I present to you the new SAMGABELL SHOOTS!
No longer just a viewing gallery for my photography portfolio this new site seeks to make life a lot simpler for the both of us by combining my unique ability to write 2,000 words without really saying anything and my passion for framing the world around me. This site will become the new landing page for everything I’m writing and shooting and as such my travel blog will be retired to the hallowed halls of my development archives and the domain will redirect here instead. Sad yes, but let’s not get too nostalgic, instead let’s look towards the future.
If your interested in finding out more details, including what my intentions for this new site are then please feel free to hit the ‘Read More’ link below.
If however you couldn’t think of anything more boring then hearing me talk about myself—you must be new around here—or about the frustrating results of having OCDD (Obsessive Compulsive Design Disorder) I instead invite you to browse some of my photography using this shiny orange portfolio link, or to explore the projects I have on the horizon using this equally colourful project link.
How did we get here?
This new site has been a real labour of love for me. For those of you that are wondering the new site still uses Wordpress as a platform but both this site and my travel blog were both based on freely available themes with an assortment of personal front-end and back-end customisations. The problem is that although free themes are a fantastic way to get things started on your blog, they usually don’t have the same sophistication and longevity as a paid or custom option.
While it’s true that I have a reasonable amount of web development experience I really didn’t see the point in building something from scratch when there are plenty of great themes out there to use as a base. So I started shopping around and eventually came across Brandon Jones’ Atlantica Wordpress theme over at ThemeForest.
The Atlantica Theme managed to fulfill many of the requirements I had but I immediately saw that there were a number of design changes I’d like to make. The theme ended up requiring a lot more customisation then I had originally planned. Along the way I found a few bugs and areas for optimisation but mostly the work involved tweaking things to satisfy my perfectionist nature. It might not seem like it when compared to the original version of the theme but I’d estimate that I’ve sunk an extra 50 hours, on top of setup, into getting the site to what you see before you.
Where are we going?
As my grand travels are now winding to a close this site will become more focused on my journey of photographic discovery rather then my mental and physical one. That’s not to say that my passion for photography won’t hopefully take me to some new and exotic places, nor will it prevent me from getting into embarrassing or unusual circumstances, I’m sure.
I sincerely hope to use this site to develop my passion for photography into something that I might one day be able to pursue as a career and to that effect I have several upcoming projects aimed at trying to broaden my portfolio and polish my skills.
Enough words already, let’s see some photos!
Just before you leave please consider subscribing to my blog updates on this site using either RSS or E-Mail as it’s far easier then religiously checking for updates every hour, which I’m sure you all do.
Also a reminder that print versions of many of my shots can be purchased through my deviantART account. I can attest with first hand experience that the service is both secure and reliable. At the moment I am only uploading the shots that I think I have a chance of selling but I’m more then happy to make available any photo I have taken, all you need to do is get in contact with me and specify which one you would like the option of printing.
Finally I would like to thank those of you that have given me praise and encouragement for either my blogging or my photography, without it I do not think I would have the balls to try and see where this could all lead.
