David Brabyn wears two hats: he’s a working photojournalist based in New York, and also a website consultant and designer with his own business, digitaltechparis. As a consultant, David recommends and builds solutions for photographers who want to get the most out of the Internet.

David is a PhotoShelter Certified Consultant and also one of eight members of the Dream Team Advisory Board in our Jumpstart Your Photo Business Contest. One grand prize winner will receive one-on-one time with David and the other Dream Team members, as well as a Canon 6D and $2,000 in gear from Calumet.

“The goal is to empower photographers with a web presence that they can manage independently, rather than having to wait and pay for every little modification,” says David.

We asked David to comb through his past clients, and show us three examples of defunct photography websites turned great. His examples showcase excellent photographers who were limiting themselves with a sub-par site. David helped turned that around with his consultations – here’s how:

Example #1: Harold Feinstein

Famed photographer Harold Feinstein began his career in 1946 at age 15, and soon became a prominent figure in early New York city street photography.  His work has been exhibited in the permanent collections of major museums around the world.

Last year, Harold’s wife Judith contacted David to help them revamp their website completely. Harold’s long and rich career had gone somewhat dormant, but that was about to turn around – a new retrospective book was coming out and they had plans to get his work back out in front of fine art collectors.

Harold’s existing site did a decent job of showing his images, but the design looked a little handmade. They also couldn’t edit the content themselves and it didn’t have any blogging capability.

Given the richness and variety of Harold’s work, the need to boost his visibility moving forward was pretty obvious. So David suggested a WordPress portfolio and blogging site with a content-text heavy homepage and seamlessly customized PhotoShelter archive.

This setup works well for most photographers, but in Harold’s case it was particularly suited. Fortunately, Harold and his wife enjoy blogging and have a lot of material to write about. Doesn’t hurt that his images are terrific, too!

Example #2: David Paler

David Paler is one of the top real estate photographers in New York City. He spends his days photographing the most expensive apartments and offices in New York. Even with the big, beautiful splash image, his site looked dated. On top of that, SEO was (and still is!) crucial to David’s business, and his old site wasn’t built with SEO in mind.

The way forward was obvious: a website that featured a content-rich homepage, powered by WordPress. The layout let’s David display a slideshow of images that represent his portfolios, so visitors can see his architecture, line and form, and interior work. His new site’s navigation bar is also much cleaner and more modern looking, and allows visitors to easily access his portfolios, client galleries, and blog.

Overall, David’s new site gives him the blogging and content creation capabilities that help his site rank in search engine results. The new site is more modern, and let’s David connect with both potential new clients as well as existing clients through his private galleries powered by PhotoShelter.

Example #3: Charlie Mahoney

Like David himself, Charlie Mahoney is an acclaimed freelance photojournalist who has worked on global issues ranging from climate change to political unrest. Charlie is also a founding member of Prime Collective.

Charlie had been looking at all the usual photo website options when he contacted David. He wanted to be able to blog, but wanted to work with a more sophisticated design. He also needed to blend his PhotoShelter website’s pages with his portfolio.

After working with David, Charlie now has a portfolio site that showcases his images at their best. His new site is very effective as a promotional tool, and his archive is all bundled under a single brand. He also has the ability to edit his content independently.

Charlie’s site works well because it has a rotating portfolio slideshow on the homepage that shows off his best work, as well as a side navigation bar that let’s clients easily access his most recent work, client galleries, and archive. He can also link out to blog posts on his homepage. Overall, it’s a very “hardworking” website.

David is one of eight members of the Dream Team Advisory Board in our Jumpstart Your Photo Business Contest. Enter to win consultation time with our Dream Team, as well as a Canon 6D and $2,000 in gear from Calument. 

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