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Advice/discussion on setting up a portfolio/photo website

Ross Stockwell

New member
Hello

I'd like to start a thread on various approaches/options to the design, setup and maintainance of a website to showcase photographic/art.

This is current interest of mine - I am an amateur photographer and am just now to the point where I am ready to show and share my work with a broader audience than immediate family and friends.

I have no website now but am seriously considering one. I don't know if I should build from scratch or buy-in to an existing service. I want to organize and showcase my work and provide the opportunity for people to criticize ((and of course praise ;)); maybe sell an image or print on-line .... I am sure there are other ideas and options as well. Of course costs are a practical constraint .....

I am very interested to hear opinions and experiences; pros/cons of various options; links/referals to worthy services; software or other resources for consideration would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance .....
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
Hi Ross
To build a website is not so difficult, there are some software like dreamwever, Golive that make things quite easy as you may work WYSIWYG. You'll need some work on the design but I guess you have a creative oriented brain!
However be prepared for long nights of try and search, but it can be fun.

I cannot talk to you about pre-prepared website as I build my own ones and therefore have no need for such.

I'm sure you'll find very good advices here on this subject (we all need to show our work!)

Bonne chance!
 

Ross Stockwell

New member
Thanks Nicolas -

Your reference to 'long nights' suggests maybe another constraint to think about is time and effort ;). I already spend long nights with Photoshop!

As an amateur, I also have a 'day job'; as an older parent with young kids, I suffer frequently from brain-fade. So while I am sure I could figure out the programming thing -- practically - some sort of service or 'turn-key' option will likely make the most sense (for me). I'd rather be messing with photgraphy than the computer .... ;)
 

Asher Kelman

OPF Owner/Editor-in-Chief
Ross,

Good idea. Thanks for starting a key subject.
1. exposuremanage.com the are many others this allows slide shows and sales. They print and deliver or you can or both. You get a monthly check. They are new but v. good and reliable.

2. A custom design as suggest above: Nicolas Claris M&N design company might do it for you or others can give more ideas.

3. Design it your self.

4. Use a pro service like Pictage

I suggest you start with the exposuremanager.com type site as this requires the least knowledge and thus get some experience in a workflow for preparing your photos of the right format and size, color corrected or not.

You can either upload them "print ready" so after an order they prints will be processed immediately, or upload as small .jpg, this is v.fast and then only process and upload when exposuremanager send you an email request for the fully processed file.

You get informed each step of the way: order, sent to printer, printing and delivery!

Whatever you choose, there are companies waiting to custom design for So, bookmark sites you. For the site designer, you can now give them the general look and interface, site flow from say certain features of favorite sites or whatever tickles your fancy!

The most important information for the web designer is the function: is the content and what you want it to do and the "how" and "who" of updating.

Asher
 

Ross Stockwell

New member
Merci Nicolas!

I am already learning something ... the Pbase site looks interesting.... don't stay up toooo late :)!

BTW I am most impressed with your site -- very nice .....
 

Ross Stockwell

New member
Here I am replying to my own thread -- ;)

I just came across this link http://www.bigblackbag.com/


It seems to be a 'semi-custom' approach to setting up a web-based portfolio. Does anyone have any experience with them? Are there similar services to compare this with??

BTW - Thanks Asher for your post - I checked-out exposure manger.com - it looks interesting - Ist impression is that it emphasizes the commercial side of things (not a criticism) - will definitley look in to these and similar services.
 

nicolas claris

OPF Co-founder/Administrator
When choosing such website, test carefully the speed to download pages with images.
On my own, I do not like flash as it takes too long to download galleries (though when the're downloaded, you may browse with speed...)
On a photographic website, you'll want to show clean images so you'll not compress JPEGS more than 8 on PS scale. Therefore they will be quite "heavy" and you'll need to have a nice layout but ALSO o fast server with huge pipelines...

PS, yes I still have some flash on our website, but it will not survive long...
 

Tom Yi

New member
Ross,
Have you looked at smugmug? You can get a pro account that lets you use your ownd web address, unique banners and a look, private galleries with passwords, ability to download original sized files, ability to sell your prints through them, etc, etc, etc.
 

Don Lashier

New member
Ross Stockwell said:
Thanks Nicolas -
So while I am sure I could figure out the programming thing -- practically - some sort of service or 'turn-key' option will likely make the most sense (for me). I'd rather be messing with photgraphy than the computer .... ;)

I'm reluctant to even mention this since I'm not ready for primetime yet, but I've written a CMS with features specifically for photographers (since I'm one ;) . My own site (obviously not updated much in some time) is hosted in it as well as another photographer's site. It includes galleries and ecommerce (shopping cart). Neither of us are using the shopping cart currently but I've got many other non-photo sites that do. I just added a bulk upload that'll create a gallery of photos with a single click but still need to add support for IPTC etc. I'm currently trying to "fool proof" it since I'm finding that many artists (present company excepted) are computer impaired, and the user IF for my system was originally intended for professional web developers. I'm finding that the average person can't even cope with the idea of heirarchical organization even though the folders on their own computer are organized that way. It seems that average (computer) intelligence is around 70. I call it the "Lake Wobegon Effect". ie, all the kids in Lake Wobegon are above average, meaning that the rest of the population is below average? Andy (2nd site above) is a good example - superb photographer/artist but has a difficult time grasping basic web site concepts although he has managed to add many galleries to his site after initial professional setup. Another artist using the system is my friend sculptor Bill Kucha, also computer impaired, but Bill manages to not only add new galleries but now also does his own photography rather than calling me.

preview omg: smiles are here :)


- DL
 
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Ross Stockwell

New member
Tom/Don -- Thanks for your input I am finding it very helpful in quickly sorting out the range of possibilities. Also it helps me rethink my priorities about what I want.

This is a 'green field' situation for me. I have no strong opinion about ahat direction to go with on this. I have reasonable facility with computers/etc.. I have not abandoned the idea of building a site from scratch - its just that its been a long time since I did any programming (think FORTRAN) .... On the other hand I just want to keep-it-simple and easy to organize/work with - even after the third glass of wine ;)
 

Tom Yi

New member
Ross Stockwell said:
Tom/Don -- Thanks for your input I am finding it very helpful in quickly sorting out the range of possibilities. Also it helps me rethink my priorities about what I want.

This is a 'green field' situation for me. I have no strong opinion about ahat direction to go with on this. I have reasonable facility with computers/etc.. I have not abandoned the idea of building a site from scratch - its just that its been a long time since I did any programming (think FORTRAN) .... On the other hand I just want to keep-it-simple and easy to organize/work with - even after the third glass of wine ;)
Smugmug might be right up your alley then.
 

Mike Spinak

pro member
Ross,

I chose to build my own site from scratch. My reasoning was mainly that I'm an uncompromising bastard who wants everything exactly my way. I wanted to be able to post any content (such as nu___, (unclothed model photography) for example) without oversight and censoring. I wanted to be able to circumvent any and all aspects of site design that someone else's service might impose upon me. I wanted the final word about policy, period.

The good news is that I got exactly what I want. I'm pleased with the form my website is taking, so far.

The bad news is that the amount of work required is huge... at least in the short term, on the front-end of actually designing and implementing everything. (This is exacerbated by the fact that this is the first time I've built a serious website.) I am still nowhere close to finished; the amount to be done is seemingly endless.

(By the way, I have both Go Live and Dreamweaver. Currently, I'm more wed to Dreamweaver. While my site seems like it requires endless work, Dreamweaver does make most everything I need to do much faster and easier.)


If you use a site like smugmug.com, make sure to research thoroughly, and read the fine print, to make sure that you know what you are getting into. Each site seems to have its own set of quirks and eccentricities, which would be of no consequence to some, but would be of the utmost importance to others, depending upon each photographer's business model. For example, one of the complaints I've seen photographers level against smugmug, if I'm remembering and understanding correctly, is: When someone orders a print of one of your pictures through smugmug, smugmug considers the orderer to be their customer, not your customer. So, they keep the orderer anonymous from you, in the name of privacy of their customers, and refuse to share specific customer information with you.

Mike

www.mikespinak.com
 
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Ross Stockwell

New member
Thanks so much for this - I am very grateful for the advice and comments on this topic so far. There are many factors to consider for sure -- actually the terms and conditions fine print on smugmug caught my eye, and precisely because some of my images are 'n___ (unclothed model) studies (tasteful of course) I'd prefer to avoid misunderstandings or an arbitrary editiorial policy that 'shuts me down'. Thanks for the heads up on 'who owns the customer' - I would not have thought about that until I ran in to the problem head-on.
 
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Don Lashier

New member
> arbitrary editiorial policy that 'shuts me down'. Thanks for the heads up on 'who owns the customer

Ross, this is the difference between a site like smugmug and an enhanced hosting site like ours. With us you have your own site and are in complete control of it and any customer info and may post any content you like as long as it's not pornographic. Like I said earlier, although we have hosting customers all over the country, we're not ready for prime time yet, primarily from a support standpoint. We have local training sessions but online docs are still minimal at this point - hoping to change that soon but as any programmer will tell you, writing the docs is as much work as writing the program. There are other services like ours out there but I can't point you to any specific ones.

- DL
 

Anita Saunders

New member
Hi Ross

I have been making my own websites from scratch for years, always updating, redesigning, taking different approaches etc, but at the end of the day I was trained in web/multimedia and also able to spend time because I was self-employed and could make my own timeplans. Now I am full time employed I have hardly found a minute to update never mind redesign. It is really about how much time you have.

If you are short of time (Dreamweaver etc is easy to learn but still takes a lot of time) then I would go for a free php gallery which is interactive. I have tried several over the years but unfortunately most of them were hacked at some time or other. Highly unsecure and often had a lot of unnecessary options and too much structure/sections for my needs. What a photographer really needs is a basic gallery in order to be visible.

The best one I found (and which is the only one never to have been hacked) was Coppermine. The demos look quite plain but if you want to you can customise it, or if not there are 'skins' to choose from.

There are a lot of options for you to enable/disable, including feedback, ecards etc. but it is primarily a gallery not a php universe of 'stuff' you don't need.

If you want to take a look: Coppermine but you really need to buy some webspace then install and try it in order to judge it.

It's easy, ready made, customizable, free and highly secure. What more could you want?

Get yourself out there, you won't regret it!
 

Michael Tapes

OPF Administrator/Moderator
Another halfway solution is a great free web creation program called porta. It is the basis of my current galleries listed in my sig. Although I have had my graphic designed build the frames for the galleries, the base galleries are all done by porta (which in turn uses the free simpleview program.

I have not been actively posting many galleries in the past year, but that is about to change. The images that look good, were built to size by me so that there is no resizing by porta. Some of the older images are resized in porta and have been re-purposed so are not best web quality. I will reprocess those at some time.

I like the fact that one can use the arrow keys, once the gallery has the focus, to move through the photos.

The process is so fast and simple. Just run porta on a folder of files, upload the newly created folder and you are done.

Anyway here are the links:

porta web gallery maker

Michael Tapes Galleries in progress
I would say that the misc gallery on the Michael Tapes side of the gallery is a good example of what porta can do for you.

Just another approach that minimized the time needed to support a decent presentation. Clean and simple IMHO.

But there are a million ways to display your photographs. The key is more to actually display them, then how :>)
 
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