After much hard-work and many late nights, the new portfolio is now live. Here’s how I got there.

Must-haves

The list of must-haves I wrote for myself included:

• Ability to elegantly showcase portfolio of best work
• Stock photography sales with fotoQuote ease of pricing and allowance for pounds sterling via PayPal
• Multi security methods for offering different access levels
• Fully customisable templating structure
• Good bandwidth and storage allowance (35GB +), allowing me to utilise as an online archive for safekeeping/backup of all my work
• Fairly priced

I spent some time looking into a number of online packages, which included toying with the possibility of installing and configuring the new beta of Gallery3 on my server.

Options I looked at

• Gallery3 install on my own server: great reconfigurability and essentially free, but high storage space costs unless running a standalone server (but then there’s the effort of server maintenance and I don’t have time for that).

• Zenfolio: slick interface and well priced, but no true template customisation (I want to have full control over the way everything looks). Also, don’t like the way you price photos for sale. Can see it’s a great option for someone who wants simple ease of configuration, but I’m a developer and don’t mind getting my hands dirty in this respect.

• SmugMug: looks quite nice, but falls at the first hurdle in that I can’t sell in pounds sterling (although I guess this may change).

• Photoshelter: initially looks fairly expensive. But, once you delve deeper a wealth of features become apparent. Take a look here.

• Redbubble: looks quite good, but get the feeling it’s slightly too diverse in its intended application — I’m a photographer and want something dedicated to professional photography sales.

The customisation and fotoQuote facility of Photoshelter sealed the deal for me.

Onto the set-up. Getting things configured was straightforward, helped by the video and written tutorials available. The interface is slick and streamline and the process for setting up a seller’s account was painless. The part that took some time (went as far as a 4am-er last weekend) was the customisation, not because Photoshelter makes it tricky, but because it took me time to decide exactly how I wanted things to look and function.

So, I’ve now got myself a lovely little SEO friendly platform from which to showcase my best work, sell stock photography and share private galleries with family and friends. It’s a joy to use and, to put the icing on the cake, the Photoshelter desktop uploader (I use Mac OS X 10.5) hasn’t let me down once; something I haven’t experienced from other such software.

Price per month comes in at around £18 for a ‘Standard’ membership, which, once you’ve taken storage and comprehensive feature set into consideration, isn’t too bad. After all, this is a professional application, so you should be able to recoup your outlay through sales.

Just got to find time to upload rather a few GBs of photographs now!

My ‘Tim Jameson Photography’ portfolio is here.

I’ve always enjoyed running and biking, both to keep fit and as a way of relaxing. But, after time-out, it always takes a few weeks to build fitness to a level where training transitions from a difficult slog to becoming enjoyable and fun. Once fitness reaches a certain level I don’t have too much trouble staying motivated, except for early mornings, which can be a killer when working late in the evenings.

Having said this, I’m always looking for ways to further boost my motivation and maintain consistency…

I find it helpful to record routes and progression of fitness level. I use a Garmin Forerunner 305 for this (highly recommended). It helps me stay in tune with the condition of my body and assists in preventing injury from over training etc. In the past I’ve always kept a long-hand training log, but this can be tiresome to maintain. As a result, I’ve recently been on the lookout for some decent software, to directly integrate with the GPS capability of the Forerunner and help me stay motivated. Must haves are:

• Route mapping with distance and way point capability
• Heart rate and training zone mapping (graphical if possible)
• Calorie expenditure
• Min/mile recording (average and at specific points)

A lot of software is either too simple, too complex or PC-only. Examples I’ve tried include the Garmin Training Center (not enough features), SportTracks (PC-only and don’t like the export options) and MotionBased (web based and too complex/involved for my needs). I’d almost given up finding something to fit the bill, but then discovered TrailRunner.

TrailRunner is OS X based with a very sleek interface. It is compatible with a number of devices, including the Forerunner 305 (via LoadMyTracks), iPod and iPhone. It’s primarily billed as route planning software, but includes a nice feature called My Diary. Import your GPS and other info and you can populate the diary with all the must-haves from the list I made above. It shows a graphic of your three training zones and maps your runs within these zones, to show whether you’re meeting your targets. It’s packed full of features, but is simple and straightforward to use. You can also copy and paste information as comma-delimited values, which is a real boon to the way I like to work.

Perhaps the thing I like most is the fact that you can publish your diary to a web page, via an integral FTP client. This, for me, is another way to stay motivated as I can track my progress as the days and weeks progress and compare seasonal values etc.

If you have a GPS device that you use for running, I’d definitely recommend TrailRunner as worth a try.

You can view my TrailRunner diary here.

I’m forever seeking the most efficient ways of Getting Things Done (GTD). The concept has received a lot of interest amongst various communities, with many companies cashing-in on the concept. 43 Folders is a site I visit quite regularly, offering hints and tips on how to become more productive. There’s a plethora of software available to help you achieve the sweet-spot of task management and I think I’ve tried most of them.

One thing I’ve found is that it’s easy to invest time in organising time, but it’s more difficult to actually put your head down and press on with the graft of getting the work itself completed (and to schedule). Arranging software preferences can actually be fun (if you’re that way inclined), but the business of real hard work is less attractive.

In recent months, the closest I’ve come to finding the ‘perfect’ solution (BTW I’m a Mac user) is OmniFocus. But still, it’s never quite hit the aforementioned sweet-spot of enabling a definite improvement in productivity, particularly since the advent of the iPhone. Roll-up Cultured Code’s Things.

Things takes things to a new level. For one, it integrates the desktop with the iPhone. Two, it has a beautiful and intuitive interface. Three, it isn’t prescriptive about the way you should use it – there are so many workflows. I could write a long review of each here, but that’s already been done. Watch Cultured Code’s screencast here.

I admit that the desktop version may seem expensive, but the fact that the Cultured Code team are ever improving the software (and remain very in touch with their users) is a major boon. The only thing that’s sorely missing at the moment is MobileMe integration, but we’ve been promised that this is on the way.

Give it a try?