Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

[Glen Miyashiro]

I mostly keep my online photos at Flickr, but I have heard good things about other sites like Buzznet, and I just learned that Kodak (yes, Kodak!) has gotten into the act with a service called the Kodak Gallery. Those are the ones I know about. Are there others? What's good, and what's bad about these sites? Does anybody have experience with more than one of them, for comparison?

[Linkmeister]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

I was gonna mention Picasa, but I see that it's meant for filing photos locally, not online.

[Glen Miyashiro]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

Oh, and Photobucket.

[pzarquon]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

I host my main photos on my own webspace using Gallery, but I do play around with several photo hosts, including and primarily Flickr. I love Flickr, and paid for a pro account, even though I use it primarily to host images posted directly from my cameraphone (when Flickr is great for even high-resolution, professional photography). It's clean interface and various "social software" features were the draw for me. If you're Flickr and HT user, feel free to add me as a contact! Fortunately, despite a takeover by Yahoo!, things haven't gone downhill dramatically.

I use Buzznet and TextAmerica as my backups. To be honest, I haven't visited either in a while.

For photo sharing of a more conventional variety, and one that'll be less likely to confuse grandmothers and other tech-averse relatives, Kodak's work at KodakGallery.com (previously Ofoto.com) is notable. Of course, their aim is to sell you prints, so the features related to basic online display are fairly limited.

I'd stay away from ImageShack and PhotoBucket and other photo hosts that more commonly cater toward online auctions and message boards. They're great for what they do, but for long-term storage and for organization and presentation of collected galleries? Low marks all around.

[mel]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

I have about 2,000+ photos hosted at BuzzNet. I was one of the early people to sign up with BuzzNet and have something that is called a "legacy free account." It allows me to post 200 photos a month to the site. All of the photos I posted there are easily archived and accessible by clicking on archive in each photo album category.

Over the past year BuzzNet has added keywords, photo group albums, on site blogs and external blog posting to sites such as mySpace if you have an account there. BuzzNet started out as a mobile phone posting site, but most of the postings are from people who have regular digital cameras now. They also have a good messaging system and buddy list system. Nice community of photo bugs who comment on each other's photos.

Similar services are available on Flickr, and possibly more. I have about 80 photos on Flickr.... The one drawback of Flickr is that if you go beyond 200 photos in your album on a free account, the older photos are not easily indexed or accessible. I guess they want us to pay, but so far I have resisted. What I do there is keep some photos online, watch their view statistics and if no one looks at them, I delete em and put up a few more photos at the time to keep below the 200 photo threshold.

I also use Webshots which seem so far to have unlimited storage. I have 3 photo albums there.

Photobucket: I just recently started an account there just to use the ability that site offers to remote post photos to webboards.

I also have a few photo albums on a my own site domains, but not too many.

[jkpescador]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

My wife likes mypicgallery.com. We pay $24 a year for unlimited space. She must have over 2000 pictures on the site.

[Mokihana]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

I've been really happy with Picturetrail.....

[pzarquon]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

Just a heads up to any local Flickr users, there's another Flickr Meetup being planned for July 29 (Upcoming.org entry here). Actually, there are at least two in the works, one in Honolulu at Kahana Bay, and one on the Big Island, location TBD. Maybe even one on Maui.

You can visit the Hawaii Flickr Meetup group for photos from the last one at Kakaako Waterfront Park, and here's a short video of the gathering.

So, if you're a Flickr fan and a local shutterbug -- hobbyist or pro -- come on down!

[drumorgan]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

I started using webshots.com as it has a great archive of photos and integrates into a random wallpaper generator where you can add pictures every day. You can only store 1000 photos for free, though.

When I print photos, I upload to costco's site, then the prints are ready the next day at the location of my choice.

There IS a Costo in Hawaii, right?

[pzarquon]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

There IS a Costo in Hawaii, right?

Several. Most have in-store digital photo printing kiosks. Stick in the memory card right out of your camera, or a CDROM containing your photos, pick which photos you want printed and how many via a touchscreen, then send 'em in (and prepay). An hour later, usually, they're ready. Never tried the online option.

Prints are important, and I've been known to blow $200 at once at Costco catching up on several months' worth of digital photographs at once... but frankly, more and more my stuff is stored online only. Not a good thing for historical preservation, but for accessibility and cost? The deals get better and better.

[Linkmeister]

Re: Photo hosting sites (Flickr, Buzznet, Kodak Gallery)

If you just need one or two prints from your memory card and you don't want to be bothered with driving to Costco, Kodak has machines in its stores (I imagine; I've used the one at Pearlridge for prints of two pictures). As you'd expect, it's a little pricier, but with gas prices what they are...