Mpix.com really “stands out” and offers a discount to blog readers

*** From now until June 30th, you’ll get 15% off your entire order when you enter the discount coupon code ronmart2 in your shopping cart ***

When I featured my last article on MPix.com when I got a metallic print framed, and I was thrilled with the results. This time, when I needed to get some prints to display in my wife’s obstetrician’s office I went back to Mpix.com without hesitation. I loved the results I got before, so this time I was a little more daring. I started out by trying their standout frame which is basically a picture glued to a thick foam core board. Here’s a view from the front, side and rear of the 8x12” standout printed on E-Surface paper with a lustre coating:

It was okay, but for $31.49 ($30 + $1.49 for lustre coating) I felt I’d rather spend a little extra money and get a frame. Fortunate, for this order I DID! Here’s the two frames I ordered:

 

Much better! For only $2.99 for the frame on the left, and $7.99 more for the frame on the right, I got an 8x12” frame with the same exact type of print in a custom frame shop quality frame with excellent quality glass. However, the results were outstanding – especially the black matted version which has been getting tons of great feedback from those who are seeing it in real life. I’m embarrassed to say how many times more I’ve spent for a similar product from my local frame shot (where I provided the photo), but let’s just say they won’t be seeing me again. Mpix.com’s frames prints are outstanding!

A Word about Shipping from MPix.com

If you are like me, your biggest fear for ordering frames through the mail is that you’ll get a damaged frame. Let me assure you that there’s no reason to worry. Mpix.com always ships these frames out FedEx overnight so it minimizes the transit time (and thus the likelihood of damage), PLUS they wrap these things enough drop so that they could be dropped from the roof of my house on to the concrete below and they’d survive unscathed. I’m serious. It takes about 10 minutes to open one of these frames because they put bubble wrap on all four corners, then they put a piece of oversized cardboard against the frame and shrink wrap it. This is placed in the gigantic bubble wrap in a huge box (you think your 8x12 is really a 16x24 when you see the box).

I keep forgetting to take a picture of how well these are done because I’m so excited when they come in, but believe me when I tell you that you are more likely to be struck by lightning than you are to get a damaged frame. In fact, I’d go so far to say that if you got a damaged frame it was because it was that way BEFORE it shipped – it’s really that good!.

Shipping all 3 of these frames overnight via FedEx cost me $10.75, which I felt was very reasonable. I’ve paid nearly that much sending just regular prints from other services. My total order was $115.75, which is less than I’ve ever paid for one framed print from my local frame shops, so I consider this to be a steal!

Discount

The last time I talked about MPix.com I worked very hard to get my readers a discount, but that isn’t something that they normally do so I could only get one for a short period of time (15 days to be exact). GIven the fact that this was during my Noise Reduction Roundup, most people just flat out missed the offer. Well, enough of you saw it that MPix.com felt it was worth it to offer another discount, but this time for twice the duration. From now until June 30th, you’ll get 15% off your entire order (or ANYTHING you want from MPix.com) when you enter the discount coupon code ronmart2 in your shopping cart. I encourage you to take advantage of this offer as I know you’ll be pleased with the results!

Top Photographers Interview: Stephen Eastwood

 

This past week I had the opportunity to exchange emails with Canon Explorer of Light, Stephen Eastwood. He is currently number 8 on My Favorite Photographers list and someone whose beauty photography represents what I would like to accomplish one day. This article contains a series of some of my favorite shots from Stephen’s portfolio as well as information I collected during our discussion. I hope you enjoy this peek into the world of one of the top beauty photographers out there right now.

Background

• Photography Specialty: Beauty
• Years Pro: 9
• Favorite Photographers: Alix Malka, Arnold Newman, Marino Parisoto, Warren Du Preez & Nick Thornton Jones. “They all shoot things differently than myself, and yet still consistently hold my fascination.”

 

Q&A

Do you have any advice for those getting started? (i.e., How to get discovered?)

“Networking, networking, networking. There is really no other good advice, get your work out there, be seen, send direct mailers, send your book out, send you site out, but before all that, make certain your work is within the level of quality that may actually fit the people you are sending it to and their requirements, if not, its an insulting waste of their time.”

Any advice about how to stay graceful under pressure? (i.e. photographing celebrities, for big advertisers, etc…)

“Never make it personal, its stress of a business day and pressure, its rarely personal, and even if it is, you getting upset [and] accomplish[ing] nothing but making you less able to deal and think and react as needed as efficiently as you could be.”

No favorite photo? Does that mean you are like a lot of photographers where you are hard on yourself in that search for the perfect photo?

Always, but more so that all the photo I use to represent myself usually have some meaning or reason for me to be using them.  Some commercial shots are not as interesting to me, but they are what the client wanted and my ability to consistently give that to them is of more value in maintaining my ability to continue to be a photographer, so that has meaning and value.

Do you use Photoshop? (If not, what?)

Yes. [Adobe Camera Raw (ACR)] for most conversions with the remaining falling to Bibble or [Canon Digital Photo Professional (DPP)].

Since you don’t use plug-ins, what Photoshop techniques or tricks do you find most useful?

Lots of layers, lots of adjustment layers, near every image needs different things, most can use a tad of contrast added since I convert a little flat to give me more headroom, there is no set formula at all. 

Here’s some of Stephen’s Favorite Web Sites:

• http://www.dpreview.com
• http://www.modelmayhem.com
• http://www.openphotographyforums.com

Stephen also has some great tutorials at http://www.StephenEastwood.com/tutorials

Gear

Stephen is a gear head’s idol. He’s got all of the coolest gear and he is very knowledgeable about some of the hottest stuff in the industry right now. In this section I get the skinny on some of the cool stuff that he uses. Here’s a partial list of what’s in Stephen’s bag: (more follows)

• Canon 1Ds Mark III
• Canon 5D Mark II (mostly for video)
• Canon Super Wide Angle EF 14mm f/2.8L II USM Lens
• Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM
• Canon EF 28-300mm f/3.5-5.6L IS USM Lens
• Canon EF 135mm f/2.0L USM Lens
• Canon EF 180mm f/3.5L Macro USM Lens
• Canon EF 200mm f/1.8 L USM Lens
• Canon 300mm f/4.0L IS USM Lens
• Canon 300mm f/2.8L IS USM Lens
• Canon EF 400mm f/2.8L IS USM Lens
• Canon EF 400mm f/4 DO (Diffractive Optics) IS USM Lens
• Canon 580EX II Speedlite TTL Shoe Mount Flash
• Vivitar 285HV Professional Auto Shoe Mount Flash

What gear do you shoot with (or recommend)?

Phase One backs, now a P65 on an H2 body, long glass, on the H2 the 300 most often, sometimes the 210 for when I need wider, and extension tubes. On the Canon I stick to 200-400 range most often, going as wide as 135, and that accounts for about 90% of what I do, the remaining 10% can be anything from 14mm up. For lights I use anything, but mainly prefer Broncolor (now versos) and speedotron blackline. I picked up some hensel porty packs to use so I could possible recommend them as a lower priced portable option on some DVD series and when asked. I have used lumedynes and continue to do so when I need lights in very small spaces as accent lights (heads in a lamp or sconce, strange and exotic locations where a normal head won’t fit) I use [B&W and Hoya] polarizer's and ND filters outdoors often. I also use a collection of speedlights, slaves, random strobes, vivitar 285hv's and all sorts of strange and one off or custom made lights from when I use to get bored and have all these things made or designed or retrofitted.

What Tripod Legs & Head do you prefer?

I don't, but for video I have  a Cartoni S422 C20S head and H601 legs and Sachtler. [These are] mainly used for the RED camera, on smaller format cameras like the Canon XHA1, XLH1, Sony EX1 you can use much, much less expensive setups. 

What do you carry your gear in?

Pelicans (review), and large (very large, Photoflex Transpacs and Kata gear cases usually).

NOTE: For those who aren’t familiar with Transpacs I’ve included a list of some on B&H here:

PhotoFlex Transpacs

• Transpac Digital Media Transport Case
• Transpac Multi Kit Case
• Transpac Single Kit Case with Wheels - for a Single Lighting Kit
• Transpac Dual Kit Case
• Transpac Outbound Bag - 47 x 8 x 9.5

What studio light gear & mods do you recommend?

Broncolor or Speedotron Blackline, maybe a Hensel Porty System with ringflash. Plus Kino's, LED's, Fiber Optics, and all the above. I use fresnels strobe and HMI and tungsten, most any and all softbox, stripbox, octobox has a grid on it, beautdish with grids, reflectors with grids, para's and octabanks, as well as umbrellas and softlighter II's

Any gear, book, etc… recommendations for the gear heads?

I think most all books I have looked through have a combination of good and bad, I myself prefer to look at fashion and advertising work in current print, in magazines, many European, and figure out what to take from what is being done in that work.

As for gear, Interfit makes a really cool reflector paney set, its like a lower priced feature packs sunbounce, its called the flex-lite 5 in one panel with a C-Stand and grip gear, or just the frame and panels and a smaller one.

What type of computer do you used to edit your photos?

PC's dual quad core systems currently.

Do you own a printer (if so, what kind) to print your own photos, or do you use a print service (which one)?

Commercial work goes to offset, [and] I have a Canon IPF9100 60 inch printer

With the rise in popularity of photographers doing video with the 5D Mark II, what camera stabilization system would you recommend?

Well, I personally like the indicam.com  but I hear the Merlin Steadicam works as well, you need an arm and vest otherwise its hard to have any real smooth footage.

Parting Thoughts

It was a real treat to get to talk to one of the industries leading beauty photographers and a Canon Explorer of Light. What I never expected to learn was just how much video is a part of his life as his photography is. What’s more, Stephen is a real gear guy so it was a blast to learn about a lot of cool gear I haven’t discovered yet. I’ve loaded up my wish list on B&H with all the cool gear he loves. Now I just need to win the lottery to so I can buy that list and live the dream life as a beauty photographer/videographer like Stephen Eastwood!

Click here to learn more about Stephen Eastwood in his own words, and stay tuned for more interviews from My Favorite Photographers list.

Professional Photography Web Hosting Roundup: Conclusion (6 of 6)–RETIRED

 

**** WARNING ****  **** WARNING ****  **** WARNING ****  **** WARNING ****

THIS ARTICLE HAS BECOME TOO OLD AND OUTDATED. I now use Zenfolio exclusively for my personal portfolio and http://ronmartinsen.com now only points to my Zenfolio site. Click here to read my Zenfolio review and learn why I feel it’s the best service available now.

**** WARNING **** **** WARNING **** **** WARNING **** **** WARNING ****

 

Through the end of May ‘09 when you mention this blog you can save $600 off the Unlimited Package and $300 off the Select Package when you sign up.

Extend your trial to 30 days

$75 off your setup fee - special code RMART

Discount: 20% off first year

After two months of evaluating the services featured in this series, I’ve reached my conclusion about which service is right for me. However, I encourage you to recognize that what is right for me may not necessarily be right for you. Read on to see what I recommend and how a different service might be just what you are looking for.

Article Recap

If you missed any of the articles in this series, I encourage you to go back and read them before you continue to read this article. Here’s a complete list of previous articles:

1. Professional Photography Web Hosting Roundup: Intro
2. liveBooks Review
3. FolioSnap Review
4. SiteWelder Review
5. Smugmug Review
6. Conclusion

Ron’s Opinion Of What Service Might Be Right For You

The cool thing about this series is that there’s no real loser, because all of these services are very good. There is something I really like about every one that I wish the other services offered, so you’re takeaway should be that you match your needs to the appropriate service that best suites those needs. With that in mind, here’s a quick rundown of each:

liveBooks – The Best in Presentation

If you want a site that looks like you are a world class photographer, then liveBooks will deliver on that. If you look at the sites of their top clients you see some unique and fantastic presentations, so I believe their design team is without equal. I also loved the level of control that editSuite offered as well as the way their thumbnails work. If you can afford it, I highly recommend liveBooks for a world class Internet presence. If I had the money to do it, I know I would. To help with the cost liveBooks has release a special offer through the end of May ‘09 - when you mention this blog you can save $600 off the Unlimited Package and $300 off the Select Package when you sign up.

 

FolioSnap – Fast Setup without Flash

Of the four sites I created, none was working faster than FolioSnap. I literally got it up and going in about 20 minutes. What’s more, it worked brilliantly with my iPhone using the same site design that non-mobile users would see. I liked that A LOT. If you are in a hurry to get your site online or you need a solution that avoids the use of flash, then I highly recommend FolioSnap. I encourage you to try it out and extend your trial to 30 days just by entering the promo code RONMART when you sign up.

SiteWelder – Excellent Template Layouts with a Can Do Attitude

Of the sites reviewed, nobody offered the volume of custom template layouts like SiteWelder. Once you choose your template layout you aren’t done because their “Can Do” attitude will serve you well to create a custom experience that goes beyond the initial template layout to create something unique from other SiteWelder users. I loved the fact that the template was only a starting point and that they were willing to make reasonable changes at no additional cost. In addition, they were the only site advertising that they would migrate your existing site from another service which could be useful for those stuck paying to much for their current solution. Get $75 off your setup fee when you use the special code RMART.

Smugmug Pro – The Value and Customization Leader with Best in Class Support

$59.95 to $149.95 per year for all of this??? – WOW! Smugmug Pro offers many features the others in this series haven’t even began to think about yet, and its customer support doesn’t seem to have the word “no” in its vocabulary. In addition, it offers access to its CSS which means you can do a tremendous amount of customization. However, the key word here is YOU. If you aren’t the type that can learn how to program for the web, then its Easy Customizer will give you nice results for local photographer work but not for the big leagues. It’s private gallery support is definitely the best – bar none – for wedding and portrait photographers, and if you don’t do your own printing then its shopping cart integration with third parties is the only game in town. Smugmug used to be compared to rival Zenfolio for general purpose to prosumer photo sharing, but its now in the big leagues and certainly competent enough for pro web hosting. Get a discount of 20% off first year when you use the coupon code SmugRon.

And the new hosting service for http://RonMartinsen.com is:

I chose Smugmug Pro because I’m comfortable doing web programming to tweak my site to get the exact results I want and because it offers a value that meets my current budget. I don’t do self-fulfillment, so the shopping carts integration with EzPrints and BayPhoto really met my order fulfillment needs. In addition, I love how quickly I can get my photos online and share them with clients. I wish it had a better thumbnail presentation like liveBooks, and I really wish it would take a cue from FolioSnap and do a non-Flash slideshow. However, Smugmug surprised me here and offered something that I never thought was possible at the beginning of this series.

Runner Up

I wish I could have gone through the entire design process and created a compelling site with liveBooks like a normal customer would do. I felt like this service offers a very professional presentation that results in a world class presentation, albeit for the highest cost in this series. It truly is the Porsche of professional photography web hosting services, so if you can afford it then I’m fairly confident you won’t be disappointed.

SEO Follow Up Article

As of May 16th, 2009 at 10:54 PM, the search results for the sites created in this article with the big three search engines were as follows:

Google.com	Live.com	Yahoo.com
SiteWelder Smugmug liveBooks – not found FolioSnap – not found	SiteWelder FolioSnap liveBooks – not found Smugmug – not found	No sites found

I continue to monitor this, and if the results change in a month I’ll be sure to post a follow up article that shows who is winning in search engine results. Right now it appears that SiteWelder is the big winner. This is something to consider when choosing your hosting service because your site is useless if nobody can find you!

UPDATE: Here’s the follow up article on SEO and Smugmug wins big again!

Thoughts from the Pros Follow Up

At the conclusion of this series I had hoped to include the opinions of some top photographers as to their thoughts of the sites created for this series. Unfortunately busy schedules precluded that from happening, so I will try to write a follow up article at some point should I get enough responses back. In the meantime, here’s what two pros had to say:

Scott Robinson

• Web Site Address: http://www.scottrobinsonphoto.com
• Years as Pro Photographer: 25
• Specialty: People on location for magazines and corporate clients
• Your Current Web Hosting Service: SiteWelder
• Your Favorite Site: http://ronmartinsen.com on Smugmug
• Your Least Favorite Site: http://www.ronmartinsen.com.temp.livebooks.com/ on liveBooks

Gary Parker

• Web Site Address: http://www.garyparker.com and http://catdogphotography.com
• Years as Pro Photographer: 30+
• Specialty: Dwarfism, Cats, Dogs, Kids, People & Advertising
• Your Current Web Hosting Service: SiteWelder
• Your Favorite Site: http://ronmartphoto.com on SiteWelder
• Your Least Favorite Site: http://ronmartinsen.com on Smugmug (but he still liked it and loved the click for large images feature)

FolioSnap Review Update

I’d like to issue an open apology to FolioSnap for an error I had made in my review. I had mistakenly said they only offered one layout when in fact they offer three. I had gone to the Choose Theme portion of their site when I was writing the review (late at night) and naturally only saw one layout.

Shopping Cart Experience

In my review I also trashed the shopping cart experience because it simply didn’t work. The Add to Cart and View Cart buttons didn’t show up, but after some debugging on behalf of Founder, Josh Rencher, it was discovered that I hadn’t set a title for my image. This is required to make this feature work (which I believe should be addressed from a usability standpoint), so my test site now works as expected:

After you add the item your cart it' will take you to PayPal just like SiteWelder does, and you’ll see a page like this:

In addition there were a couple other minor errors. I would encourage my readers to re-read the updated version at Professional Photography Web Hosting Roundup- FolioSnap.

FolioSnap has also added a special offer for my blog readers where you can extend its normal 15 day trial to 30 days just by entering the promo code RONMART when you sign up for a free trail. This service was the fastest to get up and going in this series with a nice professional look, so I encourage you to try it out for yourself!