Digital Era – Doing more with your Digital Photos

Digital media is moving faster and faster as the days go buy.  I find it mind blowing when someone says they don’t have a digital camera. I remember talking to a friend recently about digital camera’s and they said they don’t have one right now because it was broken.  While I could fully function without a digital camera to live, I would feel very weird because it’s become something I truly love.  I would probably be out at the store the next day to purchase a new camera.  This situation, as well as my recent purchase of an iphone, reminds me of how life has changed, and how much of an influence the digital era is in full effect. They key is in knowing to disconnect from time to time and enjoy other parts of life that are much more simple.

With the Digital Era comes heaps of digital files.  Since you have a digital camera, you’re fully aware how quick your collection of photographs grow.  So, what can we do with all of these photographs or movie files that we create today?  This article is all about ways to do more with your digital photos.

Facebook & Flickr

Photo Sharing.  Since Facebook is so massive, I am sure this is how most people share their digital photos today.  Even with the recent events of the Facebook Terms, it didn’t change much. People are still uploading their photos. Facebook is a great way to share your digital photos with friends and family.  I believe this is the extent to which you can make use of photos on facebook.  I, personally, have stopped uploading pictures to facebook because there is not enough of an added value to having them there.  This leads me into Flickr.  Flickr is another way to share photos with family, friends, or anyone.   Flickr will allow you to upload much larger resolution and file sizes. You can also use the flickr API or plugins that developers have created that use the flickr API to display your flirkr photos on other websites and create slideshows. You are limited to 200 photos with a free account, and if you upgrade to the Pro Account – you can upload unlimited.  The pro account is totally worth it in my eyes for the small fee of $24.95/year. It’s a community that loves photography so you could get a lot of feedback if you are looking to improve your photography.

Start a Blog or Photoblog

Starting a blog has been made very easy these days.  It’s been easy for a long time with sites like live journal; however, sites like wordpress.com, squarespace, typepad, blogger, has dramatically increased the quality of the blogs and give them search engine rank.  There are many programs out there that also allow you to create your blog on your own hosted domain (totally recommended to get your own domain, almost as people owned land in the past). There are a lot of benefits to having your own domain, but you should definitely take some time to see if your up for working on your own domain. I enjoy my own domain because I have more control of what I can do because I own it. I also love using Wordpress to power my blogs and I love the theme design work by WooThemes.  The benefit of your own blog and photography is that you can post your photos on your own blog and generate another method to get your photos published. If family or friends don’t want to join social media sites, like Facebook, they only require your domain address and they can stay updated on your life and journeys.  A lot of people have joined in with the “photogblog” phenomenon – The goal is usually posting a new photograph every day.

Make Money from your Photos

There are websites dedicated to the topic of making money from your pictures. I am not about to list every way to make money from them though.  I am not talking about starting your own photography business; however, I am talking about passive income.  There are many websites that deal with stock photography and allow you to upload your photos.  Your photo go through rigorous review and could be rejected.  There is the potential to make quite a bit of money if your photos are approved and become very popular on microstock sites.

Another way to earn some coin from your photographs is by selling prints or digital downloads on photo hosting sites like Zenfolio, Redbubble, or SmugMug Pro Account
.  These sites offer the storage for a cost as well as the option to set your own prices for prints or digital downloads. This is where you have the option to make some money.  You will probably have to invest in a plan with these companies and hope that you earn it back from the sales.  I believe that they do compete with Flickr’s 24.95/year fee and may even beat it over time.  If you do this, I believe you’ve made the leap into the possibility of a photography business. I admit that I am not a fan of Smugmug and it’s because I don’t like the company name. Weird eh.

There are other websites which you can also become a part of and have the chance to earn money if you’re photo is used in a particular way.  JPG Magazine allows you to upload full resolution photos and have the chance to be published in their magazine.  If you’re published, you’ll be paid $100 for your image.  It’s pretty interesting and you become a part of a community.  I havn’t fully embraced this community yet, as they state that photos cannot be digitally enhanced.  I am still playing with the term “digitally enhanced” and what it means.  It’s a pretty rad magazine though and the chance to be published is intriguing.

Create Slideshows

Most imaging software helps you to create slideshows of your images now.   Slideshows can look great, and become a simple and asthetically pleasing way to show your images.  They allow you to have your images in one place, and your viewers don’t need to keep loading new pages.  These slideshows can be added to your blogs [if you start one], sent in e-mails to people, embedded into websites, and integrated with newsletters.  You see a lot of slideshows on news websites because it’s easy to have some real estate designated for images and the viewer can stay on the same page and just browse through some photos associated with the story.   As more and more people begin to integrate a computer media centre with their televisions, the slideshows can really enhance your experience at home or at a location.   I have an Apple TV and I can play my own photos as a slideshow to my itunes music or keep the music off and the photos cylce on.   Apple TV, as a default, easily accesses Flickr and you can create slideshows from your photos there or slideshows of photos that your contacts have uploaded.   I think features like this turn your 46″ flatscreen into a 46″ Digital Frame and you could have it running in the background of a party, a celebration, a wedding or baby shower, or a simple get together upon returning from vacation.

There is a company that has changed the way we may look at slideshows though.  I would have to agree that it is the end of slideshows! Animoto is creating visually amazing slideshows with little to no effort.  I’ve planned a full post on Animoto soon. Until then I think this video/slideshow should give you an idea of it’s awesomeness. These are funky and they keep my interest.  Imagine sending a dvd with slideshows like this to family members! They might not fall asleep…only kidding.

Participate in other Social Forums

Forums around the Internet are great places for inspiration and learning.  They are also great places to see what other  people are doing, trending towards, or accomplishing with their camera and post-processing work.  Join in on themed assignments like “Photo Friday,” where a new topic is posted every Friday and you link to your photo that is considered for that theme.  This may cause you to need a blog or account at some type of hosting website.    Over the weekend, people are able to vote for the photograph they love the most for that specific theme, and then you could be showcased.  This would drive a lot of people towards your website, or gallery.    JPG Magazine is comparable as it is very social and voting occurs.

Forums are pretty great for sharing your work.  Places like PhotoJoJo or DPreview will allow you to create or participate in threads to share your images on specific topics.  Usually around the end of the year, a lot of forums begin discussing their favorite photos of the year.   These forums can help you form a bond between other photographers and send people to your website.  Be careful though, you could get lost and spend a lot of time just going from forum to forum.   Hopefully you come across a helpful place and you receive constructive criticism on your photos.  Watch your for the overly grumpy people.

iPod and iPhone

Load your most favorite photographs onto your iPod or iPhone.  They don’t just have to be for music or video.  If you go away on vacation and you come back to work, people always ask you about your trip.  Maybe your co-workers don’t use Facebook, or it’s blocked at your work.  You just load the photos up on your iPod and let them browse through them.  If you’re out taking photographs and someone starts talking to you about what you’re doing, you could quickly show the person your end results and it may interest them to follow the information on your business card that you give them.  I havn’t go to do  this yet, but I have loaded some photographs onto my iPhone.  With photo editing programs today, you could easily add text to special photos that inspire or make you feel better.  Take a break at work and play a slideshow of your images and perhaps it will help your through a day.

Digital Frames

I admit that I am not too into digital frames yet.  They are small, expensive and just seem silly compared to using your HDTV.  You can purchase another LCD or Plasma HDTV that’s 30″ and I am sure the extra cost is worth it.   Plus that TV could be used as another entertainment area.  If you’re thinking of frames, I am still in favor of tangible prints and wood/metal frames and change out the prints on a regular basis.  Although, digital frames may be something to consider for an office desk, or in the entrance to your company.  Surprisingly enough, I could see use of a digital frame in a home bathroom.  Probably the only time I would consider that would be when having a party, an open house, or just having people over.  It’s a way to display your digital photos in a different way and this is a sure way to get more images in front of people.  I think that doctors offices should really have something like a digital frame of decent size or an LCD / Plasma with the ability to play slideshow images.  Give people something to look at and something amazing to stay awake while they wait for appointments.  Another thing you could do with a digital frame is using it at an art show, or on the table in a booth if your selling your work.  It may attract people to stop and watch, or be a quick way to show a lot more photographs that you have for purchase but not in print form at the show.

Screen Savers

Have your screen saver access your photo folders and cycle through images.  I have often caught my eye on our screen saver cycling through our pictures and I end up sitting there watching.  These days, with creative commons licensing, you have the ability to use the images of photographers at no cost.  You could consider downloading these images you’ve come across with creative commons licensing, putting them into a folder and linking that to your screen saver.   I have a few of my images on Flickr set to creative commons; however if you want to support the photographer / website you can download low resolution files or full resolution for personal use on my Zenfolio gallery.  Amazingly cheap compared to only being able to buy prints.

These are just some of the interesting things you can do with your digital photos right now.  If you know of anything that’s new or something old that should be getting more exposure, please discuss it in the comments.  I am keeping my eyes open for new ways and things  to do with photos.  We buy these expensive digital cameras, computers, and external hard-drives to store the digital files/photos we create but how can we make better use of them once we’ve got them.   Hopefully there is another part to this post in the future as new and exciting things happen in the digital world.