Which Photo Hosting Site?

[Brian Moore]

I currently use Zenfolio. I've had it for a number of years now and despite it's occasional glitches I've not been unhappy enough to change. However, my plan is up for renewal at the end of April and I have recently become particularly concerned about Zenfolio's level of support. I'm looking for alternatives.

SmugMug is an obvious choice. Their "Portfolio" plan would provide what I want and would only be marginally more expensive than my current Zenfolio plan.

Today I was looking at Shoot Proof as a possible alternative. There is also Pixieset, Pic Time and others.

What I'm looking for in a photo hosting site is photo storage, a customizable website feature, and printing/selling tools. (I don't sell many photos but I do some from time-to-time and I want to be able to have a hands-off experience,...which is to say print and mailing services.)

I'm wondering what, if any, "all-in-one" photo hosting sites RPFrs are using and whether you would recommend it.

Thanks in advance for any thoughts on this.

 

[Rob MacKillop]

Once Flickr got too expensive I gave up looking for a hosting site. Never looked at SmugMug, just didn’t like the name. I’ll see what others say.

 

[Brian Moore]

Never looked at SmugMug, just didn’t like the name.

I know what you mean.

I thought you were using 500px or something like that for a while, Rob.

 

[Rob MacKillop]

About a month - the free trial at the time. Not sure what I’m looking for, tbh.

 

[Beth Carter]

consider checking out your favorite printer to see if they have something already set up for photographers to use. mpix has shootproof. i've never looked into them, so i can't say too much about it.

zen was always seemed too expensive for what you got. i had them for a few years and finally left. tried wordpress, it took too much time to set up and keep it going and it was self fulfillment.

i like 22slides a lot. they have the ecommerce option through paypal, but it's also self fulfillment.

 

[Brian Moore]

consider checking out your favorite printer to see if they have something already set up for photographers to use. mpix has shootproof. i've never looked into them, so i can't say too much about it.

zen was always seemed too expensive for what you got. i had them for a few years and finally left. tried wordpress, it took too much time to set up and keep it going and it was self fulfillment.

i like 22slides a lot. they have the ecommerce option through paypal, but it's also self fulfillment.

Thanks Beth. Good idea. I use MPIX through Zenfolio whenever I sell something. I'm happy with MPIX so if they work with Shoot Proof then that is a plus for me.

 

[Gary R. Smith]

I don't really host my stuff anywhere. I have a flickr account, but I don't pay it much attention. I mostly pop things onto FaceBook or to dpreview. Seems silly for me to pay to put my stuff anywhere. I did just go through an organization exercise. I got tired of looking for images, I attached one of my external USB drives, created a number of subject-specific folders and then dragged images from my year/month/day folder scheme into folders based on subject. When I was done I dragged the whole top-level folder back to my C drive. Now it's easy for me to find stuff using FastStone.

 

[Brian Moore]

I don't really host my stuff anywhere. I have a flickr account, but I don't pay it much attention. I mostly pop things onto FaceBook or to dpreview. Seems silly for me to pay to put my stuff anywhere. I did just go through an organization exercise. I got tired of looking for images, I attached one of my external USB drives, created a number of subject-specific folders and then dragged images from my year/month/day folder scheme into folders based on subject. When I was done I dragged the whole top-level folder back to my C drive. Now it's easy for me to find stuff using FastStone.

Thanks Gary. Something to think about.

 

[Stevenson Gawen]

I have my self built Wordpress based website hosted with Siteground.

All works well, although my web building skills are fairly shaky. It was cheaper for the first year, with their 'Startup' plan but now costs $27 AUD per month which is causing me to many second thoughts. (plus a comparatively small fee for the domain.) I've paid up for the rest of this year but am intending to look at other options.
I'm nearing the 10GB limit too, so will need to either cut back or pay for more....

 

[Gianluca Drago]

I can't be of any help @Brian Moore as I use static websites, not suitable for your purposes (sales, etc.).

 

[Brian Moore]

I have my self built Wordpress based website hosted with Siteground.

All works well, although my web building skills are fairly shaky. It was cheaper for the first year, with their 'Startup' plan but now costs $27 AUD per month which is causing me to many second thoughts. (plus a comparatively small fee for the domain.) I've paid up for the rest of this year but am intending to look at other options.
I'm nearing the 10GB limit too, so will need to either cut back or pay for more....

Good for you, Stevenson. (Not sure I want to get into wordpress and all that.)

I can't be of any help @Brian Moore as I use static websites, not suitable for your purposes (sales, etc.).

Thanks for responding, Gianluca.

 

[Gord Tomlin]

What I'm looking for in a photo hosting site is photo storage, a customizable website feature, and printing/selling tools. (I don't sell many photos but I do some from time-to-time and I want to be able to have a hands-off experience,...which is to say print and mailing services.)

Thanks for posing this question. I don't use any hosting site at this point, so I don't have any very useful insights to add. But that day is coming, so I pay close attentions to threads like this.

I hadn't thought of using a photo hosting site for photo storage beyond what is presented as a portfolio, but SmugMug's unlimited* (unfortunately, for JPEGs only) storage at a reasonable price is an eye-catcher. The add-on for storing raw and sidecar files isn't outrageous either. It could be a viable cloud backup solution.

Are you comfortable with a site producing and sending prints of your work without you ever seeing them?

 

[Gord Tomlin]

Never looked at SmugMug, just didn’t like the name.

I don't like the name either, but according to their web site they do offer custom domain names.

 

[Brian Moore]

Thanks for posing this question. I don't use any hosting site at this point, so I don't have any very useful insights to add. But that day is coming, so I pay close attentions to threads like this.

I hadn't thought of using a photo hosting site for photo storage beyond what is presented as a portfolio, but SmugMug's unlimited* (unfortunately, for JPEGs only) storage at a reasonable price is an eye-catcher. The add-on for storing raw and sidecar files isn't outrageous either. It could be a viable cloud backup solution.

Are you comfortable with a site producing and sending prints of your work without you ever seeing them?

Zenfolio has unlimited storage, too, though for RAW images you pay extra. I went to SmugMug's RAW storage link to find out the costs but it didn't show the money required. I'd have to dig deeper I guess. Is there a max file size limit on their RAW storage?

Regarding my comfort level of sending prints that I never see,...I was concerned about this at first. I'm using MPIX. I did some test prints with them and they looked good. I haven't had any complaints at all from people who have purchased images from me so they'll continue to get my business.

 

[Gord Tomlin]

Zenfolio has unlimited storage, too, though for RAW images you pay extra. I went to SmugMug's RAW storage link to find out the costs but it didn't show the money required. I'd have to dig deeper I guess. Is there a max file size limit on their RAW storage?

 

[Brian Moore]

View attachment 19014

Thanks Gord.