Posted by Chad Dees on February 1, 2009 at 3:12 PM
Hi I just sold my first photo as some of you who posted some tips on my early photo licensing post know. I want to make a webpage to display my photography and start getting out there so people can see my work. is there certain things to look for in a webhost? Also how do I put the images on my webpage so that I they can be seen but not copied or stolen? and help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you.
Chad
Posted by Ed Cordes on February 1, 2009 at 3:32 PM
There are many options for developing a website. You can pay someone to do it for you, but this tends to be expensive and harder to update as you get new images. You can get one of the HTML programs to write your own, but then you have to learn HTML. There are several programs that allow you to use a "what you see is what you get" format. With these programs you will type in English and the software converts to HTML for you. Some are easier to customize than others.
If you do a search on this and other forums you will see many suggestions. I would invite you to check out my website
I created it myself using a program called Web Easy. It cost about $50. It is a what you see is what you get program that automatically converts your English into HTML.
I have it hosted on ieasysite which costs about $15 per year for the URL and $9.95 per month for hosting. I find it easy to update and maintain.
While it took many hours during the development phase it is not hard, just time consuming. You do have to think about how you want to organize the site first then implement it. Web Easy has numerous templates that are easy to get started with , especially for photo sites, but I am stubborn and wanted to create my own. This past November I did a major overhaul that took me about 1 1/2 weekends to accomplish, but I like the results.
This software is not the most sophisticated, but it is relatively easy to use. The learning curve on any of these is a little steep, but not that hard - after all I learned it!!
I am sure you will get much more advice as others post.
Posted by Bryan Maltais on February 1, 2009 at 3:34 PM
Chad, web hosting companies have pretty much become a commodity item, meaning that most offer the SAME features, for the SAME price. You basically should look for unlimited bandwidth, and unlimited storage, with shopping cart integration, which most have anyway. I use BLUEHOST.com, which I'm paying $5/month.
As for your images not being downloaded, there are ways to disable mouse right click, which entails adding a piece of HTML codeto each image page. The drawback is that by disabling right click, you're also disabling web navigation via mouse, which can annoy your visitors.
The common answer is to simply flatten a watermark into your images, and keep them at a low resolution. I opt not to go too low in res because the nicer and bigger your image looks, the more likely it is to sell, so I choose to display my images at 700 px. Frankly, if somebody wants to go to the trouble of cloning out my watermark and signature to get a usable 5x7 print, or a crappy 8x12, be my guest.
A lot of guys use images as small as 400px, which is obviously a lost cause to produce a print from. In that case the goal is not necessarily to sell the print based on the web image, but for customers to use as a reference for full sized prints that they've already seen in person.
Good Luck!
Posted by Chad Dees on February 1, 2009 at 5:30 PM
Thank you guys, I really appreciate the tips and ideas. NP.net rocks. do you know if any of the free webhosts are any good? Thank you again.
Dustytrails photography
Chad
Posted by Phillip Noll on February 1, 2009 at 8:33 PM
I don't have any direct experience with free webhosts but I'll bet you get what you pay for! In other words, be careful if you go with a "free" webhost. You might not get all the features you want/need and customer service will probably be nonexistent! Buyer beware!
there are a number of photographer centric web hosting companies out there. I personally use smugmug. They have three level, Standard - Power - Pro. You pick the features you want and you can customise it pretty easily if you have the Power or Pro account. It has all the features you list plus lots more. http://www.smugmug.com/
Posted by Lon Overacker on February 2, 2009 at 12:33 AM
Chad,
Some good advice so far and I echo what's already been said. Although I've never used Smugmug, it's quite popular and might be a great start to get your images and a site up rather quickly. Then, over time you can either A. Learn html, design and write your own site and host it with any hundreds of reasonably priced and reliable web hosting companies, OR B. save money and pay someone to do it.
I've had a website for nearly 15 years. The very first on hosted on AOL - way back before the dot com boom (and bust.) For a very simple, no java, no flash, no-nothing website, and learning from scratch, it took me 3 months, and countless nights staying up til 3 in the morning.
I'm not discouraging building your own site. I happened to like the idea that I did it myself and there's lots of pride and accomplishment. The down side is that there is no way to know or understand all the current web technology. Even something like making a website be compatible with dozens and dozens of different web browsers is just short of rocket science.
As far as preventing people from stealing your images. You can't. I started out with disabling right-clicks, but for those who are intending on swiping images, they can still do it. All you need to do is a screen capture. Most folks now simply include some sort of watermark, or even a copyright/signature in the image somewhere. Keep the image small enough that the worst that could happen is someone could make a 4x6 print. The size and quality of the web images aren't good for anything really except for display on the web.
Having a website is all of these: promotes your work, enjoyable, rewarding, tedious, frustrating, causes headaches, carpal tunnel syndrome, loss of sleep and in extreme cases will break up a marraige... (JUST KIDDING)
Good luck,
Lon
Posted by Chad Dees on February 2, 2009 at 1:01 AM
first I would like to thank all those who have posted tips and given me advice, I am currently taking a wed design course at my high school. and I will deffiently look into the sites you have all told me about. thank you again. any more tips would be great.
Discussion
7 repliesChad
If you do a search on this and other forums you will see many suggestions. I would invite you to check out my website
www.ecordesphotography.com
I created it myself using a program called Web Easy. It cost about $50. It is a what you see is what you get program that automatically converts your English into HTML.
I have it hosted on ieasysite which costs about $15 per year for the URL and $9.95 per month for hosting. I find it easy to update and maintain.
While it took many hours during the development phase it is not hard, just time consuming. You do have to think about how you want to organize the site first then implement it. Web Easy has numerous templates that are easy to get started with , especially for photo sites, but I am stubborn and wanted to create my own. This past November I did a major overhaul that took me about 1 1/2 weekends to accomplish, but I like the results.
This software is not the most sophisticated, but it is relatively easy to use. The learning curve on any of these is a little steep, but not that hard - after all I learned it!!
I am sure you will get much more advice as others post.
As for your images not being downloaded, there are ways to disable mouse right click, which entails adding a piece of HTML codeto each image page. The drawback is that by disabling right click, you're also disabling web navigation via mouse, which can annoy your visitors.
The common answer is to simply flatten a watermark into your images, and keep them at a low resolution. I opt not to go too low in res because the nicer and bigger your image looks, the more likely it is to sell, so I choose to display my images at 700 px. Frankly, if somebody wants to go to the trouble of cloning out my watermark and signature to get a usable 5x7 print, or a crappy 8x12, be my guest.
A lot of guys use images as small as 400px, which is obviously a lost cause to produce a print from. In that case the goal is not necessarily to sell the print based on the web image, but for customers to use as a reference for full sized prints that they've already seen in person.
Good Luck!
Dustytrails photography
Chad
there are a number of photographer centric web hosting companies out there. I personally use smugmug. They have three level, Standard - Power - Pro. You pick the features you want and you can customise it pretty easily if you have the Power or Pro account. It has all the features you list plus lots more.
http://www.smugmug.com/
Another that comes to mind is clikpic at: http://www.clikpic.com/
cheers,
André
Some good advice so far and I echo what's already been said. Although I've never used Smugmug, it's quite popular and might be a great start to get your images and a site up rather quickly. Then, over time you can either A. Learn html, design and write your own site and host it with any hundreds of reasonably priced and reliable web hosting companies, OR B. save money and pay someone to do it.
I've had a website for nearly 15 years. The very first on hosted on AOL - way back before the dot com boom (and bust.) For a very simple, no java, no flash, no-nothing website, and learning from scratch, it took me 3 months, and countless nights staying up til 3 in the morning.
I'm not discouraging building your own site. I happened to like the idea that I did it myself and there's lots of pride and accomplishment. The down side is that there is no way to know or understand all the current web technology. Even something like making a website be compatible with dozens and dozens of different web browsers is just short of rocket science.
As far as preventing people from stealing your images. You can't. I started out with disabling right-clicks, but for those who are intending on swiping images, they can still do it. All you need to do is a screen capture. Most folks now simply include some sort of watermark, or even a copyright/signature in the image somewhere. Keep the image small enough that the worst that could happen is someone could make a 4x6 print. The size and quality of the web images aren't good for anything really except for display on the web.
Having a website is all of these: promotes your work, enjoyable, rewarding, tedious, frustrating, causes headaches, carpal tunnel syndrome, loss of sleep and in extreme cases will break up a marraige... (JUST KIDDING)
Good luck,
Lon