How to share your family photos

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I'm going to talk you through some of the great options out there for how to get started with photo organising. I’ll also be covering sharing images, including the pluses and drawbacks of each way of doing this. There’s a big warning at the end of what most definitely not to do, don't say I didn't tell you.

Things to Think About First
Before you run off and start sharing your photos, there are some things we need to think about first: information versus preserving.
●      Are you looking to share information, just to tell people what you've been up to?
●      Are you really only wanting to preserve your legacy?
Think about why you are sharing your photos with your family members or friends because that will impact how you share them: one way or two way.
By one way I mean you're sharing to people and you don't want any kind of input or feedback. It's just:“Here you go, here's my lovely photo catalogue”. But if it's two way and you want to gather input or photos from friends and family, then some of the options are not going to work for you.

Type of Content
Are you sharing just photos or a mix of photos and videos? Some options have limitations on the length of videos or types of files they will accept, so don't get stuck going down the wrong road when you’re sharing your lovely memories.

Sharing Quality
The quality of the sharing you need is a big one to consider and worth some research, especially when loading stuff up to online platforms. Are these platforms going to compress your files and lose all that amazing detail forever?

Ways to Share
1. Online Apps
For online apps, there are a tonne of options that are pretty good for sharing your photos. They are accessible across both your computer and your phone.
If you want to know my views on the top cloud storage options for your photos, then checkout my video here.
When it comes to some of those pesky online apps they like to compress your photos to save space; they may have limitations on file size.
From one way sharing you can simply send them an image in a message through text or WhatsApp or you can upgrade the approach and send them a Google link so viewers can see your photo in your folders.
For two way sharing you can create a shared album on the likes of Apple and Google Photos - pop your photos in there and share away. Your friends and family can add their photos too. But getting the photos out from these shared albums that aren't yours and into your photo catalogue can take a little bit of work, especially if you want to take them out of the apps and move them to somewhere else, like an external hard drive.
Another two way option is a central folder, just like any file folder on your computer that you can find on OneDrive and Dropbox - nothing fancy but the files keep their original quality and they are easily downloadable to another location wherever you want to put them.

2. Photo Websites
Photographers have been using photo websites to share their photos for ages and you can do the same for your photos. They are a really beautiful way to share and store your legacy. Because they offer a service to mainly photographers, these websites preserve the quality of your photos but it gets a little bit more expensive and you need to make sure that your chosen website will stay around forever. You can even give your friends and family free reign by sharing your login details or you can give them a password protected access and restrict what they can do to just sharing or giving them the ability to download photos or leave comments in the files. Flickr is a solid option in this area. Then there is SmugMug which is a supercharged version but to make it all look beautiful it takes a little bit of work. Available for both Android and iPhone, SmugMug does have an upload photo function with images being sent into a private folder so it saves a little bit of time of uploading up all those new photos. Also naturally there are some limitations when it comes to videos as these platforms were really set up for sharing photos. So for SmugMug you are limited to a 20 minutes video but if you're willing to put in the work it is amazing.

3. Digital Tech
Digital tech, and in this case I’m talking about digital photo frames, have moved on a lot in the last few years. It used to be a bit of a challenge to load photos. On some you needed a card or USB stick that sat with a frame and I have to admit I used to have one which languished in a box for awhile because I couldn't be bothered to keep loading up new photos to that USB stick.
But now you can get web enabled photo frames that you can send photos to your frame directly from your phone or even email them to the frame from wherever you might be. I love these and there are a few out there in the market. I am a super fangirl of Nixplay and they are so cool; I could gush about how easy and fun they are to use but there are limitations on the length of video you can load, but 15 seconds is more than enough. For me another great option is to turn your smart TV into a digital frame so you can link your Google account to your smart TV and it will happily play beautiful photos for you to sit and watch. Or you could make your friends super jealous by posting pictures from your next epic holiday.

4. Printing & Gifting Photos
There's still something rather lovely about seeing your photos beyond all that digital tech. And there is now a whole industry out there on ways to share your photos from mugs to calendars from cushions to a good old trusty photo book; they're a great way to see your photos every day but for some of the options it can take a little bit of time and investment to build them like a photo book. I still leaf through the photo book given to me by some amazing friends as a gift for a big birthday three years ago. It is great to see what other people see as your special memories. If the thought of spending time making a photo book fills you with utter dread, then never fear there are professional photo organisers out there who will make the book for you.

What Not To Do
All those options have their pluses and minuses, but now it's time to give you a very stern talking to you. Do not, I repeat, do not share your photos on Facebook and expect the quality to be maintained. Facebook compresses your photos within an inch of its life. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying no to Facebook in general, it is a great way to share and keep in touch but for sharing your photos and using it as a central hub it is most definitely no way, so move away from Facebook. So there you have it, the best way to share your digital photos with your friends and family. Do you have any other great tips for sharing your photos with your friends and family? Leave them in the comments below.

What Next?
Are you still struggling and don't know how to get started with photo organising? I have put together a simple straight forward quick start guide to organising your photos which you can find here.