Finally found Flicker

After nearly a year of poking and prodding I finally got around to creating a Flickr account. (Keep trying MySpace friends.) As is usually the case in these situations, my fears proved unfounded. Flickr is a wonderful service. The layout is clean, the menus are intuitive and little touches like pulling captions out of Photoshop’s file info and simple copyright protections are a testament to how well thought out the service is.

The fear of going onto Flickr touches on many photographers fear of having their work be seen. This makes no sense whatsoever given the public nature of photography. In photojournalism especially, the purpose of the photographs we take are to been consumed by the public eye. Yet the fear of rejection persists. It’s a tough business and rejection comes with the terrain. We must recognize this and face it head on. Keep your head up and do what it is that you. Do it well and success will come.

Another major fear for some student photographers from showcasing their work online is the fear of having their work stolen. Flickr protections are pretty good and if you upload at a pixel count in the low hundreds even screen captures shouldn’t be an issue. Given that, realistically the odds of someone going to the trouble to steal from an unknown are slim. Rather, one of the benefits of Flickr is its ability to give even the lowliest of photographers a public showcase for their work. Editors and potential clients can find your work at anytime and strangers stopping by may help spread your name on word of mouth. It’s akin to an unsigned garage band releasing free MP3s on their website. The goal being to build an audience and keep them coming back in hopes of bigger things down the road.

Also a word of advice, reduce the quality to five and 72dpi, there’s not much bandwidth for uploads. In a completely unrelated note, new pictures will be online in January.


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