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If this title sounds vaguely familiar to you we are probably about the same age, for those of you that don’t know Dire Straits here is a link to history!

We know you love FYP and we also know that you are not always at your computer and therefore can’t get on your browser to keep up-to-date with the latest postings.  Rather than watch you flop around on the floor, I’m going to share some additional ways that you can read your favorite FYP authors during your morning  or afternoon travels, lunchtime or even lying on a tropical beach like me.  If you are reading this congratulations, you already know the most popular way to read the great articles from the most diverse photography writers on the web!  In this posting I’m going to explain elements of the little yellow box on the site inviting you to “Get Fueled”

RSS

Really Simple Syndication more commonly known as RSS is a great way to aggregate feeds from your favorite sites.  RSS comes in both desktop and mobile forms and allows you to go to a single place to receive all your latest updates. Google Reader is a popular desktop and mobile RSS client if you have an Android phone you can get it from the Android Marketplace.  Apple fanboys/fangirls you are not to be left out, a version for iPhone is available here.  Blackberry users , like me, will have to be content with Viigo, it is not quite as intuitive but it does the job!

Once you have your preferred method you can click on the “SITE RSS FEED” link and then select Google Reader and FYP will be added to your feed.  Full and complete articles are available for you to read at any time just by opening your RSS reader and selecting Fuel Your Photography.  This is especially great for smaller screened mobile devices where mobile browsers are a pain.

Email

Keeping up by email is even easier, simply enter your email address in the field in the yellow box that says “Suscribe by Email” and then click the subscribe button new articles will be emailed to you immediately after posting.  Depending on your mobile email client you may not receive the full multimedia experience.  Your mileage may vary!  You will not be sent any Unsolicited Commercial Email (SPAM) by subscribing to the email feed.

Twitter

FYP maintains a very active twitter feed, a link to every article published is posted here along with select other tweets, follow us on twitter @FuelPhotography.   One of our Twitter secrets, for you die hard photographers and tweeters you can follow the list of our writers and keep up with their tweets.  Be advised that writers tweets are their own and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of FYP.  If you are brave and not faint of heart follow TeamFYP.

Facebook

Facebook??  Heck yeah, we are on Facebook!  You can find our page here and Facebook provides an additional forum for you to give feedback and easily share our articles with friends and groups, we really appreciate when you do so.  Feel free to fan us on Facebook.   We also have a page strictly dedicated to our FYP/500px Photography Contest, have you entered yet?

Google +

What is Google +?  Google Plus, like FYP, is a great place for creatives, however not as targeted as FYP, we know we are among your top photography resources. FYP maintains a page on Google Plus and reaches out to photographers and photography lovers alike, if you are on Google Plus circle us at gplus.to/FYP, if you are not yet on Google + join here mobile clients are also available.

Flickr

Check, we are also on Flickr and if you are too you can post 2 images per day to our group for feedback of other members.  We look forward to seeing your shared images!

I’ve shared with you some great ways to interact with FYP, I’m interested in hearing how you use it in the comments section below.

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If you practice one of the creative arts such as painting, music, photography or sculpture, you would be familiar with that all-encompassing yearning to find inspiration.  Artists dread  the “black hole”; those days, weeks or months of desperation when the creative spark is missing.  This type of desperation arises from the inability to create; those days when the artist cannot look at his brushes, when the camera sits abandoned on a shelf, watching sadly as you pass. During those periods you struggle to find something that will spark that fire within you, the fire that when lit, leads to moments of creative joy.  Personally,  I fear the “black hole”, no light escapes from it.  It sucks all matter and life into its bowels and drains all creativity from my bones.  A bit over dramatic but you get the idea. So, how does one avoid the “black hole”?  Some listen to music, walk in the park or play with the children.  We all have different methods of fighting the onset of  the “black hole”; my method is the use of the Internet.  I love the Internet. I cannot think of a world today without this behemoth of  information being available.  My day job is Information Technology and my passion is photography.  They both converge on the Internet

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There’s a saying: “Look around and not up.”  When I look up, I see people richer and more beautiful than myself with better toys and nicer views.  However, when I look around, figuratively speaking, I see that there are more than six billion people on this planet worse off than I.  So, what have I done to deserve anything I have been given in my life?  From education, to good food, to a beautiful home, to health care – I’ve done nothing to deserve any of it.  I won some sort of divine lottery and popped out over here in North America in the middle of the highest standard of living the human race has ever known.

On top of this I get to work as a writer, and as a photographer – albeit with a few day jobs thrown in – which I think most people reading this would agree is one of the greatest jobs in the world.  How much better could I have it?  I think most photographers, from hobbyists to professionals, agree that it’s a humbling profession.  We have it good.  Real good!

That is my massively long segue in to the real point of this article: The Giving Lens.  The Giving Lens was born out of the tension I just described; the understanding that we have it good.  So very good and yet we haven’t done all that much to deserve it.

Professional Photographer Colby Brown felt that tension after spending years and years traveling the world.  Feeling frustrated by the poverty around him, feeling helpless to do anything, humbled to work as a photographer, and not knowing what to do with those feelings.  Rather than throw a pity party for himself, he started an organization called  The Giving Lens that seeks to bring together that which we love – photography – and that which we feel moved to do – give back.  We send teams of aspiring photographers to developing nations to make a difference with their hands and with their hearts while learning the intricate nature of photography.

First, The Giving Lens (TGL) forms a relationship with a Non Profit Organization in a developing country.  We get to know them, hear their story, and empathize with their plight.  If the Non Profit can identify a way in which we can be a tangible, helpful resource for them, then we begin to assemble a plan and a mission.  This could include photo education for impoverished children, wildlife preservation or even disaster relief support.  It can, and will, be many things.  There are many causes around the globe that people are passionate about and many organizations that deserve the attention.

Once in country, we work hand in hand with the Non-Profit on the ground, with the people in need or issue at hand.  Sometimes photography will be used to help the local community, such as through photo education.  Other times it will be by simply getting our hands dirty and helping in any way that needs it.  Each combination of country, organization, and need is different.   We always work with a very low overhead, allowing these unique photography workshops to not only be affordable, but allow for nearly all of the proceeds to go to the organization we connected with on the ground.

Colby creates, designs and leads every trip which includes running photography workshops in the mornings and early evenings, so that the participants can grow as photographers while they give back to the communities we are working in during the day.  It’s a double win. 1) we make a difference and 2) we get to learn from a world-renowned photographer in a small, private, exotic setting.  Does it sound good yet?

Bringing a TGL team to a developing nation does several things:

1. The community in need is served in a tangible, practical way.
2. The Non Profit involved receives proceeds from the team members’ fees, and amazing photos for their websites and campaign.
3. The team members involved are impacted, and not only become better photographers, but better people and become advocates for the cause, the organization, and the community they served.

Sound interesting?  TGL has an upcoming trip in July to Nicaragua, where participants will work alongside underprivileged and at-risk youth who have been taking a photography class run by Empowerment International, who uses education as a means to keep kids off the streets and out of gangs.  Colby Brown will be teaching and overseeing workshops around the city of Granada and surrounding countryside, where both the participants and the youth will work together to take amazing photos.  Empowerment International’s numbers have shown that by demonstrating the importance of education, youth are more likely to stay in school, build more confidence and aim for a better way of life for themselves and their families.

And that’s just one trip coming up for The Giving Lens.  We’re moving quickly and new countries and new opportunities are presenting themselves every day.  If you like what you’ve read, sign up at our website to stay in the loop.  You can support us by joining a team, but you can also support us from your home, by cheering us on and spreading the word.  There’s much to be done and so many ways you can help.  This is just one way, and it’s perhaps seen as a small way, but it’s our way and we love it. Our website launches in on October 26th, 2011.  Join us!

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Top 5 Free Sites

We all love to take photographs but along with our consummate love we take them not just for our own pastime and pleasure but also to share and receive accolades of others and sometimes as a means of income.  In order to do this we have to make our photos available for viewing by a wider audience, in the past this meant that we had coffee tables of albums or wallet sized photos that we showed our friends or used old media publications.  With the advent of the Internet came the ability to reach a wider audience.  For those of us brave enough to webify our work for appreciation/critique of a wider audience there are a few options to choose from.  Here are the top 5 free and paid sites for sharing photo.  While both offer the ability to view photos the paid sites offer many more options including the ability to customize and sell your work to viewers who just must have a copy of your photograph.

In the number 5 position we have  Photobucket, a worthy site for the beginning photographer especially for those that take great pleasure in mobile photography.  Photobucket’s strength comes from its communities and its many mobile applications, in fact the Android Photobucket app just won a 2011 Appy Award.   While Photobucket does have a community to share your photos with and some great mobile apps, I’d like to warn you about one feature that concerns me, on the Android app there is a  selection to upload every photo taken with your phone automatically; this can not only be costly if you have a usage based data connection or are roaming on vacation, but also potentially embarrassing. I prefer to chose what I upload not automatically upload everything that I shoot!

4. While this spot was originally for PhotoJima, the site seems to have gone down between the time of researching this article and publication, hence we have Photoshop.com offers 2GB of online storage space for you to use to share photos but in addition to this they offer an express version of their market leading software that allows you to editing your photos using limited features. Photoshop.com also offers editing software for the IOS and Android tablets. Given that Adobe has been a market leader for serious image editors this automatically puts them ahead of the field. Photoshop.com provides its own online albums and also conduits to Facebook, Picasa and Flickr. (In a last minute development the operators of Photojima which is located in Fukushima City tweeted me to advise that they are currently relocating their family members in addition to the fact that the server has partially melted down due to the nuclear disaster, however they intend to restore service as soon as possible, I wish them all the best.  September 1st update:  Photojima.com is currently packing up and moving the office to Canada, while they will not be online on publication date of this article they will be back soon, follow them on Twitter @photojima for updates).

3. Google+/Picasa,  Google+ is Google’s latest advent into the social media network, it has become a mecca for photographers and has an amazingly vibrant community there where you can not only show your work but also interact with many other photographers from around the globe.  While Google+ is still in beta it receives many accolades.  One thing to be wary of is the resolution of photographs, many photographers experienced issues with the screen presentation of their work.  The workaround for this is to ensure that you upload your images to Google+ with your work sized to 72dpi and 1024px at it’s longest side.  Google+ still needs to develop apps to be integrated with popular editing programs to allow for upload of images.  Feel free to add me on Google+ at http://gplus.to/JADG.

Picasa is Google’s former effort at photo sharing and it is quite robust and also integrates into Google+.  In addition to having a fast add free interface.  Picasa’s web albums are not only virtually limitless but you have the ability to edit photo easily using their customized software http://picasa.google.com/ and also or order prints online.  Picasa’s web albums have many of Apple’s iPhoto new features including facial recognition and the ability to add locations to your photographs using Google Maps.  Picasa’s software also has the ability to index each and every photos on your hard drive if you want it to… no more lost photos if you don’t have a well organized digital filing system.   Picasa’s web albums are well worth a try, however, be VERY careful with the permissions set on your photographs on Picasa, you will want to ensure that only those albums that you want visible to the public are set that way additionally you will want to ensure that persons at large can’t order copies of your images. Review your Picasa settings CAREFULLY!

2.  Flickr has been around for ages and is among the first to offer a viable photo sharing option to the Internet community at large.  The biggest thing Flickr has going for it is its community of photographers and photography lovers.  Its brand recognition is such that most people on the Internet have heard of Flickr.  On the down side, unless you get the paid Pro account (USD $24.95 annually),  Flickr only allows you to upload 300MB of images (max single image file size 15MB) or 2 videos per month.  If you use Flickr, or for that matter any photo sharing service you’d do well to learn how to size your images properly for web viewing.

1. 500px.com is a new entrant to the market but they offer serious competition for the previous entrants.  500px is a site that allows you to concentrate on photography while they give you an ideal site to show your work, it has customizable templates which allows you to create a rather unique site.  500px is becoming the debut site for up and coming photographers who want something a bit more serious than Flickr but are not yet willing to make significant investment in their efforts to have an online presence, this is the best and quickest way to get a free site, despite image upload limitations on the free version.

Top 5 Paid Sites

5. Squarespace is a multipurpose webhosting platform that also includes a facility to make good photography hosting sites.  Squarespace boast of being extremely easy to use even for the newcomer to websites, their cost is $12/month ($144/annually).  Squarespace boast of E-commerce, easy data collection and various apps to increase the functionality of your website.

4. Photoshelter’s standard plan which is the lowest option that allows you to use your own domain name cost $29.99 per month ($359.88/annually) for a maximum of 35GB of storage. While Photoshelter is a purpose built site, that allows the use of custom domains,  centric around photography, I, personally, find the cost prohibitive. Photoshelter takes a 9% cut of any E-commerce transactions.

3. Zenfolio is another photography centric site that also allows custom domains.  The Zenfolio premium plan that allows for removal of their branding cost $100/annually and they take 12% of the top of your print sales (8% for digital sales) made via the site or 4% if you self fulfill the order.  While Zenfolio is a viable option their brand has not become a household word in the photographic community.

2. 500px.com, the newcomer to the block, allows you to use your own domain name with their site, providing an instant and portable website.  500px allows you to create your site via customize templates with relative ease.  500px cost $50/annually.  500px is currently in the process of developing iPhone and Android apps.  The Co-Founder and Creative Director of 500px, Evgeny Tchebotarev, is very responsive to any query when contacted on Google+

1. Smugmug, founded in the early 2000s, is the granddaddy of Photographer centric sites,father and son team Chris and Don MacAskill have developed the site into an industry leader.  Rather than rest on their laurels they consistently innovate their product to offer cutting edge offerings to their customers.  It doesn’t hurt that they have what is undoubtedly the best support team (heroes) in the business.  Smugmugs Pro accounts cost $20/month or $150/annually, and their site literally provides everything including unlimited data transfer (including video).

All of the above free and paid sites are capable of hosting your images, however, with free sites, one should carefully read the terms of service to ensure you are not ceding any right to your images.  It is always best to read prior to clicking OK.

What is your favorite photography hosting site, and why? Share your favorite in the comments section below.

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As photographers there is a constant need to improve our skill, not just the desire that we want to take better photographs but also in the respect that we seek inspiration and the inspiration will come in the forms of wanting to try a new technique.  This means that one must be introduced to new techniques and fortunately given the advent of digital photography and the progress of digital photography and the raft of resources available on the internet.  This now makes it so much easier because we can not only see photographs that other people have done and seek to put our own spin on them but we can also learn techniques that we can use in our own photography and this article seeks to address some of the resources available on the internet that can be utilized to improve our skill set through the use of podcasts and social networking.  For those of you who don’t know what podcasting is, podcasting is a form of communicating and sharing ideas via the internet in audio and visual form.  The beauty of podcasting is it is a platform where the average inspired person can share their knowledge without need for grand production houses in and audio and visual format. Many photographers, such as Scott Wittenburg of the Photography 101 podcast, are sharing their knowledge of camera techniques, settings and other equipment in order to achieve an outcome through weekly/monthly episodes of their show and also inspire their audiences to enhance their cadre of skills through assignments or competitions.

For those of us who are not only learning photography now but also those of us who have been photographers for some time and are seeking to hone our technique this is a great outlet from which to do that, by watching/listening to podcast we can learn new techniques to utilize in our own photography, This means that  no longer are you limited to just your immediate inspiration sources but now you can get inspiration, points of view and learn from sources around the world.  There are some great photographers who make podcast in order to be able to share their knowledge, some of those are Chris Marquardt who produces Digital Photography Tips from the Top Floor and also Martin Bailey who produces the Martin Bailey Photography Podcast.     The competitions/assignments are important because they provide a benchmark for you to measure your own photography against.  There are also resources such as Flickr and Pbase, while both sites allow you to view photographs and EXIF data (which is helpful so you can see settings used to achieve an outcome), Pbase also allows you to search images taken with specific cameras such as the Nikon D3S and lenses such as the Nikkor 85mm f/1.8.  If you intend to buy a new lens in the future check out the actual lens performance to make absolutely sure it is what you want.

What scares many people with digital photography is the post processing aspect of imaging, Photoshop is a daunting program for the uninitiated but there are amazing tutorials by The Photoshop Guys of Photoshop User TV.  The Photoshop Guys present a weekly program with each of the 3 hosts providing a tip of moderate to advanced skill.  These tutorials are shown with clear visual instructions that make them easy to follow.  Justin Seely of Photoshop QuickTips, provides an amazing plethora of short quick tips on techniques that are easily understandable and will navigate you throw a gamut of amazing post production techniques for your images.  These resources are amazing and will bring you up to speed with your Photoshop skills.

In addition to podcasting you have another great resources on the Internet, Twitter.  Twitter is a micro-blogging resource where persons can post messages up to 140 characters in length for persons to read.  While this may sound both short because of character limitations and also congested will the millions of people that use Twitter, a simple feature, hashtags, allows one to separate the wheat from the chaff.  As photographers we would be interested in following the hashtags for photography (denoted as #photography).  Here you may expect to find all manner of news regarding photography including product/software releases, tips for new techniques/processes and also photographers posting and sharing their own images.  Twitter follows the old Chinese adage of “Many hands make light work” because no one person on their own can search and catalog the internet for all the possible resources available.  Following the appropriate hashtags lead to great opportunity for discussion and collective learning, you are able to utilize the reach of many persons searching, qualifying and sharing information they have come across that they think is of value to others.  You can also follow  other photographers individually on twitter (for instance I’m @ymerej on twitter) or follow the collective hashtag #togs.   Twitter also allows you to share when you come across articles/techniques or photographs that you think ought to be shared.  You can share your latest work and even invite critique and hopefully receive suggestions for improvement from more experienced photographers.

While reading and researching is an integral part of improving your output there is no substitute for practical experience, as you learn new techniques it is imperative to practice them so you can call on them without question when the time comes for them to be used.  Cataloging techniques that you wish to try and executing them is a good start but don’t just stop there utilize Internet sites such as Facebook to share your images and receive feedback.  In many locations you will have local or regional photography organizations such as the one I belong to, The Barbados Photographic Society,  that will allow you to exercise your skills but also in addition to virtual sharing allow for some valuable face time.  While the internet is an extremely valuable resource for the improvement of your photographic skill set, human interaction is what really makes photography tick.  Photography is more than a personal pleasure it is also about sharing your images for the appreciation of others both in person and virtually.

Happy Shooting!

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Three years ago I said no to Picassa.  I know; sacrilegious to say no to a Google product and go to a Yahoo product! It was called Flickr and though spelled wrong, I navigated through the world of photos.  And then I fell I fell in love, because the vast awesomeness of photography could reach visitors within seconds.

If you are an amateur photographer or professional photographer, Flickr is the largest community of photos online.  Sure, there is Picassa and Smugmug, but they do not have the ability to connect with others like Flickr.  In this article, I am going to cover how to get the most out of your photos in the Flickr community.

Getting started

Uploading photos is a little tricky, that’s why I am covering it. If you know this, scroll down to Getting Exposed.

To upload photos in Flickr, go to You -> Upload photos.  Since you can now batch upload photos, pick a whole bunch and then press on upload.  Let Flickr do its magic.  It will then ask you, “Next:  add a description, perhaps?.”  Click on the link and you arrive at all the newly uploaded photos.

Now is it the time to organize it.  I admit, it’s tedious and even I avoid this task (only later to regret it).

Add Tags -  This allows you add tags that will be all the photos in the set.  If you took a bunch of photos of San Francisco, you should add “San Francisco,” SF, Bay Area.

Add to a a Set – All the photos can be added to a preexisting set or you can create a new set.

Title, Description, Tags – Add personal titles, descriptions, and tags to each photo.  If you know anything about search engine optimization, this is like adding meta data.  If you want anyone to click on your photo in a search engine search, add this data. And add lots of tags, don’t be afraid. Of course, be on topic but if the photo is of a rabbit (like the sample above) use general tags like “rabbit, bunny, fuzzy, furry”, etc to ensure that people would stumble upon a photo when searching.

Once done with this… save!

Getting Exposed

Groups
The awesome part of Flickr comes in with Flickr groups.  There are thousands of groups on Flickr from locations (Stockholm) to camera reviews and equipment (Nikon Nikkor 70-200mm f/2.8 VR) to random goodness (Purple Flowers).

You want to add your best photos to groups. The more groups you join, the greater the amount of photos you can add to groups. Okay, some groups do put limits so no one person spams the group.

Make sure to visit Flickr on regular basis to submit photos to groups so that your photos don’t get entirely buried in the deluge.

Interact with others
Like any social community, chatting/interacting with other people is the way it survives. In Flickr, photos gain popularity and exposure through commenting and favoriting them.

The more comments a photo receives, the more popular it becomes and higher it will rank on searches. Give feedback and constructive comments because you are demonstrating the ability to be a good contributor. Plus, by commenting on another person’s photo, chances are, they will visit your page. Just think of this like blog commenting.

Same goes for making a photo a favorite by clicking on the pink star. The cool bit is that you can look through any user’s favorites’ photos and see what inspires them. The photos you favorite will then appear in your favorites folder so that you can see them at any time.

You can also chat with others through threads and question groups. Some groups are entirely off topic from photography while others are ‘meet and shoot’ clubs where people decide where to meet and go off to take photos together. Yet, another great way to become more well known in the community.

Figuring out Your Activity

Your home page on Flickr is the second most important page (you’ll find out about the second in a bit).

The left side shows recent activities within your network. The Photostream shows any comments made on your photos, favorites, and any replies on comments you made on other photos. The Contacts section shows latest uploaded photos by your contacts. And, you can guess, the Groups sections shows the latest uploaded photos in some of your groups.

On the right side, is the latest from the Flickr blog. And below is an advertisement for many of Flickr’s third party applications (Moo, etc).

Now it is time to go to the most important page: Stats. See the graph to the right of “Your Photostream?” Pro account users can see statistics on all their photos. You can see number of photo views, favorites, and comments. You can also track the domain referrers. Because you can see the domain referrer, it’s easy to learn how your photo was used. If possible, comment on the post or article where the author used your photo, you can get more exposure again.

What does this all lead to? If you tag your photos well, write good descriptions, participate in community by favoriting and commenting, join groups, then you stand a chance of getting good exposure. Many photographers, especially amateurs are approached to license their photos or even do real shooting. I licensed my photos through people who emailed me via Flickr.

Don’t stand in the dark(room) anymore. Even if you have a professional site, put up your best stuff on Flickr. Chances are people are looking both via the search engines AND in the Flickr community for their next photographer or photo to buy.

About the Author:
Preeti loves taking photos even though she can be lazy at tagging them. She enjoys writing, traveling, and of course taking photos. Her blog, Lost in Stockholm, is about living in Sweden. You can see her favorites photos from Grand Canyon to Narvik, Norway on her blog.

Got questions or comments about using Flickr? Send her a tweet.

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1. Digital Photography School

This site has it all. Tutorials and articles on everything photography you can imagine. Equipment, post-processing, tips/tricks, forums, assignments, etc. It is because of sites like this that people can buy a camera and make a career out of it with no formal education. If you haven’t seen it, well, you are missing out on a TON of really useful information.

2. Strobist

You may have your camera down pat, but what about your flash? This site has some fantastic tips for on and off camera lighting. Photography IS all about light, right?

3. Photographer’s Edit

If you find yourself pulling your hair out because you have taken on more jobs than you can handle, Photographer’s Edit might be your solution. The concept: you take the pictures, they do the editing. Tempting, isn’t it?

4. Behance

A collection of portfolios from some of the most talented creatives in the industry. A great source of inspiration for all genres. I would say this site is best for those photographers who are already established and need some new ideas. Just be careful, you could find yourself browsing the site for hours!

5. B&H Photo Video

Love this site. Mainly because it is where you will find the most reliable equipment for the best deal. For most products, you have the option of buying new or used equipment. I love it when people take your budget into consideration.

6. Photojojo

You wouldn’t believe some of the ideas these people come up with. Ways to use your photos, or even recycling your camera…this site is a MUST for all you photo fans!

7. I Heart Faces

This site has you smiling the second you see it with it’s clean, appealing design. A great resource for portrait photographers who are looking for both tips/tricks, and get to know other talented photographers. Check out the challenges and the guest judges they bring in.

Do you have other sites you frequently visit? Let us know about it!