You can even get rid of some of the smugmug branding through customization. I haven't done much on my site, but ... like you ... the "powered by smugmug" bugged me. So check out my site: //www.dterryphotography.com/
The title bar doesn't mention smugmug (well, it does briefly until the javascript fixes it). And then as you navigate around my site, the title bar actually tells you where you are (what folder you are in). Again, smugmug flashes briefly ... but it doesn't stay there.
Would I like a smugmug sponsored fix rather than javascript? Sure. But I'll take this solution for now. :-)
Correctly keywording your site will help you rank higher in search engines like google. For instance, the alternate text for the photo on your home page is "undefined". If you add an ALT tag with some helpful keywords (see below) it would help improve your search engine rank. Smugmug gives you lots of ways to add keywords for photos and galleries.
width="625" height="500"
alt="Fashion, artistic, and senior portraits at David Nusbaum Photography">
You say that you're frustrated with the "standard navigation" on smugmug sites. What would you prefer to see? The site you have now isn't much different from a lot of smugmug sites that I've seen. You have a single photo on the home page that links to a page of galleries. The galleries have slideshows instead of individual photos. You could do all of that with a smugmug account. And you can do it without loosing all of the other functionality that comes with an account. I can create a new gallery for a customer and upload hundreds of photos with just a few mouse clicks. Then the customer can go view the photos and buy prints and I don't have to lift a finger.
If you want a portfolio site just to show off your work, then you could do something like Ben Rudick's smugmug site.
First of all, thanks for the hint on the alt tag. I'm still finding pieces that I have missed, like the alt tag on images, which would be another advantage with smugmug because they have already worked through all of this. You are also right in saying I could almost build the same site with smugmug, in fact I had almost exactly the same site over there. This will sound silly to some, but there were small things like "David Nusbaum Photography - powered by SmugMug" that really poked at me. I pay for the service yet they stick their brand on the title for my site. I know it's a minor issue, but I work hard to build my own brand and it just seems a little inappropriate to take that space to promote their own brand. Perhaps building my own site to keep my own brand independent is a bit extreme, but at the time is seemed like a good idea. Outside of this one issue SmugMug was a great value.
I fully understand about the Smugmug co-branding thing. Some people just don't like it. But, did you notice Ben Rudick's smugmug site? You don't see the word "smugmug" anywhere on his site. It's easy to do too. It's just a matter of hiding the right elements.
BTW, your site looks great. I just wanted to point out that you can make a similar site with smugmug. You aren't limited to that cookie cutter look.
With no model release, other than selling for editorial use by a publication, you are opening yourself up for legal action--unless the people in the photo won't be able to recognize themselves.
To be clear the model release is needed for commercial use (i.e. to sell as stock or promote a product/service). Any other use should be fine without consent so long as you don't make the subject appear to endorse or advocate something that they may disapprove of (ex. advocate drug use). The law seems to say you need a release for that the way I understand it.
You can even get rid of some of the smugmug branding through customization. I haven't done much on my site, but ... like you ... the "powered by smugmug" bugged me. So check out my site: //www.dterryphotography.com/
The title bar doesn't mention smugmug (well, it does briefly until the javascript fixes it). And then as you navigate around my site, the title bar actually tells you where you are (what folder you are in). Again, smugmug flashes briefly ... but it doesn't stay there.
Would I like a smugmug sponsored fix rather than javascript? Sure. But I'll take this solution for now. :-)
The challenge here is that google shows "David Terry Photography- powered by SmugMug". Now David Terry's web presence may be powered by SmugMug, but I doubt that David Terry Photography is powered by SmugMug. I know how much work you put into building your brand, doesn't it drive you nuts that a hosting service you pay $149 a year for feels entitled to tag their brand onto yours in such a key location? Maybe I worry too much about a little thing, but this one is just a hard pill for me to swallow.
The challenge here is that google shows "David Terry Photography- powered by SmugMug". Now David Terry's web presence may be powered by SmugMug, but I doubt that David Terry Photography is powered by SmugMug. I know how much work you put into building your brand, doesn't it drive you nuts that a hosting service you pay $149 a year for feels entitled to tag their brand onto yours in such a key location? Maybe I worry too much about a little thing, but this one is just a hard pill for me to swallow.
That's because David hasn't added the code to prevent this. It's true that Smugmug should make this a control panel option, but it's not too difficult to fix yourself. If he adds the following JavaScript to his "Header Javascript" edit box, it should fix the problem. Be aware that it may take google a while before he sees the results. He should see them right away on his browser's title bar.
titleSettings.separator = ": "; // text to insert between parts of title
titleSettings.maxLength = -1; // limits length of title (-1 == no limit)
titleSettings.doPhotos = true; // true == append photo captions
titleSettings.doAlbums = true; // true == append album names
titleSettings.doGalleries = true; // true == append gallery names
titleSettings.stripSmugmug = true; // true == remove " - powered by SmugMug" from title bar text
function ContextualizeTitle()
{
var smugmugSuffix = " - powered by SmugMug";
var insertAt = document.title.indexOf(smugmugSuffix);
var newTitle = document.title;
var newText = null;
function Trim(text)
{
var regexp = /^\s+|\s+$/g;
text = text.replace(regexp, "");
return text;
}
function IsHomePage()
{
var isHomePage = false;
// Test for the "homepage" class name in the tag
var classStr = document.body.className;
if(classStr && (classStr.indexOf("homepage") != -1))
{
isHomePage = true;
}
return isHomePage;
}
/* Add a handler for the window load event. Calls ContextualizeTitle on window load */
addEvent(window, "load", ContextualizeTitle);
Mick...I added that code to mine...that totally works! THANK YOU!
So in the event we get smugmug accounts we just need Mick to code our html?
Well, he's definitely my HERO for today...;-)
You are very welcome. However, I didn't write the code, I just grabbed it off DGrin.com. I'm a C++ developer, and I only use JavaScript and other languages when I can't avoid it. :D
If you have any questions about Smugmug customization, feel free to ask me. I can't guarantee that I'll have an answer, but I will gladly try my best.
I know the script fixes the title bar in the browser, but does it fix the indexing in google as well? I didn't think the crawlers executed and honored the javascript or the CSS since they are not rendering the page. When I look at Michael Newton Photography on google the indexing shows "Michael Newton Photography- powered by SmugMug".
I know the script fixes the title bar in the browser, but does it fix the indexing in google as well? I didn't think the crawlers executed and honored the javascript or the CSS since they are not rendering the page. When I look at Michael Newton Photography on google the indexing shows "Michael Newton Photography- powered by SmugMug".
Yes, the script is intended to fix search engine results. At least that's what the developers said. However, I only added that script to my site a few hours ago. The hits your seeing may be from cached data. I'm not sure how the search engines get their results. Although, if they don't execute script or style code, the results they get may not match the pages that get displayed to users.
I'll check google again tomorrow to see if the results have changed. If not, then I'll ask the developers for a full refund. :D
So Smugmug won't allow you to simply modify the title tag? You have to use that needlessly long script?
Yes, you can modify the title tag. The script is only as long as it needs to be.
But not directly like you should be able to. If you have any interest in ranking well in the search engines that stuff like that pretty much kills your chances.
So Smugmug won't allow you to simply modify the title tag? You have to use that needlessly long script?
Yes, you can modify the title tag. The script is only as long as it needs to be.
But not directly like you should be able to. If you have any interest in ranking well in the search engines that stuff like that pretty much kills your chances.
I doubt very much that having "-Powered by Smugmug" added to your title bar text is going to kill your chances with search engines.
So Smugmug won't allow you to simply modify the title tag? You have to use that needlessly long script?
Yes, you can modify the title tag. The script is only as long as it needs to be.
But not directly like you should be able to. If you have any interest in ranking well in the search engines that stuff like that pretty much kills your chances.
I doubt very much that having "-Powered by Smugmug" added to your title bar text is going to kill your chances with search engines.
Well I'm overexaggerating but the point is that it does hurt if you plan to optimize your site for the search engines. Those extra words in the title tag effect that tag's keyword density, which search engines will analyze among other things for ranking purposes.
For example, if you want to rank well for "Fine Art Photography" and that is what your title says your keyword density would be 100%, which would be more relevant in the eyes of the search engines than something like this, "Fine Art Photography - Powered by SmugMug", which is only 50% keyword density (i.e. only 3 out of the 6 words are relevant keywords). Granted that's only one tag but it's an important one plus the script itself adds a lot of extra words and characters to the page and some bots will only parse up to a certain character limit when analyzing for keywords and if it doesn't get to all of your content in the body tag it may think your site is more relevant about something else and not your chosen keywords. That is because your keyword density would be very low with all that code in there an little keywords. However, if smugmug allows for external .js files then it would be better to put that script in there and just link to it.
Gosh...such an intense programming discussion...time for a commercial break, Gentlemen...;-)
I'm wondering the following:
I found how the Smugmug icon can be replaced in the title bar, but is there a way to just remove it altogether?
I'm a simple country girl at heart and I just want a clean site...;-)
PS.
I did google my site and it did still did come up with "powered by smugmug"...but I'm just starting to put it all together so for my purposes the relevance isn't that high.
Although that script is different from the one I was using ... it doesn't really look much different in practice from what I had. Both of them suffer from the "brief appearance" of the words "powered by Smugmug" on the title bar just before the script changes it.
Since I can't see any difference (other than the layout of the title bar text, in which case I prefer mine), I've gone back to what I was using.
Gosh...such an intense programming discussion...time for a commercial break, Gentlemen...;-)
That's not really programming. It's more like... geek tweaks. ;p
Originally posted by hihosilver:
I'm wondering the following:
I found how the Smugmug icon can be replaced in the title bar, but is there a way to just remove it altogether?
I'm a simple country girl at heart and I just want a clean site...;-)
I'm not sure what you mean by icon and title bar. Are you talking about the title bar of your browser, or something on your website itself? Do you mean the "HihoSilver Photography" banner on your home page?
Originally posted by hihosilver:
PS.
I did google my site and it did still did come up with "powered by smugmug"...but I'm just starting to put it all together so for my purposes the relevance isn't that high.
I'm not sure what you mean by icon and title bar. Are you talking about the title bar of your browser, or something on your website itself? Do you mean the "HihoSilver Photography" banner on your home page?
You will be very proud of me, but actually I was able to remove the smugmug logo from the website itself. Specifically, I mean the tiny wee icon right next to the text that your script below changes and removes "powered by Smugmug"...on the leftside of that text is the tiny icon. I don't want to replace the little icon...I just want to remove it.
Is that possible?
Not to worry. I'm not too concerned with the search engines right now...
::whispers sacredly:: My "fine art photography" listings are not quite as pressing as Mr. Yanko's...;-)
I'm not sure what you mean by icon and title bar. Are you talking about the title bar of your browser, or something on your website itself? Do you mean the "HihoSilver Photography" banner on your home page?
You will be very proud of me, but actually I was able to remove the smugmug logo from the website itself. Specifically, I mean the tiny wee icon right next to the text that your script below changes and removes "powered by Smugmug"...on the leftside of that text is the tiny icon. I don't want to replace the little icon...I just want to remove it.
Is that possible?
If you mean the icon labeled "Title bar icon" in this screen shot, then I don't how you would do that. I could do it using Visual Studio by directly editing the icon resources in the executable, but that's not going to help you. There might be a way to change or remove it using the registry editor. With IE you can change the segment of the title that says "Windows Internet Explorer". To do that you add a string value named "Window Title" to the following key in the registry:
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main]
"Window Title"="Powered by DPChallenge"
I set it to "Powered by DPChallenge". You can see the result in the screen shot.
I don't know if or how you can change the icons. There may be a way to do it though. Maybe someone else here knows. Sorry.
Originally posted by hihosilver:
Not to worry. I'm not too concerned with the search engines right now...
::whispers sacredly:: My "fine art photography" listings are not quite as pressing as Mr. Yanko's...;-)
I'm just trying to get the thing up and running!
I think your website looks great, and your photos are great too. Keep going!
I checked this morning and it appears that google doesn't pick up the modified title bar text. Too bad. I guess I'll have to ask the developers for a refund after all. :D Apparently, it takes google longer to update than I thought it did. :D
Not to worry. I'm not too concerned with the search engines right now...
The javascript that I posted earlier replaces your title bar text with a fixed string + the current catagory, gallery, or photo name. If you just want a fixed string, here's a simpler way...
Go to your control panel, remove the code that I posted previously, then paste the following line in the "Head Tag - optional" edit box. Replace the "Your Text Here" part with whatever text you want in your title bar. Then click Update.
BTW, I read somewhere that it takes Google a week or so to re-crawl your website and load the new info. Don't expect your new title to show up in google search results right away.
Oh Mick...not only are you my HERO, but you are a very thorough hero as well. Thanks for the long posts. Yes, your screen capture is very helpful! I'm referring to the active tab icon and the address bar icon.
I found on DGRIN how to change replace the little icon with one of your own with this tutorial. I have not tried it out yet because I don't really want my own icon...I just want to get rid of the Smug Mug one.
I guess SmugMug does not allow *.ico files so in addition to making a little customized icon, you have to find a place to house those type of files as well.
You know...it's all about the learning process and finding what works with our own style...right? All I can say is I'm have a blast building it...it's just FUN! I'm going to try your code later tonight and I'll keep you posted.
As I have been scaling back a bit. I no longer have a need for a pro site but because I am locked in at $100/year and have enough referrals to last till 2011 I have no reason to scale back the website. Plus the customer service in my opinion is tops.
width="625" height="500"
