Six legitimate reasons for excitement

It feels really good to be back working full-time on the PhotoShelter Personal Archive again. It is, and always has been, our core product – it is healthy and strong and there’s nothing else like it.

I am actually legitimately excited right now about all the upgrades we are about to inject into the Personal Archive. (That’s right! Legitimately excited!) Our engineers are busy putting the finishing touches on things as I type this, and you’ll get to see everything for yourself this month, in a few weeks, before the start of PhotoPlus Expo (which starts October 23 – we’ve got a large booth space — #1808, so visit us.)

Here are my personal favorite updates:

1) Customization Templates. If you love the power of PhotoShelter’s Seamless Customization system, but don’t love all that HTML and CSS that comes with it, you’re going to love what’s coming. The process couldn’t be easier and the templates, or “Themes”, are nice and clean. The engineers showed it to me in action today, and I can’t wait for us to roll this baby out for everyone.

2) Upgrades to the Virtual Agency feature. The Virtual Agency enables a series of independent photographers to “link” their archives together so that they can form a “virtual agency” of their own. The VA is getting an overhaul, will contain a host of new features, and one big huge surprise that I can’t mention just yet — but I am DYING to tell. (This is torture.) Let’s just say that I expect people to really love the VA and there won’t be any excuse not to use it.

3) New PhotoShelter Uploader. What’s special about this version is that it allows threading. Translation: No more waiting for through that pesky “Processing Image…” period. Images will just immediately send one after the other without delay – which means even-faster uploads are coming. (Less time uploading means you’ll have more time for beer.)

4) Member Forum. You’ll finally be able to chat with other PhotoShelter Users right through the member forum. The forum will be broken down into a few different sections, and is similar to the message board we had within the PSC. If you’re a fan of forums, but you’ve only got a free PhotoShelter account, you will be able to read the messages, but you won’t be able to post. It will be a place for people to talk about all topics related to the business and art of professional photography.

5) Navigation Improvements. Getting around the site will be quicker, more intuitive, and very simple. Can I get a big “Yay!” for simplicity? Oh yeah.

6) PA Gallery Widget. We created a similar feature within the PSC, and it went over so well that we thought we should make the same thing possible within the PA. This will allow you to take a gallery of images, and create a widget that can be embedded in a website, blog, or even Facebook. You can go totally nuts and create one for every one of your public galleries if you want. Clicking on the widget will take you to the gallery itself within your PhotoShelter Archive. Super cool stuff alert!

We will be showing off these updates, and more, in our booth at PhotoPlus Expo, in New York City. If you do, I’ll be happy to show you what I look like when I am “Legitimately Excited.