A SmugMug Event at the Nikon Photography School.

I have always been interested in photography and would love a DSLR camera, although, I have to say that my iPhone 5s does a pretty amazing job – I will share a photo with you later in the post to prove that point! So, when I was invited to the Nikon School and an event with SmugMug, the worlds largest independent photo sharing platform, how could I refuse?

SmugMug is a service which enables you to store and share your images securely, present them beautifully and keep all of your images safely in their own place in the cloud.

I was really excited to arrive at the Nikon School in the West End to find out more about SmugMug as well as get some photography tips on taking pictures of children. I was also pleased to see some familiar faces from the world of blogging: Stephs Two Girls, Maris World and Life As Alice.

Alistair Jolly, the Business Development Manager for SmugMug in the UK provided us with a bit of history about the company. SmugMug was set up by a father and son team in Silicon Valley, San Francisco. They have accrued several million customers over 12 years and, from what I have seen, look like a wonderful company to work with and for.

They are passionate about their photography and this really shows in the user-friendly site that they have created. SmugMug offers the following benefits to their customers:

• Secure and safe storage – their back end is controlled by Amazon Web Services who provide the biggest data systems in the world, some of which are the size of a small town! The privacy settings are fabulous, enabling you to choose the level of accessability.
• High quality of images and video. When uploading, the file is not compressed, down res or changed in any way.
• Customisable site designs. When you open your account, your site is for you and is easy to personalise in order to reflect your image and images.
• Use of a site the professionals use. The storage is unlimited.
• The option to monetise your images as well as buy merchandise and prints.
• Tailor the package to suit your needs, choosing from four different products at four different prices. 
• SmugMug App which means you can download the photos direct from your phone or smart device.

One of the things that Alistair also taught us was the 3 rules of photography:

3 – copies of every file,
2 – different forms of medium
1 – offsite.

A tip that I shall put to good use.

Alistair, a keen photographer himself, then gave us a talk on ways to take stunning portraits of children. Tips which I will share with you in a separate post together with the photos I took on the Nikon camera which I was given to use to take photos of our 9 month old model, Mia.

In the meantime I will leave you with a couple of the practice images I took before the photoshoot and finish with that iPhone photo I promised you.

You can find out more about SmugMug on their website, on Facebook and on Twitter.

Disclosure: I attended an event held by SmugMugs at the Nikon School in London. We were provided with a goody bag and years subscription to SmugMug, however, all words and opinions are my own and have not been influenced in any way.