Image via Wikipedia
Most photographers have an online photo portfolio. However, only a few are able to derive significant benefits from their portfolios. The following are some of the things that characterize a great online portfolio.
1. Simple and uncluttered
If people are paying attention to your site’s design more than your photos, then there is a problem. The main attraction of your site is supposed to be your photos. Therefore, you need to avoid cluttering your site with unnecessary design elements.
One of the things that can cause distraction in your portfolio is a watermark. People should notice your images first, and not your watermark. Therefore, if you have to add a watermark to your image, you need to do it subtly.
Make sure your images are neither too large nor too small. Web users want to view images on their monitor at a suitable size, without having to strain or scroll to see the image.
2. Easy to understand
Your portfolio needs to be as simple as possible. Make sure that the sections, categories, navigation and labels can be understood by everyone. Being complicated will only give your visitors a frustrating experience. When naming your portfolio categories, use obvious terms which will be clear to web users.
3. Easy to link to images
Each of your images should have a unique URL. These links will make it easy for people who visit your site to share your work. Don’t frustrate your visitors with numerous instructions. If people find your portfolio difficult to link to, they will simply leave your site.
4. Properly edited
You need to ensure that your portfolio does not have any poor images. Edit thoroughly. Most photographers tend to be subjective about their images. Therefore, it is important to get the opinion of other people before publishing. It is better to have few high quality images, rather than have many images with some of low quality.
5. Contact details on every page
If you are hoping to get assignments through your portfolio, you should ensure that your visitors know how they can reach you. Therefore, your contact info should be on every page of your portfolio and website. This tactic has worked effectively for my blog promotes photos.com discounts and istock photo coupons. However, you need to make sure that the contact details do not take away attention from your images.
6. Captions included
Some text-based information would be useful for any photo. Some web users would want to get some details about the image (how it was created, date created etc.). However, you should make sure that this information is not a distraction.
7. Fast loading
A great photo portfolio should be very smooth and fast. A portfolio which is fast will encourage your visitors to go through your whole portfolio.
8. Obvious specialties
If you have a specialty in any particular area, you need to mention this very clearly. It would be a good idea to have separate portfolios which showcase each specialty. You could then add links to these portfolios in your ‘About’ page.
Author Bio
A writer with a particular interest in technology, Charles Mburugu writes often photos.com promo and istock promo, and at times for profitonknowledge.com. He also blogs about about special coupon and discount offers such as istock photo coupons and photos.com discounts.
Related articles
- to watermark or not to watermark? (blatherskiteblog.com)
- How Not to Put Your Foot in It When Creating a Photo Portfolio [With 34 Examples of How to Do it Right] (digital-photography-school.com)
- 7 Twitter Photo Sharing Tips To Spread Your Photographic Masterpieces (makeuseof.com)
- Create Your Own Social Portfolio with the Timekiwi Timeline (seanclark.com)
{ 17 comments… read them below or add one }
As a graphic artist and visual artists I must say these are great points and tips. All of which are true, having images online or even on a website is more than just copy and past. It is organization, titling, level or user friendly navigation and quality is all a part of have and creating a great online photo portfolio. Continue to share great points like this, well informative.
kenal recently posted..iZigg A Cost Effective Mobile Subscription Service
Hey Kenal, I’m glad you found the post helpful. Thanks for stopping by
whew this is very nice tips to follow, I know all of this will work, thanks for sharing this infos, one thing caught my attention is the word that has quotes located in the right corner of the website, really thanks a lot for this information. I really like reading here. This is simple yet true.
Mika Castro recently posted..SMS
Twitter: http://www.victorianplumbing.co.uk/
Excellent post as you have point out some simple but prove highly important and effective too.
Building all perfect online photo portfolio is an one type of art with require deep knowledge concern to this as this is gonna build our reputation online.
Thus thanks a lot for sharing this useful post.
Shower Heads recently posted..Shower Heads
Great tips! I’m having a problem generating what concerns should I consider creating one for my personal blog. You are right, loading time and the meaning of the image is important. The thought is in there, relevance to your point of view and properly edited.
Twitter: PNCGlobalorg
So far I have only shared articles on the basics of photography for people wanting to get started with shooting in manual and taking better photos. Reading your post here brought up a new idea of sharing photos with the setting used to take them to visually share the concept talked about in the article. Thanks for the thoughts shared here. Will help to improve my site for the visitor.
Although they are all simple and common sense but it’s great to have them listed out here as a sort of check list.
Lily Rose recently posted..Is the Healthy Trim Price Worth It for the Results?
I think that tags are really important as well b/c they help keep track of what your uploading and keep you organized for your sake and the sake of your visitors.
ella recently posted..February Is National Heart Month
Nice steps on how to make an online photo. will bring these into practice and hope they will work. loved the read !!
One more important thing I would suggest is redirection from Google Images Search. So people can’t take your pictures from Google but instead they are redirected to your website. There are some few wordpress plugins for that.
And yes, caption are very important as you will get more search engine visitors that those who doesn’t have caption in place.
Mike recently posted..Vocabulary Level E Answers
Hi Mike. Thanks for sharing that important tip….much appreciated.
Yay! This is what I need, I have been thinking lately on how to build online photo portfolio because I have seen it most of the website are having portfolio and I find interesting. Thanks for sharing!
Alesia Medas recently posted..Timber Doors
Hi, Charles,
I usually hire a friend who deals with Photoshop, as I am not very familiar with photo manipulation and organizing. However, your suggestions are so clear and easy to follow that I will take time to try them out and maybe next time when I need to make an online photo portfolio, I will not have to bother my friend anymore.
Keep your fingers crossed for me.
Thanks!
EleonoraEOF recently posted..Lean1 Review by Nutrition 53
Hi Eleonora. Thanks for stopping by and all the best in your endeavors.
Excellent tips, I know I hate it when I am viewing a portfolio and the images load slow. It ruins the whole experience. Its really easy to optimize pics for fast downloads. One thing I always do is make sure I tag the pics and captions are smart too. great post.
John recently posted..Long Island Divorce Lawyer
I’m not a graphic artist or photographer but I still find these articles useful in my own personal portfolio creation. I’m in SEO and web marketing and strategies work for others as well if they just think outside the box like artists do. Thanks
Jim Jenks recently posted..Melaleuca Announces A New Tooth Polish | Melaleuca gives Melaeuca customers something to smile about.
These are really a very good tips to make a good Online Photo Portfolio and i really appreciate this post. Thanks for this good share.