diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index 18f8e6e..14aa457 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -8,7 +8,7 @@
 
 	<groupId>org.janelia.saalfeldlab</groupId>
 	<artifactId>paintera-conversion-helper</artifactId>
-	<version>0.7.1-SNAPSHOT</version>
+	<version>0.8.0</version>
 
 	<name>Paintera-Conversion-Helper</name>
 	<description>Command line helper to convert datasets to be paintera friendly.</description>
@@ -87,7 +87,7 @@
 	<scm>
 		<connection>scm:git:git://github.com/saalfeldlab/paintera-conversion-helper</connection>
 		<developerConnection>scm:git:git@github.com:saalfeldlab/paintera-conversion-helper.git</developerConnection>
-		<tag>HEAD</tag>
+		<tag>paintera-conversion-helper-0.8.0</tag>
 		<url>https://github.com/saalfeldlab/paintera-conversion-helper</url>
 	</scm>
 
diff --git a/release.properties b/release.properties
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8919f66
--- /dev/null
+++ b/release.properties
@@ -0,0 +1,19 @@
+#release configuration
+#Tue Aug 27 14:37:22 EDT 2019
+project.rel.org.janelia.saalfeldlab\:paintera-conversion-helper=0.8.0
+project.scm.org.janelia.saalfeldlab\:paintera-conversion-helper.tag=HEAD
+scm.tagNameFormat=@{project.artifactId}-@{project.version}
+scm.tag=paintera-conversion-helper-0.8.0
+project.scm.org.janelia.saalfeldlab\:paintera-conversion-helper.url=https\://github.com/saalfeldlab/paintera-conversion-helper
+project.scm.org.janelia.saalfeldlab\:paintera-conversion-helper.developerConnection=scm\:git\:git@github.com\:saalfeldlab/paintera-conversion-helper.git
+pushChanges=false
+scm.url=scm\:git\:git\://github.com/saalfeldlab/paintera-conversion-helper.git
+preparationGoals=clean verify
+project.scm.org.janelia.saalfeldlab\:paintera-conversion-helper.connection=scm\:git\:git\://github.com/saalfeldlab/paintera-conversion-helper
+project.dev.org.janelia.saalfeldlab\:paintera-conversion-helper=0.8.1-SNAPSHOT
+remoteTagging=true
+projectVersionPolicyId=default
+scm.commentPrefix=[maven-release-plugin] 
+exec.snapshotReleasePluginAllowed=false
+exec.additionalArguments=-Dgpg.skip\=true  -P deploy-to-scijava
+completedPhase=end-release