Skridlov
Posts: 164
Location: United Kingdom
Registered: 12 Nov 2007
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Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 16:21 GMT
updated: 20 Oct 2008 at 16:41 GMT
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I realise that this is a big question and apologise for its generality. I have spent about a year learning to make spherical panoramas, with invaluable help from this site and it's participants - J.H. being foremost amongst them. I can produce reasonably consistent, if not brilliant results now but the next stage of the learning curve looks like a very steep slope.
This technique is not a lot of use without a website to display the results, whether good or bad. So I need to build a one. I haven't had any experience of website creation, having worked for over 20 years more or less exclusively with print technologies - and I'm even 5 years out of practise with them too. So I'm pretty apprehensive. Initially all I want is to display the results in combination with some static photography of the same locations plus text annotation, links etc. I have no commercial objectives for the forseeable future - if indeed, ever.
I am not earning any longer so I can't afford to commission a site. In any case I need to play around in order to find out what I really want and need. An ex-colleague convinced me to buy a copy of Serif's WebPlus X2 website creation software - which has a DTP-style interface, pre-packaging a lot of the functions. I don't much like this approach but it can be customised, they assure me; to what degree I'm not able to judge at this stage.
I'm well aware that the ability to deliver the panoramas in a way that will make them accessible to as many viewers as possible is a key consideration. Obviously one would like to display them as well as possible too, given bandwidth considerations. I suppose my initial question is whether anyone knows enough about WebPlus X2 to warn me if I'm heading down a cul-de-sac? Of course even if it's limited it may still offer me a way of getting a website out there pending the creation of something more capable. But I don't want to spend most of this winter suffering in order just to build a site that's useless.
I would greatly appreciate some advice or pointers to threads about how to approach this. There's an immense amount of invaluable discussion on the site about the mechanics of parorama creation, but I sometimes feel that most people already know plenty about building websites, so it's an embarassment to admit that I'm a complete novice in this respect, despite > 20 years of daily involvement with I.T. in one form or another.
Roy
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irieman
Posts: 156
Location: East Sussex, United Kingdom
Registered: 8 Jul 2006
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 16:38 GMT
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If you are on a Mac get RapidWeaver and Pleinpot and it's very easy ( and Flashificator once Trausti has released it) - if you're not....... - sorry can't help.
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Skridlov
Posts: 164
Location: United Kingdom
Registered: 12 Nov 2007
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 16:40 GMT
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Hi irieman
No, Windows I'm afraid. But thanks, I should have said what the OS was.
BTW are you shooting the fireworks at Lewes?
Roy
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John Houghton
Posts: 2335
Location: Hitchin, United Kingdom
Registered: 17 Jan 2005
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 17:43 GMT
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Whatever web site generator you use, I would strongly recommend that you learn the basics of HTML if you haven't already done so, so you can at least read the source of the generated pages with some understanding of what's going on and maybe apply minor edits when necessary. I can recommend the books by Elizabeth Castro, which lead you through the steps to create web pages quite painlessly. An earlier one which I have used successfully is "HTML 4 for the World Wide Web", and there are copies available for as little as 29p at Amazon. You cannot go wrong at that price. There are lots of alternative books, of course.
John
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Rosauro
Posts: 242
Location: Toronto, Canada
Registered: 15 Dec 2006
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 18:07 GMT
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Roy
As John suggested, learning basic HTML will help you out.
Have a look here...
htmlgoodies.com/
Colleges are using this site as a part or their curriculum.
IT'S FREE!
Rosauro
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Vilmer
Posts: 164
Location: Argentina
Registered: 23 May 2007
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 18:23 GMT
updated: 20 Oct 2008 at 18:36 GMT
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Another option is to have someone install a cms (content managing system) on your webserver. You will need a hosting service where you can create a mysql database. The $100.- per year 'bronze' plan of downtownhost will do, 5Gb hdd space should be enough for some time: downtownhost.com/shared.html
As cms I use cms made simple (www.cmsmadesimple.org/) ($ free)once you have it set up, the only thing you have to do is add or modify content. And that's as easy as creating a document in Microsoft Word. It looks like tinyurl.com/5cmq6e . You can choose a template from here:themes.cmsmadesimple.org/Full_Themes.html
Grts,
Ronald
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Bob Stone
Posts: 49
Location: Rochester, NY, United States
Registered: 20 Oct 2007
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Vilmer
Posts: 164
Location: Argentina
Registered: 23 May 2007
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 18:40 GMT
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And I noticed a service called psd to html, www.psd2html.com/ If you design the page in photoshop, they will turn it into a working site, or template for a cms site. You will have to pay for it of course
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John Houghton
Posts: 2335
Location: Hitchin, United Kingdom
Registered: 17 Jan 2005
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John Willetts
Posts: 54
Location: Bath, United Kingdom
Registered: 13 Mar 2008
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 18:53 GMT
updated: 20 Oct 2008 at 18:58 GMT
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Hi Roy,
As a fellow geriatric, I quite understand where you are coming from.
But what else is there to do through the winter? At least the heat generated by the PC will help to keep you warm.
Before I can give you any advice, can you tell me what software programs you are using to produce your panoramas? Because I suspect that you might need minimal exposure to HTML - don't let the annoraks blind you with science, art is far more fun!
John
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Skridlov
Posts: 164
Location: United Kingdom
Registered: 12 Nov 2007
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 20:18 GMT
updated: 20 Oct 2008 at 20:20 GMT
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Thank you everyone. A blizzard of responses.
Well, as far as HTML is concerned I was hoping to avoid learning it directly, and just to pick it up as a by-product of cobbling something together DTP style (hence WebPlus, which allows HTML editing of completed pages or HTML design). This would accelerate the process, or so I imagined.
When I hear CMS and - gulp - MySQL, I reach for my something or other. Oddly enough I have had some dealings with SQL in the course of investigating huge advertising databases, but in those days all I had to do was swivel my chair around and ask someone cleverer than myself what the syntax was. And of course I've forgotten it all. Clearly any kind of website other than the simplest contact page is inevitably a database, even if not constructed in an underlying database framework. It's just that I was hoping to get something up and running quickly... I know, I know...
John W. I am shooting Nikon NEFs. The workflow, simplifying a bit is as follows:
NEF>ACR corrections>16-bit tiff
TIFFs (HDR bracket sequence - usually) > Enfuse
Enfused tiffs > PTGui > 8 bit Equirectangular tiff > CS3 (tweaks)
Sometimes I also convert to cubes via Pano2QTVR if edits are needed (far less since I started listening more carefully to J. H.'s advice) and back using Lanczos 3.
I'll investigate the suggestions everyone's been kind enough to offer and keep the dumb questions coming: with luck they'll eventually become less dumb. But any further suggestions would be appreciated in the meantime.
Roy
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Vilmer
Posts: 164
Location: Argentina
Registered: 23 May 2007
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 20:29 GMT
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Hey Roy,
actually, the only thing that has to be done is to create a database, which is very easy to do in the admin panel of your hoster, and fill out the username+password in your cms. No coding whatsoever needed, it's all generated automagically.
Greets,
Ronald
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Peter Stark
Posts: 101
Location: Glasgow, United Kingdom
Registered: 12 Sep 2007
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 20:31 GMT
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My tuppence worth: Making a web site is only as difficult as you want it to be. There are many simple methods to get your pano's and images on show. If you are using a program like Pano2QTVR or Pano2VR the html page is generated for you, from there you can learn and add to as you go along. Learning html does help, there is no question about that, but it is not essential to begin making a web site.
Contact me privately if you want to have a try. You can borrow some of my web space.
Ped
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irieman
Posts: 156
Location: East Sussex, United Kingdom
Registered: 8 Jul 2006
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 21:22 GMT
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Hi Roy
Well, you have my sympathy - I can only scratch the surface with coding, most of it is a new trick too far for this old dog 
I don't want to start a platform war but I just couldn't have achieved what little that I have if I didn't have a Mac. I don't know why PC users can't have software that is equally user friendly, given the far greater number of users - it does amaze me.
Yes I will be at Lewes, not sure where yet - I have pretty good coverage of Cliffe High Street from last year. I'll definitely be at Cliffe fire site though - don't forget that you must buy tickets in advance for entry to the Cliffe fire site if you want to get in there, the others are free and open.
I was at Hastings last weekend and will post a link to those panos once I have had time to process them all.
Bruce
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remltr
Posts: 3
Location:
Registered: 2 Mar 2008
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Re: Starting a website
Posted: 20 Oct 2008 at 23:28 GMT
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Are you doing this because, like me, you are unable to find a hosting site for qtvr movies?
I am not a prolific shooter of equirectangular or panoramas but I dabble. I am a lurker to this site and I have learned quite a bit just by reading. It would be nice to have a place to post your work so you can show it to others.
Anyway I have asked a friend, a couple weeks ago, who is a website developer, if he would be interested in building and hosting a site dedicated to qtvr. He said he would think about it. Obviously something like that would not be free. Maybe an annual subscription fee with a max limit on space.
If there is an interest in this sort of thing I can push him to think some more on it.
If this post is inappropriate, please forgive me and I will request it be deleted by the moderator.
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