New website, any feedback?

[crimbfighter]

Hi all, I just launched my first website. I felt I had outgrown the disjointed system I have been using with Flickr for showing my images, especially when someone is interested in being a client. I used Wordpress and built it over the last few weeks.

I'm interested in any feedback on the site. Too many images? Not enough? Does it seem to flow?

A couple things to keep in mind. First, I'm not a working professional, so the site is intentionally set up more simply as a place for me to showcase my images, but on the back swing it mentions I provide some services.

Second, I don't really have a "theme" or "style" I'm trying to convey, so like I mentioned above, it's more a place to showcase my images. I don't have it set up as a blog because I don't produce enough new work on a regular basis to keep a blog fed, but I will be adding to one gallery as a running gallery. Link below.

Tanner G Photography

 

[crimbfighter]

nice. I like the clean black and white layout.

Thanks for the feedback!

 

[Frank F.]

On my phone the mixing of landscape and portrait orientation does not look nice at all...

 

[weepete]

Looks ok to me mate, though there are a couple of things that spring out to me. I'm not fond of the switch in background colour from white to black when moving between the pages and the gallery so I'd pick one and stick to it (personally I'd go all black). The only other thing that I would say is on your portraits front page I'd include a link to the portraits galleries, it took me a few seconds to realise I had to go to the menu and into the galleries from there.

 

[Derrel]

I looked through it last night, then lost the thread. You're a better shooter than I remembered! I thought your senior photos were pretty good, very clean, traditional, not too edgy or weird. The one thing I felt needed to be moderated or removed was the Personal Favorites gallery, which really seemed out of place and by its nature (not in other galleries,etc) seemed, well...I dunno...discordant maybe?

Overall, I was impressed by CLEAN processing, and straightforward imagery.I too was a bit baffled at first, as was weepete, on the menu/galleries issue on the portraits. Those followed a slightly different link relationship than the other galleries, or so it seemed.

I guess overall, pretty solid, but perhaps a few too-many images, in total? I dunno...depends on who is looking at a gallery, and what they expect to see, and what kind of a client they are. Some people advocate showing ONLY 100%, Grade A+++ images...I think for showing to regular people, non-photo-people, that bar is too high, and plain A to A+ images are fine to include, and seem to help build that impression of capability, and the ability to crank out many, many solid images.

I think there are portfolios, and there are showcases. Different things. Yours as-seen yesterday by me seemed to be more of the "showcase" of capabilities, and Proof of Skill type of web offering. And I think that is good for the generalist photographer.

I personally like to see 5,10 shots from 10 or 15 shoots. ANYBODY can choose that ONE, single, perfect shot out of 700 shots; to me, seeing 5 A- or even B-grade shots from one, single shoot tells me more than the old Winchester 1 of 100 or 1 of 1,000 type Diamond From truck Load of Rocks type shots we often see. Like MLB, when a btter hits .400...he's DAMNED good!

 

[crimbfighter]

On my phone the mixing of landscape and portrait orientation does not look nice at all...

Is that because the images are overlapping? I was seeing that, too, but I'm not sure how I'm going to fix it.

Looks ok to me mate, though there are a couple of things that spring out to me. I'm not fond of the switch in background colour from white to black when moving between the pages and the gallery so I'd pick one and stick to it (personally I'd go all black). The only other thing that I would say is on your portraits front page I'd include a link to the portraits galleries, it took me a few seconds to realise I had to go to the menu and into the galleries from there.

I looked through it last night, then lost the thread. You're a better shooter than I remembered! I thought your senior photos were pretty good, very clean, traditional, not too edgy or weird. The one thing I felt needed to be moderated or removed was the Personal Favorites gallery, which really seemed out of place and by its nature (not in other galleries,etc) seemed, well...I dunno...discordant maybe?

Overall, I was impressed by CLEAN processing, and straightforward imagery.I too was a bit baffled at first, as was weepete, on the menu/galleries issue on the portraits. Those followed a slightly different link relationship than the other galleries, or so it seemed.

I guess overall, pretty solid, but perhaps a few too-many images, in total? I dunno...depends on who is looking at a gallery, and what they expect to see, and what kind of a client they are. Some people advocate showing ONLY 100%, Grade A+++ images...I think for showing to regular people, non-photo-people, that bar is too high, and plain A to A+ images are fine to include, and seem to help build that impression of capability, and the ability to crank out many, many solid images.

I think there are portfolios, and there are showcases. Different things. Yours as-seen yesterday by me seemed to be more of the "showcase" of capabilities, and Proof of Skill type of web offering. And I think that is good for the generalist photographer.

I personally like to see 5,10 shots from 10 or 15 shoots. ANYBODY can choose that ONE, single, perfect shot out of 700 shots; to me, seeing 5 A- or even B-grade shots from one, single shoot tells me more than the old Winchester 1 of 100 or 1 of 1,000 type Diamond From truck Load of Rocks type shots we often see. Like MLB, when a btter hits .400...he's DAMNED good!

Thank you both for the feedback, and thank you Darrel for the compliment! I see exactly what you guys were taking about with the galleries and how the menus weren't intuitive. I struggled with how to set that up, but taking your thoughts into consideration, I rejiggered the menus and changed the Favorites gallery to actually make it a blog. I think that makes is feel like more of an intentional departure from the way the other menus are set up. I will eventually add many more blog posts, but I only added two for now, just as a test. It also lets me put some context to the images by adding a blurb about them and group them by subject or context.

I think over time, as I get more clients, I will reduce the number of images from each shoot and add images from new shoots to diversify the images seen. I may also look at pulling some of the images to pair it down. I have the ability to create password protected galleries so I think I will utilize that in the future for clients galleries.

Weepete, I thought I couldn't change the carousel background color, but it turns out I can chose between black and white, so I changed it to white. I like it better and it more closely matches the overall color background. I know it's a matter of personal taste, but I like the lighter background color on the site.

Do these tweaks help?

 

[weepete]

Yeah mate, that's a lot better. I like the blog and the back and forward buttons at the bottom. I think you could combine the portraits page and about my portraits page. The galleries page I'd get rid of as it's not really needed.

 

[crimbfighter]

Yeah mate, that's a lot better. I like the blog and the back and forward buttons at the bottom. I think you could combine the portraits page and about my portraits page. The galleries page I'd get rid of as it's not really needed.

Thanks. I'll take a look at it again. I like having the page to explain my portraiture but perhaps I can incorporate it elsewhere.

 

[theblackandwhiteblog]

I have to say that your nature work is outstanding! The editing is so crisp and the images are very sharp. I think that the thumbnails are too small of a display. Have you looked into the Elegant Themes site? That's what I use and I think the themes are super easy to put together.