I haven't looked it over, but plan to start the free trial. I have been looking for something that is easy to setup, fully searchable, incorporates a cart without having a Bachelor's degree in Programming and is simple for customers to use.
This is pretty affordable and may fit the bill.
They don't offer complete custom interface customization yet, but it is coming soon.

http://www.zenfolio.com

Im debating on using them for clients galleries. I like how they are setup from what ive seen.

Interesting discussion. Is there a generally accepted "best" open source standard for this sort of thing for those with the programming skill to pull it off?

(i.e. has someone written some sort of addon to integrate something like gallery with an open source cart system?) or is there a purpose-made project out there on the webs? i've not looked into it yet... EDIT: i see gallery has a plugin for this now.)

i found this one for $195 http://www.pixaria.com/
it looks pretty good for the price. here's a nice description of it... http://www.allchorn.com/2008/02/14/gallery-vs-pixaria/

Back in November I looked into zenfolio and smugmug. zenfolio's customization capabilities have been in the works for quite some time now.

I eventually went with smugmug and am pretty happy.

Here is the thread I started back then http://www.newschoolofphotography.co...light=zenfolio

While smugmug requires programming thier forums are really great and they have some really helpful people that will give you pretty good instructions on what you need to do. Also, if you do decide to go smugmug let me know and I can give you my code to save $5 and of course I get some money in the bank too

A few of us here use smugmug and while not perfect I think it works pretty well.

Originally Posted by kensington

Back in November I looked into zenfolio and smugmug. zenfolio's customization capabilities have been in the works for quite some time now.

I eventually went with smugmug and am pretty happy.

Here is the thread I started back then http://www.newschoolofphotography.co...light=zenfolio

While smugmug requires programming thier forums are really great and they have some really helpful people that will give you pretty good instructions on what you need to do. Also, if you do decide to go smugmug let me know and I can give you my code to save $5 and of course I get some money in the bank too

A few of us here use smugmug and while not perfect I think it works pretty well.

Thanks for the tips everyone.

The issue I have with smugmug is - No Shopping cart. Maybe I am wrong? If they do, can it be set up so I just get an email stating what the customer wants so I can have WHCC do the printing? I don't want to use the service smugmug has, if they have one.
Having a customer email me the print they want is not acceptable for me.
I want add to cart features that make the print buying experience easy and enjoyable.

^ Shawn, my gallery2 does exactly that... Someone orders, they pay via paypal (where they can just use a CC if they don't have an account) and then I get an email that says Betty Sue Orders an 11x14 of img_1234 and that I should ship it to xyz address.

See if you can track down the cart plugin on the gallery2 site. That's the only thing I had an issue finding. I can see if I can find it if I have time tomorrow but it's unlikely. If you need help with installing it I can walk you through it. The instructions that come with it are pretty easy to follow for the gallery itself though. It's a basic FTP affair with a DB.

Thank Ben,
I downloaded the files for Gallery2. The weird thing is I couldn't find the gallery2-preinstaller-1.0.zip file in that download.

1. Download the Gallery 2 Pre-Installer to your computer. Get it here
2. Extract the gallery2-preinstaller-1.0.zip file.

OOOOPS, I found it.

Ok, I am going through the motions on my site right now.

I feel stupid, i can't get connected to the MySQL database I created.

EDIT - Got it figured out, had to use the database wizard to set permissions for the DB user account.

how's it going? Still OK?

they definitely have a shopping cart, as far as customization I am unsure of what those capabilities are but if you check here http://dgrin.com/forumdisplay.php?f=31 or here http://dgrin.com/forumdisplay.php?f=35 you may need a Pro account.

Originally Posted by jacobsen1

how's it going? Still OK?

I got everything on there. I didn't understand how they wanted me to secure the Galler2 folder. Looked like they wanted me to run a command from a command line. No clue how to do that.

However, I was to the point where I could start uploading images and customizing.
But, now I keep getting
500 Server Error

A misconfiguration on the server caused a hiccup. Check the server logs, fix the problem, then try again

I am done for tonight. Will have to resume tomorrow night.

Thanks for the help guys.

hmmm, that's weird.

and do you have ftp access to the directory?

You can probably do the command line stuff through your webhost control panel if you have cpanel or something similar. poke around in there for command line and follow the instructions closely on where to apply the chmod command.

You will need to navigate to the directory where your gallery install is located. you have to know like 3 commands and then you're done.

pwd = print working directory. this shows you where you are.
ls -al = show the contents of the directory with some details.
cd directoryname - changes to that directory. do ls -al again to see the contents.
cd .. goes back a directory (thats cd dot dot)

assuming now you see the dir you need to fix, you will enter your command

chmod xxx directoryname (xxx being the 3 numbers they tell you to enter, probably 744)

now do the ls -al to show the dir contents. You should see the permisssions changed from drwx rwx rwx to something like drwx r-- r-- which means you're locked down now.

Don't know if that helps or not. after you finish that biz if you're still getting the error, check with your webhost cause sometimes a 500 error can be a server configuration problem on their end.

^ see all that right there? Yeah, that's why I do FTP installs...

I'm using:

Code:

Gallery2 Core 	1.2.0.4
Checkout 	0.1.14
Checkout by Paypal 	0.1.9

Originally Posted by jacobsen1

I'm using:

Code:

Gallery2 Core     1.2.0.4
Checkout     0.1.14
Checkout by Paypal     0.1.9

I found the paypal checkout module, but can't even find the existing checkout folder on my Gallery2 install that they want me to replace.

Any ideas Ben?

Originally Posted by QJ

*bump* for Zenfolio. Anybody currently using it and do you like it?

I use Zenfolio, been using them since February. I like them a lot; you get unlimited uploads and very easy to set up; it was very easy pointing my page to my own domain and haven't had any issues with my site working. I've been trying out the $40.00 per year, but I am going to the $100.00 per year (which is prorated BTW)so that I can create my own pricing and using my own company logo, instead of have Zenfolio's logo on my page.

Anybody interested in trying them out you can use this referral code for $5.00 off. ZTS-EZP-55Y You can click the link to my site on my signature below.

I gotta be honest Shawn, I think Ben's gallery2 with paypal serves exactly the purpose you're looking for and would be ulitmately free, just take a bit of time to really figure out.

edit: wow this thread is actually pretty old.

So is Zenfolio really for people who are selling their work? I like the look of it and all, but is my flickr good enough for now? I guess I need to justify spending any $ on a frivolous service if I am not selling my work...

Look at Photoshelter.com

Their services are top notch and they are driven to provide support to photographers.

another alternative http://www.viewbook.com/

I use a paypal button that I built by filling out a form on the paypal site...client clicks the buy image, selects size and matting option, fills in the filename/title if the print they want, and then I get an email with the print and address. plugs in via HTML.

As mentioned in one of the earlier posts in this thread Smugmug is my site of choice, even more so 2 years later. Here is a recent Smugmug thread SmugMug... is it time? Discount code in my signature, save you some $

i used zenfolio the last 2 years i think. i loved them. since switching to new hosting and installing gallery3, i've decided to host everything myself. i will say zenfolio did make things easy. easy to order directly from mpix, easy to upload (better than gallery3 anyway).

I heard about zenfolio but don't join there! I'll join there later, It's still in my watching list!!!

So assuming that I take the plunge and sign up for one of these sites, how do I forward traffic from my domain at godaddy?

zenfolio makes it easy with their $40/yr and up plans. you get to select a custom domain (whatever it is from godaddy).

Originally Posted by Lonnie Utah

how do I forward traffic from my domain at godaddy?

I would assume what Eric said above is so it SHOWS your domain on your site there, but on your host you should have a CP you can log into and somewhere in there I'd bet there's a domain section with forwarding (there is with both 1and1 and hostgator).

I am thinking about paying for Zenfolio too. To anyone who has sold prints there, is the commission worth the sales on the regular plan, or should I go premium? I am just starting, but I have had requests for photos and I want to get this thing up and running for the holidays...

Originally Posted by Lonnie Utah

So assuming that I take the plunge and sign up for one of these sites, how do I forward traffic from my domain at godaddy?

You point the domain CNAME at the Zenfolio site you are using, then it forwards to the Zenfolio site, but uses your domain name.

Looking further, I think godaddy makes domain fwding pretty easy. Right now, just as a test, I have my domain redirecting to my blog site. Seems to be pretty seamless....

http://www.landshapephotography.com

Think I'm going to set up the free trail, and go from there.

So if I decide I like things and sign up to pay, do I have to pay the $100/year upfront or is it on monthly installments?

I need to upload a ton more pics, and sort a few more things out, but the demo site is working...

http://www.landshapephotography.com/

you pay upfront. i did the $40/yr plan. if i was selling, through the site, i would have paid the $100.

Originally Posted by case sensitive

you pay upfront. i did the $40/yr plan. if i was selling, through the site, i would have paid the $100.

Eh. Not the answer I wanted to hear, but 1). It's what I figured, 2). Won't break me up too bad. Thx 4the411.

you like orange don't you...

IBlookatalltherocksinutah....

Originally Posted by Lonnie Utah

So if I decide I like things and sign up to pay, do I have to pay the $100/year upfront or is it on monthly installments?

I need to upload a ton more pics, and sort a few more things out, but the demo site is working...

http://www.landshapephotography.com/

I saw your Huge copyright watermark and closed the browser window immediately. Are you worried about people stealing your web res images? It makes for a real bummer of an experience on your site.
Other than that it was looking good.

Originally Posted by thomps6s

I saw your Huge copyright watermark and closed the browser window immediately. Are you worried about people stealing your web res images? It makes for a real bummer of an experience on your site.
Other than that it was looking good.

Lol. That's the site default. I'm going to change the watermark to something less intrusive, I just haven't had time to do it yet. I should most likely just remove it for the time being as I'm not getting that much traffic anyway... Edit: I killed it for now...

What do you guys do about sell cropped sized prints? Most of my images are in 4x6 dimensions, and that doesn't always jive that well with std printing sizes (8x10, 11x14, 16x20, etc) Do you upload other images or just let folks crop them for themselves?

Thanks for stopping by, as I said I'm just trying to get it figured all out. Finding out I have lots of work to do. I have to get a tax id #, rework a bunch of images, resize a bunch of images, upload a bunch of images, all before I head back to NC on Sat. Oh, and the wife informed me I had to bath the dog(s) and get a haircut too!

I print in native sizes 99% of the time, i.e. 4x6, 8x12, 12x18, 16x24, 20x30, 24x36

If someone wants a "standard" size, I will crop an image for them if it permits cropping. I will show them what it will look like cropped first.

Originally Posted by jacobsen1

you like orange don't you...

Dem iz Sony colors Ben!