As I mentioned in my previous research post, the next thing to research is creating a website.
I've been doing a little bit of reading, and some talking to my teacher and I'm quite surprised how easy the whole thing seems.
Basically all I need is some form of web presence and contact details, this can be achieved quickly and easily with a blog just like this one, I can upload all of my work, even create a gallery link for a showreel and portfolio, and it's a very tempting and cheap option! It's easy, no hosting or security worries, and perhaps most importantly... I actually know how to do this one.
Another option is to buy a domain, which are very cheap... Ranging from just £2 to £10 for .coms and .co.uks, and it's a one-time cost. This is done very simply by going to a domain registration website, typing in the site name you want, picking .com, .co.uk, .org or all of them, and poking buy, easy peasey...
http://www.godaddy.com is one such domain buying site, and one of the most popular, though I'm sure there are probably cheaper... They also provide hosting services, which is handy.
Hosting is slightly more expensive, but not as much as you might expect, you can get very basic hosting package, with limited bandwidth and storage for as little as the price of a cup of coffee a month... I can live without one cup... Or at least, I can afford an extra one.
A host is essentially where all of the data on your website is stored, so when someone puts in your website, the host server shows them what's there on the site. They have to be on all the time, which is why most people don't host their own websites, it also means you don't have to worry (as much) about security threats... Though there's not much you can really do about it. There are many hosts out there, but it's best to be picky, you get what you pay for with hosts, or so I'm told...
http://www.fasthosts.co.uk/ provide very cheap UK based web hosting, for less than a fiver a month and includes a free .co.uk domain name.
They also include a web building package, which allows you to easily create a website and upload it to the server. Another way of doing this is get Wordpress, and install that to your website, it does basically the same thing, just with a few more options. Wordpress isn't compatible with all hosts though, so always best to check.
Personally I think at least for a while I'll be fine with a blog. I've reserved a blog that I intend to use, and I'll get my showreel on there as soon as I'm able, after Friday it seems I'll have an abundance of free time... I can't wait!
Along with my new blog, I also have a youtube and vimeo channel, which I can upload to. Youtube is a great option but it's been pointed out to me that a the creative community seem to use vimeo more, probably because it's much easier to follow people, find what you're looking for etc. Personally I like vimeo a lot better, there's no lag, which is now abundant on youtube, and the interface is much cleaner and more user friendly... However, they charge money for a premium membership, meaning for a free membership you only get to upload up to 500mb per week, which is only one or 2 films. Also, vimeo don't offer the option to monetize your channel like youtube does, on the flip side, this also means that there's no ads on vimeo...
I'll be uploading any videos I create and videos I've already created to those sites and link them to my personal blog. On which I'll also have a contact section for prospective employers etc.
Should my needs evolve past what I can achieve with a blog, I'll look into creating a full website.
No comments:
Post a Comment