my website + portfolio, critique and advice

[msbarnes]

First, hello everyone!

Second, I am not interested at all in critiquing my actual work--just my layout and website plan.

1. Thoughts/opinions on the layout of my site.
michaelsergiobarnes
and it links to my portfolio,
rolleiportraits

Overall, I like it. I tried wordpress but it was honestly too confusing for me to use and inherently too bloggy. It took me a while to make it "static" but then I couldn't come up with anything clean or figure out how to use wordpress.org. and so I gave cargo collective a spin. I feel that this just flows well and the two websites integrate well (maybe others may differ?).

2. Advice on what to do next.
Now I am interested in having more space for rolleiportraits and using my custom url for michaelsergiobarnes. Now the cargo collective that I am using is free but I need a site upgrade ($66/year) to use a custom url and/or to have more space. that is understandable. Issue is that I only want more space for my portfolio (rolleiportraits) but I just want the url for my website (michaelsergiobarnes) so to me paying for a website upgrade for both accounts is necessary with my current model but perhaps a waste. I'm definitely considering it because of the convinience but I'm a newb so maybe this move is silly or I am limiting myself relying on wordpress as it is inherently more limited than other services (I think?).

Anything "wrong" with using cargo collective as my main website? I don't want to commit myself and then realize that what I really wanted was wordpress or some other website builder for some unforseen reason/limitation. I mean, I'm fine with the layout but I have never built a website before so I don't know everything that needs to be considered.

And if it matters. I am not a professional and I do not do this for money so marketing myself isn't too important. I just want a simple/sleek way for people to see what I am about.

 

[Derrel]

I thought your rolleiportraits galleries were the best part of the various links.

Photos

Some really pretty young women there.

 

[msbarnes]

I thought your rolleiportraits galleries were the best part of the various links.

Photos

Some really pretty young women there.

Yes, that is kind of the point . I forgot to mention it, but it is still under construction and hence the sizing/spacing is off and not all the images are touched up (dust...i shoot film btw). My plan was to build a solid hub to lure people into my portfolios mostly(rolleportraits is the first at the moment, I plan on making more in the future). I just threw in the other social networks incase anyone was curious about other facets of my photography/life and to stay connected.

I have no experience with website building so I don't know all the issues that can arise (like being compatible with ipads and such). Now throwing the money into the upgrades isn't really THAT much money compared to the money that I spend (or we spend ) on gear/film/etc. but I didn't want to just throw it away. I wanted to make sure that I have a strong backbone with my model for presenting things. I'm basically connecting different websites together instead of throwing everything all in one website. If I were to have some other interesting content then I would find a way to trick people into entering that particular portfolio (like urban landscape, for instance).

-Let me know if there is anything that you would have done differently? Like thumbnails for the girls, vertical scrolling, slide shows, and etc. I've gone threw a few different iterations and I felt that this model worked best.
-I'm unsure about the color images because I feel that it might break away from the consistency since it is predominately b&w.
-Honestly, does the picture on the cover of the rolleiportraits seem to vain/narcissistic. I personally find that image cool-looking but maybe it would project on myself negatively since I am shirtless.

I probably think about this too much, haha.

 

[ktan7]

Tried to check your website but saying it is under construction right now.

 

[Derrel]

re-the cover shot of roilleiportraits; is it too vain and narcissistic??? Are you kidding??? THIS IS THE AGE OF NARCISSISM!

Please check out this recent article on The Luminous Landscape web site: The Age of Narcissism

It's entitled The Age of Narcissism-Digitized, Homogenized: The explosion of the [simulated] self-portrait on Instagram, written by Kathleen Hay. It is a very short article, but one I think is well worth reading if you are even the slightest bit worried about being narcissistic WRT your photography. I can assure you, among your age demographic, you will NOT be considered narcissistic due to that photo.

There are entire Flickr accounts dedicated almost entirely to SELF-portraiture....and I mean hundred and hundreds and HUNDREDS of images, with the photographer putting herself into all sorts of photo modeling scenarios.

 

[Ilovemycam]

Take down under construction.


Nice graphites.
What are they?

 

[msbarnes]

Sorry, I took down the under construction...I think it is somewhat misleading because most of what I want to show is already there. I just didn't want my sloppiness (image sizing/dust on negs) to make me look unprofessional.

graphites are my drawings. I used to draw before getting into photography. I'm into photography now because it is faster than drawing.

I'll look into the age of narcissism article! On another forum they said it made me look bad because I am shirtless and I take pictures of young women....even said that I have gave off some sort of creepy fettish vibe. I think it would have been entirely vain if I were flexing in the mirror on an iphone or something. But tI can't defend my position to everyone who sees these images and I can't ask my friends or the people that I have shot because they know me...so I can only ask the people that don't. Thanks for your opinion!