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This article is from March 31, 2010, and is no longer current.

Put Your Portfolio on the Web Without Touching Code

If you’re a photographer or print designer who hasn’t yet created a Web site that represents your work, you’re almost certainly losing out on business. In the past, creating a full-fledged, professional-looking portfolio site took Web design experience and a lot of time. That’s no longer true.
You’ve probably heard of the free blogging software WordPress. Thanks to the efforts of a massive community of diverse users, WordPress has grown into much more than a platform for blogging. For example, WordPress is an excellent host for easy-to-erect and easier-to-maintain portfolios. Even if you never write a blog post, you can use WordPress to get your portfolio online, in front of prospective clients, and you don’t have to learn HTML, CSS, or any other Web design language.
What You Will Need
The following instructions are for creating and hosting a portfolio that has a URL you choose (e.g., https://YourName.com).
1. Buy your domain name (around $10.00 a year) from a registrar such as GoDaddy.com.
2. Choose a Web hosting account to hold the files that will make up your Web site and its underlying architecture. There are hundreds of choices, with prices ranging from around $3 to $100 a month. A site like FindMyHosting.com can help you compare pricing and features.
3. Download the latest version of WordPress from https://WordPress.org. (Note: that’s dot-org, not dot-com. WordPress.com is another beast.) A full installation guide on the WordPress.org site will walk you through it step by step.
4. Select the theme, or set of templates, that properly presents your portfolio. Any of the below, which include both free and for-fee themes, will change the look of your entire WordPress-powered site, creating a sleek, professional portfolio. Just install, activate, and begin uploading your own portfolio images. To install a theme, follow the directions in WordPress.org’s installation guide.
Portfolio and Photoblog Themes
Because there are thousands of WordPress themes, finding and sorting through them can be a real headache. To save you time, I’ve rounded up 10 themes that meet the following criteria:
* User-friendly for you and your visitors, with a focus on imagery. No need for you to keep a blog or write a ton of copy — unless you want to.
* Price less than US$100. (That’s easy, as nearly all WordPress themes are under that price point, and many are free.)
* Well designed. Granted, that’s subjective, so I looked for themes that expressed good balance, form, a pleasing color scheme (many include multiple color schemes), and good typography (where type was used).
Folio Portfolio ($32)

The main focus of this fixed-width, two-column theme is the large portfolio image displayed beside its description. But it’s not just one portfolio item. The large area automatically cycles through the most recent portfolio items, up to eight in each category. Visitors can watch the slideshow or manually move between images by using the arrows to either side of the main slide or by clicking on the individual portfolio item thumbnails below. Changing portfolio categories loads up a new deck of slides, making Folio Portfolio highly useful for designers whose work spans multiple fields, such as identity (logo) design, collateral, packaging, and more.
BIG Portfolio ($32)

BIG Portfolio puts a visitor’s focus right where it belongs: on your portfolio image. Multi-discipline designers or photographers can use the tabbed interface at the top to break up portfolio images into categories. A short description is below the big image. Images don’t automatically cycle as they do in other themes, but rather load up the latest portfolio entry and keep it onscreen until the visitor selects another piece by clicking the thumbnails below the main image.
Sensor ($69)

The highly customizable Sensor theme has 14 built-in color styles that include your choice of white and dark grey backgrounds with colored accent elements. The navigation menu in the top right corner features dropdown menus (as shown above) that let visitors navigate to categories of photos without cluttering the main page with links. The latest four photos flagged as “featured” appear in the main area, with titles and short descriptions overlaid on the currently displayed main image in a semi-transparent caption box. Below the main image (not shown in the screenshot above) is the most recent five portfolio images, all as large as the main image, with option descriptions beneath each. Also not shown is the footer of this theme, which contains your Flickr photostream and latest Twitter tweets.
Display 3-in-1 ($42)

First and foremost, don’t judge this theme by the screenshot above. Display 3-in-1 is dynamic and must be seen in its functional live preview to be fully appreciated. Dominating the home page is the unique, Flash-driven image “cube,” where each face of the cube presents a portfolio image and caption and then automatically cycles to the next through a random 3D transition that includes vertical and horizontal accordions, cube rotations, and the depicted segmenting and individual rotation of the display rectangle. Clean header and footer navigation schemes and minimal copy complete this dynamically unique theme.
London Creative + ($32)

Although London Creative might strike some as too busy, it’s perfect to represent teams, small studios, and even freelancers who want a lot of content to share space with the large main image motif. The function of the main image is the same as most large main image designs wherein one big image is shown at a time, accompanied in this case by the title and category of the image rather than a full caption.
The five pictures beneath the main image are thumbnails that, when clicked, load up a new main image. They’re larger than most themes’ thumbnails, making them easier for visitors to appreciate. Moreover, the plus and minus signs at the ends of the thumbnail strip scroll to show additional thumbnails beyond the initial five. Below the featured images, the most recent two pieces are presented with large images, titles, categories, and captions. Text widgets enable you to add as much or as little copy to the theme as you like.
London Creative comes in three color schemes: the yellow, black, and white shown in the figure, as well red, grey, and black, and blue, light grey, and white.
Photo&Graphic Studio ($27)

The Photo&Graphic Studio theme has a unique take on the common image slideshow — instead of the page containing a slideshow, the page is the slideshow. The entire background of the home page cycles through featured portfolio images, with titles and dates of publication displayed in the top left corner. Minimal text content — a welcome message, links to the latest blog posts or news items, and an “About” box — complete the theme.
In addition to the WordPress theme files, Photo&Graphic Studio includes layered Photoshop PSD documents, so if you (or someone you know) understand CSS and HTML, you can modify the theme. That capability is typically available only with developer licenses of themes.
Go to page 2 for four more themes!


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Pariah S. Burke is the author of many books and articles that empower, inform, and connect creative professionals.
  • Anonymous says:

    I have just spent 2 hours sifting through the requirements and purportedly “simple” installation of WordPress. The modification of the configuration file alone is rife with inconceivable code and daunting language.

    I create HTML files regularly. The expression that the “least web-savvy designers can be up and running in under an hour” is a total load. Please, introduce me to someone who can install this in under an hour. I’d like to chat with them.

  • Anonymous says:

    I have spent way more than 2 hours on the installation process of WordPress AND then the process of uploading/installing the free WordPress blog ‘Viewport’ listed in the article as one of the 10 options.

    It took a long while before I became aware that your Web Host could install WordPress for you through the Control Panel. Once you have this done and forego the actual process of trying to install WP yourself, you can upload a FREE ‘Portfolio or Photoblog Theme’. But this and much of what comes afterward is STILL very challenging because the instructions/direction given on the WordPress website is VAGUE and somewhat obsolete because the instructions seem to apply to versions of the software which are MUCH older. As I write this commentary, I am still trying to insert images WHERE I desire and can’t figure out how.

    WORDPRESS is definitely NOT easy to getting rolling with. It may be if you are already a web design savy designer or programmer but not otherwise. WP and this article are very disappointing and misleading.

  • Pariah Burke says:

    I’m sorry and dismayed to read about the difficulty you’re having. What can I do to help with your WordPress installations?

    –Pariah Burke

  • Rick Graf says:

    Please don’t despair. I’ve always found your articles time-saving and enlightening. Thank you. It takes a lot of time to research and write good articles. I know because I’ve written many in my career.

    Some are able to install WordPress in under 15 minutes. Some claim they’ve done it in 5. Others struggle with the install.

    Everyone learns in different ways. Please consider having the two mystery guests watch YouTube videos on how-to install WordPress or buy “WordPress 24-Hour Trainer: Watch, Read, and Learn How to Create and Customize WordPress Sites” (Book & DVD) (Paperback) by George Plumley (Author). It’s under $50. George also writes a blog.

    Another option is to ask the hosting provider to install WordPress for them. Many hosting providers will do the install for free. If nothing else, they should discuss it with the hosting provider anyway because not all servers are alike. Like any software WordPress comes in different versions, and each version has it tech specs.

    Once again, thanks for all of the volunteer time you donate to the creative community.

    Ricky

  • Anonymous says:

    I have spent way more than 2 hours on the installation process of WordPress AND then the process of uploading/installing the free WordPress blog ‘Viewport’ listed in the article as one of the 10 options.

    It took a long while before I became aware that your Web Host could install WordPress for you through the Control Panel. Once you have this done and forego the actual process of trying to install WP yourself, you can upload a FREE ‘Portfolio or Photoblog Theme’. But this and much of what comes afterward is STILL very challenging because the instructions/direction given on the WordPress website is VAGUE and somewhat obsolete because the instructions seem to apply to versions of the software which are MUCH
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  • Anonymous says:

    What about the much simpler option of using Blogger or WordPress to show a portfolio? Here is one I found:
    https://jeffhayesfinearts.blogspot.com/

    True, the web address has the blog name in it. But it’s free, and there’s nothing to install. I haven’t tried it, but it seems like a good option for many artists.

  • Anonymous says:

    If your hosting service provides Cpanel you can install WordPress with the Fantastico script installer, which also will install other CMS applications such as Joomla and Drupal.

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