Sharing Travel Photos: Which is the Best Way?
 

I've always used kodakeasyshare to share my travel photos with friends and family but was impressed recently by the look of photos posted here using flickr and picasa.

It wasn't just that the photos themselves were great but I liked that good sized thumbnails appeared on one scrollable page and could be individually enlarged.

I'm planning to sign up for both and see how they compare to kodak for ease of use but would love to know the pros and cons of flickr and picasa from people who already use them. I'm starting to organize my photos from our recent trip to the UK so your opinions would be especially helpful right now.

Here are he recent threads with the photos I was impressed with plus one of mine that used kodak to compare.

picasa: http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35036556

flickr: http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35030520

kodak: http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34811293

You could also look at www.photobucket.com - you can make albums and slideshows there and add your own comments too. I haven't really used it much - we have our own website which I use for photos using JAlbum, but it is a good simple site. I use it mainly for posting photos on other forums.

You could also start a travel blog at www.blogspot.com once you photos are organized.

I think you're probably looking only for free hosting sites?

The one I use ( pbase.com ) costs $23/yr so that wouldn't do, but I like it. My travel pics are at http://www.pbase.com/andrys there.

picasa's nice but very cumbersome when people want to go back to find a picture in the middle of all that. Unlimited storage though!

flickr has a good crowd, though I don't like the layout very much and I find navigation a bit odd. But their searching mechanism is great (tags) and people can find you more easily. Friendly place. Defaults to smaller images.

My favorite for friends and family wanting to start up same day while having a nice, big 800x600 image in all shots as default (with minimal advertising ruining your images) is http://myphotoalbum.com
My older cousin put up 4 albums in one day without ado and you can see them as samples at http://leeyuen.myphotoalbum.com
Extremely easy to use with a good interface. I may get a backup account there.

hetismij, thanks for suggesting yet another possibility. Photobucket seems like a great site for finding photos of specific places and subjects but I found the advertising a bit distracting.

Tim and Liz, I'll keep blogspot in mind in case I ever want to start blogging so thanks for responding.

Andrys, your comments on picasa and flickr is just the kind of information I'm looking for. Thanks also for sharing your cousin's albums on my photoalbum.com as it's difficult to get an idea just from the home page alone.

I was thinking of a free site but was very impressed with pbase, maybe because your photos are so good. $23 a year doesn't seem like much to pay for such a sophisticated look with no advertising and lots of space for comments and I assume lots of space for photos. Is it difficult to use or did you just make it look difficult because of your website expertise?

Moolyn, some of us customize our front pages at pbase.vom, which takes more work, but they just gave us a free front-page slide-show that we can tweak and I tested that at http://www.pbase.com/andrys/abtravels

The place is pretty simple to use but does take a day to look at all that it offers on your editing pages. The drawback for some is it doesn't have a way to let the visitor order prints but that'll come. Most of us love the fact it has no ads and there are several nice templates to choose from for our pages.

I have about 5 friends who joined this year for those reasons and they find it pretty easy to use. We get nothing when friends join, unlike some other places.

smugmug.com is perhaps an easier place, offering more but it costs more and many of us prefer pbase's clean, less flashy look. People's tastes will differ though. smugmug.com has terrific customer support, while on pbase, it's other members who help more.

pbase also just added free very-easy access to statcounter.com ( see the BusinessWeek article this week at
http://www.businessweek.com/globalbi...717_028843.htm ) in which you enter your statcounter ID numbers to a couple of pbase account fields,, and then pbase makes sure all your galleries and image papes can pick up traffic data. You can see what regions of the countries your viewers are in and what websites sent them your way etc. No one is identified but you can see what region of the country they're in, with a map showing that also. statcounter's doing very well because the service is free. When you check your stats, showing you which images are most popular or disinteresting :-) statcounter might have ads above your reports, paying for that service free to webpage owners.

Kodak Easyshare used to be Ofoto's from what I remember. I liked their printing but their display is not that good.

Flickr is owned by Yahoo now and is very popular with the younger set. More random in feel, more adventurous, maybe.

Thanks re some of my photos. I'd love to be able to take photos like that Clifton guy someone pointed us to. If you click on pbase.com's gallery or photo of the moment, you get a good idea of what's possible. You can usually get help at the forums for doing fancier things when you want, which is the draw of the place to some of us.

Good luck !

I use worldisround.com, which several people here do. I like Picasa for enhancing photos. ((*))

In general, the quality of friends' photos is less important to me than: 1. ease of access; do I have to establish an account in order to browse (if so, forget it).
2. captions that tell me what I am looking at

The $23 annual rate for pbase is for 500 megabytes of storage space. It really is a terrific value. In the more than 3 years that I have subscribed, the cost has remained unchanged and the storage space has increased dramatically.

A description of pricing options and services, including the 30-day free trial, can be viewed at http://www.pbase.com/pricing.html

I don't go to the effort of creating custom pages at pbase. Instead, I use only the templates they provide. For yet another example of a template, my travel gallery is at http://www.pbase.com/mike_buckley/travel

A couple of PBase questions - are all of your pictures automatically available to everyone or can you use it to simply store some images?
Can you restrict the availability of some of your galleries - only by invitation or password to family, friends?
Can you store on one account from more than one computer? or must each computer have its own account?
Do the template pages etc count in your alloted storage space?
Thanks.

There's another thread in the Lounge dated 7/10/07 that talks about this very subject (I couldn't get it to link correctly).

Before posting photos, read their TOC very carefully. Some of these sites claim rights to every photo you post for any purpose and forever.

While you might not think it's a big deal because your photos are just "snapshots", remember that this means they can sell them to anyone for any reason - your shot of a baby seal could be sold to advertise pro-seal clubbing, etc. Don't lose control of your images under any circumstances.

P.S. Always check the TOC of photo contests also - they do the same thing.

andrys, yes, kodakeasyshare used to be ofoto. I’ve used it since way back then and haven’t run out of space for albums although I only use it for photos I want to share, not for storage. Whereas, I’ve discovered, picasa, flickr and worldisround all provide a limited amount of free space and then charge $24 or more a year to upgrade. So, after reading these comments and belatedly doing a search I’ve decided that there’s no good reason to change to one of the other free sites from kodakgallery.com.

However, I'm quite smitten with pbase, especially after seeing so many brilliant albums there. I prefer the clean look of pbase to smugmug although that extra customer support would be nice. Since I acquired a better digital camera, the Canon SD800, I’ve been taking photos on my morning walks around downtown Toronto. Inspired by Hokusai’s 100 views of Mount Fuji I’ve been working on 100 Views of the CN Tower. Pbase would be a great place to display them as well as my collections of travel photos. So I'm very seriously thinking of joining.

Mike, thanks for showing me that it isn’t necessary to be a layout wiz like andrys to produce attractive photo galleries with pbase. I like that you can simply click on a representative photo to enter a gallery.

toedtoes, I checked pbase and found that “any images uploaded by a user remain the property of that user or whatever party holds the copyright.” Thanks also for mentioning the other thread on this same topic. I found it at: http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35020822 and then decided to do a search on this topic and found a few more helpful threads. Interestingly, the highest number of recommendations were for pbase and ofoto/kodak.

Jed and Ackislander, thanks for your input. I’ve noticed worldisround used here quite often so checked it out too. I think that all of the sites mentioned here and on the simillar thread meet Ackislander’s criteria.

Robjame, good questions, thanks! I’m interested to see the answers too. I suspect that you can access pbase from more than one computer as long as you use your password since you can do this with kodakeasyshare. Did you decide to take your new DSLR to France? If I had a DSLR and was going to be there for as long as you are I sure would take it with me.

moolyn, I'm another pbase user; I find the galleries of others on the site extremely inspiring, even though I'm just a point-and-shooter (someday I hope to try harder and get better).

To answer some of robjames' questions:

are all of your pictures automatically available to everyone or can you use it to simply store some images?
You can restrict/use the site to privately store if that's what you like.

Can you restrict the availability of some of your galleries - only by invitation or password to family, friends?
YES, there are a couple of ways to do this. One of my galleries doesn't even show up to you people! >:) But you can also set up a password for family/friends.

Can you store on one account from more than one computer? or must each computer have its own account?
I haven't tried this, but I think it's possible.

Do the template pages etc count in your alloted storage space?
I'm not sure--haven't uploaded anything near to my allotted storage space so haven't investigated.

http://www.pbase.com/leelygoes

p.s. Moolyn, your lovely Dordogne photos would look even better set against a darker background (blue, black, dark green, etc.). And let's not even get into robjames' French food photos! I don't want to end up licking my computer screen.

Another satisfied pbase customer here. And to answer robjames question. No the templates do not count towards your allowed space. I have almost 1400 pictures stored and am only using a little more than 20 % of my allowence.

Also, you don't need a seperate account for each computer. I upload from both my pc and my laptop.

Tom

www.pbase.com/trsw

bkmkg Thank you!

Moolyn - here's the thread where I checked out the TOCs of several of the recommended sites:
http://tinyurl.com/2hpdu3

With the pbase site, the one questionable thing is that they don't indicate what rights THEY claim on the photos.

All sites have to claim a minimum amount of rights to your photos in order to post them online, etc. Some take only the minimum (right to publish online only while you are a member) and some take it all (right to sell, manipulate, etc. for now and forever).

On pbase, there's no mention of the specific rights they claim for the operation of the site - just that you retain YOUR rights.

That's the only thing that bothers me a bit. Without stating what their rights are, there's no protection for you against their usage of your images. I believe the current owner of the site is OK, but if he decided to sell the site to some company, you could get screwed.

If I were to go with pbase (and I think it's a good site), I would simply send an email asking what rights they claim - even spell it out for them to make it easier - and ask them for confirmation that they claim no additional rights. I'd tuck that email and the response away for future reference if needed and then sign up and start posting.

moolyn, if you do join pbase, please contact me and I can watch, along with other members, for your questions at the forums. We all try to help one another.

Re any layout wizardry, the slideshow-text layout at the pbase.com/andrys/abtravels page I gave
is done with about 7 lines (which I posted to their forums). The rest is done by PBase.

The new slideshow feature means you can just type in "SLIDESHOW(gallery)" at your edit-gallery description-box between centering symbols and it just goes, and is really nice since you can choose between several sizes.

robjame, re your questions:
1. Access types for galleries there
-- Subgalleries can be public.
-- They can be non-public (my default setting), but if a person is given the exact link, they can see it, so it's a good way to keep a gallery for only friends without making them put in passwords.
-- Or they can be password-protected for more security
-- Or an image itself can be made totally Non-public, which means you're the only person that can see it, even if someone knows the link and the password to that subgallery.

2. Restricting availability - that's covered by the possibilities above...

3. Yes, you can access your account from any computer if you know the password. Important to log out after using another computer though, especially a public one. I often access from my photoshop classes at various schools.

Also of course anyone can see the photos from any computer, without registering, as long as you have your photos and subgalleries public or have given permission/rights.

4. The template pages don't count in the storage space -- only the photos you upload. We all recommend people upload no larger than 800x600, to fit 1024x768 screens that have browser and other program info and to keep loading time down AND to protect your larger version of your photos from being stolen. This is true anywhere.

Also, don't hesitate to download the free magazine done by members at pbase (not connected with management) at
http://www.pbase.com/magazine
There are several issues available and it is a top-notch resource, which is understating it. You don't have to be a member to download it and it's an inspiration for a number of us who are trying to improve our photography, how we see and how to get more out of what we get, etc.

- Andrys

Thank you all for answering all these OC questions,,,
- as amplification: "Yes, you can access your account from any computer" - this means I can upload from more than one computer?
- is it Vista compatible? (I suspect you would have heard if it weren't)

(Sounds like a go for me)

If one's willing to pay, also try zenfolio.com, which I use. Feature-wise, it's basically the same as pbase. The layout and presentation maybe a little different.

You can check out mine at:

rkkwan.zenfolio.com

Another option which I don't think anyone has mentioned is to create your own website, (similar to a free blog), but much more flexible.
Then, you can organize it any way you want, include text, travelogues, links, etc. Granted, it's not free but it doesn't have to be expensive.

Andrys- I've been reading some of your messages about photography lately and I kept thinking, "wow, that name seems so familiar..".
I just figured it out!
About a million years ago, (ok, but waaaay back in 1999 I think) I emailed you about Peru as I was contemplating a trip there. I even put a link to your Peru page on my website (www.wired2theworld.com) because you were so helpful. I still haven't made it to Peru, (too many places, too little time!) but I hope to go someday.
Small world.

robjame,

Yes you can upload from more than one computer. Like I said, I upload from both my PC and my laptop when I travel.

Tom

I have to agree with andrys, I like my photo album and have a paid account ($15.00 a year) there. The Photo size is good and you have choices you can make to set up the album's appearance.

Leely, thanks for answering robjames questions and for remembering my Dordogne trip report from last year! I’m just a P&Ser at this point too but, as a part time art college student, I have aspirations. I agree that my photos would look better on a dark background, especially the ones taken recently in the rainy English lake district. I loved your photos on pbase!

Tom, I loved your photos too! Thanks for adding your opinion.

Toedtoes, thanks for your advice! I’ve already sent an email to pbase asking for clarification of their rights. I notice on another thread that you will be in my city at the end of August. Maybe we can get together even if the group GTG doesn’t work out that week.

Andrys, if pbase doesn’t claim rights to the photos posted on their sight I’m pretty sure I will join and will let you know. Thanks for answering my friend robjame’s questions!

Rkkwan, thanks for weighing in. I’ve learned a lot about cameras from your expert opinions on other threads so I was very interested to see your excellent photos. If pbase doesn’t work out I’ll consider zenofolio. I already checked and zenofolio doesn’t take over rights to the photos posted on their site.

Kristina, I’ve thought of creating my own website but not recently. My server has a provision for this but allows only 5MB of space and limits the amount of traffic.

Hpeabody, thanks for adding your opinion on pbase.

I don't think anyone has mentioned http://fotopic.net/

Kristina! I still have my link to your travelogue under my Peru links at the end of the Peru trip menu of trip regions at www.andrys.com/peru/indox.html -hoping someday you'd get there but wanting people to enjoy your world trek with you. Fantastic to see you here.

Re blogging, I agree. Google bought blogger.com and many of us have the free blogspots there. Mine is at andrys1.blogspot.com

I call it an UnBlog since I don't post much! But I love the capability and it's really easy to use. The archiving of all entries and search capabilities for others is tremendous. All automated.

Re PBase again, I put 5 lines of code in to put in a search there too which looks through my own pages. Anyone can do that for their sites, at most places. Worthwhile.

hpeabody,
The myphotoalbum.com $15 covers all kinds of printing capabilities too from what I understand.
Not as flexible as pbase with gallery display, but I love that you can join for free and upload and see larger pics right away without a mess on the screen.

moolyn,
here's PBase's terms of service - the photos remain ours ! and they have rights to display them on their own site and in their own features such as popular galleries and photos etc.
http://www.pbase.com/help/tos

Also, a special wiki database for pbase help was made by one of our ace members at http://pbasewiki.srijith.net/

- Andrys

Kristen, sorry. The link to my Peru menu and then links should be www.andrys.com/indox.html

Shorter than I thought.

Moolyn, I'd definitely like to get together while I'm there - whether there's a GTG or not.

On the topic at hand, I use photobucket strictly to post photos on a photog forum I inhabit. For showing off photos, I usually use my website (toedtoesproductions dot com) or a very small upstart gallery (http://tinyurl.com/39gps9). This gallery was actually started by the person who taught me about TOCs and copyrights.

Moolyn-If you would really like to have your own website, don't be put off by your server's limit. Most likely, that's for a "free" web page that's not your own domain name.

You can register your own website dot com name and then find someone, even possibly your ISP to host it (that's what I do).
www.networksolutions.com is one of the biggest and oldest domain name registrars.

Of course, then you will need to learn a few more things about posting your site and bit of web design, but given millions of personal web sites out there, it's obvious this is only as complicated as you want it to be. ;-)

Andrys-I most certainly will make it to Peru someday!

Andrys and Moolyn et all, The $15.00 per year is for the special "creative" options. This is above and beyond the basic account. You get more colors and themes, more page styles/backgrounds, more framing options (or not), more size options (I just learned that that applies to your viewers also), And I think my favorite is that I can use my own pics as the background. There is a slide show which I advise my viewers to use. If they look at one pic at a time with the paid account, the pic can be opened up to full size if desired. I have lots of fun matching colors, themes and backgrounds to the subject of my album. I store many pics there, as it is unlimited storage. For the casual user with not so many pics, the basic account is fine, though. I am not so much into printing or gifts or that stuff, so I know not of what you speak.

andrys, I’ve read through the terms of service a couple of times and still couldn’t find where it states the rights of pbase except for this: By posting publicly accessible photos or text on PBase, you give us permission to excerpt that content for use in marketing materials and to make minor changes to it for purposes of presentation. In all such cases you will be credited for the work. Since I see toedtoes point I’m going to wait for clarification before proceeding.

Pbase isn’t what I was looking for when I posted my question but I see the possibilities and think that it would inspire me to be a better photographer. I’ve noticed that the camera used to take the photos is identified and I like this feature too as well as the possibility of posting panoramas.

hpeabody, I’m pretty well sold on pbase but I’d like to see an example of a gallery on myphotoalbum.com if it’s not too much trouble. It’s difficult to judge what a site is like by just visiting the home page.

Kristina, I appreciate your advice about posting my own website and it is something I seriously considered in the past and again now because of your suggestion. But I’m at a point in my life where I’m trying to simplify and I’m a bit of a perfectionist so I know I can’t invest the time it would take me to produce a website I’m happy with.

toedtoes, we have a date! Contact me a [email protected] I was very impressed with your incredible insect photos and that you’re a wanabe Canadian. Wow!

Hi, Here is a link to my top level album. The structure is set up with sub-albums. Click on a picture or test link to enter the sub-album and then some of those have sub-albums. I hope this helps give you some ideas. Try the slideshow.

hollysphotoalbums. myphotoalbum .com/

When I try to copy the whole link here it DOES NOT WORK, so you will need to cut & paste it after http:// and take out the spaces (I am a newbie here and have stuff still to learn about this site)

If you can't get it to work, let me know

Me again, It looks like you have been able to paste links here. Maybe you can tell me how it's done here. When I try it (in preview), first it duplicates the whole thing, then even if I delete the duplicate the response comes back

Not Found

The requested URL /forums/<a style= was not found on this server.


http://hollysphotoalbums.myphotoalbum.com/

Ooooooooh, when you do the "final" post the link works fine :-)

hpeabody, it looks like you figured this little link glitch out for yourself. I've learned to check that the link works before posting by scrolling down to the bottom left side of the screen and clicking on the link in my post there. If there's no mistake it will work because it isn't connected to a duplicate url with no space between like in the preview.

Myphotoalbum.com looks pretty darn good, not quite as clean as pbase but for a free service with unlimited space it's impressive. Thanks so much for sharing your albums but you do realize that you just made my decision much harder, don't you?

Moolyn - I'll email you tonight with my contact info during my trip. It's definitely a date!

Thanks for the compliment on the photos - I've gotten lucky with a few bugs that have agreed to model for me. Having a good 15 minutes to work angles and such helps a lot. It's those selfish bugs that don't sit for more than 5 seconds that make life difficult. :-d

moolyn,
Re PBase's TOS, any hosting site will want to be able to use your photo that is there for marketing (such as best galleries or best photos feature) and they will want to be able to include a representation of it whether cropped or included with other shots for that feature. Unlike some other places, they say clearly you will always be credited (not just a photo showing in an ad). Many want to be included in the features.

As for myphotoalbum.com I was the one who gave links to my cousin's albums there to give an example of what you can get for free if you don't want the bells and whistles there. I plan to join someday for backup but chose pbase first because I prize interaction with others interested in photography and also the flexibility allowed on pbase pages.
Most of all, for free access, myphotoalbum.com does have ads, and the one high point of pbase is its total absence of ads when people are viewing your photos.
But myphotoalbum.com is my second recommendation (because of the ability to show larger images one after another), and it's my own first recommendation if one needs a good, free hosting site.

But everyone's needs and likes are very different, so good luck with the plethora of good choices ! :-)

- A

Andrys - on pbase's TOC, while they say WHY they will use your photos, they don't mention time frame, limitations, etc. of their using your photos.

I don't think pbase at this time is an issue, but the TOC isn't quite as specific as it could be - thereby leaving some stuff open for interpretation.

For example, no where does it say that if you remove your photos from the site and/or stop using the site, that they will cease to use your photos for marketing purposes. Does that mean that they are claiming the right to use your photos from now until eternity for marketing purposes? Or are they assuming that you will know that they won't use your photos once you stop participating in the site.

Rather than assuming one thing now and finding out 5 years from now that they meant the other, I think it's a good idea to ask for clarification - just to be safe.

As I mentioned on another thread, I got screwed by a website on this exact thing. The owner claimed that "you retain your copyright" all over the place and in the TOC, but way down in the TOC, tucked away in small print was the statement that they "claim non-exclusive, IRREVOCABLE, PERPETUAL rights" to your photos. It went on to add that they could then use your photos for any purpose, that they could alter or manipulate your photos for any purpose, and that they could sell your photos or derivative works with no compensation to you.

andrys, I realized after asking hpeabody to share an example of myphotgallery.com that you had already posted the one from your cousin which I'd looked at earlier but didn't like as much as pbase which really appeals to me. All this choice is a little overwhelming but I have totally discarded the idea of using picasa or flickr so I'm getting somewhere.

When I post trip reports I like to add separate albums for each section. Does pbase allow that or are people always admitted to all the albums once you send them a link? I'd like to keep family photos separate, for example. kodakgallery works well for both these things.

moolyn,

In a trip report you can give direct links to each individual gallery. Here are a few to click on to see what I mean

www.pbase.com/trsw/venice2006
www.pbase.com/trsw/diablo
www.pbase.com/trsw/italyinsepia

When you create a new gallery it is in lowercase. This gives you the link.

Tom