Archive for January, 2009

Sharing a Free Online Photo Album with Family

January 30, 2009 at 7:08 pm · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , , ,

A free online photo album is a great way to share your photos with family whether they are across the street or around the world. Sometimes we are so busy with our day to day lives that we don’t have the opportunities that we’d like to share photos of our accomplishments, milestones and even our children with our family.

This can be particularly true with older family member whom we would love to spend more time with but simply don’t have the time. Sharing a free online photo album with older family members, such as grandparents, can be the highlight of their day. Sometimes, because older family members are retired and have lots of free time, sharing your photos with them is a great way to let them know that you’re thinking of them.

Of course, sharing photos can be as simple as sending your family member an invitation or a link to your photos and giving them the option to save, print, download or copy the files to their computer. That way, they can have access to the photos you’ve shared with them even when they aren’t on the Internet.

Of course, you can always create a free online photo album at a photo sharing site and have it printed and delivered to a love ones door!

Holidays, vacations, graduation, birthdays, anniversaries — and even just day to day living — are all great reasons to take photos, and these are all great reasons to share with your family. Particularly if you have a big family, the Internet can be a great way to share photos with almost everyone at the same time.

Family reunions are also wonderful photo opportunities. Not everyone can come to a family reunion. Sometimes family members have financial constraints, are too old to travel or simply can’t make arrangements to be away from work to attend. Your photos can be a way to recreate the experience for those who may have been homebound. Imagine their surprise, delight and appreciation when you share the photos from a history making event such as a family reunion.

There are many creative ways that you can share your photos with your family. You can create a free online photo album, or you can create a slide show of your photos and upload it to a web site that has social and networking functions and let all of your family members view the slide show there. If you have video, you can also upload that to free video viewing sites and send an invitation to your family members to view the video.

Sharing with family reminds them that they are special to you and let’s them celebrate your life with you through the photos, photo albums, slide shows and videos you create of your life.

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Create a Free Online Photo Album

January 21, 2009 at 10:42 pm · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Most people enjoy sharing photographs of their friends and loved ones with everyone they know. Did you know that there’s a way to get your photographs together so that everyone in your family can see them and you’ll never have to tote a photo book? It’s true; you can easily create a free online photo album. Online photo albums are typically free they’re very easy to use and create; and they are also excellent time savers!

If you’ve never considered using an online photo, but you’d like to try, the following tips will help you get started:

First of all, organize and gather your photos. You can choose any photo, from a birthday party, to a vacation, or even a wedding. Once you’ve organized your photos (remember, even hard copy photographs can be used for an online photo album as long as they’ve been digitized in some way. Scan them into computer, or create a disk), it’s time to upload.

Once you’ve uploaded your photographs, organize them into a folder of your choosing on your desktop or in your documents. After that, hop online and search for a free photo sharing service. They are tons to choose from, so it’s a good idea to review each one carefully and read what other consumers have to say about the product. Depending on the service you choose, you’ll be able to upload hundreds of photos at once. Once they’ve been uploaded they will be placed onto a server and kept secure.

What you’re selective service, all that’s left to do is to select a template. This is the fun part! Here you get to be creative and choose a template, the background, color scheme etc. once this is completed, time to decide how many photos per page you’d like to see. This will also allow you to decide on the size of each photograph to be displayed.

Next, you will use your mouse to drag and paste your photos to the perfect spot. Remember, you want to ensure that all photo editing is complete prior to this step.

Once you have organized your pages, you can add captions, messages, and add quotations. This will allow you to tell a story with your photos and convey feelings to go along with the images.

When she was finally finished with the artistic development of your online photo album, you can easily have an album delivered electronically to all your loved ones!

More than likely, your online photo sharing service will allow you to upgrade to a paid service if you so choose. These paid services typically offer more storage space, more storage time, and a host of other cool features that you don’t get with a free package. Don’t worry; the price is always a bargain for the services you receive.

Your friends and loved ones will love viewing photographs and reading your add captions in order to stay abreast of the happenings in your life. As an added bonus, try adding a photo of each person you plan to deliver to at some place in your album… they will be thrilled!

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How to Design a Digital Photo Album

January 21, 2009 at 10:29 pm · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , , , ,

When you are beginning to design your digital photo album, there are a few main considerations that you should think about, so that your finished product expertly shows off your favorite photographs and tells the story you are seeking to tell. Follow these four easy steps to design your free online photo album today!

Step 1
Your first step to designing your digital photo album is to determine which photos that you will include. It is always best to choose a theme for your digital photo album, instead of including a random assortment of photographs that are unrelated. If you have a lot of photos to share, consider creating multiple digital photo albums, instead of included unrelated photos in the same album. It can be very confusing to view a digital photo album that is simply a collection of photos, rather than photos that are arranged to tell a story. In addition, if you include too many photographs in one album, you may lose the interest of people who are invited to view the album.

Step 2
The second step in designing your digital photo album is to think about the story that you are trying to tell. Would your photos be best displayed if they were in a particular order? If you are chronicling an event, have you placed your photos in the order that the event unfolded, so that the pictures can be viewed chronologically? If the photos do not depict an event, is there some other order that you can use to organize your photographs? Perhaps you can think about the descriptions that you will use and arrange your photographs to fit how those descriptions will reveal your story.

Step 3
Once the order of your photographs has been determined, it’s time to label them and write descriptions that will either explain what is going on in the photograph or to start or continue telling a story based on the photos displayed. If you share your digital photo album, visitors may view your photos one at a time or as a photo slideshow, so ensure both that your descriptions can stand on their own and also that they will work when viewers are progressing from one photograph to the next.

Step 4
Now that you’ve added photos to your digital photo album, placed them in order, and given them descriptions, it’s time to decide who you want to share your photos with. You can set permissions so that you can send a link to the people who may want to come view your album, or keep you album private so that only you can view it. In addition, you can allow anyone in the world to view your album, or require a password to gain access. Think carefully about the types of photos that you are sharing to determine how best to set permissions for your digital photo album.

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How to Share a Digital Photo Album

January 21, 2009 at 10:13 pm · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Photographs become so much more enjoyable when they are shared with friends and family. You will want to share the pictures of your children’s achievements, the special events that you’ve hosted, and any other great time in your life. There are many ways that you can share the contents of your digital photo album. Consider all of your options and select the one that will be suit your needs, or that will best show off the photographs that you’ve included in your digital photo album.

Sharing Opportunity #1: Password Protected, by Invitation Only
If the photographs that you have loaded into your digital photo album could be sensitive in nature, or if you want to protect your family’s identity by not floating their pictures randomly around the internet, you may want to share your digital photo album by invitation only, or use a password to protect admittance to the album.

Sharing Opportunity #2: Emailing Links
If you want to send your own links to your digital photo album, you should be away that people who receive those links may then share them with additional people. If it would be okay for your photos to be seen by a larger group of viewers, emailing links to your digital photo album can be a great way to get the word out that there are new photos to be seen.

Sharing Opportunity #3: Posted to a Blog or Website
If you have your own blog or website, or participate as a user of other blogs or websites, you can post photographs that are linked back to your digital photo album. Instead of uploading photos directly to your blog or website, you can have those platforms pull directly from your digital photo album. This may allow others to access your digital photo album directly, however, so ensure that if you link photos back, you are prepared for anyone in cyberspace to view your entire album.

Sharing Opportunity #4: Print Your Own Photos
One great option that digital photo album sites offer is the ability to select photos from albums to print. Instead of you printing and sending photos to loved ones around the world, you can let them choose just those photographs that they are interested in buying and they can purchase them on their own. The prices for printing and shipping photos from digital photo albums is comparable to the prices offered by retail locations, and twice as convenient because people can order photographs from the comfort of their own homes.

Sharing Opportunity #5: Gifts and Gadgets
In addition to guests to your digital photo album being able to select prints to purchase, they can also choose to have a variety of gifts and gadgets printed with their favorite photos, including mugs, calendars, cards and more. By creating a free online photo album and allowing your loved ones to view your favorite shots, you’re opening up a whole world of photo printing opportunities for them.

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5 Reasons to Edit Digital Photos

January 21, 2009 at 9:37 pm · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,

When you share digital photos, you may simply upload them to your free online photo album and send links to your friends and family to view. When your visitors arrive, they will be able to see whatever shots you have shared – including some that might have been better displayed if only they’d been edited before sharing. There are several great reasons to edit your digital photos before sharing them with your loved ones.

Reason #1: Limiting a Picture’s Focus
Some of the pictures that you include in your digital photo album might be too “busy.” Instead of focusing on one person or group of people, or documenting one event, they could be taking in too much action. These photographs may be hard to understand or not pleasant to view because there is simply too much going on at once. By editing your digital photos, you can instead focus on one part of the picture to share exactly the story that is the main idea.

Reason #2: Put Your Pictures Front and Center
Sometimes, the subjects of your photographs move just as you’re taking a shot. Or you might think you’re centered on a particular item, only to find that it’s in the left corner of your picture instead of the main focus. You can edit your photos before including in your digital photo album in order to ensure that the main idea for your digital photo is displayed front and center in the shot.

Reason #3: You’re Not a Werewolf
One of the biggest issues faced by photographers are the appearance of red eyes. Many film and digital cameras feature red eye reduction functions, but those do not always take care of the problem. You can use online or software based photo editing programs to reduce the appearance of red eyes in your photography so that your subjects look like humans instead of werewolves – red eyes are not the best way to show of your baby’s baby blues or your girlfriend’s smoky brown eyes. Instead, you can make easy edits to fix your photos before you share.

Reason #4: Size Matters
Sometimes, the perspective of your photographs may be a bit…off. You may have focused on one particular person or object, just to have them or it dwarfed by what is going on in the background of your shot. Instead of showing off a background, show off your main subject by cropping your photographs to show only what you want to show. Size does matter – when your subject is barely seen, you aren’t showing off the story that you actually want to tell.

Reason #5: Clean it Up
When you are focusing on one particular person or object, you may not even notice what is going on the background. You can edit your photos to take out background objects that may not be quite what you want to show off in your pictures. You can either crop your photos to show only the main object, or you can use other editing features to remove portions of the photograph that may not be appropriate to share.

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Online photo album sites: 5 Things to look for

January 14, 2009 at 10:29 pm · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , , , , , , ,

You’ve finally decided to join an free online photo album site. Good decision! As you look around, you may find many different sites available. How do you choose which site to join? You should choose one photo album site, and stick with it. If several sites have caught your eye, and you are trying to decide between them, consider these points:

1. Safety: Make sure your pictures will be safe once they are on any site. You will want your family and friends to be able to view them, but perhaps not a free-for-all. Your pictures are your own, and they should stay that way. You will also want to be sure that if you need to download anything, it is safe and not malware or spyware.
2. Options: Do you just get to upload your photos, or are there capabilities to be creative and organizational? This will make a big difference once you realize how many memories you are re-living. Learn what you will be able to do with your pictures, if anything. Different sites offer different options. Remember, you’ll be sharing these albums, so you should have an opportunity to edit, or customize your albums.
3. Availability; Although it normally does not cause much of a problem, I would give a site a trial run and make sure their server does not experience a lot of down time. You don’t want to be constantly interrupted while you are uploading or organizing your pictures. Down times are frustrating, to say the least.
4. Customer Service. Make sure there is someone available via email at least, to answer any questions you may have. No one wants to be stuck with half of their life memories somewhere and have a question that goes unanswered. Given you are looking for a free site, do not expect online or phone customer service (although that would be a big plus!) You should, however, be able to ask a question via email and get a timely response (within 2 business days, preferably).
5. Site Appearance: Although you may think that appearances are only “window deep” and anyone can hire a web designer, that isn’t all there is to consider. A fly-by-night organization is not going to go to the trouble and expense of building an attractive and useful website, if they don’t plan on being around for a while. If it is haphazardly thrown together, well, maybe you should move on.

Once you have checked out each site, and perhaps given them a test drive, it’s time to decide which you will go with. Consider carefully, you will more than likely be putting some time and effort into gathering, uploading and organizing your pictures. Don’t forget the test drive. It’s good to get a general feel for the site before investing your time and energy into it. Once all of that is done, go for it! By the way, the most important thing is: Have fun!

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Top 5 reasons for using an online photo album site

January 14, 2009 at 8:10 pm · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

1. Backup your memories: This really is the number ONE reason you should use such a site! Sometimes, bad things happen, like fires, floods, or burglaries. It is extremely unfortunate, but it is a fact. Having your photos online would insure that no one could take those memories away. While the actual photo may be gone, you have the image of the photo (from which you can have new photos made) out of harms way.
2. Organizing photos just seems easier online: Rather than sorting and sifting through photos, you can normally point, click and move your photos online. This saves a lot of time, and a lot of space on your living room floor! You can scan them, upload them, and then organize at your leisure. Besides, you can do all of this online as often as you wish!
3. You can share more pictures online: You probably are not going to mail 50 photos of your vacation to each of your family and friends yet you want to be able to share them. With an free online photo album, the people who want to see them can check out all of your wonderful photos and no one has to pay postage!
4. Editing photos: Many online photo sites allow you to edit your photos. That way, you can remove the red-eye, or crop the picture; whatever you need to do to make it perfect. Online photo editing is such a wonderful tool! You can’t do that with regular photos
5. Freedom to be creative: While it is possible to do many things with real photographs, like add the funny little stickers, you are still limited. Many times, with the online sites, you can add descriptions and more. Depending on the site, sometimes you can get really creative with your photos, and that is a lot of fun.
Online photo album sites can really be a personal asset and a time saver. Your pictures can be safe, sound and easily accessible. You can edit, create, move pictures, add or delete pictures all at the click of the mouse. Many people spend a good amount of time online anyway, so why not keep your pictures there? There really is no good reason not to belong to an online photo or photo album site. So many of us include pictures in emails, websites, and groups that it makes sense to have your pictures all in one place.
Which site you join will be determined mostly by what exactly you are looking for, different sites offer different perks. It is a plus, however, for the site to have the 5 above mentioned features. The important thing is that your pictures will be there, whenever you need them, and that in itself is a comfort.

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Free Online Photo Albums: Gathering your photos

January 14, 2009 at 12:49 am · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , , , , ,

How do you store your pictures? Are your pictures kept in a box, in an album, or something else? Most people do have hundreds, if not thousands of pictures in various places in their homes. Perhaps it’s time you consider joining a free online photo album site. Keeping your pictures on an online photo site would eliminate a lot of clutter, and help you organize your pictures the way you want.

Even if you belong to other photo sites, most charge a fee for organizing more than a certain amount of albums. Free online photo album sites allow you to keep all of your pictures in as many albums as you would like.

It is fun getting out the pictures, old and new, scanning them, and uploading them into neat albums online. You could organize the pictures before you upload, or after, but we are sure you are going to enjoy the memories along the way. You could find all of those pictures of Mom and Dad, or Grandma and Grandpa, and they could each have their own album. How about an album for each of the kids? You could make an album for each family vacation or reunion. The possibilities are endless, and so much fun!

Organizing your pictures may seem like a task, but once you get started, you are going to wonder why you didn’t think of it before. I guarantee the pictures will bring smiles. Of course, you won’t know until you try. Commit yourself first to gathering all of the old pictures. More than likely, as you start finding them to add to your online photo album, you will enjoy the memories so much, you will want to keep on searching. Pretty soon, you’ll be thinking things like; “Where are those pictures of the kids when we went to Disney World”.

I would strongly suggest you start this venture on a weekend. It will begin to occupy your thoughts more than you may realize. These are some precious memories you have your hands on. You’ll want to savor the time with them. All of this is even before you’ve begun uploading to the free online photo album site! The fun will only continue once you start that adventure.

You could make it a family event. The kids are sure to come across some pictures and say “I remember that!” A Free online photo site could be responsible for some quality family time, and what’s wrong with that? Whether you decide to do this on your own or as a family event, I guarantee you will have a good time. There are probably many, many pictures in your home you have forgotten about. Start a photo hunt today, and prepare for the beginning of the free online photo site adventure! Happy Gathering!

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Why Should You Use a Digital Online Photo Printing Site?

January 12, 2009 at 9:23 pm · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , , , ,

With the advent of online digital photo printing websites, it is easier than ever to get great quality prints from the images in your camera. Simply sign up for an account, upload your pictures, and you’re ready to go. You can use photo editors to touch up the images and clean up imperfections or add some creative and fun special effects. All of these features are still less expensive than paying for a print down at the local photo processing shop and you don’t have to bother with driving around town and wasting money on gas.

Free online photo album sites give you a convenient way to share your pictures with your friends and family. Most sites have a “share this” link that makes it easy to email a specific photo. If you wish to share a set of photos, you can set them up as a separate album and give access to only your friends and family. This can be a nice way to show the entire family what happened at the latest family reunion, wedding, or birthday party. Online photo albums are also great for travelers, giving them a place where they can post their pictures from anywhere out on the road.

Most digital photo printing sites have an easy to use interface, so anyone can quickly upload their photos to the site. Even for people who are not that familiar with computers, it should be easy enough to understand how to select a photo and send it off for printing. However, there are always a few sites that are unnecessarily complex, so look around for another site if you have trouble with the site. There are so many options out there today, there is no reason to fumble around with a clumsy interface.

You can purchase personalized gift items from most photo printing sites and have them shipped to your friends and family. Some of the most commonly offered merchandise includes posters, coffee mugs, calendars, greeting cards, t-shirts, puzzles, and even custom-made teddy bears. The higher-end sites usually have the most items to offer in their store, so check around if there is a specific item you wish to create. These sites make it very convenient to produce your annual holiday cards and send them out to the entire family all at once.

Of course, the price of the actual photo prints is much lower on an online digital photo printing site. There are usually shipping costs which should be figured into your price comparisons with local retail outlets. Even with the shipping costs included, purchasing prints online is generally far less than the cost at a traditional photo processing store. Some sites even offer large discounts for bulk purchases, especially when they are trying to attract new customers. You can save even more money over traditional film processing because you can select only the photos you really want. Before, you would have to waste money developing pictures that did not come out the way you intended.

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Create Photo Books for Your Business

January 5, 2009 at 10:04 pm · Filed under 1 ·Tagged , , , , , ,

Digital photo albums may seem like they are only useful for personal and entertainment purposes, but there are also a number of reasons for a business to create photo books. They can be used in-house to commemorate special events or pay tribute to a retiring employee. Photo books can also be assembled to thank existing customers for their continued patronage. Promotional photo books are part of almost every company’s marketing plan these days, as they provide a convenient way for the company to display all of its best work in one place. Plus, some sites even offer free online photo albums!

Photo books are perfect for office holiday parties, annual meetings, or any other gathering involving the entire staff. You can easily keep all of the pictures for a specific year or event in one book for easy viewing by other employees or customers. Over the years, these event-based photo books will give you an informal company history, including many employees who are no longer employed. You can have a bit of fun with the photo book preparation by posting certain pictures and asking the employees for funny captions.

You can create photo books for long-time employees who are retiring or moving on to another job. This is a nice surprise for the departing employee when it is presented at their going-away party. The photo book creation process is also a nice way for the rest of the company or department to spend time together outside of a work context. They can get together and share their memories while choosing which pictures to include in the book. The employees can also write down their fondest memories of the departing employee, giving them a nice gift to look back and re-read over the years.

Photo books can be used to thank major customers who have been important to your company’s success. This is easier if the customer has a longtime relationship with the company since there will be more opportunities to take pictures together. Photo books also work great as promotional materials, displaying the company’s prior accomplishments or achievements in order to attract new customers.

Events that require corporate sponsorship, such as golf or tennis tournaments, can also benefit from the use of a good promotional photo book. Photos from prior years can be included to demonstrate why a prospective sponsor should donate their money to the event.

Creative professionals like architects, graphic designers, or photographers can create a free online photo album to display their portfolio. This can even be done online so that prospective clients and employers can view the entire portfolio as a public album.

If more privacy is required, the album can usually be set up as only viewable by family or friends. You can simply create a new account for each prospective client and send them the username and password to view your photo book. Most digital photo sites also offer professional-quality printing, so you can order a top-quality binder with all of your work neatly stored inside. This presentation can be worth the money many times over by helping you land a better job.

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