I'm thinking of starting a blog/website...

eclark1849

I've been thinking of this for quite sometime actually. Several years in fact. To be honest, I still haven't decided whether or not I will do it. Mainly, it's more a matter of will I have time to do it or not more than anything.

My thought is to write articles, probably one or two per week/bi-weekly on something or someone in the CG field, primarily, but not confined to Poser, Blender, and GIMP. If you're wondering why I left out obvious other software like Studio, Silo, or Photoshop, well, I don't use any of those well enough to know what I'm talking about, so when I have articles on those software packages, I'll probably present it it the form of a guest contributor who knows what they're talking about.

Other things will be tutorials on the features in software like Poser's Cloth Room, how to use Bullet Physics, or how to set up renders for Cycles to get the best result. Or tips like a short cut on how to align a row of vertices in Blender.

I'd also like to do a controversial one... product reviews. That's on a back burner for now... with the flame off.

I don't know whether or not I will have a forum since frankly, I don't want or need the headache, so while people may be able to respond to my blog articles, to begin with they will not be able to start any new threads of their own. Maybe that will change, maybe it won't. We'll see.

Right now, this is something I'm mulling over doing. I'm checking out web hosting sites and blogging software. How much this will cost, etc. Right now, I have no desire or intention to have a pay to join site, so ads may be a necessity here to help pay for it.

Thought I'd post this to get some feedback. Thoughts?

nonesuch00

Well it sounds like you will be spending your time and your money. Blogs are a good creative outlet too, not just the visual arts but how will folks find your blog? The DAZ forums aren't really the place. Deviant Art sounds like it would be a good place to do that. Or you can start your own thread in the Arts Section of the DAZ Forums.

It would be nice and probably profit DAZ & it's customers if they added a Blog section and a Tutorial section and maybe a freebie (although I can see why they might not do that with the extra product policing that might necesitate) to a User's DAZ Gallery.

Khory

Trying to keep up with a blog.. well anything like that is high on my list of things I never can seem to do.. But if you do affilite programs and add revinue should be able to "pay your web bill" if you put enough effort into it.

FSMCDesigns

Khory said:

Trying to keep up with a blog.. well anything like that is high on my list of things I never can seem to do.. But if you do affilite programs and add revinue should be able to "pay your web bill" if you put enough effort into it.

Same here, it's why I don't do facebook, no time to do updates. I actually started a 3D blog last year, but found it too time consuming..

 

LayLo 3D

I would say the big question is, what do you want to get out of it? Meaning, what's your motivation for starting it in the first place? Knowing what you want and/or expect to get in return from it, in my opinion is a big contributor of whether it will become a fulfilling project, or a burdensome one.

For example, I started my blog simply because I like creating. I like to code HTML, PHP, MySQL, etc. and create my own WordPress template. I also like to share things I have figured out (or found the information scattered about) and present it to people in a hopefully more straightforward, easier to understand fashion. Things that could have helped save me time on my projects.

Do I currently have the time I would like to spend working on it? No. I have 3 businesses and no shortage of side projects. Sometimes my blog gets neglected... Summers are usually bad for my blog LOL. But, I still enjoy spending time on it, and I don't beat myself up when I can't. Eventually I'll be able to put more tutorials and what not up.

Anyway, creating a blog is fairly cheap. All you really need is hosting and a domain name. You can probably get that for around $10 a month. Most people can buy a few less pops, or a lil’ less junk food and swing that. WordPress is free and is just fine to use for blogging and even more advanced websites really.

So, I would say if you're doing it for yourself, then definitely do it! If you're doing for yourself and want to make money with it, do it, just make sure you have somewhat of a plan in place to drive traffic and make money.

In my opinion time and persistence, is key to the success of any project. Basically, if your persistent enough, for long enough with any project, and put in a reasonable amount of effort, eventually it will become a success.

You can look at my start of a blog if you want: laylo3d.com and see what I got going on. There's some useful information on there, some art, and I definitely still need to do some more work to it.

Anyway, I hope you find something in this post useful. You can ask me more questions specific to this tthread if you want and I'll try and answer them.

RAMWolff

Good luck with that Earl.  Last time I updated my website was about 4 years ago.  Life is too busy.  LOL 

eclark1849

LayLo 3D said:

I would say the big question is, what do you want to get out of it? Meaning, what's your motivation for starting it in the first place? Knowing what you want and/or expect to get in return from it, in my opinion is a big contributor of whether it will become a fulfilling project, or a burdensome one.

For example, I started my blog simply because I like creating. I like to code HTML, PHP, MySQL, etc. and create my own WordPress template. I also like to share things I have figured out (or found the information scattered about) and present it to people in a hopefully more straightforward, easier to understand fashion. Things that could have helped save me time on my projects.

Do I currently have the time I would like to spend working on it? No. I have 3 businesses and no shortage of side projects. Sometimes my blog gets neglected... Summers are usually bad for my blog LOL. But, I still enjoy spending time on it, and I don't beat myself up when I can't. Eventually I'll be able to put more tutorials and what not up.

Anyway, creating a blog is fairly cheap. All you really need is hosting and a domain name. You can probably get that for around $10 a month. Most people can buy a few less pops, or a lil’ less junk food and swing that. WordPress is free and is just fine to use for blogging and even more advanced websites really.

So, I would say if you're doing it for yourself, then definitely do it! If you're doing for yourself and want to make money with it, do it, just make sure you have somewhat of a plan in place to drive traffic and make money.

In my opinion time and persistence, is key to the success of any project. Basically, if your persistent enough, for long enough with any project, and put in a reasonable amount of effort, eventually it will become a success.

You can look at my start of a blog if you want: laylo3d.com and see what I got going on. There's some useful information on there, some art, and I definitely still need to do some more work to it.

Anyway, I hope you find something in this post useful. You can ask me more questions specific to this tthread if you want and I'll try and answer them.

Laylo, I would go so far as to say that there's a little bit of all that involved. I'm not quite at retirement age, but I'm getting there, and I really like working with 3D graphics. Truth is, I'd like to get things up and running now while I have the energy and hope that by the time I do retire, (if I ever do... or can) everything will be running on autopilot. That said, I'm NOT counting on that happening. It's just a nice daydream at the moment.