If you’re navigating about my site and are thinking to yourself "Eeeee – this site’s reet nippy" – that’s because I have VPS hosting
"VP What?" I imagine you to say in my slightly warped head 🙂
VPS = Virtual Private Server.
Most webhosting companies offer a shared hosting service where you have your websites on a machine alongside about 400-800 other people.
That’s a lot of stress for any machine and disks and why your online site may be dragging its heels.
2 other options hosting providers offer are:
1) VPS Hosting
2) Dedicated Hosting
(1) Is what I have.
They cut one of those powerful servers into 10-20 and sell/rent then to individuals. The VPS acts like a complete server install so it looks like I have the whole machine to myself. I has it’s own CPU and reserved memory, so when I need some power – it’s instantly there.
The upside is I’m not sharing the main machine with many other people, so the site flies and delivers content much faster.
The downside is that it costs a lot more than regular shared hosting
(2) Dedicated hosting is where you hire a complete server.
This costs thouuuusands every year and isn’t really a requirement until you head into the successful small-medium sized business with an online shopping cart or something like that.
So what’s the point of this blog?
I’ve helped out a couple of friends who were having problems with their shared hosting and they now have their sites running from my VPS server.
Example websites hosted here:
http://PMcGPhotography.com
http://BelfastStudioRental.com
http://IrishProductionServices.com
http://www.Freedom2Breathe.co.uk
I have more space available and so I decided to invite 3 more people to share my VPS server.
I’ll be selective in who I choose as we’ll be all sharing my fast machine.
The 3 spaces I’m offering will each have:
1) 1Gb of fast diskspace
2) 25Gb bandwidth (unlimited in theory, but not in practice)
3) 20 addon/parked domains
4) 50 databases
5) Unlimited email, ftp, subdomains …. etc
6) Email capped at 2,500 /hour (share hosting is capped at 350/hr – not so good for mailing lists)
6) Your own private cPanel interface to manage your sites
The cost …. £100 plus VAT per year.
It’s not as cheap as shared hosting, but it has the huge speed and performance a VPS server delivers.
Fast website = happy Google and visitors 🙂
If you think you’d rather your own VPS server then here’s an idea of costs:
http://www.hostdime.co.uk/web-hosting/vps
So – if you’re interested in having access to publish from my super fast VPS then let me know by filling in the form below
Fullscreen for Hi-Def
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I was contacted by one of my favourite clients a month or so ago and asked if I would take some pet pictures of their stunning Pointer breed dogs, mother and daughter Imola and Monza. It’s a bit of a change to the product and car photography I show, but they are great people so I said "sure" 🙂
We discussed the details on what the images were for (a large high-key print/canvas) and I suggested we also did some shots of them just being dogs and playing in the local park as a nice contrast to the posed shots. Everything was set and so we watched the weather and a couple of weeks later the conditions turned to our favour.
I rolled up outside the house with Prabha (girlfriend and pooch fanatic) as my assistant and a 1/2 sized studio setup in the boot. For the ‘studio’ style shots there was just enough room to set up a small backlit background and train, a front light plus a little ‘CallumW special‘ to crisp them up a little 😉
The stage was set.
There’s an old saying never to work with kids or animals, but I have to say that both pooches were extremely well behaved. They were easily transfixed with the promise of biscuits and "coochycoos" from both their owner and Prabha.
Both of them were so well behaved and so adorable, I think Prabha was eyeing one of my bags to see if she could smuggle one of them home (just kidding :))
After the formal setup we headed to the park to let them loose.
A short while back I blogged about the JDM Drift cars that I photographed sliding past at speed, but seriously, they have nothing on these guys. Man these dogs are faaaast.
‘meep! meep!’ … blink …. you’ve missed them.
Needless to say there were a few shots where they were flying out of frame before I could track them. So quick … and unpredictable. At least cars follow the track (usually) and are consistent in speed.
These guys … forget it 😀
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After a short time (but not before they both went for a swim in the lake) the light began dropping which meant I was struggling to keep the shutter speed up high enough, so we got them to pose for us in a few remaining pools of light to add some variety in style.
We headed back and I packed up my mini studio and we said our farewells.
Both pooches were wiped out from all the running, but you could see they had a great day.
If that’s a dog’s life then where do I sign 🙂
A few semi-edited shots below so you can see how adorable they are 🙂
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The place ….. Wembley Stadium
The event ….. the JDM AllStars Drift series – round 4
The scene is set.
For 2 days in late August the locals around London came to watch the 2 day specticle of a bunch of men skidding in their pants.
I say that, but one of the skidders was just a boy …. of 13 (I kid[sic] you not).
I went along to see what was occurring ….. waved my golden ticket (aka my NUJ card) at an Oompa Loompa, donned my fluro jacket and chased the cars up and down the carpark like a 14yr old chav princess looking for a DSS handout.
Ok, not quite, but while I was there I took some shots of the action. Got some shots as well as totally drenched in a downpour … thank you Nikon engineers for creating cameras with better water sealing than a fish’s butthole.
Did a small accompanying video … 5 minutes of HD goodness. Grab a cuppa and a biccy and enjoy 🙂
As always – feedback and/or comments welcome
If for some reason the video doesn’t show below, refresh this page or go directly to the video …… here