Rules for Posting Photos

When digital cameras first came out, I thought that it would make people take better pictures, since you could instantly see the picture (and do a retake if necessary), and could take an almost unlimited amount of pictures (no longer restricted to 24 or 36, and the number of extra film rolls you had).

I was right... digital photography has made some casual photographers better by removing the restriction of film costs.  For that, I think the quality of photographs from the casual, 'artistic' photographer has improved greatly. 

But... I was also wrong!  Because of the large amount of pictures that can be taken, people have become trigger-happy with their cameras.  This isn't bad in itself; however, when people start posting them online for the world to see, this is where we see that...  Quantity does not equal Quality!

I'm posting this because I like looking at photo albums, and whenever one of my friends puts one up, I check it out.  But it pains me to see that the person simply uploaded everything from their camera without giving much thought to the actual content of the album.

So, I have created 3 'rules' when creating online photo albums:

1.  Place captions!  It gives the picture more meaning, and makes the picture (and album) more interesting.  It tells the album viewer, 'hey, this is why I took a picture of the food I ate for lunch... it was so good, I want you to try it!'.  It also makes the viewer feel that time and effort was taken in selecting the pictures for the album. 

2.  Make sure pictures are grouped or ordered properly.  Chronological, grouped by subject, I don't care as long as there is some sense to the sequence of pictures in the album.  It is weird to look through an album of someones travels and see some pictures taken at night followed by some taken during the day, then some at night again. How do i know they aren't pictures of the next day?  They're wearing the same clothes!

3.  Don't post duplicate pictures!  Ok, how many pictures do we really need of our dinner with friends in the restaurant?  Or the ones where its the same picture, one with flash, and one without?  I especially hate the fuzzy, out of focus ones that should have been deleted as soon as they were taken (that's what the preview - delete option is for!).  Please do not 'select all' the images in your camera's memory card when uploading them into an online album.  Heard of the term, 'collect and select'?  It definitely applies here.

The worst album contains a gazillion photos, no captions, and multiple pictures of the same thing over and over again.  Is it any wonder that I almost never go through the whole album and just stop after the first page?  Thank God some online albums have limits on the number of pictures you can place in an album.

The best albums I have seen tell a story... each picture carefully selected, each caption more like a narration than just a label, and with a proper beginning, middle, and end. 

It really doesn't take long to organize and place captions on photos.  Selecting them can take long, if you have a large number of photos to choose from.  However, its better that you spend an hour or so creating the album rather than all of your viewers spending an hour each viewing the album.  Rule of thumb:  if you are overwhelmed by the sheer amount of photos to choose from, then you probably should delete some of the duplicate photos... or create multiple photo albums.