The fiddle-free way to parade your pics

By MICHAEL FOREMAN

I hate to admit it, but my home website has become a bit of an embarrassment.

When I started the site a few years ago, the photos and family news it contained went down very well with my relatives overseas, but since then I haven't kept it up to date.

Building a website isn't that difficult, but getting photos in the right format for the web and writing lines of HTML (HyperText Markup Language) code to annotate them is extremely fiddly. After a couple of half-hearted revisions, I'm afraid I gave up.

More recently I have taken to sending a few digital photos to friends and relatives by e-mail, but this method also has disadvantages. No matter how charming I might think a certain picture is, a one or two megabyte image file will not be welcome on my parent's dialup connection, and even small photo files may clog one of my friends' e-mail systems.

But a much easier way of sharing photos over the internet has appeared, partly as a result of the dotcom fallout in the United States. In industrial quantities at least, web space is now available so cheaply that many companies are offering to host your photos for free.

Visit Dave Dyer's guide for example, and you will find about 50 of these specialised photo album sites to choose from.

Most of them are free services, but they usually make money by selling photo prints, frames and all manner of other merchandise based on your photos from posters and mugs, to key-rings or mouse pads.

Because these sites are designed to carry photos and short pieces of text only, they are much easier to set up and maintain than a full-blown website, and you certainly don't need to know any HTML. When I tried out computer and printer manufacturer Hewlett-Packard's site for example, I found I was able to create a small family photo album in a few minutes.

After signing up and providing some not-too-intrusive information about yourself, you can upload photos.

Simply name your photo album, describe each photo, then tell the web site where that photo is stored on your hard disk. When you are finished, click a button and you have created a site that is accessible to anyone with a web browser. If you prefer, you can protect it with a password that you make available to whomever you choose.

The site includes a section where you may design an electronic postcard to let your friends and family know your album is online. You may choose from a limited range of border styles, and include an optional title to be superimposed on the photo of your choice, as well as adding a message.

Your recipients will then receive an e-mail that includes a web link to your postcard and the rest of your photos. It also adds a rather lengthy exhortation of the benefits of the HP Photo site - but hey, it's a free service and this as good a way as any to let people know your photos are there.

Uploading to this site is a very simple process because it accepts just about any popular image format.

The only limitations are that no photo may be larger than 5MB and you may send only three photos at a time, unless you are using special uploading software, which is available for free download at the site.

This Photo Manager program also allows you to schedule your uploads automatically, but the program is a 10.3 megabyte download, which would take about 25 minutes on a good dialup connection, so most people would probably find the web method easier.

Unlike other album sites, there does not seem to be a limit on the number of photos you can keep on the HP Photo site, but it does warn you when you join that if you don't access the site for six months, your account will be considered dormant and your photos deleted.

In my case, this could be just the incentive I need to keep things up to date.

Links:


Dave Dyer's guide

Hewlett Packard Photo

Dot Photo Pro