Steam & Excursion > Where do you post your photos?

I was viewing Chris Fussell's excellent series of photos of the 4449 Daylight at Sherwood
and was wondering how I might have come across them outside of Trainorders.com. Maybe
I would have come across them independently at the 4449 site, maybe not.

Where do you post your photos and what is your reason for choosing that site?

I post 90% of my photos on Trainorders and Railpictures.net.

Trainorders, as it is my favorite daily visited site.
I feel welcome here, met many friends and I post many of my best shots here first, but also shots
of interest to others here, news photos, abstract - and discriminately, humorous and
entertaining shots.

Railpictures.net - I wanted to see just how bad the screeners were after hearing
comments on several other sites. If anything, I think too many get accepted, a few of mine shouldn't
have, though I had a few I can't figure why not. Regardless, I felt it was a well known and popular
place to have a "public portfolio" available to all, from anywhere, without a membership. I think
the quality is there once you zip through the wedgies - a quick search through People's Choice or
thier Editor /Screener's choice saves you the hassle. There are also some well known "good people"
over there, many from TO as well.

I view many other quality sites and hope to have my own one day but there is only so much time in
a given day.

How about the rest of you? RR Archives? RR Forums? RPN? Your own page or blog? Magazine page?

/Mitch

My feelings are very much like Mitch's. I do send some in to RailPictures, but as you say they often seem to pass on good shots and accept some that surprised me.

There is a good variety that turn up here on T.O.

Some days I don't get the time to post my stuff here before folks seem to lose interest. Meaning that I don't have them up within a day of the occurrence.

Soundman out

I post to Railpictures.net and RRpicturearchives.net, generally I only post photos on this site if they are newsworthy or there has been discussion about the subject. I like Railpictures because of the format of the site, just how it looks and works in general, and how you can search by locomotive number, train symbol, location, and by a multitude of different categories very easily. Although, some standardization of the data would be a little more helpful (such as DRGW vs. D&RGW, for example... and amperstands seem to totally freak out the search function). It also seems to be the most visited (my photos on that site have more views). I also like the detailed photo stats, for example, how you can see if one of your photos has been linked to on another site; mine have wound up in some interesting places, such as a Dutch model railroad forum.

I began posting to RRpicturearchives.net as a place to put on my Railpictures rejects. I still do that but I also tend to break up similar images of the same train or from the same location between the two sites so there is an even balance on both. I also post more of my roster shots on RRpicturearchives, and the Railpictures screeners often reject my artsy stuff so it ends up there too.

-John

Most of mine get posted only to my own sites (www.drgw.net / www.iaisrailfans.org / www.railarc.org). Even then it's a small fraction of what I shoot (or, for that matter, even a small fraction of the good stuff I shoot). RailARC was built as a container for everything I shot, so that it could be searched easily. Unfortunately, it requires a good number of hours to prepare submissions, so I think I'm about four years and 80000 frames behind... When applicable, I'll put up the occasional photo on some of the various boards I read - TO, railroadforums.com, the Goat, the Narrow Gauge Discussion Forum, the Atlas boards, etc. Every now and then, before we lost Rob, a few used to make it on the Altamont Press newsline.

I don't submit to either of the big picture sites. I have a few that I've uploaded on each to test the waters, but that's it. For railpictures.net, it's largely because of their hideously annoying ads and because their goals differ significantly from mine (what's pretty vs. what's historically interesting but maybe poorly lit). There are a good number of my D&RGW pictures on rrpicturearchives.net, appropriately credited to me, that somebody else has been kind enough to upload. That's perfectly okay under my standard terms of use on my website (reposting elsewhere for non-commercial use, as long as I'm credited), so I'm glad they've done it - it's saved me a lot of time and gotten my work more exposure.

Nathan
http://www.drgw.net

Given the number You Pee lovers and apologists on TO I am seriously considering no longer posting on here but I have not decided on an alternate forum. I would like to construct my own website but do not have the technical knowledge to do so.

drew1946 Wrote:
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> Given the number You Pee lovers and apologists on
> TO I am seriously considering no longer posting on
> here but I have not decided on an alternate forum.
> I would like to construct my own website but do
> not have the technical knowledge to do so.

Drew,
There's many wysiwyg web editor's out there, some are free and some are not. The What You See I What You Get editors are pretty much drag and drop your pictures and text. You might want to try some out. Here's one that has worked for several people I know.
Home Page
http://www.nvu.com/index.php
How to build your Website.
http://www.nvu.com/websitehelp.php

Hope this helps. I started HTML coding using the old Netscape Communicator and learned some stuff from it but has been many moons ago.

jd

Mitch, I put a few of mine from each trip on my own website, at http://www.pioneer.net/~fitzrr and always put some on Trainboard and Trainorders. Drew, it's easy to create your own site. Heck, I'm older than you and did it.

Drew, it's really easy. In my case my ISP had some canned programs I could use. Check out http://home.att.net/~trainphotos/wsb/html/view.cgi-home.html-.html. Basically all I had to do is scan some pix, upload them to a canned site, and add a bit of text. I'm even older then you are, a computer idiot, but occasionally can learn to follow directions (my wife might dispute that). Check with your ISP, or if necessary find a new one.

John

drew1946 Wrote:
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> Given the number You Pee lovers and apologists on
> TO I am seriously considering no longer posting on
> here but I have not decided on an alternate forum.
> I would like to construct my own website but do
> not have the technical knowledge to do so.


You've got to be kidding.. Is Trainorders.com not a good site if it's not full of hatred of everything UP?

CTCFailure Wrote:
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> You've got to be kidding.. Is Trainorders.com
> not a good site if it's not full of hatred of
> everything UP?

As far as posting photos - what's to not like about UP?
Heck, start another thread to answer this but what's not to
like about UP at all - unless maybe you're a disgruntled employee.
3985, 844, E9's, Heritage Units and a flashy paintscheme that
isn't horrific orange but still more colorful then NS and CSX.
(Give or take the dirty units...)

Keep 'em comming.


I've seen lots of TO subscribers posting at other locations -
where are the rest of us posting? And why?

Jim, a personal site is nice, and again, when I find the time and
know how, I'll be there. If you can not share your photos, what
is the point and consequently - wouldn't you want to share your
photos with the largest audience or perhaps an audience which most
appreciates your "personal vision"? So let's hear the locations!

I used to post on the AOL message boards quite a bit(pre-2000), then I got rid of it since it was not worth the money AOL was charging. While exploring the internet, I searched for all kinds of discussion forums because this was how I met many other 'railfans' and 'railroaders', plus the boards are a great source of information.

A few seemed good, and I remember coming across Trainorders in the early years when the format and text layout looked like a forum from the cavemen ages. This had me continuing the search without giving Trainorders a second thought, I think primarily because of the lack of graphics I was used to seeing (typical consumer response, searching for the best appearance, overlooking quality).

I still hadn't found my place on the internet, and was bouncing back and forth between boards like All_Aboard @ Yahoo, coming across this one once in a while. Finally I signed up to reply to "Kimura" about the P42 #116 coming back from the dead after it's collision in Black Butte, CA. During this time, I was in transition between playing with model trains and the big toys, plus I was finding a great wealth of "credible" information here vs other sites. (I think after these years, it's clear where this transition ended.)

Had posted a few about the models, but I found my photo coverage of unique Amtrak trains and other specials at Portland Union Station as viewed from my apartment valuable to others. That's the only reason why I'm here, because I feel that my posts contribute to the rail community, and others do as well. I like the easy-to-use layout, the lack of graphics that make reading posts easier, and no competition. I detest the rating systems because I feel they have no merit, kind of like "oooh, I got a 10, and you got a 9! This clearly means my photo is better than your photo!". (Yes, I posted a collection of photos at RP.net, and been meaning to tell the mods to delete my photos and account for a number of reasons.)

Here, a person's reply is not only a valid rating itself, but also helpful in corrections, feedback, and shows appreciation. Another good thing here is the variety of posts, you never know what you'll learn about or see every time you log in. No flashing banners or pop-ups is a big factor, I'm here to read and learn, to post and see, and having those distractions is like being at a theatre performance with a brat sitting next to you, demanding for your attention to look at some comic books (or something).

Anyway, slowly stepping off the soapbox... I post here because many have expressed gratitude for the information and "hot off the memory card" photos that allows everybody to see what's happening in town. I like the detailed coverage of certain trains in the Bay Area, SoCal, and the east coast. I also like those who post ASAP as their trip goes on, it's kind of a weird feeling to see photos of passengers or even crew on freight, knowing that they're still there ridin' along, unknowing that somebody half-way around the globe is watching.

I'm with F40PHR231.

There have been a lot of high quality photos posted here, but in addition, this is also the place to come for news and event-related photos. Witness the Amtrak Starlight run down the Valley last fall. I was at work on that Sunday, but was able to keep up through postings and photos.

I value that highly.

I don't take the UP bashing/supporting one way or the other. Take it or leave it. After all, I don't have to read the post. But on the other hand, maybe I'll pick up a tidbit of valuable information.

Not to mention the Electronics discussion, and video/audio. I came across an answer to a Uniden scanner question I had, without even posting the question. And it was very illuminating to view recent videos posted from the U.K.

I've been to the other websites, and indeed there are nice photos out there to be found. But nothing quite does it in the way TO does.

I'll agree with you both - I was transplanted onto Trainorders from Eastern Railnews - a former great site for news, especially at the time, Conrail Office Car Specials. News like what was posted at ERN is getting harder to come by in such a timely matter. TO's is close, but alternate sources are helpful as some news appears elsewhere first.

I first posted shots at Compuserve! Some of those photos are still preserved, though I forget where on the Web they ended up.

Chris, why have RP.Net remove your photos? I find myself viewing them to this day. AI agree their "rating system" is far from an accurate reflection of what is generally percieved as top quality - derailments, time of submission and so forth, but it's still a quick way to share with a large following your portfollio of shots.

Mgoldman Wrote:
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> Chris, why have RP.Net remove your photos?

Number one reason is it's not compatible with FireFox browser (mine anyway), and I don't feel like digging I.E. up solely for RP.net. Two is, I've discovered a number of my photos "stolen" from RP.net elsewhere, and still get emails from overseas asking for hi-res formats. Getting a little tired of the photo-theft, so I'd like to have them removed. (Photos had been robbed from the 4449 site, so as a result I'm reconfiguring the galleries into Flash format, resizing the images to 400x300.)

I know one can't prevent all theft, but at least they won't be high-enough resolution for further uses. As for Trainorders, you've got to be a paid member to see large-size pictures, so I'm a little more comfortable with posting pictures here.

F40PHR231 Wrote:
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> Two is,
> I've discovered a number of my photos "stolen"
> from RP.net elsewhere, and still get emails from
> overseas asking for hi-res formats.

I can assume my photos are being both "borrowed" and
stolen but it hasn't hit me in the face - outside
of reposting online, I do not have a big problem as
long as I am credited. On the other hand, I found it
rather satisfying regarding the many requests for
purchases and even a few requests for professional
publishing - I need to figure a price schedule as
initially (started posting in April '06) I've been
rather generous but at the same time aware of the
sliding scale as this effects to a degree the value
of profeesional photos being offered by others.

I sometimes put my initials or name in a photo but in
a color and font that would require a really good eye.

If I had a following such as Robert Morris, I think at
that point, I'd be content to move everything over to
a personal site. Working my way there, I suppose.