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There are plenty of photo sharing websites available to photographers, both professional and amateur, where you can post your portfolios, show off current or recent photo projects or even just store your snapshots. With so many fish in the sea, as the proverb goes, here are a few of the best to start with should you be looking into creating an online collection of your work, but aren’t looking to spend the time or money developing a registered website.

While these may not be the most professional method of showcasing your work, a photo sharing site is a great way to back up your files. Just keep your albums private and it’s like having unlimited hard drive memory.

Shutterfly
Shutterfly is unique in that it allows an unlimited number of photos to be uploaded and stored on their servers. The site keeps posted photos at their full resolution, rather than scaling them down for easier storage and altering the original file.

Photobucket
Photobucket allows 500MB free storage and is usually used to store photos (often organized into albums), online avatars and short videos. Users can share their photos/videos by email, IM or MMS phone messaging. The site also offers a user-friendly slide-show builder.

Flickr
Flickr, in addition to storing member photos and videos, is commonly used to host images embedded in blogs and other social media forums. As one of the largest photo sharing sites around, the site reported hosting more than five billion images as of September 2010.

Snapfish
Snapfish, owned by Hewlett-Packard, allows members to upload files for free and gives them unlimited storage space. The only catch is that members must submit at least one paid order to Snapfish a year, or their files can be deleted.

If none of these photo hosting sites seem right for you, take the time to do a little research until you find the one that best meets your needs. These sites may not be the most professional way to showcase your work, but they can also be a fantastic addition to your website, allowing interested visitors to view more of your work.

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