Developing webpages for photographers

[aniMal]

My current occupation is in web-development. I am in the process of setting up a team, and we are working with implementing good visual design on an open source platform.

Today I got a request about making a top-notch site for a photographer, and this entails not just visual design, but also designing a really good system to run the pages.

I am starting this thread as part of the development process, as I know that we will be needing lots of hints and tips from other photographers as well.

The main specs are the following:

- templates/layout of the site will be 100% customizable, and it will then also be possible to implement this system on existing designs.

- there will be different modes of showing galleries, lightbox-style for the most part. Styling of frames will be easy.

- the site will have closed areas for different customers, as an example it should be possible to give buyers access to downloading high rez pictures.

- the closed areas will have a possibility of having paying customers. It will also be possible to make a webshop where customers pay directly.

- it will be possible to publish breaking news with just uploading pictures including EXIF to a folder with ftp. This will also be possible to link with RSS.

- video and sound will be possible to publish in the galleries.

- there will possibly be a plug-in if photographers wish to have a local disk connected to the site, so that trusted customers will be able to access photos in full rez without having to upload all to a server. This depends on security issues, and will probably not be amongst the first modules to be developed.

- it will be possible to choose different modes of resizing pictures on the fly. Possibly this will take the form of having a script locally that processes the chosen folders and then publishes this on the net.

- it will be modular, and we will continue to develop plug-ins and solutions that are innovative and effective for busy photographers that want to or is using the web as a working tool.

We will be having a phase where we collect the specifications, and we will then set up a testing server. We will then need a limited number of beta testers, before it is launched.

I expect the full process to last for at least 6 months, but the testing server will be up probably during the next 2 months. It all depends on what platform we choose.

I would be happy to offer everybody who contributes actively here with a lower fee for the finished product, and will be coming back with details regarding pricing when the initial planning stage is finished.

 

[aniMal]

Thats really interesting! I am currently reading up in Ruby on Rails...

I realize that most of this will be standard packages, but it will be new to the photographer that is ordering the first installation. Also I would like to have absolute control of the visuals, that is often a brute job in CSS.

My knowledge is mostly in the php/joomla-world so far, and it would all be pretty standard as you say. Still it would be lots of work of course. Would it be possible to get this kickstarted on RoR with combining existing projects/applications? My understanding is that it is really worth getting into, and I think that it might just become really big in a few years...

As for the local server thing, that might be hard. It could well turn into something different, like a simple scripts that uploads chosen folders to a remote server. Although the traffic load will be high - the photographers at my studio (I am renting out to 8 others) often spend a long time getting things delivered somehow...