Online Hosting - Personal Pics and "Professional" Pics?

[FotoPhocus]

I've got accounts on Flickr, Picasa, and Smugmug. I'm trying to decide which pictures should go where. I'm leaning towards doing the following:

Putting lower-res (1600px wide) family pictures and my photography work on Picasa. This link would then be given to family and friends. My thinking here is that they would mostly just be interested in viewing on the web. If they wanted prints, they would most likely be talking to me directly anyway.

Then, putting the full resolution of my photography work on Smugmug (locked down so nobody can download the full res, of course). The reason I'm leaning towards separate hosting is so I have a "professional" link I can give out to anyone, without worry of them getting to peruse my family photos. I know I could host it all on Smugmug and password protect galleries, but most of my family would be unlikely to remember a password. They just want to bookmark something and check it from time to time.

What are your thoughts? Picasa low-res for family pics, and Smugmug for pro pics?

 

[mrkahuna]

You can have "unlisted" galleries on Smugmug that won't show up in the public views. They don't need a password to get access which is the same thing you're doing on Picasa. Here's the help page on Smugmug that explains it. The password-protection on Smugmug is another feature on top of unlisted. Sharegroups also seems like a nice way to share a group of galleries.

I also have Picasa and am on the trial of Smugmug. It feels like trying to maintain photos in both places would just be more work for me so I'm going to pick one (probably Smugmug).

 

[FotoPhocus]

You can have "unlisted" galleries on Smugmug that won't show up in the public views. They don't need a password to get access which is the same thing you're doing on Picasa. Here's the help page on Smugmug that explains it. The password-protection on Smugmug is another feature on top of unlisted. Sharegroups also seems like a nice way to share a group of galleries.

I also have Picasa and am on the trial of Smugmug. It feels like trying to maintain photos in both places would just be more work for me so I'm going to pick one (probably Smugmug).

Cool, thanks for the reply. I'm on the trial of Smugmug as well.

Anyone know how long they'll keep my photos after my trial runs out? I probably won't pay for Smugmug until a few weeks from now.

 

[FotoPhocus]

Actually, the more I think about it, having "unlisted" galleries doesn't help much, as I'd have to give family members new links every time I add a new gallery.

Or can I have an unlisted gallery that I give a link to, with subgalleries inside? So my mother-in-law could bookmark the URL to the unlisted gallery, and see new subgalleries as I add them?

Edit: I just read up more on Sharegroups, looks like a great solution to my problem. Thanks!

 

[LindaZ]

I'm using Picasa for family and Zenfolio for client work (sort of like Smugmug) , works great.

 

[FotoPhocus]

I'm almost sold on Smugmug, but the Sharegroups doesn't quite do it for me.

Undoubtably, someone from my family will click the link to get back out to the top of my gallery, at which point they can't access the galleries from the galleries section at the bottom of the page. They would have to exit out and use the Sharegroup link again.

So far I'm not seeing the benefit of Smugmug over Flickr (unless I pay $150/yr to be able to sell prints through them). Am I missing something, or is there another service that can do what I'm looking for?

Or -- is there a reason to keep my family pics separate from my "pro" photography, or am I being paranoid?