Another Website/hosting/space Question

I guess my website is big, and that's why bluehost is going to shut me down soon. I've taken the majority of my sample pictures down. I've taken the majority of any proofs before 2023 down. Nothing has changed on my site usage. 

Am I supposed to be shrinking the pictures down before uploading them as proofs?? If so, is there an easy way to do that? If it's not the proofs, what could be using all the space? I'm not a web designer. I don't understand how unlimited sites are limited. I don't understand how unlimited is limited to a certain gb, which is smaller than any sd card I own, for something or other. Sorry, if I'm asking stupid questions, but this just gives me a headache and I'm already in the busiest 3 months. 

Thanks

1. Bluehost is the worst, move your site. Left them years ago and have had ZERO problems since. 2. You should consider moving all images to Amazon S3, cheap to store your images and  fast. I have about 70,000 images on S3 and it costs me less than $6.00 a month sometimes higher when downloads are purchased.  You will have problems with storing images with any shared hosting platform, these platforms hate photographers. 3. yes you should reduce your images, most cases i only upload 2200 pixel long side some times 3200, but yes you will want them each down to a couple of mega bites each.

Thanks! 

I don't understand the Amazon S3 part. I have Backblaze for cloud services and love them. I have multiple hard drives, and I'm going to start just getting rid of pictures. If they want them, they should buy them. Would I still need Amazon??

If anyone buys digitals, I edit them first and then send them to them via dropbox, email, or a usb.

Does Sytist have something to reduce when uploading? Or, is that something I need to do after converting them to jpgs?

Again, sorry if I'm asking stupid questions

Hi Martha, S3 is a CDN (content delivery Network) storage, somewhat like backblaze. S3 is integrated with sytist and will automatically send your files to S3. Sytist only downsizes your images from the original size you upload them at for download and viewing purposes. It will not downsize your upload for storage. If you are offering retouching service you can easily replace the images per order, by selecting " Do not allow download until I upload a replacement file or manually approve it" in your product set up. I do not recommend at any point to upload a full resolution pic from a full frame camera, files are just to large and will take forever to process, there is no need for such big files, unless this is a commercial production such as a billboard. At that point for me at least, i send them a flash drive with the images requested. I use lightroom to process all my RAW files to like i said above 99% of the time it's 2200 pixel long edge. These are plenty big enough for proofing and printing to 8x10, 2400 pixel would be a perfect 8x10 at 300 DPI. If you do not mind spending under a 100.00 a year for all of your storage needs then yes get S3 going. If you are just a portrait photographer i see no point to hold them for more than 2 years, if no orders come in during that time, then remove them and if they want to see them again charge them a fee to re-upload or make a deal with them for all of them on a flash drive. If you want to even give them 6 months to order then remove, it will greatly reduce your S3 cost if you are a very busy photographer and uploading 1,000's of images a week.  PS those were not stupid questions.

It's not 'just' the size of the files uploaded.

Most shared hosting will restrict the actual number of files you can hold on the server at any time irrespective of their file size - for many hosts this is about 250,000 files or nodes as they are called. 

This can be a far greater problem than actual file size.  Each image you upload to Sytist has five copies made at lower resolution for things like viewing and thumbnail for baskets.  It also creates new images for basket images if using greenscreen.  Thus, you can see how the 'node count' can increase very rapidly if you work in volume.

If you are starting to get serious, then amazon S3 bucket storage is the only real prospect.  It's fantastic that Tim allows images to be be hosted and called from an S3 bucket at all!

Here is the information on hosting your photo files on Amazon S3 which will reduce the amount of files on your hosting account. 

Hosting Photos on Amazon S3

Thank you all so much!!!!!!

OY!!! If I move the pictures to s3 then they're not available on my website for purchase. Is this right???? If not, Tim can I pay you to set this up correctly for me? I'm so confused and stressed out that Bluehost is going to shut down my site. I've asked all of my people who usually understand computer stuff and nobody knows anything about S3.

No Martha it is just where the photos are being stored, S3 is just a storage service. All products are available to your customers.

Amazon S3 is just where your photo files are stored. Your customers won't see any difference.

Here are the instructions on setting it up. 

Once it is setup, you can move the existing photos in a gallery by viewing the photos in the gallery in the admin then click More and Move to S3.

I don't know if you can add administrators on S3, but if you can or want to send me that log in info you can along with the login to your Sytist admin.

My son came over and we got this figured out finally!! I chose Ohio as the closest area, since I live in Cleveland, and no matter what we tried it wouldn't work. We made a new bucket and chose VA instead and it works fine. 

Thanks for all your help!!! Now on to finding hosting and dumping Bluehost!

Martha, you will need to manually move all photos that are existing on your site. But now when you upload check the box to send to Amazon S3. 

Yes. I will get that done in the next couple of days and then find hosting, so I never have to give bluehost another dollar! Thank you and Tim for all of your help through this!! 

You are welcome, i would recommend Tim's primary host Saratoga (sp) i believe, they will help you move the site. Not sure there is an extra expense, but they are very reponsive from what i have seen. I use green geeks and they rock, but i set it up from scratch so it made it easier. Good luck and any other questions Tim and many others on here are always willing to help.