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View Full Version : What Approach for Making a Photographer's Website?



p.s.
August 20th, 2010, 08:30 PM
My girlfriend is a film photographer and painter. She wants a website but we're not exactly rolling in $$$ so paying someone is basically out.

I recently learned some HTML and CSS to make a website for work because our normal web person was in situ having a baby. It turns out I really enjoyed it, so I'd like to surprise her by making her a site.

So if I wanted to make a nice, clean site for her that basically had information and then a gallery that will be relatively easy for her to manage, I would use HTML, CSS, and ?????

(It seems like maybe I want to look into PHP or something? As a relative newb on what the web is actually made out of beyond HTML it's hard for me to parse all the different languages' descriptions on the net. I know what CSS is as of like two weeks ago, even though I've been hearing people say it for ten years or whatever.)


Relevant notes:

1. Although I don't know too much about this stuff, I'm technically proficient in general. I use Linux/use CL/like math/understand the rationale behind languages in general/geek out and enjoy it. In short I don't necessarily need something "easy". I really enjoyed starting to learn HTML, even though I only did it out of necessity. I'm more looking to save time on the process of figuring *what* to learn than on the actual learning.

2. I don't want to use a pay service, or a blogging service like tumblr, or wordpress.


Suggestions on what tack to take on this would be appreciated.

Thanks!

tgm4883
August 20th, 2010, 08:42 PM
Yay, more oregon people :)


On topic, don't recreate the wheel. I'd suggest using something like gallery.

http://gallery.menalto.com/

:EDIT:

As a note to your 2nd point, the software is free, but you would need a webserver to install it onto.

p.s.
August 20th, 2010, 09:06 PM
Thanks for the reply, and I second your toast to Oregon! The weather's been beautiful, assuming you're on the same side of the mountains as I am and not in the desert, although that might be beautiful too. I'm planning on getting out to Harney on a camping trip next week, so I'll see.

The thing is, I do want to recreate the wheel, because this is half about getting a wheel, and half about wanting to know how to make wheels.

There's tons of artists' websites out there that seem to be "bespoke". I'd like to know how the people they hire to make them make them.

tgm4883
August 20th, 2010, 09:16 PM
Salem here. I would think most photography sites out there (read, not picasaweb, flickr, etc) use some sort of management system like gallery. There are others as well.

Keep in mind, that something like gallery is highly customizable. You can make it look however you want.

If you still want to do it yourself, you are probably looking at PHP.

mendhak
August 20th, 2010, 09:36 PM
You'll need to pay at some point - you can create the gallery software in PHP or whatever server-side language of your choice, but you'll have to host it somewhere. You could host it on your own machine at home but it'll be slow and I don't think your ISP would be too happy with you doing that, so you'll have to pay for some hosting at least.

Oh and you'll probably want to do this in PHP as it's free, so the hosting plans are generally cheaper than Windows hosting.

As an alternative, you could also consider hosting the photos and artwork in flickr, and then creating a front end that uses the Flickr APIs to display the photos. I've been working on something similar here (http://flickr.mendhak.com/photos.aspx) (just an example).

p.s.
August 20th, 2010, 09:42 PM
Oh, I don't mind paying for domain registration and hosting, the costs of which are negligible. It's the cost of paying someone fairly for an aesthetically pleasing site that's more out of reach.

(We have friends who would do *something* for her, but with anything like this free is always going to get you someone's B effort. Plus, like I said, it's also that I *want* to learn it.)

So, it seems like I was right in thinking that PHP is basically what I'd use.

Thanks for the help!!

blur xc
August 20th, 2010, 09:51 PM
Have you looked into smug mug and/or zenfolio? IIRC, $100/yr gets you a pro account, your own url (myphotographysite.com vs. smugmug.myphotographysite.com or some crap like that), they handle the selling, printing, shipping of the photos, you specify the prices, they take their cut, and send you the rest. I've been pondering creating one for a while now, and might actually do it soon.

BM

p.s.
August 20th, 2010, 09:56 PM
Have you looked into smug mug and/or zenfolio? IIRC, $100/yr gets you a pro account, your own url (myphotographysite.com vs. smugmug.myphotographysite.com or some crap like that), they handle the selling, printing, shipping of the photos, you specify the prices, they take their cut, and send you the rest. I've been pondering creating one for a while now, and might actually do it soon.

BM
I know commercial photographers who use smugmug, and I think it simplifies things for them in terms of selling prints for weddings and stuff, but that's not what I'm looking for. Pay services are great if your site is just a means for selling commercial work, not as much if its an extension of your art portfolio.

blur xc
August 20th, 2010, 10:01 PM
Pay services are great if your site is just a means for selling commercial work, not as much if its an extension of your art portfolio.

I don't understand? What do you mean by the extension of your art portfolio?

Are you looking to sell prints or just display your art online? Why are the downsides of using smugmug or zenfolio for that kind of work?

BM

p.s.
August 20th, 2010, 11:50 PM
I don't understand? What do you mean by the extension of your art portfolio?

Are you looking to sell prints or just display your art online? Why are the downsides of using smugmug or zenfolio for that kind of work?

BM
Well:

For selling commercial work services like smugmug seem useful, even great. I know people who use and love them, especially wedding photographers &tc. I'm a big booster for services like etsy or the like that allow entrepreneurial craftspeople to cut themselves loose from middlemen and agencies and corporations.

Paid or free gallery services also seem great if you just want to display your hobbyist photography or etc., along with blog formats like tumblr or wordpress.

So I don't think there's anything wrong with using any of them.

On the other hand, if you sell your prints in limited, numbered runs and they're printed through an atelier that prints wet, and you also need to display images of paintings that are for sale (but the images aren't; they're just scans of slides), and also not-for-sale images of sculptures that are already collected in a museum, and clips from your video installations, and etc. having a site that's tailored to what you make becomes more natural than using services that are formatted for people who are solely selling unlimited alright-quality prints of journalistic, commercial, or hobby photography.

earthpigg
August 21st, 2010, 01:11 AM
you could always throw something together on, say, wordpress.com for $0.

it uses a fairly limited subset of wordpress features, and isn't especially extensible... but, with a little creativity, im sure you could make it work. you could remove all the blog-ey stuff and just use categories, tags, and whatnot.

& you could always export it to any other wordpress-using host later on.