Flickr, Photobucket or Imageshack?

Chinook Arch · #1 Posted **Aug 27, 2009, 7:50 PM**

I'm thinking of uploading some of my pictures and before investing time and effort into doing so, thought I'd check into which site people like and why.

It seems like most of the people here use one of the three forementioned sites. Thoughts?

freeweed · #2 Posted **Aug 27, 2009, 8:04 PM**

I'm lazy and use imageshack because it doesn't require an account and it's a pretty simple one-click upload. It's a pain in the rear for lots of pictures, though - although if you're a Windows user I think there's some sort of application you can install to help with that.

Bigtime · #3 Posted **Aug 27, 2009, 8:21 PM**

I like using Flickr. If you are planning on uploading a lot of images you might as well skip the free account and purchase the upgrade to a Pro account ($24.95 USD for a year) so you don't have a monthly upload limit.

I also like the community you get at Flickr, by contributing to photo groups and expanding your contact list and seeing what new additions they have made. You will find quite a few of us on there, and probably see some photos that we don't post here.

ue · #4 Posted **Aug 27, 2009, 8:25 PM**

Flickr. Definitely the best, but you gotta pay for the pro account (25 USD) for the full sort of experience and not have to worry about limits, etc. It has a really nice interface with neat things like tags, geotagging, loads of exif data, group pools, stats (if you get pro), sets, collections (pro), subcollections, etc. And there are over 10,000 small communities of groups to suit the types of things your interested and take pics of. It's really easy, good quality photographs (are uploaded), and never has any downtime (except a few hiccups which usually go away in a few minutes). There is a real community at Flickr.

Imageshack is a no-no. I just got out of Imageshack recently, still re-uploading my images to Flickr. Horrible horrible service. If you try to e-mail the admins to fix a problem, it rarely gets fixed, at least from my experience. Downtimes happen all the time, probably at least 5/7 days a week I'm sure whereby your images just won't load at all. So if you're posting on SSP no images will pop up on an image thread you've created. Very frustrating. But I guess you get hwat you pay for.

Photobucket is okay, I don't know as much about it, but I know it's okay. The Bandwidth thing really sucks because if you get too many people to view your photos then the bandwidth will exceed and photobuckets icons appear. Images will not load. Plus in the free account you have very limited amount of space...where the buying account...pro i think...still has limits. Really not worth it.

Spend the money on Flickr is my advice.

you could try tinypic, i heard it's not bad...and free.

freeweed · #5 Posted **Aug 27, 2009, 8:43 PM**

Huh, I don't think I've ever seen Imageshack not work, but I'm an extremely casual user. My few pics always seem to load in SSP but who knows.

Agreed on Flickr, if you're a heavy user it's the way to go.

ue · #6 Posted **Aug 27, 2009, 8:57 PM**

freeweed, it is probably because you don't upload too many pics. it is a common occurance for most who upload lots.

Just Build It · #7 Posted **Aug 27, 2009, 9:27 PM**

I'm ashamed to say that I don't own a digital camera so I don't upload pictures anywhere. If i'm looking for photos though, Flickr is easily the best for that. Pick almost any subject and do a search on IS, PB and Flickr. You'll almost always get better results with flickr. I find the photo compilations and sets on Flickr are usually better.

Rusty van Reddick · #8 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 1:04 AM**

Flickr has all those great communities, but I hate it for viewing pics. I use Picasa, which doesn't have communities but is incredibly fast to search by tags, and the viewer is superb since it shows big images by default, none of this "all sizes" crap you have to go through on flickr.

Ferreth · #9 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 1:23 AM**

Flickr is what I settled on. Paid for it as soon as I hit the 200 image hard limit. Don't know if they still have that on free accounts.

Features I can't live without:

- Bulk uploading tool. Batch processing within tool to add tags, descriptions, titles.

- Geotagging. Having trouble remembering where a photo was taken? You can put every photo on a map. It is also interesting to see what other photos were taken where you were. Pretty much any place you plan to travel will have photos you can look at in advance.

- Communities. Whatever your interest may be, Flickr will have something.

- Commentary, favs, view stats. I find it interesting to see what other people view out of my photo stream. Some things I consider throw aways are much more popular than I expect.

Ayreonaut · #10 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 1:25 AM**

After a while on Imageshack, I switched to flickr pro to upload all my Europe photos. I'll never go back.

ue · #11 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 1:27 AM**

^^yes i had to live with that 200 limit (the images arent deleted, so if you host em on ssp they'd still appear) for months...until i recently got a pro. flickr is only 'okay' in free in comparison to paid pro.

Cowtown_Tim · #12 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 2:56 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rusty van Reddick

Flickr has all those great communities, but I hate it for viewing pics. I use Picasa, which doesn't have communities but is incredibly fast to search by tags, and the viewer is superb since it shows big images by default, none of this "all sizes" crap you have to go through on flickr.

I actually prefer the 'all sizes' feature. Some people's photos are large, like 3000x 5000 pixels, etc... and take a while to load.

Flickr is where I go to find the best pictures. If you're looking to find images of a given place somewhere in the world, Flickr will have the best collection for sure. also the best quality pics, I find.

Surrealplaces · #13 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 3:39 PM**

I have a Flickr account for my good pictures. I use Imageshack for construction updates or low quality pictures that I don't want to put on my flickr photstream.

Witty Nickname · #14 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 6:13 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Surrealplaces

I have a Flickr account for my good pictures. I use Imageshack for construction updates or low quality pictures that I don't want to put on my flickr photstream.

Ditto. Flickr Rocks.

Ramsayfarian · #15 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 6:16 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rusty van Reddick

Flickr has all those great communities, but I hate it for viewing pics. I use Picasa, which doesn't have communities but is incredibly fast to search by tags, and the viewer is superb since it shows big images by default, none of this "all sizes" crap you have to go through on flickr.

I have to agree with you there, however Picasa sucks when it comes to posting pictures on a webpage, I think the largest size they allow is 800x600. I've switched from Picasa to Flickr because of that and because I like the communities on Flickr.

Big Sky · #16 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 7:18 PM**

I use Flickr to find stuff, but don't have an account there. What do people mean by 'communities'? Do you need to be a member to use them?

ue · #17 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 7:38 PM**

^You can see them if you're not a member, but like anything you need to be a member to use them. These communities are called groups. And you add your uploaded material to the group pool if they fit the topic. Then there are discussions that go on for whatever.

Bokimon · #18 Posted **Aug 28, 2009, 10:52 PM**

I currently have a photobucket account and a new flickr account.
I only just started using flickr and so far I am on the free account. It is taking me some time to get used to it but it seems that many of you guys really enjoy this website so I will try and learn this. One of the problems I am having with flickr is how do I hotlink my pictures to the boards?

Photobucket has three hotlinking options under each upload where I can just copy and paste but I cannot find this in flickr.. Unless I have to pay for the full membership?

I am trying to reshuffle my albums so flickr can be the one where I store my good shots and photobucket I would store stuff like construction updates and renders. Just like what Surreal is doing.

bulliver · #19 Posted **Aug 29, 2009, 4:50 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bokimon

Photobucket has three hotlinking options under each upload where I can just copy and paste but I cannot find this in flickr.. Unless I have to pay for the full membership?

Above every one of your photos will be a little button that says 'ALL SIZES'. Click on this and it will show large by default. Scroll down, and you'll see the copy/paste links for the large size.

Edit: And as for viewing photos on Flickr, I hate the blinding white background, so I use flickriver.com

Tobyoby · #20 Posted **Aug 30, 2009, 1:01 AM**

Flickr for me.