Flickr was one of the first online communities that brought artists and photographers together to share their work for all to see, but it languished in the years since Yahoo's acquisition of the service. Since that point, we've seen a number of photo-sharing services come to light, including popular pro service SmugMug — which just purchased Flickr from Yahoo.
Whether you plan to stick with Flickr, move entirely to SmugMug, or ditch Flickr completely, you might be curious about some of the other services out there for sharing and protecting your photos. Here's a quick rundown!
500px
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Though newer than some of the other options on this list, Toronto-based 500px has quickly become one of the go-to hosting sites for amateur and pro photographers alike.
When you sign up for an account you'll be able to follow photographers to get their newest photos in your personalized feed, give feedback or your thoughts on people's work by liking and commenting on photos, and even discussing all the details of photography in groups you can join. Plus, 500px offers you a way of monetizing your work: You can submit your photos to the 500px Marketplace to sell, or work on custom shoots for various brands.
Like many of the pro-am services, 500px has a monthly subscription fee: It ranges from $2.50/month to 15.99/month depending on the features you need for your account.
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Photobucket
With over 15 billion (yes — with a "B") photos to browse from, Photobucket is by far one of the largest image hosting services on the web.
Photobucket not only lets you store your photos, but also offers some basic editing tools as well, making it easy for amateur photographers to quickly tweak their work before posting it online. Plus, Photobucket also gives you the option of privately hosting certain images or albums so you can send your work directly to clients with a simple link and password.
It's subscription plans range drastically in price depending on feature-set; you can create a free account and share or store up to 2GB of photos, so if you want to try before you buy, it's got you covered.
DeviantArt
DeviantArt focuses more on digitally-drawn art (some of it NSFW) than photography, but if you're looking for a large, active community where you can host and share your work, it's worth a look.
Amongst the many digital art subsections, there's a whole area of DeviantArt dedicated to photography; the community is pretty active, with many users commenting on other people's work. Thanks to the DeviantArt Critique tool, you can also get meaningful feedback from fellow members on your photos and any other artwork you choose to put up. Additionally, you can connect with professionals to gain further insights your projects or even set up future collaborations.
DeviantArt offers a free membership, where you can store up to 2GB of images on the network; you can pay $4.95 a month to get unlimited storage space and full access to the service's features.
Instagram is more for sharing highlighted work (and at a lower resolution) than than many of the other services, but it's still a great place to upload and share photos amongst your friends — and, if you're a pro photographer, it can be a great way to advertise your work.
Every photographer I know has an Instagram account, and many pros also use it as a networking tool for fellow shutterbugs in their physical area (or area of expertise). Because Instagram is primarily a mobile platform, there's no good option for uploading your images from your Mac; that said, newer cameras make it pretty easy to send images to your mobile device.
Google Photos
These days, practically everyone is connected to Google in some way or another, whether through Gmail, Hangouts, or YouTube. Having a Google account can also be beneficial if you want to use the company's cloud storage to backup your photos. You can add pictures to Google Drive or back up your entire collection of pictures using the Desktop uploader or iOS app.
Google Photos provides some pretty solid organizational tools: For example, it will automatically recognize people, places, food, and events, and organize them into collections for you. Plus, you can build your own personal albums, or create shared albums that others can access via a link. You can even let the recipients add their own content to a shared album. Plus, Google Photos also includes some basic editing features, like adding filters, tweaking lighting, and color balances.
Google Drive includes 15 GB of free storage with additional plans starting at $1.99 for 100 GB.
Where do you host your photos?
Let us know in the comments below!
