Seriously? What’s the point?

• To sell prints
• To serve as your portfolio and gain clients
• To experiment
• To serve as a transparency tool
• To start a 365 project
• To achieve a goal or number of goals
• To show you like photography
• To show family and friends your photos

Photoblog Intent

What are you intending to achieve through your photoblog? Anything? I would cringe if you just said there is no intent behind your photo blog.  There should be a reason that you have the urge to show photographs to the world on a photoblog, especially one that’s costing you for a domain or monthly hosting costs [because I assume you're that much more serious about photography].

I visit a bunch of photoblogs everyday and the photography is outstanding but I can’t always leave a comment that says, “GREAT SHOT.”  I love leaving feedback on these photoblogs, but I don’t know if the photographers are really interested in the comments. Like if I leave a short critique, is it looked at positively or in negativity?

Here’s the thing, I have no idea why many people have a photoblog.  This semi-applies to my own photoblog as well.   When I was making use of the before and after feature, the purpose was to share my photography and the difference post-processing can make to an image.  The point was that images take WORK beyond snapping the shutter.  Some photographs require more post-processing than others.   I’ve been slowly moving away from such a purpose to my photo-blog though.

These days, my photoblog has dual purpose for me on a daily basis.  I’ve talked about some of the purpose within my photoblog, but I want to explain it here in more detail.  My hope is that you take a few moments to better define your photo-blog for your viewers.

1. My Photoblog is a playground

The photoblog on Nuwomb is a photography playground and plays into the fact that I view Nuwomb as an incubator for photography. Hopefully we’ll both learn some things as I play, test, push, pull, and stumble thought images that I share in the photoblog.

One day I might post an HDR image.  The next day I may share a macro photo of a flower. The day after that I might share some car photography. There isn’t a single niche focus for the images that will be posted on the photoblog.  This isn’t because I’m secretly hoping to appeal to a general audience.  It’s because I feel the need to explore and see what other forms of photography may lend to another.  Trust me, there are connections between differing types of photography and you probably already know that.

2. My Photoblog is a place for free-form writing

I don’t try and formalize my writing most of the time, but I really let it all slide over in the photoblog.  I do want my images to speak and I believe my 900px emphasis helps to show that.  In providing commentary for the photoblog post, it may relate to the image or it may relate to something else about photography, social media, projects, or even something personal.  I use the space as a way to get some thoughts out of my head – something you do when free writing.  Normally you might place this kind of writing behind a screen – ie 750words.com.  Since my photoblog is a playground, I’m free to rant or ramble.  It’s not a place for perfect writing just in the same that it’s not a place for pixel perfection or one type of photography.

What Having a Purpose Does

Giving a purpose to your photoblog does a lot for you and for your viewership.  There are many times in which I wonder if the purpose is to inflate the photographers ego.  In the past I continually notice issues in the photographs that apparently no one else notices.  I can’t help but question these issues after 20 comments that express a perfect photo.  In my head I’m freaking out.

I have never been one to kiss butt and I’m not exactly saying that all comments are fake.  I have noticed that some photographers do get very uptight when you challenge them on something though.  At the same time, some photographers are very appreciative of constructive feedback and continuing the conversation.

Having a purpose, one that’s clearly defined, will allow viewers to understand what you’re doing.  If you’re looking to improve, perhaps you’ll state that you would love constructive criticism and you appreciate when people point things out that you may have missed.  If you’re using Fotomoto and there are links to buy the photo, I’m going to assume that this is the final copy you’re looking to sell. Perhaps you’ll want someone to point out a processing issue so that the photo is more appealing and may sell some prints.

The point is, I have no idea. Is it for a cheerleading squad and you don’t care about being pushed by other photographers? Is your photoblog directed to art buyers and not photographer critiques? Are you trying to attract a photographer community that high fives?

I honestly get more and more lost everyday.  I love that people share photographs everyday and fill that creative urge.  I’ve been looking further into the future and I’ve lacked the view on many photoblogs.  The photography is hugely inspiring and highly motivational, but I am not sure how I should be commenting as the days go by.

So, does your photoblog have a purpose?

I hardly use Tumblr for posting my own content. I grew tired and frustrated with the we’ll be right back message of the past. Nuwomb has always been powered by WordPress and proud of it. When Tumblr was having some massive problems I opted to move my photoblog back to it’s proper home: here.

I do login to Tumblr because there are blogs that I follow and I do explore searches to find things to share each week.

Recently I ran into the page on Tumblr from which this instagram shot was captured. The Image was pretty cool and then I realized it was telling me that the site is down again. Gotta give it to Tumblr for at least getting a sweet graphic of the situation.

I ran into it again.

I ran into it again just now.

There are a few important services to have set up to protect yourself in the future but for the point of this post, I recommend considering the move to a self-hosted WordPress option.

These Tumbeasts appear to be multiplying like Gremlins in contact with water.

If you’re frustrated enough, let’s talk because I’m happy to help those looking to move to WordPress but hesitant or confused on the process. Just hit up the contact page for all the ways to get in touch.

Yesterday I did my best to show you the basics of how I implemented the Before and After jQuery effect for a photoblog.  This is my way to try and help photographers, with a photoblog, keep up with others. At the end of the article, I mentioned that I would try and explain exactly how I integrated the jQuery fade effect into the WooThemes Canvas Theme for WordPress.

Nuwomb runs on WordPress and uses a very flexible theme known as Canvas. I haven’t fully written about my experience with the Canvas theme yet, it sits in a draft that is really long right now.  I think some people wouldn’t even call the theme Canvas anymore because I’ve messed with it so much.  I’ve created a child theme and it’s a Frankenstein version of Canvas.

With that said, I’ll do my best again to mention how someone could easily create the before and after effect for a photoblog using Canvas.

In an ideal WordPress world, we’d create a custom post type and a page template for the photoblog.  I’ve done this for Nuwomb, but getting into could possibly confuse you even more. Instead, we’ll uses normal posts and create a category named “Photoblog.”

Create the Photoblog Category

Regardless if you’re using WooThemes Canvas or not, the simplest way to start is by creating a category named “Photoblog.”  This is where you’ll post to the photoblog. Made note of the Category ID number.

Styling the Effect with CSS

You have a few options for placing the CSS styling and not have to worry about losing it during theme updates in the future.  I’m just going to mention two options – choose one or the other.

The Theme Editor And Custom.CSS

Under the Appearance section of WordPress there is a link to the Editor. When you go here, you’re presented with the style.css file.  You won’t edit this file.

WARNING! DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE!
To make it easy to update your theme, you should not edit the styles in this file. Instead use the custom.css file to add your styles. You can copy a style from this file and paste it in custom.css and it will override the style in this file. You have been warned! :)

Instead, just scroll down and select the custom.css link and that’s the place to paste the code.

Canvas Theme Options

In the Canvas Theme Options, you’ll find a box in the general tab for custom css. This is a nice and easy solution for all of the themes that WooThemes offers.  This is where you could paste the css code as well – Whichever is your preference.

jQuery for Before and After Fade Effect

This is where it gets specific to the WooThemes Canvas Theme. It could get more specific because of my Frankenstein WooMashup, but I won’t put that on you right now.

Navigate to the Theme Editor under the Appearance Tab on the Left of WordPress. Once you’re into the Theme Editor, select the functions.php file. You’ll want to back up your file and blog just to be safe. Scroll down and put code in grey between the nicely noted area:

/*———————————————————————————–*/
/* You can add custom functions below */
/*———————————————————————————–*

/*———————————————————————————–*/

/* Don’t add any code below here or the sky will fall down */
/*———————————————————————————–*/

Next we want to initiate the jQuery for Before and After Fade Effect. This is where you’ll need to use the category ID number that you got when you created it. You’ll put it in place of where it says ID in the code. This script will only activate if the current post is in the specified ID.

Basically what the JavaScript is saying is that when the mouse hovers over the “span.starteffect” class, we want the img “a” class to fade to opacity of zero – revealing the original image. The 2nd part of the function is saying that when the mouse moves away from the “span.starteffect” class, we want the img “a” class to fade back to an opacity of one – hiding the original image.

Creating your Photoblog Post

Posting the photos for the photoblog post is pretty self explanatory from here. You’ll add a new post and select the HTML editor instead of the Visual Editor for now. Here’s the code to paste there:

Of course you created a title for your post and made sure the images are the same size. Depending on your other style settings for Canvas, select the layout you want – maybe the full width to show a large images.

Remember the CSS styling set up is pretty basic and may need more adjusting. I’m just trying to spread the idea of how it all works. You might even notice that my photo-blog still needs some fixing for portrait-orientation photos.

In the future, I think I’ll try and create a short video of what I did but it would probably be pretty ghetto too. I’ll try!

Conclusions Here

I am a massive supporter of WooThemes (an affiliate even) and I want to try and help photographers with their websites.  I’ve found using WooThemes Canvas to be such a pleasure and allowed so much creative flexibility to show off my own photography.

Customizations of any theme can be daunting! I remember messing with Thesis long ago now, and never looking back once Canvas existed.  The customization that could throw people off here is the code for the jQuery and where to place it.  We also covered a conditional tag specific with WordPress Codex.

As for photoblogs and photography, I’m excited to see this feature on more websites.

Just today I noticed a different style of toggle functionality on another Canadian photoblog.  He installed it just yesterday! Check out MUTE

Yesterday I told you how you can make your photoblog a trillion times more cool. How many of you were as interested in it as me? Deep down after wishing the snow would just go away, I bet you were at least curious. Maybe you weren’t as OCD as myself, but if you were curious I want to help.

Why did I seriously get so obsessive? I’m not kidding, I didn’t need food or realize the day disappeared as I was messing with the feature. I should have let it go after 30 minutes but something inside me wasn’t going to stop. I’ve actually always been this way with things. I saw the feature happening on the Chromasia Photoblog and it wasn’t some kind of alien technology – I was equally capable of solving the problem. In school, from elementary to university, I was this same way. I knew the answers were there and that I was capable of figuring everything out. My grades were proof enough.

I can apply the mindset to everything. If I can’t see it done, then it requires me to imagine what it would look like done. I’m resourceful and I wouldn’t stop until I got it. Finally, I said that I have to sleep to get my mind off it all. I consider this a very important part of any process. I hadn’t stopped yet. Before crashing, I laid in bed doing a few searches using Twitter and my iPad. One link I found within minutes looked like the solution.  I woke up at 5:45am and knew what to do – I loaded the iPad and Problem.

Keeping Up with the Photoblogs

We know that attention is getting more and more difficult to keep. Photoblogs are interesting but they can easily fall into the stumbleupon effect – mindless clicking. Toggling back and forth between the photographic art and the unprocessed picture was interesting to me. I spent time on the Chromasia photo blog, longer than ever. I wanted to provide a new layer of interest to viewers, one that might try and keep my photo-blog out of the graveyard.

Coding the Before and After Feature

First, I am not a professional programmer.  I hacked at code as I scoured the internet with supreme hunger. I watched jQuery tutorial after jQuery tutorial. I learned a lot of really cool knowledge I may never ever use – kind of reminded me of High School.    Perhaps if I wasn’t trying to integrate the code within WordPress or WooThemes, it would have been easier. Perhaps just looking at it from a different perspective would have made me “get it quicker.”

Let’s start with the CSS

Copy and paste these into your .CSS stylesheet

All that is happening here is styling how you want everything to look on your website with CSS.

The JavaScript

This is what will create the fading between the 2 images.  Depending on your WordPress Theme, where you place this will probably change and there may be other code required.  Essentially, this is something that would be found in the header. I’ve had the pleasure of using WooThemes WordPress Themes and I’m spoiled with how awesome they are to me.

Basically what the JavaScript is saying is that when the mouse hovers over the “span.btn-port” class, we want the img “a” class to fade to opacity of zero – revealing the original image. The 2nd part of the function is saying that when the mouse moves away from the “span.btn-port” class, we want the img “a” class to fade back to an opacity of one – hiding the original image.

The HTML that uses your Images

Here is what you would put into the photoblog post.

Where I FINALLY learned this jQuery Mouseover Fade Effect

The biggest help in this adventure came from Twitter and not Google. I searched Google so many times with different wording and became so frustrated. Like I said, I watched great tutorials but the first page of Google was just terrible.   I went and laid on our bed with the iPad and searched Twitter for something simple like jQuery Fade Effect and there was a dude that posted some jQuery link not very long before – but the actual article was from August 2009!!!!!

Here is the article if you want to get more direction – Creating a Mouseover Fade Effect with jQuery

I have altered things a bit because I didn’t want the effect to happen while hovering over the image. I wanted the effect to happen when the cursor hovered over the words “see the original.”

I hope this helps out anyone interested in taking their photoblog to a new level.

While not being a pro web developer and just hacking around, this is pretty much the best I can do to try and generally explain the effect.  If there are any WooThemes Canvas users in the bunch, I’ll share exactly what I did in my modified version of the Canvas Theme for WordPress.

If you have a feature that is different from many many many photoblogs, let us know.  We want to see photo blogs that are finding ways to keep the attention of viewers.  Leave a comment and let us know about your photo blog!

How To Make Your Photoblog a Trillion Times More Cool

I know what you’re thinking, you’re website is already pretty freakin’ awesome and I was probably just going to tell everyone what you already know. Having a photoblog isn’t new or revolutionary in the blogging world let alone the photography world. There are roadblocks to success and I believe you need to continually try and up your game.

Before we can get into how to make your photo blog a trillion times more cool, let’s look at how photoblogs have gained cool with people in the past.

Stages A Photoblog Goes Through

Blogging was okay until no one was reading. The time and effort put in was not balancing out for the attention received. Topic ideas were running dry and blogging about blogging about blogging gets old quick.

Photos are worth a thousand words? And it’s way easier to post a photo on a blog than it is to write. Ah Ha, The Photoblog!

“I let the photos speak for themselves.”

With photos being posted, it was easier to post a new photo every day. HOLLA!!! This was cool because website traffic would go up and it felt better internally for everyone! Daily updates over time brought an increase in visitors per month!

Like nearly everyone with a camera, a new found awesome emerges – Passion. Passion for photography! The about page became a place to talk about the analog camera used during infancy – passion for photography always did exist but the photo blog ignited it. You know what comes with this massive passion for photography, don’t you? Monetization! A photoblog gained cool once it installed a simple script from FotoMoto. Instantly the entire world wide web could purchase photography!

What else happened in the photoblog world? Don’t forget the Photoblog Awards badge that needs to be installed each year. Many photographers dream of being awarded the the best each year. Maybe 2011 will be the Nuwomb Photo blog’s Year to shine! (shameless ask for your vote)

Wow. The work that goes into getting a cool photo blog is pretty tough and detailed. I’ve long wondered what a photographer could do to improve upon their coolness.

The addition of social buttons like Twitter and Facebook are a given now. I mean these features do improve the capability of sharing awesome photography. However, the buttons are pretty much a ‘requirement’ now and don’t add any value for viewers.

To make your photoblog a trillion times more cool requires something that adds value once viewers are looking at the photography. And let me tell you, I finally realized how to add more value!

Chromasia – Show the Original

A massive inspiration for me in early days of photo blogs and photographer was a website named Chromasia run by David J. Nightengale. His dedication to posting consistently amazing photography inspired me to learn from his Photoshop photography tutorials.

I don’t visit the Chomasia photoblog on a daily basis, but I probably will now because I noticed an awesome feature a few days ago.  I was checking out a daily image and noticed a “show original” button.  Upon hovering the “show original” text, the image faded out to the before edited version.  I was blown away.

I already know David J. Nightengale does awesome post-processing work.  But I was blown away with the new reason to come back to his photo-blog everyday.  Instantly I saw this new layer that would make a photoblog a trillion times more cool!

Photoblog. Trillion. Cool.

It should be pretty clear now that the way to make your photoblog a trillion times more cool is with showing the before and after of the new daily image. The coolness comes in the form of the photographers confidence and the additional level of interest for the viewer.

Simply posting a new photo is great, but being able to see the changes made in post-processing is very interesting.  Many photographers say they get annoyed with people asking about their type of camera.  People ask about this because they don’t understand what goes on after the image is taken with the camera. Having the ability to see the original image shows the viewer that there is more to photography than simply pressing the shutter button.  Hopefully, viewers soon realize that the creativity of your work doesn’t just sit within the camera you use.

Viewers usually know that Photoshop (or whatever your favorite processing software) was used in some way with the photo, but they don’t know what was actually done.

If you want to keep viewers on your photo-blog a little bit longer, add a way to show the before and after.  Chromasia, the first that i see consistently offering feature, has upped the game.  Brian Matiash doesn’t have a consistent way to show before and after, but he does have a running series for everyone called behind the curtain.   The level of interest that Brian’s before and after posts draw in, I am very confident many photographers should be integrating it from time to time.

Nuwomb Photoblog is a Trillion Times Cooler now

The moment I saw the before and after feature on Chromasia, I had to integrate that into my photoblog.  I decided instantly and went to work.  After a bit of time and a nights sleep, I figured out how to add the feature to my own photo blog. I’ll be tweaking it in the future a bit, but it feels great for people to have the new ability.

For myself, I love being able to see what the original image looked like before post-processing is great.  I can quickly look back at my own artistic work.

Questions For You!

• Would you add this feature to your photo blog?
• What do you think of showing viewers the original, un-edited photograph?
• Do you want to know more about integrating this functionality into your photo-blog?

I had decided to create a photoblog section right here on Nuwomb in November.  The idea was to wait until the 2011 to get it going, but sometimes the universe says that there is no time like the present.  I could almost use this post as my Reverb10 post for Day 5, but I will leave it for a bigger reflection piece on the year.

As you’re probably aware, Tumblr has been down and out since yesterday, December 5th 2010.  Many Tumblr’s have become very familiar with the above graphic! I hadn’t noticed because of the decision to slowly move away from it.  In the short time that my photoblog – Nuwomb 360 – was alive on Tumblr, it did gain about 180 subscribers and caused me to question leaving the community.  The Nuwomb 360 photoblog will still be around if and when Tumblr decides to become live again; however, it will stand as it is now.

We Make Lemonade!

Finding Tumblr still down this morning, I opted out of crying and abusing Tumblr via Twitter.  Many people have decided to rip into Tumblr on Twitter and it’s pretty scary.  Other people are dusting off their Posterous accounts or considering a move to WordPress.   Instead of brewing in the negativity (which was pretty tough considering the amount of snow that is hitting us right now), I turned the situation into lemonade.

There is a new menu item in the navigation! The Photoblog is a custom post type, modified thanks to being a WooThemes Developer Club Member.  This new custom post type is turning my website into a pretty rad beast.  My vision of wanting to have the majority of work right here on Nuwomb is happening.

As I was building up Nuwomb 360 on Tumblr, I felt weird pushing people away from my main photography hub.  I want people to come to my photography website and be able to learn about photography, see photography, and eventually work with us in some way.  I felt as if there wasn’t any of my personal photography being added to the site anymore and I really can’t stand that. I can’t stand going to a photography website and not being able to seeing the work of the site owner.  There are a number of photography websites where I can’t locate any of the work done by the “photographer” or site owner.  I didn’t want that happening here.

Behind the Scenes

Nuwomb is run on the WooThemes Canvas Theme Framework, but it’s getting pretty involved and makes upgrading quite a bit of work.  I’m still really happy with everything involved here.  From the image, you can see that there are a few more admin options than normal.

Obviously the Photoblog is the Photoblog Category there.  I love it because I can now quickly scan down and see the little camera and know that is where I create photoblog entries.  I don’t have to search through a million draft posts and other blog posts if I’m searching for a specific photoblog entry.

Within the Canvas settings is another option for the Photoblog as well.  Within the Photoblog option, I can specify the tags for the photoblog, the amount of posts per page, use of lightbox or not, and what I want the url link text to be.  If you use another WooTheme – Caffinated – you may recognize these options.

Take Off Your Coat and Stay A While!

We hope you stick around and check out the photos! Maybe we’ll even work together some time.  While Tumblr was a cool host for a while, the downtime was too much to bear.  I see that Tumblr is now doing some planned database maintenance and I guess this means it will be back up soon.  That’s good news for those angry Twitter folk.

I’ve got a question – Does anyone know how I can integrate the custom post types into the main RSS feed? I just thought about as I was writing this and if you know, I’m all ears!

Before I talk about the HDR Photo of the London Rotary Reading Garden, I want to mention the difficulty of a daily photo blog. I’ve always had trouble with these daily photo projects.  I know that I’m not alone either.  The task of posting a new photograph everyday is pretty daunting and requires one to let go of the perfectionist in them.  The commitment and the execution of uploading a new photograph requires that we make the act a ritual.  Without the ritual, the project is doomed to be sporadic and end up as one of the 77% inactive photo blogs online.

In my world, what causes me to start missing days? I often the need to write a paragraph or more about the photograph.  I would hate to make an excuse in not doing what I love – sharing images to show off a interesting world and spark positive believes that the world isn’t all going to hell – but there is no deny that I miss a day here and there. I haven’t gone a few days without a new photo but if I don’t address the issue now, it may fall to the wayside.

What does one do?

I decided to call myself and I came up with a plan with a bias-towards-action:

• Each Sunday I am to create 7 actions within the Action Method
• The creating of a photo blog post must be the first action I do upon waking up
• There will be some days when I only post the photograph and little to no text
• Failure to post a photo with this plan is not an option

With that plan in place now, I’ll mention that this photograph is created from 5 hand held images shot with my Nikon D300.  This was taken on the same day as the Arts Project photographs.  I  adore seeing the snow melting away. We were all craving some spring in London, Ontario at that point. I do plan to get some additional photos of the London Rotary Reading Garden on a very nice day.  We desire them for our wedding website since it is the location of our wedding ceremony.  When people ask us about the wedding – where it’s being held – they get super excited and interested to hear of the locations we picked.  We give them answers that they didn’t expect.  I bet they hear the same locations and companies all the time.  We’re excited too! However, I admit, that doing some gift registering at Kingsmills yesterday was pretty tiring.

With Places like Flickr, Facebook, Twitpic, etc., Why would anyone need to start a photoblog?

It’s a great question.  Especially if only about 13% of photoblogs last once their started, is there really a need or desire for them?

Back in 2003 when photoblogs started to boom, the photoblog was seen as a way to simply show your own pictures.  You’d post a photo per day, or something like that.  The photographers motivated enough then, are now photoblog rockstars.  And what they did, was post everyday, all year, for 6 years.   You can see the dedication.  Although, there was no notion of making money from it at that point that I am aware of.

You can go all the way back on Sam’s Photoblog (Daily Dose of Imagery) and see what he was posting in 2003.  While the photographs are great, he’s exploring creativity.  You can also see a difference in quality from then til now.  This is both the result of his increasing skill, because is constantly using his camera, and because of technological improvements to digital cameras.  In the future, I do want to bring my readers here an interview with Sam, and a few other photoblog rockstars. My questions for the interviews would be a bit different than the interviews I have seen in the past.

The point I am slowly making, is that a photoblog can become much more than a Flickr, Facebook, or Twitpic account.  Having one account or the other doesn’t make a difference either.  You can upload your photographs all over the internet, but a photoblog is a place to call your own.  People don’t need to register, or sign in to view the images you took the time to take and post online.

Do You have A Creative Urge?

So why start? It’s the same reason you start anything. Because you have a burning passion, or creative urge that will not go away.  I’m not kidding either, that creative urge is not going to leave.  Even if you havn’t picked up a camera since you were a teenager, on your 35th birthday you’ll be given a digital camera that reignites the internal desire to be creative.

The thing is, you bought your digital camera and spent 200-5000 on the thing.  You want people to be moved by the images you create and a photoblog allows room for people to grow with you on your photographic journey.  If you start a photoblog thinking you’re going to sell a constant supply of prints, that’s awesome, and all the best if that works out.  Monetary gain is something that will take time to happen.  This may be why so many photoblogs slow to a halt.  But remember, you don’t have to add photographs every day.

Consider the act of starting. It only takes one photograph to start a photoblog(I can even help you).  Build up the momentum, and show people that your in it because you love it. Miss a few days! You’re human. Remember that it is okay to show it!

2 Quick Case Studies

Here are 2 photographers that started a photoblog and are now reaping the rewards.  If you know of other photoblog photographers that are in a pretty awesome position now, let me know in the comments or on twitter!

Trey Ratcliff

Started out Stuck in Customs photoblog and look what he’s doing now. He’s changing the game for HDR photography, launching a book with his Photographs, and launching a new site called HDR spotting very soon.  All of this recent awesomeness, started with his photoblog. He posted photographs on a regular basis and created a following.  He’s branched out and doing great things for everyone.  And it’s only going to get better for him.

David Nightengale

David started Chromasia as a regular blog, but the pictures started to become more dominant.  His photography is outstanding, and having the photoblog gave him the reason to take more and more photographs.  It pushed him to keep updating, especially has his viewership increased.  By the way, it was about 6 months of blogging before he converted it over to photoblog.  So, it’s important to remember that time is a necessary evil.  Today, Chromasia has photoshop tutorials for photographers with different options for getting access to them.  He’s turned the photoblog into a way to run his business.

Can you think of more reasons for starting up a photoblog today? Why did You Start? Please feel free to comment if you’ve started up and especially if you thinking of starting a photoblog.  I’d love to here what you want to know before you start!

Remember the best time to plant a tree was 50 years ago. If you havn’t started already, give it ago.   You may be surprised by where it takes you.

Garden State. In Garden State, the characters come across a massive hole in the ground. It’s discussed and named the Infinite Abyss. If you were to throw something down it, it would simply fall forever.

Forever. Lost, falling into the Abyss. You might catch a short glimpse of the image(s) before you can’t see them anymore. And this is how I am starting to look at Facebook Photo Albums: As an Infinite Abyss.

I love photography. I enjoy looking at many photography websites, photoblogs and portfolios. But I tend to stay away from the Abyss that is Facebook and Photography.

Please don’t confuse that statement as me saying that I don’t agree with any photos being uploaded to Facebook. I fully believe that everyone should share their photographs within the Facebook Community. Now here is the problem and why I see it as an “infinite abyss” – People upload a memory card worth of photographs at once. Go on a vacation recently? Might as well upload all 200 photos! I even catch a glimpse of some that need rotating still. I’ve tried to look at pictures and find I can’t keep clicking next after the first few.

So what do we do about this?

Most people will probably do nothing. Most people will continue to barf photographs up for no other reason than the fact that they can. But, you? Hopefully you’ll take a moment and think about the photographs you’re going to share.

Take a moment and really consider which are the best photographs. Show you’re favourite images; images that you took a few extra moments to clean up and show you care about them. I know that not everyone has Adobe Photoshop, but there are programs now that you can take a few moments to improve the image. I’ve seen commercials on TV with 4 year olds doing it. You spend a paycheck on that digital camera and I really believe that you’ll be adding value to Facebook if you only upload the images you care about. You don’t add just ANY photograph to a tangible photo album, so pick the best.

If you want to go a step further, step out of Facebook for your images. If the images are of you doing something you’d regret someday, don’t show it. Remember the quote I used from Chris Brogan about not everything stays in Vegas. Your Online Presence is important! Even if you’ve “protected” your Facebook profile, I am sure there is still away for an image to be leaked.

Consider Uniqueness, Personality, and Creativity

What I mean by stepping out of Facebook is to create a photoblog. Creating a photoblog allows you to have a bit more control and you can link your photoblog to Facebook, so that when you show some photographs off, your Feed will be updated. I do it now and I find it way better than uploading to my photo albums.

I strongly suggest people consider this option because who knows if Facebook will be around forever. Having control over your images online, gives you a way to truly display your photographs like they deserve. Facebook is notorious for degrading images of mine. The benefits go on and on for using a photoblog instead of Facebook for housing your photos. A big one is RSS Subscription or E-mail Subscription. Whenever the photoblog would be updated, you’d get an e-mail with the images. Pretty simple to keep in touch.

Creativity and uniqueness has become priceless these days.  I would hope if you’re adding photos to a photo album for your living room, you’re going to try and find something you can personally stand seeing everyday on your coffee table.  You want something unique, interesting, and with personality to hold your treasured memories.  This is how I view a photoblog online as well. Consider the photo below. What a freaking cool photo album!

Rise above the status quo and look at ways to show off your photography, your family, and the great experiences you have in your life. Give yourself permission to take control of your online presence.  My Online photo albums are getting a makeover next week and I’ve never been so excited.

This article is intended to raise your creative awareness. There are so many tools, and ways to enhance your experience online. I know Facebook is great for some things and social sharing, but you can still do that but gaining greater artistic freedom through a blog or photoblog.

What are your thoughts? Is Facebook just a place to contribute to the noise? Upload and spew as many things out as you can? Or become selective?

Photoblogs are quite fun and people desire them because they look easy. Post a Photo a Day?! How hard could that be? Having a photo blog and showing a photo once a month, or once ever 3 months is easy. I agree with you that a Photoblog would be easy work if that’s the case.  So, why are 77% of photoblogs inactive on Photoblogs.org? It’s because making your photoblog remarkable requires a lot of hardwork. If you’re ever going to cut the cubicle umbilical cord and enjoy freedom via a photography home business, you’re going to have to work at it. I believe if you can creat a great photo blog, you’re going to see business opportunities open up.   To get to that point in transitioning your photoblog from just another site, into a photography small business you’re going to probably run into some roadblocks.

Day Job Gets in the Way of Your Very Small Photography Business

Trying to earn money and treating a photoblog as a micro business creates some interesting roadblocks that most people run into and find it hard to recover from.   I know that life and the “day job” can seriously take over and the start up of your photography home business gets swept aside. I am actually currently still living it through this roadblock. Since this issue is one of the toughest, I neded to mention this first.  I firmly believe in sychronicity and that when you’re ready, the teacher will appear.  About 2 weeks ago, I came across Chris Guillebeau and I haven’t looked back.  If this is your biggest roadblock to freedom and being paid to exist as yourself, I strongly reccommend you check out his ebook that discusses  Creating Personal Freedom through a Very Small Business!  It’s an Unconventional Guide to Working for Yourself.   I read Chris’ ebook in a night and the amount of motivation I recieved is out of this world.  It’s outstanding and I finally feel as if I really am set on the right path to owning my own home photography business. Click here to view more details about the Unconventional Guide to Working for Yourself. Now, don’t get me wrong, I believe your day job can seriously help to work towards your photography business.  There are activities you can do at work during downtime or lulls.  The problem is that the day job can take over and the passion for photography is pushed deeper down in you that it can disappear for a long time.   In order to combat the stress of doing something you aren’t meant to do, you need to find ways to ensure you’re always taking micro-actions towards your photography business dreams.

You Photoblog Ego is Hurting

This is directed at the existing photoblogger or a potentially new photoblogger. You’ve listed your photo blog on many sites across the internet and you’re photographs are looking awesome these days. Perhaps you’re even a recent grad from a photography program at University or College. Don’t your viewers realize that you graduated top of your class and have a degree for your photography work? Sadly, photography school and having that degree does not ensure we receive 100,000 unique visitors per month to our photoblogs. Even though you are getting a little bit of traffic to your photoblog, those visitors are not interacting or leaving any comments. Even your closest friends are not talking about your photos that much if at all. Self-Doubt can seriously kick in and, if you even get the guts to tell friends or family you want to make money from your photography they might tell you that’s unrealistic. It may be very, very easy to let your photoblog slip when the ego starts to hurt.  This is very tough and it’s something I fight with on my photoblog that is focused on urban HDR photography.

Picking the Wrong Reasons to Photo blog

This follows perfectly from the previous problem. If you’re ego is hurting, you’re coming from the wrong place anyways. Are you blogging and trying to start the photography business for any other reason than to make money? I totally get that you want to make money from your photography. Your equipment cost you money, and so does your hosting for the photoblog. What was your reason for starting a photoblog? Hopefully it’s for far better reason than to impress others.  This is something that most people do not even consider when beginning a photoblog.  If you don’t pick the right reason, you’re never going to make anything of yourself or your photoblog.  If you’re having trouble thinking of a reason to photoblog, that’s okay.  Keep coming back here and you’ll find reasons and ways to utilize them to add value to the internet and the lives of people.

Photoblog Post Consistency

When your photoblog ego is feeling down, you’re much less motivated to display your work. The other day, I posted up some really interesting findings in my eyes. I took a random selection of the accounts on photoblogs.org to see how many active photoblogs are there out of 100.  Check it out if you haven’t reviewed that article yet because it might shock you.  Sometimes I think that this roadblock emerges from the others or vice versa.

If you don’t have a consistency to your posting, you’re not going to drive the traffic.  What does consistency mean to your photoblog?  It could mean so many different things to different people.  If you’re interested in making money from photoblogs and using it as a gateway to creating a photography online business, you’re probably visiting other photographers’ photoblogs already.  You might not realize it, but feel a bit annoyed when you visit a photoblog or blog that hasn’t been updated?  How long is it until you just stop checking it all together?  Consistency keeps a viewers attention.  Setting up a system to ensure success is recommended.  Something this simple could help you stand out from many other photoblogs.

Ignoring Analytics

I am a  very laid back person.  I believe everything happens for a reason and that I will be guided towards greatness. I tend to ignore certain activities that I should probably be giving more attention.  If I want to run my photo blog as a way to get my small business in photography running, I need to pay attention to aspects of the business and view it as a business.  It doesn’t mean I am suddenly back to filing TPS repots, but depending how busy I am there may be someone else that can focus on these activities for me.

If I organize properly I may realize that these business activities do not take near as much energy or attention once I have a system set in place.   I believe this runs very true with blog/website analytics.  People either put way too much time into trying to analyze the data, or people spend no time at all and look at how many hits came in the day before. If all you’re doing is looking at your number of hits, you’re missing a great deal of valuable information that will contribute to your success in the transition to a photography small business.

You’re Photoblog is Boring

I touched on this point in another blog post about photoblog content etiquette.  Does your photoblog have to look just like the next guys? I love when I visit a website and the person is doing something creative that I’ve never come across before.  I don’t find that very often with photoblogs.  Thank goodness I am on a search for creative photo blog success stories and I’ll be sharing them in the future.  In the mean time, start to think about what kind of value can you add?

The other issue might be that you’re photographs are boring.  The great thing about boring photographs is that over time, with a photoblog, you’re going to build upon you skill in photography.  It’s a given because whatever you put your attention on expands. Overtime you’re going to learn the types of photographs that generate the most love from viewers.

How are you talking about your photographs, if at all?  My initial suggestion is for you to visit some of the top photoblogs on coolphotoblogs and take some notes.  What are they doing? What are you doing?

Summary: Make the Transition

My hope in writing this article for my blog is that you start to think of these roadblocks and explore your own ways to go around them.  As I mentioned, it’s not  easy. If you’re not experiencing any of these troubles in getting your photoblog to become a part of your photography business, you can pat yourself on the back.  I might even send you a reward in the mail.  If you are experiencing these issues, you’re not alone.  I go through them myself.  Come back here, sign up for the newsletter e-mail list and we’ll take the journey together in getting over these humps and get your photoblog transitioned into a photography home business.