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  #11  
Old 6th April 2015, 03:56 PM
TonyMiller TonyMiller is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by David Brown View Post
"all" ??
- fair comment and apologies. Most of those on there have stayed the course for a few years though and are a good place to start for ideas which is what Terry was after I think. Also, in the context of a University course they are some of the more contemporary photography commentators/ bloggers and so would appeal to an academic/ student audience.
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  #12  
Old 6th April 2015, 05:39 PM
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Another tip:

If you go down the buy your own domain name route, then buy your domain from one of the domain registrars such as 123-reg (there are many others) and then use a web host elsewhere.

The reason for this is that if you use some webhost who turn out to be a pain and they have provided you with a free domain, then it can be impossible for you to move your hosting elsewhere and take your domain with you. i.e. They own it and its registered in their name and they won't let you move it away.

Just a warning, some may let you move it others won't.
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  #13  
Old 6th April 2015, 09:45 PM
paulc paulc is offline
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If a provider is giving out free domain names, there is always a catch to lock you in and make some money out of you. Always read the small print in the Terms & Conditions, especially the termination clauses and rights to the domain name.

That said, I use Mythic Beasts for name registration and hosting and haven't experienced any problems with them. At the moment, they have domain registration from 99p +VAT (.info for the first year). If you want to splash out .photography (and variations) is available for £18.33.
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  #14  
Old 7th April 2015, 05:03 PM
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I would like to put Daily.co.uk name in to the mix. I have used them for years without a hitch. UK based and provide packages for wordpress and their own.
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  #15  
Old 7th April 2015, 07:38 PM
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The majority of blogs tend to get left by the wayside after the first few posts so maybe try a free one first and see how you get on. Tumblr has the added benefit that more people are likely to see your posts due to users bring able to repost your work.

If you go down the self-hosting route then A Small Orange are a reliable hosting company (~$35 on their cheapest option) and install either WordPress or Ghost CMS.

WordPress can be much more than a blog (should you ever want to grow your site or sell your work on your website) and has a large user base so has a lot of help articles online; Ghost CMS is relatively new but very focused only being used for blogging.
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  #16  
Old 8th April 2015, 06:23 PM
KevinAllan KevinAllan is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Terry S View Post
H

Also, any good blogs out there that are worth reading (photography wise) that might also give me a few tips.
I use Wordpress but rather than address the hosting issue I'll try and answer the second part of the question.

Since the blog is for a degree project, the most important piece of guidance will come from the course guide, which should indicate the learning outcomes and the assessment method.

If the object of the exercise is to simply demonstrate that you can master the IT skills necessary to create a blog, then the tutor may assess you by ensuring that he can access the blog, all the links work, etc.

If your design skills are being tested, then the tutor might assess the overall look of the site.

If the content of any photographs you post on the blog is to be assessed, then a different set of criteria will come into play.

Alternatively the tutor may assess your ability to engage in discourse around contemporary photographic issues (whatever that means - I don't know myself). In that case, the quality of your writing may be assessed.

The above might seem obvious; the reason I raise the issue is that about five years ago I had to do something similar for an Open College of the Arts course and I either failed to understand what was required of me, or I understood but hoped that creating a web site the way I wanted would be good enough ... it wasn't and I didn't pass as a result.

So, pointing at some sites which are of general interest to fellow photographers might be misleading, because those sites were probably not created to meet the needs of a degree project.

The photography blogs that I have seen tend to fall into one of three categories, with some overlap:

a) Those which consist mainly of photos, often single images, with few words.

b) Blogs with a high content of reviews or other discussion about equipment. Film blogs are as likely as digital photography blogs to go down this route; they just discuss older pieces of kit. (Incidentally I try not to have too high a percentage of equipment discussion on my own blog, but the blog stats tell me that these articles are by far the most popular)

c) A small percentage of blogs which have something interesting to say about technique or approaches to photography.

Because most blogs are maintained purely for the enjoyment of the blogger, there are no rules or style guides which must be followed. The very low barrier to entry (compared with, say, magazine publishing) is both a tremendous strength and a weakness. There are lots to see, but most (including my own) are of interest to only a tiny number of readers. There is no financial impact of my failure to attract hundreds of thousands or readers hence I'm not driven to up my game.

Anyway enough rambling, that's my two pennorth.

Last edited by KevinAllan; 8th April 2015 at 06:26 PM. Reason: spelling
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  #17  
Old 8th April 2015, 07:58 PM
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All good advice above.

I would add that in any website whether it be a blog (which is just a website with blogging functionality) or a normal website, require text. A pure photo blog which just shows images provides very little to search engines to index. You need wordy text with search phrases that people might actually use to find what you are "Blogging" about.

And just because you think people will use a particular phrase doesn't mean they will. They will use a myriad of different phrases to look for content like yours (whatever it is) and if those phrases aren't in your content it won't be found when they do searches using them.

This is why most websites and blogs fail to get more than a trickle of visits (and why people give up on them). Artists and photographers are particularly bad about this. They just want to put pictures in their site and don't want to write text to go with them. Result = useless website except for actually giving people your web address.

And bear in mind that Art and Photography are two of the biggest subjects on the WWW after computing ( in all its forms). That means massive competition to get yourself found.
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  #18  
Old 20th April 2015, 12:24 PM
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http://thewebdarkroom.co.uk/blog-temp/
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