James Geiger M. Ed.
"Being a photographer is not about taking a photograph, it is about being curious about life."
~ Jared Platt http://www.jamesgeigerphoto.com
While looking through your website I found a few small things that you might want to address:
1) The Engagement Gallery (->Portfolio -> Engagement) comes up empty - I would hide it as long as it does not contain any photos and make it visible as soon as you have some. Because if I were in the position where I was looking for someone to take photos of my engagement and would then come across your site, I might not even take contact because that gallery is empty.
2) Since you are trying to get people to hire you as a photographer it would be nice if you would include some words about in which area you operate. As of now it seems not to be mentioned on your About page or on your Contact page. So someone who wants you to take his profile taken for say an application tomorrow in Paris, France should know easily that you might not be able to do so.
3) A little typo in your Archive-Gallery I think it is "Promotional" (with "r" after the "P") and not "Pomotional" (Archive -> Photoshoots)
4) Archive -> Corporate, in my opinion I would think that another photo for the Gallery would be better, as you are here cutting that mans head at his eyes off... (I know that this is because only a section of your photo is shown, but will your customers know too?)
5) Archive -> Concerts -> 2012 has the same problem as nr. 4 in my opinion.
6) I wonder if it would be a more "unified" website if you had one kind of copyright-watermark instead of three or four.
7) You are showing your galleries for your most recent events, yet those events are not included in your portfolio (one would have to "dig" through the archive) - I would either move events completely into the archive and that includes the first page galleries below the slideshow or add some of those event photos to your portfolio.
But of course this is nothing but an opinion and a matter of taste
What's black and white and red all over?
Your website....
First of All, Stunning Photography
I like the simplicity of the design that allows your photos to speak for themselves and I like the way you used the framers on your gallery page.
What is the voodoo doll all about?
:-) Thanks for your feedback PhotoDavid78. Happy that it feels like I wanted it to feel: simple and to the point.
Voodoo doll is a cairn :-) ... very helpful for a traveler especially in the hills
While your overall design is clean and elegant, the original images you have posted are so small they are, in some cases, no bigger than the thumbnails when displayed in the Lightbox. For me, this makes opening them in the Lightbox very underwhelming.
Hi there, my site is now up and running and I welcome feedback/comments: www.danoutandabout.com
Thanks a lot
Cheers
Dan
Hi Dan. Great BW photography which gives the site an air of simplicity and good style. Just a couple of minor things.
1. Each gallery seems to have the gallery image header (with the title on) at the end of the gallery. It's a little confusing until you realize it's just there as a shot itself. Does that make sense?
2. Your 'about me' is well written, but on a wide screen like mine it spans across a wide area. Might be better to contain it in a narrower box, as I have done with mine. http://www.macromeister.co.uk/About Also, I think french canadian should be French Canadian as it's a proper noun?
I admire your courage in giving up pretty much everything and traveling. Good luck to you.
Allright Customization gurus, we want to see what you have been doing to the New SmugMug. Reply to this thread with your new SmugMug site. If you can also give a brief overview of the additional customization you did, that would be awesome.
We are going to start showing off awesome sites via our social media channels soon, so show us what you got!
Michael
Mine is pretty basic compared to the snazzy sites listed here...jdnphotos.smugmug.com. I came to the forum looking for help formatting the home page slideshow. (I'd like the images to line up centered starting at the top, not the horizontal center & vertical center.) I am told there is no way to make this simple change. Now I see some really great sites. I will have to check these out more.
Mine is pretty basic compared to the snazzy sites listed here...jdnphotos.smugmug.com.
Your site has a clean look to it; I like the simplicity of it.
Unfortunately you seem to have set a minimum width that is quite wide. While I do have a large monitor I very rarely have a browser window opened full screen. That means I need to scroll sideways to see all of the menu entries on your site, not a good user interaction.
It appears that you have all of your galleries set to slideshow. Make sure your expected viewers will be happy to watch a slideshow as opposed to selecting photos for longer perusal. While I believe slideshows have a place I usually will not browse a site via slideshows.
If I click the blog link from your menu it opens a new browser window. And if I manage to find the link back to your smug site from your blog it opens yet another browser window. I know this is personal choice - but when a site starts propagating new browser windows (and I didn't request them) I usually close the site. Browser window clutter does not help viewers.
Although I’ve been an avid photographer all my life, I began seriously studying photography in 2009.
I presume from your various sites that you do commercial/professional (paid) work. It's just my view of it, but that sentence doesn't really help promoting that professional impression. When I read it I thought it sounded more like a hobbyist statement - I subconsciously wanted to insert the word 'only' between the 'I' and 'began'. If you have only been a serious photographer since 2009, I would not actually say that. No one is going to ask when your fine photography speaks for itself.
I've been using Smugmug since 2010 and I've only ever had one Gallery folder that was private, I basically used Smugmug as a hosting device for the images on my WordPress blog as opposed to uploading to WordPress (WordPress reduces the file size and added sharpening whilst Smugmug lets me set sharpening to 0 and keeps the file size the same size)
So after 5 years and 1 single Galley I decided to take the plunge for the first time as this new level of customisation allows me to create a gallery linked to my site with a similar look.
I did not have a clue about folders and pages so its been a whole new learning curve for me but after a couple of days I'm finally getting there by trial and error ha ha
Simplistic is the idea here and no fancy wide screens as my blog is only about 1030 pixels wide so my Smug mug follows suit to help blend in (but I may change everything which would be a pain but worth it to be big and wide as I love the look of full screen web sites)
Still got loads to do Gallery wise but its finally nice to be able to post publicly on Smugmug instead of just using it as a hosting device.
I've only got 4 Galleries up at the moment but I think it should look quite nice once it starts fill out with lots more galleries.
Hopefully this will encourage me to continue blogging again
Excellent photography, Marco (and that's the most important thing). I like the simplicity of layout. Not sure how useful the search option is, and I was a little confused on that page by the options for video, pages etc.
The blog menu item opens in the same window, so one loses your site. Is that what you wanted? Also, the logo on the smug site links straight to the blog, which seems a trifle confusing to me.
Excellent photography, Marco (and that's the most important thing). I like the simplicity of layout. Not sure how useful the search option is, and I was a little confused on that page by the options for video, pages etc.
The blog menu item opens in the same window, so one loses your site. Is that what you wanted? Also, the logo on the smug site links straight to the blog, which seems a trifle confusing to me.
Thanks Rob that's kind of you to say ... And some some excellent advice there ... yeah I wanted it to open in the same window so it was as though you were opening another page ... good point about the search so I'll remove that ... I did link the logo to go back to the blog but I agree with you now I've looked at that again so yeah I'll take that link away as well
I love your background. I was thinking it was neat to have that grey image. Then I read Denise's comment that it is distracting, and I realized, oh, true. Because I was focused so much on it! But I still like it. One technical question, if you don't mind my asking: Does one photo as a background result in slow page load times? Or, how did you achieve fast-load times?
And a little bitty thing: On your contact page, you have two sets of share icon sets, one on the left and one on the right. It appears there is some duplication there? If you really want both sets, they aren't horizontally level with each other.
Mine is pretty basic compared to the snazzy sites listed here...jdnphotos.smugmug.com. I came to the forum looking for help formatting the home page slideshow. (I'd like the images to line up centered starting at the top, not the horizontal center & vertical center.) I am told there is no way to make this simple change. Now I see some really great sites. I will have to check these out more.
Very enticing site.
One strange behavior: I clicked to go to the landscape page (from your home page), and the page initially came up all white, meaning, no photo. I could see the left/right arrows so I discerned there should be a slideshow, but I waited maybe 8 seconds. I left the page and when to Newborns, and there the first image blinked right into place. Went back to landscapes (from home), and the first image blinked right up. I have no idea why at first there was at least an 8-second delay.
Gorgeous owls!
On this page: http://marcopesaresi.smugmug.com/Bird-Galleries/Barn-Owl/
the 4th gallery image (it's the first one on the 2nd row), is a broken link, so I don't see any image, just the jpg icon placeholder. Clicking the non-image does take me to the gallery and the images.
I'm not sure why the thumbnail image is missing - you may need to go to gallery settings and click and choose an image for this function.
Gorgeous owls!
On this page: http://marcopesaresi.smugmug.com/Bird-Galleries/Barn-Owl/
the 4th gallery image (it's the first one on the 2nd row), is a broken link, so I don't see any image, just the jpg icon placeholder. Clicking the non-image does take me to the gallery and the images.
I'm not sure why the thumbnail image is missing - you may need to go to gallery settings and click and choose an image for this function.
Thank you very much indeed, they are my favourites too ... Don't know why the link did not work but it seems to be working now
Make sure you're uploading images in sRGB color space. Looks like you might be uploading AdobeRGB files. Check out the difference in color between one of your original size images vs. one of SmugMug's display copies:
Original:
X-Large:
This is causing all your thumbnails and smaller display copies to look a little muted. I'd also suggest uploading your images in full resolution and disable display of Originals.
Beautiful Photography!!
Marco,
You really bring out the beauty in these birds. Your page layout of deliberate simplicity keeps the emphasis on you photography and birds. Well done.barb
I'm very happy with the customization framework generally, I used lots of HTML and CSS tweaks provided in this forum, and am very encouraged that the smugmug folk are actively upgrading things, and seem passionate about making it a really good web development environment for web dummies like me.
I've tweaked the layout what seems like a million times. My goal is to get people to a recent event with one click, and then be able to 'buy' with one more click. Hence the 'Recent' stuff on the left, and the way I did the galleries.
I just switched to a carousel on the home page, not sure if I like it or not, maybe too cluttered.
Some thoughts and suggestions for you smugmug folk:
I stuck 'Purchasing photos' up top to give people some idea of what they would be buying, but it is not very good. It'd be good if visual examples were right in there inside the 'Buy' options, as opposed to just saying some words like 'gorgeous'.
Since its no more work for me if someone purchases something big compared to small, I set profit to almost a fixed amount, as opposed to a percent. It'd be nice if that were an option (or is it?). I did them all by hand one size at a time.
If you 'empty cart', there is no option to continue browsing, that'd be nice.
Hi. It took me about 200 hours (2 weeks lay-out and 3-4 weeks content) but it worked out: www.bennienhuis.nl (sorry only in dutch).
Wonderful how smugmug can be customized!
I wish there was a way to save templates and customized objects in a kind of library, to re-use them on other pages.
(that would save lots of times when making a new personalized page, gallery or folder, or would want to make an English version)
But for mow I'm very happy with what smugmug can do :-)
Hi. It took me about 200 hours (2 weeks lay-out and 3-4 weeks content) but it worked out: www.bennienhuis.nl (sorry only in dutch).
Wonderful how smugmug can be customized!
Nicely done!
The one thing I would recommend fixing is the behavior of your top logo / photo band at the top of your site. It works well on your home page but on all other pages that I touched it moves up and half-covers the top menu.
Hi. It took me about 200 hours (2 weeks lay-out and 3-4 weeks content) but it worked out: www.bennienhuis.nl (sorry only in dutch).
Wonderful how smugmug can be customized!
I would drop the top menu bar. Not only does it not display correctly (for me, Chrome on a Mac), but the vertical menu bar makes it redundant.
Thanks for the feedback Denise and W.W.!
I' would like to keep the top menu bar (for later to make a difference between mobile and desktop-users)
Thanks for your comment I think I've figured out how te prevent the banner cover-up- half of the top menu
Greetings, Ben
I' would like to keep the top menu bar (for later to make a difference between mobile and desktop-users)
In that case, why retain the side menu? Wouldn't it be preferable to let your content flow across the full width for desktop users rather than retain a redundant side menu? To see both looks a little curious!
Thanks again for the feedback W.W. After a good night sleep I decided to drop the top-menu.
Gives less distraction. The mobile version shows just the left menu (collapsed)
Here in Holland Spring has begun, time to stop working at the website and go out taking pictures :-)
Comments
--- Denise
Musings & ramblings at https://denisegoldberg.blogspot.com
"Being a photographer is not about taking a photograph, it is about being curious about life."
~ Jared Platt
http://www.jamesgeigerphoto.com
While looking through your website I found a few small things that you might want to address:
1) The Engagement Gallery (->Portfolio -> Engagement) comes up empty - I would hide it as long as it does not contain any photos and make it visible as soon as you have some. Because if I were in the position where I was looking for someone to take photos of my engagement and would then come across your site, I might not even take contact because that gallery is empty.
2) Since you are trying to get people to hire you as a photographer it would be nice if you would include some words about in which area you operate. As of now it seems not to be mentioned on your About page or on your Contact page. So someone who wants you to take his profile taken for say an application tomorrow in Paris, France should know easily that you might not be able to do so.
3) A little typo in your Archive-Gallery I think it is "Promotional" (with "r" after the "P") and not "Pomotional" (Archive -> Photoshoots)
4) Archive -> Corporate, in my opinion I would think that another photo for the Gallery would be better, as you are here cutting that mans head at his eyes off... (I know that this is because only a section of your photo is shown, but will your customers know too?)
5) Archive -> Concerts -> 2012 has the same problem as nr. 4 in my opinion.
6) I wonder if it would be a more "unified" website if you had one kind of copyright-watermark instead of three or four.
7) You are showing your galleries for your most recent events, yet those events are not included in your portfolio (one would have to "dig" through the archive) - I would either move events completely into the archive and that includes the first page galleries below the slideshow or add some of those event photos to your portfolio.
But of course this is nothing but an opinion and a matter of taste
Good luck
Lille Ulven
Hi there, my site is now up and running and I welcome feedback/comments: www.danoutandabout.com
Thanks a lot
Cheers
Dan
What's black and white and red all over?
Your website....
First of All, Stunning Photography
I like the simplicity of the design that allows your photos to speak for themselves and I like the way you used the framers on your gallery page.
What is the voodoo doll all about?
My Website
Facebook | Twitter | | VSCOgrid | Instagram |
:-) Thanks for your feedback PhotoDavid78. Happy that it feels like I wanted it to feel: simple and to the point.
Voodoo doll is a cairn :-) ... very helpful for a traveler especially in the hills
Thanks again for your feedback. Cheers D
Hi Dan. Great BW photography which gives the site an air of simplicity and good style. Just a couple of minor things.
1. Each gallery seems to have the gallery image header (with the title on) at the end of the gallery. It's a little confusing until you realize it's just there as a shot itself. Does that make sense?
2. Your 'about me' is well written, but on a wide screen like mine it spans across a wide area. Might be better to contain it in a narrower box, as I have done with mine. http://www.macromeister.co.uk/About Also, I think french canadian should be French Canadian as it's a proper noun?
I admire your courage in giving up pretty much everything and traveling. Good luck to you.
Very Nice! Wow!
Mine is pretty basic compared to the snazzy sites listed here...jdnphotos.smugmug.com. I came to the forum looking for help formatting the home page slideshow. (I'd like the images to line up centered starting at the top, not the horizontal center & vertical center.) I am told there is no way to make this simple change. Now I see some really great sites. I will have to check these out more.
Unfortunately you seem to have set a minimum width that is quite wide. While I do have a large monitor I very rarely have a browser window opened full screen. That means I need to scroll sideways to see all of the menu entries on your site, not a good user interaction.
It appears that you have all of your galleries set to slideshow. Make sure your expected viewers will be happy to watch a slideshow as opposed to selecting photos for longer perusal. While I believe slideshows have a place I usually will not browse a site via slideshows.
Your contact menu has no way to contact you. Is there some reason you chose not to use the built-in contact form? See http://help.smugmug.com/customer/portal/articles/1248294-how-do-i-create-a-contact-page-.
If I click the blog link from your menu it opens a new browser window. And if I manage to find the link back to your smug site from your blog it opens yet another browser window. I know this is personal choice - but when a site starts propagating new browser windows (and I didn't request them) I usually close the site. Browser window clutter does not help viewers.
--- Denise
Musings & ramblings at https://denisegoldberg.blogspot.com
Janice, You have some very impressive photography.
I have to echo what Denise said about the slideshows. As a viewer I would rather choose what I look at.
On your 'about', including the http://jdnarchitecture.com/about/ site, you state I presume from your various sites that you do commercial/professional (paid) work. It's just my view of it, but that sentence doesn't really help promoting that professional impression. When I read it I thought it sounded more like a hobbyist statement - I subconsciously wanted to insert the word 'only' between the 'I' and 'began'. If you have only been a serious photographer since 2009, I would not actually say that. No one is going to ask when your fine photography speaks for itself.
Rob
So after 5 years and 1 single Galley I decided to take the plunge for the first time as this new level of customisation allows me to create a gallery linked to my site with a similar look.
I did not have a clue about folders and pages so its been a whole new learning curve for me but after a couple of days I'm finally getting there by trial and error ha ha
Simplistic is the idea here and no fancy wide screens as my blog is only about 1030 pixels wide so my Smug mug follows suit to help blend in (but I may change everything which would be a pain but worth it to be big and wide as I love the look of full screen web sites)
Still got loads to do Gallery wise but its finally nice to be able to post publicly on Smugmug instead of just using it as a hosting device.
I've only got 4 Galleries up at the moment but I think it should look quite nice once it starts fill out with lots more galleries.
Hopefully this will encourage me to continue blogging again
Here is my Site ... Marco Pesaresi
Cheers Marco.
Excellent photography, Marco (and that's the most important thing). I like the simplicity of layout. Not sure how useful the search option is, and I was a little confused on that page by the options for video, pages etc.
The blog menu item opens in the same window, so one loses your site. Is that what you wanted? Also, the logo on the smug site links straight to the blog, which seems a trifle confusing to me.
Thanks Rob that's kind of you to say ... And some some excellent advice there ... yeah I wanted it to open in the same window so it was as though you were opening another page ... good point about the search so I'll remove that ... I did link the logo to go back to the blog but I agree with you now I've looked at that again so yeah I'll take that link away as well
Once again thanks for your help
Cheers Marco.
I love your background. I was thinking it was neat to have that grey image. Then I read Denise's comment that it is distracting, and I realized, oh, true. Because I was focused so much on it! But I still like it. One technical question, if you don't mind my asking: Does one photo as a background result in slow page load times? Or, how did you achieve fast-load times?
And a little bitty thing: On your contact page, you have two sets of share icon sets, one on the left and one on the right. It appears there is some duplication there? If you really want both sets, they aren't horizontally level with each other.
Very enticing site.
One strange behavior: I clicked to go to the landscape page (from your home page), and the page initially came up all white, meaning, no photo. I could see the left/right arrows so I discerned there should be a slideshow, but I waited maybe 8 seconds. I left the page and when to Newborns, and there the first image blinked right into place. Went back to landscapes (from home), and the first image blinked right up. I have no idea why at first there was at least an 8-second delay.
Edit: I was using Chrome.
Gorgeous owls!
On this page: http://marcopesaresi.smugmug.com/Bird-Galleries/Barn-Owl/
the 4th gallery image (it's the first one on the 2nd row), is a broken link, so I don't see any image, just the jpg icon placeholder. Clicking the non-image does take me to the gallery and the images.
I'm not sure why the thumbnail image is missing - you may need to go to gallery settings and click and choose an image for this function.
Thank you very much indeed, they are my favourites too ... Don't know why the link did not work but it seems to be working now
Make sure you're uploading images in sRGB color space. Looks like you might be uploading AdobeRGB files. Check out the difference in color between one of your original size images vs. one of SmugMug's display copies:
Original:
X-Large:
This is causing all your thumbnails and smaller display copies to look a little muted. I'd also suggest uploading your images in full resolution and disable display of Originals.
Dave
Marco,
You really bring out the beauty in these birds. Your page layout of deliberate simplicity keeps the emphasis on you photography and birds. Well done.
Smilestogophotobooth
Ok folks, here it is. www.lane1photos.com
I'm very happy with the customization framework generally, I used lots of HTML and CSS tweaks provided in this forum, and am very encouraged that the smugmug folk are actively upgrading things, and seem passionate about making it a really good web development environment for web dummies like me.
I've tweaked the layout what seems like a million times. My goal is to get people to a recent event with one click, and then be able to 'buy' with one more click. Hence the 'Recent' stuff on the left, and the way I did the galleries.
I just switched to a carousel on the home page, not sure if I like it or not, maybe too cluttered.
Some thoughts and suggestions for you smugmug folk:
I stuck 'Purchasing photos' up top to give people some idea of what they would be buying, but it is not very good. It'd be good if visual examples were right in there inside the 'Buy' options, as opposed to just saying some words like 'gorgeous'.
Since its no more work for me if someone purchases something big compared to small, I set profit to almost a fixed amount, as opposed to a percent. It'd be nice if that were an option (or is it?). I did them all by hand one size at a time.
If you 'empty cart', there is no option to continue browsing, that'd be nice.
All the best, Dave
Wonderful how smugmug can be customized!
I wish there was a way to save templates and customized objects in a kind of library, to re-use them on other pages.
(that would save lots of times when making a new personalized page, gallery or folder, or would want to make an English version)
But for mow I'm very happy with what smugmug can do :-)
Kind regards, Ben
The one thing I would recommend fixing is the behavior of your top logo / photo band at the top of your site. It works well on your home page but on all other pages that I touched it moves up and half-covers the top menu.
--- Denise
Musings & ramblings at https://denisegoldberg.blogspot.com
I' would like to keep the top menu bar (for later to make a difference between mobile and desktop-users)
Thanks for your comment I think I've figured out how te prevent the banner cover-up- half of the top menu
Greetings, Ben
Gives less distraction. The mobile version shows just the left menu (collapsed)
Here in Holland Spring has begun, time to stop working at the website and go out taking pictures :-)
After toying around with so many other service providers, I've finally returned to SmugMug.
Honestly, I've missed the fast loading / rendering of my photos and the clean look.
I've spent about a week customizing the layout and a few CSS tweaks.
Check out www.picomoments.com.
Looking forward to some feedback.
picomoments.smugmug.com
I really appreciate any feedback!