Apogee Photo Magazine: Share Your Images

Reprinted with permission from DIGITAL Photographer, a bimonthly print magazine.

It has always been one of the more perplexing questions thrown before us as we travel through life. "If a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to see it fall ... did it make a sound?" While we ponder that bit of silliness, how about considering the following: "If an image is captured and no one but the shooter sees it, has it really been enjoyed?" Clearly, a much less complicated equation, it's answerable by simply stating, "Not nearly as much." The sharing of an image is, after all, the reason you capture it in the first place, isn't it?

Forming a Community - There are many photo-sharing sites on the Internet, some with greater features than others, some that charge, some that are free. Importantly, each offers a way for photographers to share their experience and work, PhotoPoint is one such site, and it includes a one-stop shop for buying a digicam and accessories.

Among the many wonders of the Internet is the fairly recent development of photo-sharing Web sites. These sites are set up as online communities where people can "drop off' their images for all of the world (or maybe just mom and dad) to see. What's really terrific about these photo-sharing sites is that the model is the same as it's always been socially, psychologically, and emotionally. The only difference is the scale of the transaction - people will pass their photos around as always, but now, instead of just in the living room or at the water cooler at the office, you can pass 'em around the world.

And think about the cost associated with the old methods of sharing images. Because you don't have to spend time searching through shoe boxes for negatives, stopping at the store, dropping off the order, stopping at the store again, picking up the order, returning the negative to its (junk drawer) file, buying envelopes, buying note paper, buying postage stamps, and going to the post office before getting on with life, the whole-cost pricing of each shared picture is greatly reduced.

Our relationship with images today, especially in this online picture-sharing: environment, is ever dynamic and ever-changeable. It was rather cumbersome in the past as to be quite bothersome. Web sites, such as the ones we'll take a look at, have made it so easy now as to be almost irresistible.

There are a bunch of photo-sharing communities on the Internet, and if we attempted to cover them all, we'd simply run out of real estate in this space. If you bang the words "photo sharing" into the various search engines (thanks again to Stanford University for another terrific one in GOOGLE) the three sites that appear at the top of most lists are: www.clubphoto.com; www.photopoint.com and Adobe's www.activeshare.com. One real attractive aspect of all three sites, one that we've almost overlooked, is the fact they don't cost a dime. Let's take a look at each one.

At the heart of the Club Photo experience is its free software program, dubbed Living Album, which removes the pain of building the metaphorical photo album. You simply point the program to the image folder on the desktop or removable disk, and the software brings the pictures in as a group, automatically. Once your images are placed into Living Album, you can name the photos and add comments, even video and voice annotations, right there on your local machine. Amazingly, this is done without using an outside phone line or worrying about rush-hour Internet "flaps" that can lose the entire thread in mid-word while you are booted off-line.

What's nice about the Club Photo setup is that there is no messing around with single-picture uploads or staying online when uploads are done. After the album has been completed on the desktop, the software transforms the album into a fully contained photo Web page. The software already knows where the Club Photo site is once you've completed the album you are a few mouse clicks away from uploading to Club Photo. From here, Living Album creates an index page in the form of fast-loading miniatures, or thumbnails, of the full pages for easy navigation for visitors. Think of it as your table of contents. You are then given the option of sharing your images with the world or giving the album a password for the privacy of family and friends. Club Photo also offers the ability for visitors to order prints and photo gifts such as mugs, calendars and even photo cookies ... yes, photo cookies. Neat stuff.

PhotoPoint is set up to be more of a photo community than simply a warehouse for images. The site includes photo-industry news, tips, a terrific links page for real enthusiasts and a live chat room for instant feedback on your images. This setup finds you e-mailing your images to a PhotoPoint server. Once the site receives your images (minutes), they are automatically made into a thumbnail, and members can then organize their albums from a variety of templates. They can also add short messages or captions to each image.

PhotoPoint has set up a nifty program for alerting folks that your album is ready for viewing: Simply clicking on an envelope icon enables users to send out e-mail announcements to their friends and family with a hotlink back to their online album. You can include a personalized message, and a promo regarding the PhotoPoint service comes with the package. The company has worked in a pretty clever mechanism for word-of-mouth advertising as its user base grows. The site also provides a public photo gallery, allowing members to share their albums with the world, organized into AOL- or Yahoo-style categories - People, Sports, Destinations, and so on.

Another neat feature on the PhotoPoint site is its member profiles page, where members are encouraged to share the stories behind their albums. You find that after you've spent some time in the PhotoPoint environment you're interested in more than just your own images. Again, PhotoPoint has attempted to set up a photo community. Members are given feedback on how many hits each album receives. The most popular albums are placed on a weekly-updated "Top 5% Albums" list, which can encourage a little competition between members. As a result, some of the content on PhotoPoint is quite impressive.

A recently added service, with nationally known Signature Color Lab, makes it easy for users to mail their 35mm or APS film to a Signature Color film processing lab and have their prints digitized and uploaded into their PhotoPoint account. The prints are then sent out by mail the same day for home delivery.

Photo-manipulation software giant Adobe has emerged in the Web photo-sharing game as well. With its setup, the user is asked to download the site's easy-to-use ActiveShare software. A nice feature of this Adobe software is the fact it does away with the sometimes cumbersome step of importing photos into the computer by providing the user a one-click process to getting images from a digital camera or scanner. Click on the appropriate icon and the images are downloaded instantly.

Once the images are on your desktop, ActiveShare provides some very basic photo-editing capabilities along with some intuitive image organization and electronic photo album features. A real nice touch is the option to preview your work after completion. A terrific built-in search engine allows users to search for images currently residing on their hard drive that might be last-minute additions to their newly created electronic album. (Many of the Adobe photo album templates are more attractive than most of the sharing sites we've visited.)

The software automatically communicates with the site and your images are ready to roll. With one click, your images are automatically uploaded to the eCircles portion of the ActiveShare Web site.

The main emphasis with ActiveShare.com is clearly family. The site isn't set up for photo sharing between strangers, as many of the other sites are. Adobe is pushing photo sharing between family and friends as its eCircles section encourages family members to gather and share comments on the posted images. Bold graphics and brief, breezy text guide members through the steps needed to complete the process. Once you're finished adding any last minute captions or enhancements, it's time to alert the gang that your album is ready for sharing. The eCircles e-mail setup allows you to send out the entire album right from the site or have your recipients come visit your Circle at the ActiveShare site.

Each one of the sites offers something unique as part of their experience. The bottom line with all of them is that the emphasis is on fun and ease of use. There's really no reason not to start sharing your digitized masterpieces today.

Zing.com provides you powerful and convenient services to support all your photography needs:
- Unlimited free storage,
- Simple picture-upload and album-creation processes,
- ZingCard photo-greeting cards,
- Photography tips and techniques,
- Tools for viewing, searching, printing and enhancing pictures.

While each one of the aforementioned sites handles the sharing aspects of photography quite nicely, they are a little light on product and service information. DIGITAL Photographer has discovered a wonderful Web site that provides one-stop shopping for all your imaging needs in PhotoHighway.

Not necessarily a photo-sharing community, PhotoHighway offers a soup-to-nuts approach with regards to imaging. Photo-industry experts provide weekly tips columns, product reviews, purchasing advice, and photo-industry news.

PhotoHighway is really set up to benefit the entire photographic community, from beginners to advanced amateurs and beyond.

By the time you've become a regular visitor, PhotoHighway has helped you make the transition from film to digital photography. And more importantly, it makes it more enjoyable. Photo enthusiasts can interact with other folks that share a similar interest in equipment, subject matter and photographic technique. And, if that's a bit too heady for you, you can simply find out what's hot in photography or get a helping hand with your latest imaging dilemma.

The site also offers the opportunity to update your software or settings so you can enjoy the total PhotoHighway experience. Give it a click at www.photohighway.com.

DIGITAL Photographer is printed bimonthy. It is chock full of digital camera reviews and articles to help you get the most from your digital camera. Right now, Apogee Photo readers can get two years for the price of one by just clicking here and filling out the information.