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Hey Professional Photo People, Website Question

BigMike

BigMike

BrokenbikeMike
Jul 29, 2003
8,931
0
Montgomery county MD
I'm looking at starting up a small side business in photography. I'm interested in going and shooting, doing whatever I need to do post-pro, and then uploading them onto the web where people can place an order and I can get what they want printed at a local lab.
Are there programs out there on the cheap that will let you upload pictures from a gig so people can browse through them and then order them?

How exactly does somthing like that work?
 
LordOpie

LordOpie

MOTHER HEN
Oct 17, 2002
21,022
3
Denver
how much would you charge per photo... for digital version? for printed version?

EDIT: You plan on doing this for fun and experience, yeah? Not in anyway for profit, correct?
 
BigMike

BigMike

BrokenbikeMike
Jul 29, 2003
8,931
0
Montgomery county MD
It would depend on the gig, and how many prints.

I would be doing it for experiance, resume, and cash flow for better equipment. I will still have my job, this would just be in addition to
 
LordOpie

LordOpie

MOTHER HEN
Oct 17, 2002
21,022
3
Denver
oh, you're going to shoot a specific event by request and allow them to see and choose what they want?

I thought you were talking about random photos that people could buy. Nevermind :)

Did you google for something like "thumbnail generator"?
 
BigMike

BigMike

BrokenbikeMike
Jul 29, 2003
8,931
0
Montgomery county MD
yeah, I searched for that, and got a lot of garbage. I know there are some people on here with professional photo websites, I was hoping they sould shed some light on the situation :)
 
PatBranch

PatBranch

Turbo Monkey
Sep 24, 2004
10,451
9
wine country
You can put pics on your own site, which a pain (main pic, thumbnail for each one). I found it easier to use a place like smugmug.com to manage photos. I can edit them, and upload them w/o messing around with the site. It is also simple to put catagories, folders. You can write descriptions about those or each photo seperately. I think this is much easier then doing it all on my site.

I am working on my own site, but I am going to keep the photo's at smugmug (a link from my site would lead to my photos on smugmug).

www.smugmug.com
 
maxyedor

maxyedor

<b>TOOL PRO</b>
Oct 20, 2005
5,496
3,141
In the bathroom, fighting a battle
Printroom.com is a good place to manage print sales from, they take the orders and ship the prints, you just manage your account with them, and pay a comission.

Also don't expect to make much money from spec. shooting. 99.999% of people you run into love the idea of being able to buy prints, but love the idea of looking at them on the internet and not buy them way more. Not to say that you can't make money at it, but it can be nearly impossible to even cover your expenses. The only way I will shoot on spec. like that is to get somebody, usually a group of parents who have asked me to come shoot their kids game, I get then to front the cash to cover my usual rate, them if the prints sell they get a little money bak from each print sale so either way I get paid. It's not even worth leaving my house for under 10 8"x10" sales, so if I need to drive anywhere, do any extensive editing geting the cash up front is the only way.
 
jacksonpt

jacksonpt

Turbo Monkey
Jul 22, 2002
6,791
59
Vestal, NY
I'm not a photo guy, but I am a web guy, so take this for what it's worth...

Considering why you are doing this (I would be doing it for experiance, resume, and cash flow for better equipment.), I'd put the time into having a decent site done up. I'm not sure what Printroom, smugmug, etc. are like, but consider having your own site created and run (if you don't mind a small monthly fee for hosting). It will give you a more professional presence, IMO.

Paypal has some great merchant options that you can build into your site to handle the payment part of all this.
 
Konabumm

Konabumm

Konaboner
Jun 13, 2003
4,384
87
Hollywood, Maryland, United States
BigMike said:
I'm looking at starting up a small side business in photography. I'm interested in going and shooting, doing whatever I need to do post-pro, and then uploading them onto the web where people can place an order and I can get what they want printed at a local lab.
Are there programs out there on the cheap that will let you upload pictures from a gig so people can browse through them and then order them?

How exactly does somthing like that work?
Click to expand...
are you going to snap off some at SS?
 
Graphics

Graphics

Turbo Monkey
Jul 9, 2006
1,706
0
Connecticut
jacksonpt said:
I'm not a photo guy, but I am a web guy, so take this for what it's worth...

Considering why you are doing this (I would be doing it for experiance, resume, and cash flow for better equipment.), I'd put the time into having a decent site done up. I'm not sure what Printroom, smugmug, etc. are like, but consider having your own site created and run (if you don't mind a small monthly fee for hosting). It will give you a more professional presence, IMO.
Click to expand...

I agree...and I'm a computer girl AND photo girl. Here are a few links to some of my friends so you can see what's out there...

http://adrianrogers.deviantart.com/

http://www.darkside-images.com/

I have another that i'll post when i find it. :love:
 
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