Last year, I quit using DVDs and started using a cloud storage gallery system called PASS to deliver images to all of my clients. Cutting DVDs out of my workflow was a LIFESAVER!! To be honest with you guys, going to the post office is one of my least favorite things to do. It’s just one of those things that creates a bottleneck in my business. I’m trying to get better at it this year, but not having to send a DVD once a week with a completed wedding on it has been…well, MAGICAL. It definitely helped me speed up my turnaround time, and when you’re shooting between 20-30 weddings and just as many engagement sessions in a season, time is always of the essence!

I decided to try out Pixieset late last Fall. When I started using PASS, there wasn’t really another clear alternative to it. Especially since I use a Showit site for my main website and I used to be able to embed the PASS galleries so beautifully with Plus sites I’d send to my clients. I loved that those were perfectly branded and gave my clients a seamless delivery from start to finish. They’d follow a link to a site made just for them, and get all of their images there. Since PASS no longer really integrates with Showit sites the same way, I don’t use Plus sites for each client anymore because they just don’t really serve any purpose for me. When Pixieset came out, I decided to give it a try. Mainly because I feel like I’m doing my clients and my business a disservice if I’m not actively making sure that the products and services I’m using are the absolute best fit!

Pixieset has a free option (up to 3gb of storage space) so it made it pretty easy to try out. I uploaded a couple of portrait sessions to it first so I could see if it was pretty easy to navigate (it is) and send to clients to see if they had any issues with using it.

Right off the bat, I really loved the white backgrounds. Pixieset has a clean interface that I think looks fantastic. PASS recently added white backgrounds too, and implemented a gallery photo (you can do slideshows, or video too with PASS) that looks pretty similar to Pixieset.

Clients can download their images all at once, or one at a time. You can turn downloads on and off…and there’s also a PIN code you can require in order to download.

You can also set print pricing, which I think is a great feature!

Pixieset also allows photographers to create their own URL, which is pretty freaking cool. I haven’t set mine up yet, but the option is there.

Pixieset is also a great fit for my business from a cost standpoint. As a business owner, I always have to evaluate our costs and figure out what’s best for both our clients and our bottom line. Even though I really love and enjoy what I do for a living and the majority of the time it feels like so much fun, it’s still a business, and I have to make a profit to survive. PASS costs $29 per gallery. Yes, they DO have a free option, but for a full time wedding photographer, the free option isn’t practical (it only lasts 30 days and your clients have to download each image individually). Say you shoot 30 weddings and 30 engagement sessions in a year…PASS would cost you $1740 in a year’s time. That’s enough for some L series glass, gifts you could be giving back to your clients, a small vacation, etc. Pixieset costs $480 a year (when you pay annually) for 1000gb of space. For me an average wedding jpegs take up to 6-7 gbs. An average engagement session is closer to 1-2. So I could literally shoot and store 111 weddings and 111 engagement sessions a year on Pixieset for $480 bucks. Crazy, right??

We’re in the process of phasing out PASS galleries and sharing Pixieset with our 2014 clients instead…so far,they have been received really well! The small differences between the two are things that most of our clients don’t even notice…and as long as our clients are happy, we’re happy!!