Lunar Threads

So I've been working on my new photography portfolio for about 6 months, and just finished things up last night. I still have some photos to add, but a lot of my good stuff is up. If any f you would be ever so kind enough to visit it and tell me what you think:

http://www.mickeyshannon.com

I'm actually interested in any comments, praises, criticism, etc. of not just the photography but the usability of the website itself. There's likely a kink or two I haven't quite caught yet, but I'm pretty happy with things. The only thing I might change at some point is the background texture, but yeah. I'm launching this thing this week and just hoping to get some impressions of it. I really need a quality photography portfolio as I'm starting to get at least some recognition from it and will have some of my prints on display at various art galleries over the next few months. Anyways, yeah, would love any comments anyone has on it!

Whoa, those are some beautiful pictures!

I especially like the ones from Switzerland. I'm not really a photographer, so I can't really critic it, but from an average person's point of view, they are some of the most gorgeous pictures I've seen. The website seems to work fine and is nicely done as well.

Those are some beautiful, beautiful pictures, man. I am actually thinking about purchasing one myself! On a technical aspect, what kind of camera do you use?

Thanks, and I use a Nikon D80, though I'm likely going to switch to a Canon 5D Mark II here in a few months before my next big trip overseas. The D80 was wonderful though. The only reason I'm moving up to the MkII is because I won't have to do nearly as much stitching to get my super large prints. I generally take dozens of photos of a scene and stitch them together so that they can be printed at ultra-large sizes - some of those photos can be printed at 10 foot long with no quality loss at all. That's not possible from a single shot. But it's also extremely time consuming. But that's probably more than you asked for. IMO, you could go for a Nikon D90 or one of the Canon Rebels if you're starting out. The Canon Rebels are affordable, but still really good quality for a first time DSLR.

I also know nothing when it comes to photography. So all I can do is stare in wide-eyed wonder and say "preeeeeeettyyyyy..." *-*

The shots you captured are absolutely stunning. It really makes me want to visit Switzerland, haha. The portfolio looks fantastic and very professional. Navigation is simple and it's easy to change galleries and switch from one picture to the next. Everything flows smoothly. Oh, and the name of your charity organization earns you about a million points in my book.
Overall, I think everything looks amazing. You obviously put a lot of hard work into it G1. Like I said earlier, I don't know much about photography or web design for that matter. So I think all of it is really spectacular. Nice job!

The Earth is such a beautiful place.

LuNaRtIc wrote: Oh, and the name of your charity organization earns you about a million points in my book.

I was wondering if anyone from here would catch that little bit. It's a project I've been planning for about a year (and I've wanted to do it even longer). And yes, the name was fully derived from Lunar. Stolen from Nall himself! The design for it is shaping up to be the best I've ever done, and I'm really hoping it takes off. I'll post more on it when I launch it at the end of the month (hopefully!).

And thanks for all the comments everyone! In fact, where should I go photograph next? I'll have at last 15 days of vacation to use this year, possibly more if I switch jobs at some point. I'd like to go back to Europe and explore France and Spain, but I'm leaning towards New Zealand honestly.

I love the flow of the site and I think that your color choices, in particular the orange, match with the vibrance of your photographs. I'm also considering purchasing a few large prints
I love photography and really want to get a really nice camera asap. I hope to make photography a large part of my own portfolio when I transfer to a university next year; I'm an art major. Ya, I got the bit about "The Lostest Kids" also.

Holy crap, dude. That is awesome. Is this the "super secret project" you've been working on?

Your photography is fantastic! It's clear that a lot of time and effort have gone into this.

The site is also extremely professional. A couple of things you might want to look at, though... Very minor: "A Da yIn Geneva". Less minor: The larger images seem to display differently on different browsers. Checked it in Firefox, where they all looked great, but the last picture seemed stretched. On IE, they all looked compacted except for the last one. (Caveats: I don't know what the resolution settings were on the Firefox check, and you might not care if things look weird in IE6. ^_^)

G1, you continue to inspire me with your pictures. I can only hope to someday take great pictures like yours. Of course, I gotta start learning to use my camera, hah!

Now then, about the website:

1. I love the picture layout, it makes seeing the pictures much easier than you have ever had previously. I actually no longer saw it a chore to find a picture I wanted to look at... the layout made me want to look at ALL the pictures.
2. I love the descriptions you have with them.
3. I love how in some of those descriptions, you talk about the processes you used to get those shots (it really helps people like me)
4. Hidden Waterfalls makes me feel so warm and happy inside. While I generally have a policy against purchasing someone else photographic art, I just *might* have to make an exception to the rule with that one.
5. Just a note: Your "The Frozen Road" is inaccurately named according to it's description. In your description, you said that you decided to name it "The Frozen Path." Just a little error that I saw.
6. The Frozen Road/Path is surely a misleading picture, a result of how 2D our pictures can be. I can see why you named it that, without depth perception in the picture, it does look like a small windy mountain dirtroad.
7. When trying to click close on your charity program description, it doesn't seem to close and the pictures just pop up behind it. If you select a new picture, then it does finally disappear. Its likely a browser issue on my end, but it also does it to me in not just I.E. 7, but Chrome and Firefox as well. A quick test on Chrome, I.E. 8, and Firefox on my laptop all reveal the same problem. I haven't tested any other aspects of the website beyond that.

Obviously your pictures are amazing! =o) As for the website it is clean, clear and user friendly. It looks professional and is not stuffed with filler. It's great.

As for your next vacation I think you should go to New Zealand because you have been talking about visiting there for quite some time now. Throw yourself a bone.

phyco and Shiva, thanks, I'll have to look into those problems. I was having that problem before launching it, but thought I had it fixed. Apparently I need to do some more bug testing. This is a major reason why I posted it here. I knew someone would weed out the bugs!

And phyco specifically, that Frozen Road shot bugs me. I love it, but everyone seems to think it's a damn road, and not a massive glacier that's a mile wide. It's a trick on the eye. Even printed at a huge size, some people still think it's a road. The glacier does look a bit like a road, but I had hoped the giant mountains surrounding it would show people otherwise. In fact, that glacier is so massive, there is a line of 20+ mountaineer's crossing that glacier in the middle that show up as mere specks even at large print sizes.

So I was showing my husband your portofolio and he said he really likes the Frozen Road, personally I am a fan of the Mysitcal Dream Lake.

I am assuming there is a typo w/ Wengen and The... And the what?

I can understand G1, when I first saw it I was like "Of all the great pictures here, whats so special about a half frozen dirt road?" Then I read the description and was awed. It honestly doesn't look that wide. Thats the problem with photography though, its so one dimensional.

Looks impressive G1. Could use some flame GIFs like the old Lunarnet site I posted.

The only other thing I could think of was it was missing a logo or a larger Mickey Shannon title.

Monde Luna wrote:So I was showing my husband your portofolio and he said he really likes the Frozen Road, personally I am a fan of the Mysitcal Dream Lake.

I am assuming there is a typo w/ Wengen and The... And the what?

That's an issue with the Flash I'll have to fix. The title was too long to fit on one line apparently.

I dunno Mickey, they could use s'more Lensflare.

O.O Simply amazing.. and the website had such a great layout and flow to it