Best (busiest/friendliest) photo sharing community?

bl0at3r

bl0at3r

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Aside from TP, where I admit I spend most of my time in the Equipment, Computers and OOF, what do people recommend for a photo sharing community?

Clearly you only get out what you put in, but I'm keen to get back to concentrating on taking pictures, learning from and interacting with others and sharing photos - irrespective of how much their gear cost or what camera they or I have.

Is Flickr with its network of contacts and groups still king or is there something else I have not found yet ?

PS - I don't find forum threads and posts conducive to this.
 
bl0at3r said:
PS - I don't find forum threads and posts conducive to this.
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+1, agree with you on that.

DerekL said:
I find the group discussions etc on Flickr have all but died. I only really use it as a hosting site now.
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Flickr has lost a lot long-time users with all the changes to make it social media friendly over the last year or two. There have been several new sites popped up that have tried to capture what Flickr once had, but I've not found one that's really managed it. Most of the more interesting and supportive groups on Flickr have died away. The original concept of Flickr still remains the best - it's just that Flickr killed it.
 
Shame, Flickr was/is the best format for communities, groups and sharing IMHO.

Is 500px anything similar? I see they have ratings and comments....
 
I'm going to stick with Flickr and hope that they manage to entice users back to the community now they appear to be investing some time and money in it.
 
Flickr's ok, but I have to admit I'm only on there to share with course mates.

Not sure why you don't like forums, this one is pretty busy now from when I first started and there's all sorts of information and advice on here. Again you get out of it what you put in, you need to engage in the discussions.

DerekL said:
I also like Photo Camel

http://photocamel.com/forum/

It is a forum but the crit section is very good and less abrasive than here.
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Abrasive? Some is but at least you get opinions on here rather than 'nice pic' and other forms of flattery. Generally people are keen to engage and offer their views, although being busy some images miss the comments. Sometimes it's too easy just to stick to new posts to dip into the forum.

Where I do find critique fails on here is that it's mostly technical rather than artistic. We've had some really creative, artistic, sometimes contemporary images posted which just haven't been understood and slated
 
It's the layout, interface and navigation of a forum that I don't get on with for a photo sharing community. On a forum it is very much text based navigation and you have to click in and out of the threads and backwards and forwards to see any images.

Clearly a forum is fine for discussions and knowledge sharing.

Flickr (and others) allow you to browse the images and then add a comment or favorite as you wish. Displaying and browsing the images is the primary intent and this makes the layout and navigation favourable over a traditional forum IMHO.
 
If you're on Facebook, there's a number of Facebook groups with healthy communities for most photography styles and brands etc. As an example, the Fuji X Photography FB group has an excellent mix of images you can get critiqued if you want, news, info, etc. The nice thing about a lot of them are they are 'closed' groups meaning whatever you're posting isn't splashed constantly all over your own timeline.
 
bl0at3r said:
It's the layout, interface and navigation of a forum that I don't get on with for a photo sharing community. On a forum it is very much text based navigation and you have to click in and out of the threads and backwards and forwards to see any images.

Clearly a forum is fine for discussions and knowledge sharing.

Flickr (and others) allow you to browse the images and then add a comment or favorite as you wish. Displaying and browsing the images is the primary intent and this makes the layout and navigation favourable over a traditional forum IMHO.
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Interesting cheers.

I use flickrstacker on the ipad for browsing flickr, quick to get to the images as you say but it's a lot of swiping to find exactly what you are looking for. I find with this forum that the sections it's broken into means I can see from the title and section if I'm interested. Different ways for different people I guess, but then I started with the early days of bulletin boards etc so maybe that's why I feel more comfortable that way.

There's an interesting thought
 
The difference between the forum and Flickr isn't (entirely) friendliness or otherwise - their basic structures are set-up in different ways.

The forum emphasises genres, which is great if you specialise in only one or two types of photography but less good if you're a generalist. And some of the genre sections do have specific clique/banter problems if you're either a casual poster or new to the forum. But it's better set-up than Flickr for general discussions.

Flickr is still much better set-up to follow a group of members you want to interact with regardless of the genre of photography. It has multiple channels and opprtunities for cross-posting - so your friends can see your stream updated as you post, and you can garner specific attention/comments based on equipment/genre/location/etc. by Group posting and tagging. It's far more flexible. Just a shame that Flickr has been so busy making changes it hasn't stopped to see which bits people valued before taking them away.
 
Photography on the net is a pretty good forum, lots of advice and critique:)
 
bl0at3r said:
Is Flickr with its network of contacts and groups still king or is there something else I have not found yet ?

PS - I don't find forum threads and posts conducive to this.
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Why not form your own networks.. with real people, by using social media to build up a network of like minded, but useful people... maybe publishers, gallery curators, other photographers etc.? Why rely on a huge, anonymous zombie network of people who neither know or care about you? They'll only click like because they want you to click like back. Most don't really care about the work, and ultimately, it all means nothing. So 5000 people like a photo you took.. and? The value of having people... real people, speak positively about your work is far greater than collecting a number on a website.

What's wrong with forum posts? At least you'll get crit. All you get on Flickr is "awesome dude".


Depends.. do you want to be popular, or do you want to actually learn?

Just my opinion... and yes, I use Flickr. It has 1TB of free storage... it does have uses.
 
Pookeyhead said:
Why not form your own networks.. with real people, by using social media to build up a network of like minded, but useful people... maybe publishers, gallery curators, other photographers etc.? Why rely on a huge, anonymous zombie network of people who neither know or care about you? They'll only click like because they want you to click like back. Most don't really care about the work, and ultimately, it all means nothing. So 5000 people like a photo you took.. and? The value of having people... real people, speak positively about your work is far greater than collecting a number on a website.

What's wrong with forum posts? At least you'll get crit. All you get on Flickr is "awesome dude".


Depends.. do you want to be popular, or do you want to actually learn?

Just my opinion... and yes, I use Flickr. It has 1TB of free storage... it does have uses.
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Awesome post dude :D
 
Pookeyhead said:
Why not form your own networks.. with real people, by using social media to build up a network of like minded, but useful people... maybe publishers, gallery curators, other photographers etc.? Why rely on a huge, anonymous zombie network of people who neither know or care about you? They'll only click like because they want you to click like back. Most don't really care about the work, and ultimately, it all means nothing. So 5000 people like a photo you took.. and? The value of having people... real people, speak positively about your work is far greater than collecting a number on a website.

What's wrong with forum posts? At least you'll get crit. All you get on Flickr is "awesome dude".


Depends.. do you want to be popular, or do you want to actually learn?

Just my opinion... and yes, I use Flickr. It has 1TB of free storage... it does have uses.
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Interesting point and certainly valid in today's society of 'social media' which actually removes the human interaction somewhat and encourages everyone to be glued to their smartphone or tablet instead of looking up at the real world :(

I must be getting old :)

Re-reading my original post the point I was trying to make was more about the navigation and layout of flickr/500px et al vs the traditional forum, thread, post - I agree meaningful crit and feedback is much more useful than just a like or a favorite or an awesome.

I, perhaps wrongly, assumed that the image should be the prominent thing on the page not the words around it. Clicking in and out of forum posts to see photos - many of which are better and some worse than my skill level - can become tiresome.

Worryingly, when I think about it, outside of home life, family and a couple of work colleagues, I don't usually see or talk to anyone else about photography or share images and feedback in the real world. :oops: :$
 
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That's where a physical photography club comes in handy.

However forming real live networks of like minded people can take a long time or even fail compared to an online situation where you have immediate access to thousands of people. You can see the attraction, as long as you can filter out the non-like minded ones.
 
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ianp5a said:
That's where a physical photography club comes in handy.
However forming real live networks of like minded people can take a long time or even fail compared to an online situation where you have immediate access to thousands of people. You can see the attraction as long as you can filter out the non-like minded ones.
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This is the thing - people may not be minded or able to all turn up at the village hall at the same time on the same day to share their common interest.

But, a positive thing about the internet is that it enables you to contribute in your own time. I upload a photo at tea time and people then post replies as and when they are able 10pm, 1am, 10am etc.

The logistics of organising a physical photography club fill me with dread :(
 
I'm glad we've established the expression "physical" photography club. Since we now have "physical" books, physically sick, and, I heard recently, "you can download it or buy a physical CD!".

Yes my photo club has 25 members. 7 of whom will turn up. And only one of whom appears reasonably keen and knowledgeable. The rest say "awesome dude".
 
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Pookeyhead said:
What's wrong with forum posts? At least you'll get crit. All you get on Flickr is "awesome dude".
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If that's all you get from Flickr, you're doing it wrong.. I'll admit that it's not as good as it was, but there are still good groups and communities on Flickr if you go looking for them.

And my experience is the opposite, the forum generated fewer useful comments than Flickr. Maybe I was using the forum wrong, but glancing at a few current threads it doesn't look like things have changed much.
 
I'm a member on PhotoSIG, and I've given up with it. The basic premise of the site is sound - upload one, provide critique for three. Your photographs and critique are scored by the other members of the site, so you can see your critique skills (and hence your own photography skills - I believe that the act of thinking about pictures in order to provide constructive critique helps to make my own photographs better) develop.

Sounds great, right? The problem is that the upload constraints are absolutely baroque - your image file cannot be more than 360KB in size - ok, fine, Lightroom can handle that - or more than 640,000 pixels. Er, what?

Then there's the site itself - it's like rewinding to 1997. Not at all nice to use or look at. Due to stagnation at the top, there is no realistic hope in the near future that things will change.

There is also a tendency for people to criticise things like noise and sharpness, which is ridiculous given the image constraints I detailed above.

TP is not too bad for critique, at least in the landscape bit where I look - although I wish the "nice photo m8" lot would use the "like" button.
 
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pwhysall said:
TP is not too bad for critique, at least in the landscape bit where I look - although I wish the "nice photo m8" lot would use the "like" button.
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And miss the opportunity to gain post count?

(yes.. the irony of this post is not lost on me..)
 
That's what a lot of the groups are like on flickr - post one comment on three etc - trouble is nobody actually does or the feedback is not very useful or constructive :(
 
I've actually decided to give flickr some more of my time - there is still an active user base, but the head count is down on what it was.
 
bl0at3r said:
That's what a lot of the groups are like on flickr - post one comment on three etc - trouble is nobody actually does or the feedback is not very useful or constructive :(
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They're amongst the worst groups on Flickr.. I avoid anything with compulsory comments or glittery awards. Small groups with daily posting limits are generally best.

There was a useful thread here about how to get the most from Flickr, it's five years old but even with Flickr's changes in the mean time I think it's just as valid. And Flickr really can be something useful if you go about it the right way and put as much efforr in as you want to get benefit out. It beats any forum hands down when it comes to forming and maintaining small groups to provide self-encouragement across a broad range of genres. The closest TP comes is the Film and Conventional community where shooting landscapes one week, portraits the next and landscape the following week is all par for the course and the same small group of members is viewing everything.

bl0at3r said:
I've actually decided to give flickr some more of my time - there is still an active user base, but the head count is down on what it was.
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I've noticed a few of my Flickr friends have started posting again, but all now with free accounts - noone appears to be paying for Pro these days. I might see is I can kick somelife into someof the old groups I was in. Quite a few left for iPernity but don't seem to be less happy with that site than Flickr.
 
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