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February 19, 2008
Some Final Thoughts On The Redesign
I promise this is the last post on the redesign until it's at least close to being finished so if you do have any comments/suggestions now's the time. I'd especially like to hear from anyone who's had a some experience managing tags/categories in Wordpress as I'd like to get up to speed as quickly as possible and avoid having to do a lot of re-tagging/organizing later on when there'll be 5,000 or 10,000 photos in the database. Also, if any knows of a photo archive, or really any kind of archive, of similar size (mine will eventually be around 10,000 photos) that they think is particularly well designed/organized and might give me some ideas let me know.
The redesign in a nutshell: Basically, the front page will be much cleaner than it is now with just links to a gallery section, the archive, and to this blog (and perhaps a video section as well). The gallery section will be more or less Square America as it now exists- it'll have a list of every show (though probably with multiple thumbnails as samples rather than one large photo). I'll also try to keep a running tally of the number of photos in each show and when it was last updated. The archive link will most likely take you to a page which just has the tag cloud and a search box and then a link to the current archive page which will allow you to see what's been added recently (as for the next several months I'll just adding stuff that's already on the main site there'll be no need to go there but once I get caught up that'll be where I put everything as I get it). As for this site: As I've mentioned I'm going to try to make it a bit more diverse- adding letters and perhaps other ephemera, home movie clips, and the occasional essay (I promise to get a short one up sometime this week that'll give you an idea of what I'd like to be doing). I'll also feature the best of the new arrivals. Once everyting else is taken care of I'll also do some much needed maintenance here- upgrading to a new version of movable type, adding tags, links, etc....
I'm also going to add a single uniform navigation bar that'll be at the top (and perhaps bottom) of every single page of each section of the site that'll hopefully make navigation a little easier.
I think it'll be 3 or 4 months before I implement any changes as it'll take me that long to get the archive even close to up to speed. Barring any complications I'm guessing I should have every photo on the site uploaded to the database and tagged in about 6 months (that's working on it about an hour a day). The bigger job is scanning in the 5000 or so photos in my collection that aren't on the site yet and getting those tagged and in the database as well. I'm guessing it'll take a year before I'm completely caught up. Obviously, this is going to be pretty tedious work but it needs to get done. My collection is no longer a couple of shoe boxes under my bed- it's "A Collection" and I need to get it organized. The way I see it using Wordpress to create a web-based database is no different than doing it with FileMaker and having it on my desktop. The truth is I should have started this process ages ago and now I'm paying the price for my laziness.
A couple people have mentioned that I could open up the tagging and let others help share the work load. For now I think I'm going to do all the initial tagging myself. One of the main reasons I launched the website in the first place was to force me to think about my collection as "a collection" rather than a series of discrete photos and I think that process has made me a better and more thoughtful collector/curator (whatever that means). I see the tagging as continuing this process. Also, I'm 42 and I think at this point in my life it's pretty safe to assume that I'm never going to write a novel or a symphony and assembling this collection is probably as close as I'm going to get to producing a work of art. I guess I see the tag cloud as hopefully becoming a Borgesian table of contents that will contain a discursive record of everything I've ever thought about snapshots (if not a discursive record of everything ever thought by anyone about anything). Of course, the other reason I launched the website was to make it public and let other people see the photos, people who may or may not see them the same way as I do. I have no doubt that there are narratives in the collection that I could never hope to see. With that in mind- my intention is that once I get the database deep enough to launch it officially, I'll just save a screen grab of the tag cloud for myself and then open tagging to everyone.
The bigger issue is now with Wordpress it's possible to allow others to upload their own photos into the database. I'm reluctant to do this for a number of reasons. One, bandwidth would be an issue- while I don't think that many people would be uploading photos, it's possible enough would that my hosting costs could increase significantly. Two, I don't want to have to spend my time policing what other people put up- deleting porn and possible copyright violations isn't my idea of fun. Three, I think it's important (to me anyway) that the site has an analogue in the real world- every photo that you see on the site is somewhere in my apartment. At the same time, for every great photo I have there are thousands of other out there in other collections so why not open the site up and make the database as dense as possible? At this point I'd have to say it's unlikely but you never know.
Finally, for those of you who are worried that with all the database work I'll let Square America slide, have no fear- I went out and bought Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity (The first and hopefully last self-help book I've ever bought) so I'm sure I'll have no problems getting everything accomplished. Actually, I've already got three shows in the works that I'll be posting in the next month or two so you've got nothing to worry about on that front. And for those of you who made it this far- I haven't forgotten this is a photography site so here you are:
Posted by nick at February 19, 2008 04:44 PM
Comments
No problem, just let me know.
Posted by: Mike at February 20, 2008 09:37 AM
oops! I deleted several comments by mistake. Sorry, I guess I need a better spam filter!
Posted by: nick at February 20, 2008 03:11 PM
I love visiting your site, but just wish you could make the font just a tad bigger!
Posted by: Betty at February 27, 2008 01:57 PM