Beyond developing your photo blog and cultivating devoted followers, how can you take your phlog to the next level? Here’s a few extra resources that can help you along the way.
Stay Organized
Using categories to divide your photographs by type is a great way to make it easier for visitors to navigate your site, especially as your portfolio of images continues to grow. For example, as you categorize photos as “Travel” or “Black and White,” you can then add those category pages to your site’s navigation bar. If you’re using your photo blog to generate business as a photographer, this means that someone who’s looking for some black and white images can easily take a look at your gallery of black and white photos. This guide explains how to add categories to your post, and you can follow these steps to add those category pages to your site’s menu.
When displaying a series of photos, you’ll see that there are a handful of options for inserting them into your post: slideshow, gallery, and individual images. If you’re adding a large amount of photos to a single post, you may want to consider using the gallery option. Too many photos on the front page can cause a slow load time for visitors. By loading your posts as thumbnails first, visitors get the full effect of the breadth and variety of your photographs at a single glance. If you’re looking for feedback, visitors can comment directly on your photo by clicking on the “Permalink” button in the gallery carousel.
When uploading multiple photos to your post, don’t forget to use our Drag and Drop uploader so that you can upload multiple files at the same time. This will even allow you to drag a group of photos from your computer directly into the upload area.
Become a Curator
When working on a series, curate your content so that you can focus on the quality of your photos, not quantity. This means hand selecting the best photos in your series, rather than posting all of them at once to get as much out there as possible. When choosing images to include in your photo gallery, consider the following:
An example of the Rule of Thirds (photo by Bryan Villarin).
- The rule of thirds: When cropping your photos, try using the “rule of thirds” for more visually interesting photos. The rule of thirds is a compositional guideline that proposes photographs should be able to be divided into nine equal parts by two horizontal and two vertical lines. The main elements of the picture should fall along or at the intersections of these lines. In the photo to the right, the primary focus of the picture—the two red chairs—are positioned at the lower-right intersection of the grid and the horizon falls along the top vertical line.
- Stay sharp: When choosing a photo to include in your post, you’ll want to prioritize images that are vibrant and clear. A photo t
15 Comments on Photo Blogging 101, Part 3, last added: 5/28/2012Display Comments Add a Comment
Great tips – I am new to blogging and could do with more time to organise and learn the gallery tricks. thanks
Another great post, thanks very much.
I have not yet tried to slideshow or gallery. I’m adding that to my ‘to try” list. Great ideas. Thanks!
Great!!! I never knew about “The rule of thirds”. Thanks
An inspiring post. Looking forward to trying out some of the suggestions.
Awesome, thanks
Great material, have shared with our local crowd of enthusiasts and artists, as an inspiration / inducement to get themselves blogging!
On the subject of organization, we use a free GIF/JPEG tagging/databasing tool called ImageFinder, downloaded from http://www.bridgebizsolutions.co.za
It certainly saves huge amounts of time (and prevents frustration!!!) and the developers are open to ideas for additional features.
Looking forward hearing more from you. All the best.
highlighted – stay sharp! that’s an important thing.
Thanks for nice advice !
A great series with some really good tips. Thanks.
wooww!! great post, thanks for the advice, iv been wanting to start a photo blog for quite a while now.. this is super helpful..
Thanks for another great post, a very interesting read!
Really great tips keep them coming. My photography blog has come on leaps and bounds thanks to your tips
Nice…!
wow!…I just created and added my first slide show to a new post on my blog…thank you for linking to that slide show directions page… such clear, straightforward directions!..I actually did it!