(200K+ pictures and 1000Gbs later)

Read the FULL long and Intensive review after the jump

My SmugMug Page

The original reason = Backup

The reason behind signing up was because I didn’t have a backup method at the time.
No DroboPro like I have now to be safe with my pictures I was taking for all my clients.

I had read a blog by one of the founders and saw how open and honest he was with the decisions they had made in creating the company and handling crazy amounts of pictures… so I felt a connection to the company.

I didn’t know much about, or really need, many of their other options at the time which I now use all the time.
I simply wanted a place to backup my pictures for just in case and they said I could have Unlimited.
Prior to this time I was hosting Lightroom Galleries on my own site.

Well I was too busy and to this day still haven’t put on many pictures from pre 2008
Or I suppose that number would be much much higher than 1000GBs

Primary Display Site

I was making galleries with Lightroom prior to SmugMug and was decently happy, but when I saw how smugmug displays the pictures and how much time it would save me to not have to upload the pictures twice to the web.
I decided SmugMug would become my primary location.
I loved viewing the stats on my own website and was a bit hesitant thinking that somehow having that many people come to my own website would make it more popular and perhaps rank even higher for the SEO stuff.
I’m still not sure it is the case but I think the other benefits outweighed that desire and ever since I have shown off my pictures on SmugMug

Sales

I still am not very into sales, mainly as a lifestyle decision because it’s not enjoyable to me and because I book my schedule so full i don’t often have time to deal with print orders or books.
In fact I’ve thought of many ways to promote the SmugMug buy prints direct from the site ability… but haven’t gotten around to implimenting them over the last 18 months or so.
(Pretty much I’m waiting for them to come out with the Coupons feature they’ve been talking about for a while)

So I’ve had people randomly buy prints but personally I’ve never told them… they’ve always just stumbled upon it.

But I do have designs to get a bit more involved with printing.
Ever since I found out about the ability to delay prints by a few days to give me time to check someone’s order and make changes or edits as needed.
That is a perfect solution to be able to tell someone to always make their print purchases through SmugMug (which coincidentally will cover the money part)

Plus they’re also using Bay Photo which has some benefits.
Now I’m not much of a print snob… meaning I can’t tell the difference between print qualities like some others can.
But I have a talking point… I can tell people their prints will be printed by one of the best print labs in the country.
In the end it only costs a little more than using the other print companies.

Referrals

I’ve talked up SmugMug a lot since I signed up because they were perfect for my needs.
I’ve had a bunch of my friends sign up… and sometimes I’d even remember to have them put in my email address when they signed up (jarvie at jarviedigital.com)
And they’d get $5 off
And I’d get $10 off my renewal… meaning that this last April my renewal wasn’t very much.

But on the other hand it could have been free if I had done a better job of telling them to use my email.

I think a big thing was that most people ended up using bigger discount codes… there are codes out there to get a lot more than $5 off subscription.
Going to PhotoCampUtah got people 50% off (or maybe it was more)

In any case I think I’d prefer that they save even more money than earn me a couple of dollars towards renewal.

But the point is… it’s a cool program they have. And I refer it.

Blogging

SmugMug has been a heaven-sent for all my blogging needs.
When I learned that I could simply drag and drop my pictures from a SmugMug gallery into my Wordpress blog and that was all… wow!!
No longer export and then upload and then use the wordpress system to connect each picture into the post from the wordpress library.
I saved crazy amounts of time.
The best part is that the pictures were just the right size for my blog 600px on the long end. (width) But I could select larger or smaller if i wanted.

They were also watermarked so they would show up on the blog with the watermark.
Which may I add is awesome.

Watermarking

Many people ask how I do my watermarks… If I use a Lightroom plugin or something.
I created a simple watermark in Photoshop and then uploaded it to SmugMug.
I’ve tried several watermarks and each time I can just simply change the gallery to use a new watermark.
The point is they’re not burned into the pictures… you can change the watermark down the road and there’s no need to re-export or re-upload.

I can even use the watermarks from my interns and assistants and mark the pictures They took with their watermark

I know Lightroom in Beta3 is coming out with a pretty good watermarking ability, but I still think it will fit my workflow better to use the SmugMug method.

Upgrades

They’ve made some changes here and there but overall since I joined it’s stayed very much the same.
Recently they started “Nice Names” where you could decide what the URL to a gallery looked like.

There’s actually been a flurry of updates in this last month. (Some expected and other unexpected and still others that haven’t happened yet)

One of my favorites is the Slideshow feature, which as you can guess adds a slideshow to your main page.

They also added another view a few months ago called “Journal” which lets the customer see the pictures nice and big.
Since I display soo many pictures for each job it is a bit much so I don’t use it… but people are able to change the view to journal if they want.
But most of the time viewing my galleries is the first experience with SmugMug and therefor they wouldn’t know how to do that.

Just today they added the ability to change gallery settings on Multiple Galleries, that’s pretty cool.
(Not something I’ve needed a ton, but had I not set up my galleries well to begin with I’d be crying for this big time)

VIDEO

I recently purchased 2 cameras that have video capability. d300s and a G11

I love that I can take video and just straight upload it to SmugMug and that’s all.

I also like being able to stream it on my blog.

I don’t edit my videos, mainly because I know that once I start I’ll get addicted to it and feel like I have to (like with pictures)
I’m not a videographer nor do I claim to be, thus I’ll keep it simple and pedestrian.

It’s so freeing to not have to worry about editing and just put it straight up on smugmug.

They do re-size the videos, so they’re not storing quite as much as the originals, but I’m guessing it’s a decent amount of storage to put up a bunch of video.
There are of course limitations of file size to upload and length of clips, which means there are some stuff I can’t put up. (Like workshop videos… not that they’ve been edited yet)

Workflow

I export full jpgs from Lightroom (I export with a sequencer in the front 001, 002, 003)
The reason for the sequencer is so because I put my files in a specific order with the better ones first and that way I can keep that order when in SmugMug
I upload from my computer to SmugMug (the new uploader Rocks BTW)
I’ll often several galleries at a time – it seems to do 3-4 at a time rather well. (I think the restriction is more on my computer and web browser side)

I only get 2-4mb/s but if I do 3-4 galleries at a time I’ll get 2-3 mb/s upload speed on each. (Not sure why I can’t get higher speeds when just doing one)

I have a preset for my gallery so that it does all the things I want the gallery to do.
for instance

• • allow rt click save (protected = no)
  • apply my watermark
  • view up to XL Large files
  • allow camera info
  • Sort by filename 1-99
  • Printable = yes
  • Public

I’ll either unlist them or make them public and I rarely do the passwords, I’m happy enough with the quality that I don’t mind if someone sees them.
Plus I don’t do maternity or pictures of babies or random other shoots that any clients usually want passworded.

I would password them if they asked… but they never do.

Old Workflow – the reason for 75k extra pics

Once upon a time I would take pictures in Raw+JPG and upload the JPGS straight to SmugMug for a just in case something happened (pre-DroboPro)
And also to have immediate access to the pictures for things like Blogs (if the JPG looked good enough)

But that became tedious and I stopped.

They were All unlisted galleries
And it was the full photoshoot not just the final edits.

The point is 75,000 pictures came from that method (not all were full size JPGs)… and that’s a big reason I’m at 200,000 pictures

So don’t be too impressed.

Facebook and SmugMug

I used to want everyone to go to SmugMug and see the pictures there… I thought having all the brides friends go to my site to see the pictures would be beneficial to me.

But now I understand that sometimes it’s about going to where the people are, and not making them come to you.
People are already on facebook.

Thus I don’t just allow them, but I encourage Brides to grab all the pictures off smugmug and make a facebook gallery. (Best thing ever)
My pictures are meant to be seen, that’s how I like it… it makes me sad to take pictures for them to never see much the light of day. (Don’t hide your gift under a bushel just because you want a few extra dollars)
This applies to people photography and I’d probably have a different view on fine art and landscape photography.

The ability for the client to grab the pictures of themselves on SmugMug and simply drop them into a folder on their computer is very handy.
Beats having to rt click and save.

Stats

as of Oct 30th 2009

No my stats are NOT normal for a typical SmugMug user.
I was once told that I am among the top 10 or 20 users of SmugMug  (I’d be interested to know exactly where)

201,007 pictures

1022.34 GBs of pictures (and some videos)

Bandwidth

I’m not honestly sure what these stats mean. I think they are affected by having pictures on  my blog.
It’s fun that SmugMug has these stats, but I do not know how to interpret them and understand what they mean.

Oct – 323593 (Pictures Viewed) 30.7GB (Of Bandwidth)
Sep –  197576 – 23.66
Aug – 307823 – 31.43
Jul – 479-825 – 50.05
Mar – 542,798 – 30.36
Jan – 513,145 – 23.73

Analytics

They do allow you to use an analytics program to track people coming to the site with all that usual Analytics information.
When I found this out a couple months ago I was very happy. (And sad it took me that long to get around to applying it)

I use Clicky Analytics which is a tad better than Google analytics (but Google is free)
Clicky is known for very conservative numbers
And is most popular probably because of their Live Viewing feature.

It is fun to know which galleries are the most popular.
Ever since the Nice Names feature came out, you can really understand which galleries people are going to… before you had know way of knowing what that random string of numbers and letters stood for and had to go to the gallery to see which one it was.
So again props to SmugMug for that.

I have other websites for people to look at my stuff… but that being said so far in October (a slow month)
I’ve had 1220 people check out galleries on SmugMug

I would tell you about previous more exciting months… but I only installed it recently.

Like any Analytics system it’s great to see where these people are coming from

Downage

Personally I’ve been happy with their uptime.
I know they’ve had some problems and when they do it does affect my blog since my pictures are coming straight from there.

But it was down less than my old web hosting company Bluehost and when that was down the whole Blog wouldn’t exist.

So I’m happy with SmugMug … the times they’re usually down it’s to perform maintenance late at night or to do upgrades, and they let people know usually.

Wants

Coupons

Oh to dream!

I know they’ve been teasing us for Way to long on this one.

I know that they’re working on it… but sometimes I feel it’s like the company that cried wolf.

When will it ever come out we never know… But as soon as it does there will be a lot of happy brides.
I’ll be reorganizing my prices that’s for sure.

What are coupons?

Well honestly I’m not sure what some people hope it to be, nor how SmugMug is designing them (I know it’s not easy programmers at SmugMug)

But this is how I’d want it.

I want my clients to go on a type of Shopping Spree… let’s say they have $1500 of prints to buy (my set prices)

They put in their coupon they got when they paid for the wedding and they can just go crazy.

We already have delayed printing (where I can check each picture they purchase and make necisary edits before they’re printed)

Then I get the bill for the printing for the at cost prices or something like that.

I don’t know the perfect solution but that’s the desire is to make all the print orders go through smugmug and to not just have them get them all a la carte

Organizing System (To move Galleries)

This was a horrible mess for me. I wanted to reorganize my galleries and I couldn’t figure out a way to move tons of galleries all at once.
I had to do it one at a time. Which is fine if you’re moving 1 or 2 galleries… NOT fine if you have to move 100-200 galleries around.

The more you use galleries and just over time you seem to build up

Xn Galleries

Right now we’re limited to 2 levels: Categories and Sub-Categories

There are talks to open that up.
I had never thought about it… but when I heard about it I thought it made a lot of sense.
I’m not sure how that will change things for me, I guess I’ll cross that bridge when it’s built.

But one things for sure they better build that organizing system before they create that or we’ll all be cursing the new feature as we spend a decade moving each gallery one by one.

Usable Stats

I don’t know the answer to this… but I want to understand what my stats mean.
I know using analytics is usually the solution but if SmugMug itself had a way to track the quantities of visitors and where they’re coming from there’d be a lot of interested folks.

I also think lifetime stats would be fun.

Pricing syncronization

Personally I don’t mind the way you syncronize pricing from gallery to gallery.
But I know some people do.
And when they tell me about how they’d like it, I am on board with them.

For now I’ve just created a category called Prints and create fake galleries with one picture and name that gallery based on a price structure.
It’s a work around that some say shouldn’t have to happen, but I’ll go with it for now.

Customer Service

SmugMug is known for having amazing customer service.
They seem to pride themselves on having wonderful and knowledgeable employees. (That’s awesome)

They don’t do Phone service but their email support is above top notch.
They often respond faster than you could get with phone support (being on hold)

And since it is so good I can appreciate the savings it passes along to us to not have to support a call center with our fees.

I’d rather have a stable company that won’g go out of business.

Honestly I’ve rarely felt the need to call someone up about smugmug, since I’m the type to figure it out myself.

Training

SmugMug takes some getting used to, there’s a lot going on.

There is a desire by a lot of people for some training on the system.

I’ve trained some friends and interns.

I do lightroom training and you’d be surprised to know how many times people ask if I could do some SmugMug training while I’m at it.
I haven’t done it yet. But I’m just saying there seems to be an interest.

David Terry is usually the guy I went to when I had SmugMug questions back in the day

He’s been with SmugMug for a long time.

I guess if people want to understand it better they should know that SmugMug help really works and it’s great.
But it doesn’t take the place of good ol’ fashion training.

SMUGs

It’s a monthly meeting of SmugMug users that meets to have free presentations and get togethers.
They just started in Salt Lake City but they’re being held in many location around the USA

Honestly it’s more centered on socialization of photographers… they do have a short presentation each time so it seems.
The last one I went to was a little short and almost didn’t warrant the 30 minute drive, but I was late.

The SLC version isn’t terribly popular yet, but we’ll see where it goes… I applaud the concept.

Here’s more info on the subject

Should I sign Up?

In a word = Yes

That is, if you take lots  of pictures.

3 Versions

I’m not as familiar with the 3 versions I use the pro version and it’s something like $150 a year for pro $40 for standard.

If you’re a professional photographer you’ll want the Pro version for sure!

You can check it out for free and you can always easily upgrade from one level of service to another with a click of a button.

RECAP

I almost expect other photographers to be using SmugMug
It might not fit every need or aspect of their workflow.
But I consider it a no-brainer.
So when someone says they don’t use SmugMug sometimes I’m a little shocked.

I’m pretty darn sure even though I pay the SmugMugPro rate that SmugMug probably looses money on me because of how much I store.

BUT… who in their right mind does as many photoshoots as I do and edits and gives the customers as many as I do.
It’s my style to do it that way and I’m single and I spend Way to much time with photography than any normal person should.
So most people are putting up a lot less.

So I trust they’ve got a good system that will keep them in business for a long long time.

Basically, SmugMug has saved me tons of time and tons of hassle and I refer them to everyone needing a home for their pictures.

I look forward to many great developments to come.

Questions or Comments

If you have a question about SmugMug or how I use it let me know.

I’d also love to hear if this influences your opinion or prompts you to tryout SmugMug
It is free for first couple of weeks.

You can get a discount using my email jarvie@jarviedigital.com but you don’t have to, I don’t mind one bit paying for their service.

I just wanted to write a review and let people know about my experience… as a way of celebrating my first Terabyte of usage.

SmugMug 1000GBs Later is a post from: JarvieDigital Photography Blog

OPEN GALLERY

FULL GALLERY

Roommates (Fall #12) is a post from: JarvieDigital Photography Blog

Jun08 – A Coruña – 40

Europe Part 3 is a post from: JarvieDigital Photography Blog

Open Gallery

Full galleries require a password : from myself or the wedding couple

Couple, Temple, Group, Reception, Luncheon and others

Genny & Dan (Los Angeles) is a post from: JarvieDigital Photography Blog

Day 12 – Canary Island (Inland) – 17 Pictures

Day 13 – Madrid Airport – 9 Pictures

Day 14 – Toledo – 44 Pictures

Day 15 – From Toledo to Madrid – 13 Pictures

Day 16 – Oviedo – 66 Pictures

Day 18 – Picos de Europa – 42 Pictures

Day 19 – Llanes (Beach) – 18 Pictures

Day 20 – Bilbao – 49 Pictures

Europe (Part 2) is a post from: JarvieDigital Photography Blog

Last weekend I traveled with 3 friends to Page, AZ

While there we visited Lake Powell hiked through a lesser slot canyon and did other smaller hikes around town.
Then on the way back to Provo we spent a few hours at Bryce Canyon National Park.

There are 4 galleries all require Flash to view.

Lake Powell 35 Images

Canyons (Around Page) 36 Images

Bryce Canyon 52 Images

Page Area 36 Images

Lake Powell – Bryce Canyon is a post from: JarvieDigital Photography Blog