Small Businesses and the Web
Few would deny that the Internet is a powerful marketing tool but for many small businesses web site design and maintenance using outside suppliers has been a complicated and expensive exercise. Added to this is the inconvenience (and on-costs) of reliance on third parties for site updates and revisions.
Self-published web sites bring all aspects of web site construction under the command and control of the business manager. There are many free or low-cost "Content Management Systems" available, requiring a greater or lesser degree of technical aptitude - WordPress and Joomla are just two that have a massive global following. Our current CMS (also used for our sister site at www.fosterimages.co.uk) is amongst the simplest available and capable of adoption by anyone with basic word processing skills and literacy, and a reasonable eye for design. Further, it lends itself to the development of fairly complex web sites that can accommodate many strata of rich content - and rich content published by a full spectrum of local tourism businesses contributes to the Internet profile of a holiday destination. It's all part of the destination marketing "cloud".
Our Coast Path Photo Itineraries (under continual development) are just one way that rich content can be developed as part of the destination "sell" that should be integral with the marketing of tourism products. Here's a brief run through of how we did it.
Content Management
This web site has been developed using Weebly, a free cloud-based Content Management System which offers a range of design templates (not all as idiosyncratic as our own!), a substantial palette of design components and virtually all of the functions of more complex platforms. Conversion to mobile-friendly format (Responsive Design) is automatic.
Web site development is pretty much intuitive, using a drag-and-drop dashboard of functions which include text, image management and media imports (but see the note on copyright below). Text editing and formatting will come easily to users who are familiar with MS Word or other word processing software. Weebly can handle complex navigation, generating drop-down menus from root pages. It is a simple matter to create and insert new pages whenever and wherever required, to create hierarchies of information that drill down into richer and richer content. Search engine optimisation (metadata, etc.) is straightforward. The web site management system can be accessed at any time, allowing updates and revisions at will.
A few minutes spent playing with the software will demonstrate it's simplicity, and the more you use it the more possibilities you will find.
Few would deny that the Internet is a powerful marketing tool but for many small businesses web site design and maintenance using outside suppliers has been a complicated and expensive exercise. Added to this is the inconvenience (and on-costs) of reliance on third parties for site updates and revisions.
Self-published web sites bring all aspects of web site construction under the command and control of the business manager. There are many free or low-cost "Content Management Systems" available, requiring a greater or lesser degree of technical aptitude - WordPress and Joomla are just two that have a massive global following. Our current CMS (also used for our sister site at www.fosterimages.co.uk) is amongst the simplest available and capable of adoption by anyone with basic word processing skills and literacy, and a reasonable eye for design. Further, it lends itself to the development of fairly complex web sites that can accommodate many strata of rich content - and rich content published by a full spectrum of local tourism businesses contributes to the Internet profile of a holiday destination. It's all part of the destination marketing "cloud".
Our Coast Path Photo Itineraries (under continual development) are just one way that rich content can be developed as part of the destination "sell" that should be integral with the marketing of tourism products. Here's a brief run through of how we did it.
Content Management
This web site has been developed using Weebly, a free cloud-based Content Management System which offers a range of design templates (not all as idiosyncratic as our own!), a substantial palette of design components and virtually all of the functions of more complex platforms. Conversion to mobile-friendly format (Responsive Design) is automatic.
Web site development is pretty much intuitive, using a drag-and-drop dashboard of functions which include text, image management and media imports (but see the note on copyright below). Text editing and formatting will come easily to users who are familiar with MS Word or other word processing software. Weebly can handle complex navigation, generating drop-down menus from root pages. It is a simple matter to create and insert new pages whenever and wherever required, to create hierarchies of information that drill down into richer and richer content. Search engine optimisation (metadata, etc.) is straightforward. The web site management system can be accessed at any time, allowing updates and revisions at will.
A few minutes spent playing with the software will demonstrate it's simplicity, and the more you use it the more possibilities you will find.
A note on copyright. Importing content from a wide range of sources is a simple matter with Weebly, but unauthorised use of copyright protected material can lead to expensive complications. Content posted on web sites and social media remains in the ownership of the originator and should not be used without explicit permission. Even when material is sourced from content sharing sites where waivers are implicit through, say, the use of Creative Commons Licences, conditions of use must be observed. These will usually include an accompanying credit - which is, all else aside, simply good manners. In March 2014 the UK Intellectual Property Office published copyright guidelines on 'Digital Images, Photographs and the Internet', which serve as a useful gloss on the generality of Internet content. Download the PDF below.
copyright_notice-_digital_images_photographs_and_the_internet.pdf | |
File Size: | 91 kb |
File Type: |
Photography
Smartphones and point-and-shoot cameras produce perfectly acceptable photographs for web sites, but more ambitious image makers might consider moving up a notch to Digital Single Lens Reflex [DSLR] equipment for the greater creative possibilities. Low- to mid-flight DSLRs are more than adequate for most purposes and come in reasonably affordable packages. Many of the images (and some of the best) in our photo library were captured during an early foray into digital photography using a Fuji Finepix S602, a camera with a rating of 3 (actual) megapixels. (Note that megapixels are the least relevant thing to be considered when purchasing a camera. Lens quality and sensor size are far more important. My Finepix images have produced high quality A2 prints with no discernible fall-off.)
The advantages of DSLRs are several. Most important are larger sensor sizes, high quality interchangeable lenses, filter fitments and a greater range of manual controls for those familiar with photographic basics. These days most lenses zoom across a range of focal lengths, allowing frames to be composed in camera. Note, however, that smartphones and compacts usually zoom digitally and suffer from image degradation in direct proportion to the amount of zoom. DSLR lenses are optical throughout so that there is no loss of image quality.
My weapon of choice for web content over the past few years has been a consumer level Nikon D60, compact, reasonably light but capable of high quality offline reproduction. I carry a small range of lenses. For the kind of general photography featured on these pages the most convenient and useful is an 18-55 mm zoom, supplemented by a 70-300 mm zoom for the occasional distance shots. A final (and expensive) addition is a 10-24 mm extreme wide angle zoom, more suitable for creative 'arty-crafty' photography than destination imagery.
A basic range of filters is worth a small investment. A UV or daylight filter gives permanent protection to lenses and reduces light scatter in coastal and mountain settings. A circular polarizing filter enhances skies and cloud definition and controls reflections, especially useful in the coastal environment. Neutral density filters are used to control exposures beyond the range of camera settings available for given light conditions and for long exposure photography.
An optional (some would say essential) peripheral is a tripod, to provide a stable platform for telephoto shots or for exposures longer than 100th sec. Best used with a remote shutter release for static shots - or use the delay function on the camera.
Photo Editing
A basic photo editing suite is useful for cropping and scaling. There are usually a number of enhancement tools for final tweaks - contrast and brightness, colour saturation, colour balance and much more. I use a (very) old version of Photoshop as a basis for a full suite of Topaz plug-ins that give tremendous creative capability. This is not a cheap option - but a web search for photo editors will throw up a number of free alternatives and reviews.
Editing software can often salvage a shot that might seem beyond recovery - it is not always possible to revisit a location. A useful tip when shooting is to underexpose by one or two stops or, if your camera generates a histogram, check that the data curve tends towards the left of the graph. Underexposed images will capture data that can be manipulated after the event. Over exposure will give 'burnt out' areas of the image, where there is no data to manipulate.
Smartphones and point-and-shoot cameras produce perfectly acceptable photographs for web sites, but more ambitious image makers might consider moving up a notch to Digital Single Lens Reflex [DSLR] equipment for the greater creative possibilities. Low- to mid-flight DSLRs are more than adequate for most purposes and come in reasonably affordable packages. Many of the images (and some of the best) in our photo library were captured during an early foray into digital photography using a Fuji Finepix S602, a camera with a rating of 3 (actual) megapixels. (Note that megapixels are the least relevant thing to be considered when purchasing a camera. Lens quality and sensor size are far more important. My Finepix images have produced high quality A2 prints with no discernible fall-off.)
The advantages of DSLRs are several. Most important are larger sensor sizes, high quality interchangeable lenses, filter fitments and a greater range of manual controls for those familiar with photographic basics. These days most lenses zoom across a range of focal lengths, allowing frames to be composed in camera. Note, however, that smartphones and compacts usually zoom digitally and suffer from image degradation in direct proportion to the amount of zoom. DSLR lenses are optical throughout so that there is no loss of image quality.
My weapon of choice for web content over the past few years has been a consumer level Nikon D60, compact, reasonably light but capable of high quality offline reproduction. I carry a small range of lenses. For the kind of general photography featured on these pages the most convenient and useful is an 18-55 mm zoom, supplemented by a 70-300 mm zoom for the occasional distance shots. A final (and expensive) addition is a 10-24 mm extreme wide angle zoom, more suitable for creative 'arty-crafty' photography than destination imagery.
A basic range of filters is worth a small investment. A UV or daylight filter gives permanent protection to lenses and reduces light scatter in coastal and mountain settings. A circular polarizing filter enhances skies and cloud definition and controls reflections, especially useful in the coastal environment. Neutral density filters are used to control exposures beyond the range of camera settings available for given light conditions and for long exposure photography.
An optional (some would say essential) peripheral is a tripod, to provide a stable platform for telephoto shots or for exposures longer than 100th sec. Best used with a remote shutter release for static shots - or use the delay function on the camera.
Photo Editing
A basic photo editing suite is useful for cropping and scaling. There are usually a number of enhancement tools for final tweaks - contrast and brightness, colour saturation, colour balance and much more. I use a (very) old version of Photoshop as a basis for a full suite of Topaz plug-ins that give tremendous creative capability. This is not a cheap option - but a web search for photo editors will throw up a number of free alternatives and reviews.
Editing software can often salvage a shot that might seem beyond recovery - it is not always possible to revisit a location. A useful tip when shooting is to underexpose by one or two stops or, if your camera generates a histogram, check that the data curve tends towards the left of the graph. Underexposed images will capture data that can be manipulated after the event. Over exposure will give 'burnt out' areas of the image, where there is no data to manipulate.