Place to upload photos for download

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I know, upload to download sounds kind of strange. Here is what I am looking for.

I have become, kind of by default, the historian at our church. I always ask people for copies of their photos from events, that I store on the church server.

Most of the time, they will give them to me on a CD or a USB drive, (and I’m sure this doesn’t surprise most of you that are reading this but most people are quite perplexed as to how to do that) but I was wondering if there is a site where pictures can be uploaded easily and then downloaded again. One of my criteria is that the site is free or very low cost.

The problem with most photo sharing sites is that when photos are uploaded, the resolution is reduced to make uploading faster and/or when downloading, they only allow downloading one picture at a time. Many times people will have 40 or 50 or more pictures to share, so doing it one at a time is cumbersome. E-mailing pictures also creates problems as far as resolution goes.

Does anyone know of an easy to use, low cost or free site or method for doing this type of thing? Thanks for your help.

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SendSpace
You sen it
Becky’s review on WS
Dennis’ update to Becky’s article

There are lots of others.

cheers, Paul

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Thanks for the suggestions Paul, unfortunately, they only allow downloading one file at a time, and I need something that will do more than that.

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Zip the files into one archive, then upload?
Assuming you have access to your web server you could add an upload page for your members.

cheers, Paul

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The problem with most photo sharing sites is that when photos are uploaded, the resolution is reduced to make uploading faster and/or when downloading, they only allow downloading one picture at a time. Many times people will have 40 or 50 or more pictures to share, so doing it one at a time is cumbersome.

I found a “bulk downloading” application that works with the popular photo sharing site Flickr, where you can create a “members only” group. One of the nice features of Flickr is that it offers multiple sizes, so users can choose. Using the bulk downloader would require the user would to install third party software. That might be too much to ask, but you can read more about it here: http://clipyourphotos.com/bulkr. If you follow the link to the Flickr App Garden, you can read user comments on the product (plenty of early “beta” pains among them, hopefully all resolved by now).

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See Windows Live SkyDrive. It is free.

Joe

--Joe

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Hi everyone,

Thanks for all the suggestions. Unfortunately, nothing seems to work just the way I want it to. Some only allow you to download 1 file at a time and I’m looking at people having 50 – 100 pictures or more to share. Windows Live Sky Drive automatically compresses the pictures, to take up less space of course, but at some point I will use some of these photos in a slideshow, projected on a large screen, so I really need as good a resolution as I can get. It also only allows a download of one picture at a time.

I’ll keep looking.

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at at some point I will use some of these photos in a slideshow, projected on a large screen, so I really need as good a resolution as I can get.
I’ll keep looking.

You only need as good resolution as the projector can handle – so 2Mpx images should be fine. Compression artefacts may be an issue, but are seriously unlikely to be a problem.

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Have you considered emailing your photos. Some email clients like WLM with a Live Hotmail account will
alow you to send very large photos to contacts without bogging down their email clients. The photos are stored
on a server and the people you are sending them to can download them by clicking on the photo.

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The browser, Opera, has its Unite Photo Sharing feature that allows visitors to browse your photos directly on your system (no uploading required). Only hitch is that your system has to be online for it to work, but that shouldn’t be a big problem.

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The browser, Opera, has its Unite Photo Sharing feature that allows visitors to browse your photos directly on your system (no uploading required). Only hitch is that your system has to be online for it to work, but that shouldn’t be a big problem.

One other consideration is you have to trust that no one can break the design of Opera’s file sharing sandbox and get to other folders on your PC. Unless there was a special reason NOT to put the photos online, I personally do not think that is a risk I would want to run.

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Picasa looks like a possible solution….

Fast and easy photo sharing from Google

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The best idea I’ve read here is to have an upload feature on your own site (since you have your own server). As for what software to use I couldn’t really say as I’m not that familiar with server technology. It may help if you post what kind of server you use. Most servers are UNIX based but, Windows based servers are becoming more popular now.

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I have become, kind of by default, the historian at our church. I always ask people for copies of their photos from events, that I store on the church server.

A DC hub is one possible solution. I don’t know how to build one, but you could at least refine your search and
build the appropriate questions base.

Direct Connect (file sharing)
Direct Connect clients

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I finally solved this and it seems to work pretty well, so I wanted to share.

I set up an account on DropBox.com, using an e-mail address that I don’t use that often. Then, when people have pictures that they want to share, I give them the user name and password and let them upload them to the DropBox account, then I go on and download them.

I’ve been using DropBox for a while but didn’t consider it because I knew that most people don’t want to set it up on their own computer. Then I realized that you can do everything right on their web site and don’t have to download everything. I have used this method with several sets of pictures and it has worked really well. People have commented that it is even easier than copying to a CD.

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