[Art] A parrot. A parrot. A parrot.

[moonvoice]

I'm going to be cancelling my paid account at Photobucket,
so you may notice a lot of dead image links at some point in the future here.
(Right now they're still being hosted because I have a paid account).
I've switched over to SmugMug, so everything should be hosted from here on in.
So we should be good for a little while longer anyway.
Now let's see if this works.


Orange-Bellied Parrot as Totem



Pesquet's Parrot



Pale-Headed Rosella

Comments

[alias_sqbr]

UuuuUUUuuuurgh photobucket. I have EIGHTY FIVE broken fanart posts on the Ao3. I'm having trouble deciding what to replace it with. If you're up to replying: What made you pick Smugmug, and what plan are you on?

[moonvoice]

I picked SmugMug in part because it *isn't* free, which might sound weird, but it means I know they're not dependent on things like ad revenue etc. and I'm less likely to have to deal with malware and other things that Photobucket kind of did to its userbase over the years.

I picked the one up from the bottom, I think it's $71~ a year, but I was paying around $65~ a year (or maybe even a little more) on the Photobucket Plus system which is still going to be nerfed. (Ugh.)

The only thing I don't like about SmugMug so far is that they will sort of fit your photo into their pre-made sizes. They won't distort it or anything, but that's why there's a slight difference between Pesquet's Parrot and the other two. It's actually not too bad (given that Pesquet's Parrot *is* a wider photo than the other two), but I'm going to email them about it, because their fix for getting it up at the size you uploaded it at isn't working, and I'm not sure why.

Things I like about SmugMug: I like the upload system, it feels easier/simpler than Photobucket. It feels like a 'cleaner' site, but that could just be me. I need to explore it, and I may not stick with it once the year is up. I'm pretty sure I tried Flickr a while back and just didn't really like its formatting. :/

Seriously I'm so mad at Photobucket. 10 years of forum photos, even book covers on Amazon etc. Everything I've ever placed here when I stopped using Livejournal's hosting system. It's like sdalfjasdfas It's going to be *thousands* of broken/dead photos once all is said and done. I don't even want to think about my Wordpress account and similar places. I definitely won't be able to fix it all.

At least like a million other people are in the same boat though? *quietly rolls eyes*

[alias_sqbr]

No, that makes a lot of sense to me! It's why I'm dubious about Mediafire, which some people have suggested.

And yeah the problem is just...so huge and frustrating. Urrrgh.

[moonvoice]

The limited comfort I take is that it isn't 'just me' so I don't have to feel like I'm somehow letting people down by having a gazillion broken links/images. Of course that also makes it painful, knowing that just about anywhere I go on the internet - particularly forums - if I scroll back through into the archives there are going to be a lot of broken images. That sucks. But then, solidarity I guess. This has been done to so many people. :/

I'll keep my eyes/ears open for other options too.

I want to be as angry at Photobucket as other people are. What they did is wrong and possibly even illegal, and it's certainly immoral. But my rage kind of got burnt out with them a while back, with repeated downtime and other issues, and it felt like 'well why am I a paying customer again?' And I'm not now, so... that's seven years of loyalty gone, but they tanked their own brand. I even objectively understand that hosting costs must be too expensive, I just know there's other ways to deal with the issue then the one they took. Especially the 'we're not going to properly communicate this to anyone and then ransom your pictures, nice.'

Oh god I'm rambly today. (It is a really huge and frustrating problem omg).

[alias_sqbr]

I don't have anything interesting to say in reply to this, but rambly is always fine :)

[moonvoice]

I know for free hosting, some people are using Tumblr. There's a rumour going around that Tumblr eventually deletes things from its database, but I've been uploading photos there (granted, not hosting them on other websites) for years and nothing's been deleted? Could be a workaround if you want to use like a junk/side Tumblr for something like that.

[alias_sqbr]

I have an art tumblr, and afaict it's not that they delete the art, it's that they change the url of the image file, and edit the post to match. So the tumblr post and any reblogs are still fine, but direct links to the image file will eventually break.

[moonvoice]

Oh gdi, that makes sense, and makes it useless for image hosting. D:

Not sure if I saw this link on your page or somewhere else, but there's some additional options here.

I know Imgur can be really persnickety about adult content too, a friend posted explicit art there to link on Tumblr, and it got deleted.

[alias_sqbr]

Ooh, that's really useful, thanks! There was some discussion at drawesome but none of the options stood out to me.

[moonvoice]

I've just checked SmugMug and it looks like they too aren't really fans of NSFW material, though I don't know how aggressively they treat that, especially in relations to fanart (idk if this is something you even need to worry about).

The search continues! (I mean I will give SmugMug a year, and I don't really need NSFW hosted, I just also know that with my writing and everything else, I might forget and just upload someone's fanart or something and not think about it, lol).

[alias_sqbr]

Some of my art edges into mild nsfw so that's good to know, thanks!

[alias_sqbr]

Oh and imgur apparently forbids hotlinking in the T&C, so they could decide to just stop that being possible.

[silverjackal]

You know I always like your work very much at the black and white stage. I really love all of these just how they are! the shading, the elegance of the spirals...

Not that I won't look forward to seeing them coloured, but IMO they're perfect as is too. :)

[moonvoice]

I'm quite enjoying the BW stage on these, especially the Rosella and the Pesquet's parrot. :D I spent a bit longer than normal on the Pesquet's trying to get that sense of its feathers puffing out, instead of just being scalloped and lying flat. Though I do think that'll come through more in the colouring of it. :D