March 5, 2009

Life As An Intern - Episode One

Hello Everyone. Thanks for tuning in to the first episode of Life As An Intern. I hope these posts can give you some insight into what it's like working with Anne and be full of helpful little tips. I will try to make them interesting as possible but even if I fail I hope they provide you with a little break from your workday :)

I have now enjoyed three weeks of being Anne's intern. First I want you to know Anne is actually even nicer and sweeter then she is online. I didn't think this was possible but I have learned it is. My first day she greeted me with cozy slippers and my very own apprentice. Those two things were even in the agreement I signed.

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My second day I had mentioned it was kind of cold working near the window and I joked I was going to bring mittens the next day. Well I arrived yesterday to find she had set up a space heater for me. It was very cute and thoughtful, and to my surprise actually did help a little.

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I've been doing a lot of little things and meeting wonderful people. Not many of things are directly related to photography but have still been enjoyable. I will share this one little nugget of gold Anne gave me...her blogger uploading secret. (Shhh, don't tell I told). Now many of you probably are incredibly smart and already know what I am going to share. But I had no idea it could be so easy so I want to share this with you in case someone has been struggling with this as well.

I'm a horrible blogger mostly because I hate the blogger picture upload tool. It takes forever and then puts the photos in opposite order then how you loaded them. If that wasn't frustrating enough then you have to move the photos around in the very tiny preview window. I found this very frustrating and so I often simply avoided blogging. But now I know an easier way...Flickr!! That's right, I said Flickr. I would have never in a million years thought to use Flickr in uploading to Blogger.

So here are your steps:

First you want to size your pictures correctly for your blog ( I believe Anne uses a format of 400x600) and of course place your watermark on them.

Then upload those images into your Flickr account.

Create a set for those groups of photos. I'm going to create a new set for each couple or event. That way when people like one photo they can very easily see other photos from the same event

Next you can create tags for your set. This really is the key. These tags are searchable by Google! My standard tags are going to be, wedding, engagement, city, state, venue. But you can also add in the location such as a beach wedding, or even the colors used. It's completely up to you, but try to use words that people will often search. Then under each individual photograph you can add a tag. I was thinking this would be great for adding in things like flower girl or wedding ring.

Under description it's good to at least put a link to your website. That way people can very easily find out how to contact you and see more of your work.

When you are viewing your photos in your photostream there is a little button that says "Share this". When you open the button it gives you four options for your photo, you want to embed it. This will give you a link for your photo. It is important to pull the text from this area instead of simply using the grab the link field. The text in the grab the link field is really only the link. When use the text in the embed field this holds much more searchable data. It holds your Flickr account name (business name) and also holds the name of the photo. 

Copy the text and simply paste it onto your preview window. Voila!! You now have a picture on your blog without having to use the blogger uploader tool!! You also have a picture that when people click on it brings you directly to your Flickr account. Then they can see even more pictures from this event, and others.  Pretty neat, huh?

I have tried to explain this as easily as I can, but if it is unclear to someone please feel free to send me an e-mail. katie@katebakerphotography.com

I hope you all have enjoyed this weeks episode and it has proven useful to you. Please tune in next week for a new episode. :)

10 comments:

  1. Anonymous12:35 AM

    very helpful flickr/blogging info! thanks! have fun!

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  2. Agree with the first comment - extremely helpful blog post! You should mark this as a favorite post and have it appear on the sidebar, because it contains really good, basic information about picture uploading!

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  3. Anonymous11:34 AM

    That was very helpful Katie! Thank you! I've been using the "regular" blogger upload since last summer, and it always takes a while to get my images ordered & sized properly. I think I'll try flickr! Thanks! =)

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  4. THANK YOU!!! Hmm, i wondered why the blogger uploader thing was being sooo stupid! Im gonna try it this way and *cross my fingers* it will work so much faster!

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  5. YEA!! I am so glad that everyone found this post helpful. That completely made my day :) Now go update your blogs!

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  6. Anonymous3:18 PM

    When I was using Blogger, flickr was the choice. Great idea putting up a how to. If I ever go back to blogger, I certain will remember this post.

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  7. Anonymous4:50 PM

    This is incredibly helpful!!! I usually don't have problems uploading my images, but it is always great to have another way to get googled and a trackback link to more work! Thanks so much!!!

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  8. Anonymous7:25 PM

    Katie, Thank you so much! I stopped blogging a few months ago for the exact same reason you mentioned. Now you have inspired me to start again using your method! Thank You!!
    Barbara

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  9. Anonymous9:59 PM

    Good job, Katie. Glad to see you enjoy the personal assistant. Don't let Anne kid you--the space heater needs to be about forty times bigger in that room. But what a view!

    anne's mom

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  10. Anonymous10:27 PM

    i never thought about tags to my photos thanks for the tip!

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