hurricane shots, then you can type in hurricane or storm and I even have Fabian in, hit search and then it brings up the images that match that.

"Or, if you are in marketing or PR and you need a shot for the lobster fest that your company is holding or something specific (you can search that). Or I need something to do with weddings and I need a bride — and the search will come up with them. None of the subjects are identifiable, so it is all Bermuda-centric. For instance, there are ten pages of wedding photos.

"At the moment all of the images are $100, which is a nice round figure and they are for publication, but not for postcards or T-Shirts, I still maintain the copyright.

"Then you add the image to your shopping cart and purchase that. You can use PayPal or credit cards.

"Once you have paid, you receive a download link via e-mail, which will take you back to the site.

"So hopefully it is very straight forward."

Bermudastock.com aims to be the premier provider of Bermuda stock photography.

"We welcome feedback and will develop in the way that our customers want and need," Miss Andrews said. "Photography has never been this easy, cheap and quick."

At the moment all the photographs have been taken by Miss Andrews, but she hopes to one day open it up to other local photographers.

"The standard of advertising and PR in the last five to ten years has been so much higher, they are so much better, they are concept driven, so I think there is a need for it.

"And as you know, things often happen at the last minute; maybe it was time to update some of the stock that is available.

"The images are all jpegs and they are large enough to be used in publications.

"They were taken over a four or five year period, but they essentially are images that I have that someone can use."