ViewBugReviews 249

First of all i slightly disagree w the last post. I think most artists are their worst critics, all the ones i know anyway (including myself). Yes, there are a lot of really amazing photos and extremely tough competition. As an artist i also enjoy that. It challenges you to get better and inspires you to do more. If nothing else look at the entries for inspiration. I spent hours just looking at peoples work. There's a wide range from bad to professional. Win or not your work will be seen by the public. That's great for anyone just starting out!

This site is such scam! I joined couple months ago and submitted to numerous contests, but never get into final stage until I got membership paid. After this couple of my pix get the top 10 number of votes, but never get to final (they send you email VOTING UPDATE and where is your picture ranked). I emailed asking for explanation - how come that my picture is ranked top10 at the and of voting, but didn't get to final 50?... no answer. I also noticed that one photographer won 2 cameras in 2 different contests, with pretty much similar picture within a month. According to latest contest for Photo of the year the is a over 180K pics submitted. You could estimate that they have around 20-30.000 monthly paid subscribers (PRO $9, Premium $6). So they are getting minimum 100-150K per month and still scamming who will get most attractive prizes!
THERE IS NO SUCH A THING AS FREE LUNCH!

I joined when a friend that runs a photography studio invited me to vote for his photos in a contest about babies. I was very impressed with the quality of the photos so decided to create my account and join. So far I've been having a blast, seeing the most beautiful works and learning trying to win a contest... If you think you will win a contest right away, good luck, with so many photographers, it is pretty hard if you are great, if you are like me... almost impossible. But after a few months on viewbug i've learned that the contests are great for creativity and to meet people with the same interests. I did checked a couple of other reviews and clearly see that people expecting to win and don't get pretty pissed, that's sad given that art and beauty are in the eye of the beholder. Negativity sucks... but for me viewbug rocks!

I entered an amateur contest. Gotta top 10 trifecta. But I noticed that all of the ones that won the contest are professional grade. So I emailed viewbug and ask them how this could be. They messaged me back and told me in order to get into an amateur contest you have to go into your account settings and deem yourself an amateur. So that means any professional photographer that does exceptional work can go into their account settings deem themselves an amateur and enter this contest and win them. It is a scam to get your money do not ever pay for a premium or Pro subscription. I did and I'm regretting it. Because there's no way in hell that I will ever be able to win until I am a pro

Not trying to boast about my photography but I know I don't suck, I have put out some amazing shots amazing photoshop edits and I get like 5 views?! I don't get it I stopped using view bug because it doesn't make sense, I see people with bad photography example bad lighting bad exposure bad bad bad composition but yet it would have hundreds if not thousands of views and people boasting about it? I feel i`ve entered the photography twilight zone

I'm really feeling compelled to write a positive current review of Viewbug. I did join it about one month ago and I'm completing happy with it. The reason I joined was because of the variety of pictures that are on the site. The members are from all over the world so you get to see photography from a world view. Every time I've had a question I simply shoot (get it) an email to them and within 24 hours I have an answer. I do appreciate the awards and yes they come from other viewbug members. I too have entered several contest and have not won any, but that really wasn't the main reason for joining. The site inspires and encourages me to improve my photography. When I see a photo that I'm really interested in how it was done I send a message to the creator and I have received a response from everyone so far. Once in awhile I will attempt to enter a photo in the pro membership level and I will get a "sorry you must upgrade", but I just go to the next contest. ---Several months ago I was tempted to join another online contest that had daily winners. I looked at the daily winners and the monthly top BIG winners. Well after a month I came to the conclusion that you had to have either a photo of landscapes, birds or cute animals. There was nothing new and fresh. And some of those winning photos were nothing more then snapshots. Don't get me wrong there were some amazing pictures, but the same kind over and over. With the same winners too.My question for that site was how can you have the same winners over and over again, if you have contestants from all over the world. Now that's suspect! With viewbug you know that you will see some amazing photos that have that WOW factor! So far the winning photos have been extraordinary and they challenge me to work harder on my own images, both in making them and in post production. Viewbug is just one avenue that I am using to improve my photos. I think you get what you put into it and this is one very positive method of improving my images. So thank you viewbug!

Thankfully I have cancelled my subscription to the site. From the three years I have been on their the viewing figures are poor. I am not a pro photographer but do believe that I have no chance of winning any contests on there. You are misled into believing you are almost there in at least being in the running. In fact nowhere near. When you pay for a subscription what exactly do you recieve... more contests to enter. So lots more chances of not winning. Hmmm if you want to get noticed as a photographer then plenty of other sites out there.

Basically I think it's a scam. It's set up to make you feel good that you are getting awards etc. but the awards are meaningless because people get rewarded for liking photos and giving awards. The set up is all geared toward paying a monthly fee and ultimately the only one that benefits are the people that are getting that money. I'd like to see if they actually give out the prizes and who they go to. I posted photos and they don't show up in the new photos section so not sure how long it takes to propagate but there is something not quite right. I haven't paid yet. I did get a lot of "awards" but I'm not sure where they saw the photos because I don't see them in the general photo section.

Plenty of photos to view. The "contests" seem somewhat odd--at least on first inspection. Level of buy-in is tagged to participation in most of the galleries. The available postings in some of the categories (contests) are very random or maybe its the oddly-cutesy titles... so what happens in "Faces and Places" is photos of cannons (from where?) appear with portraits (human, okay) and horses and dogs and insect heads and plants that might look like they have a human face! No rules, just "give-me-what-you-got."

While I find the site OK and continue to visit and lightly participate, I find it generally a bit confusing to navigate, particularly the contest sites. Also I often find random pictures of mine submitted to free contests when I don't remember submitting them.

What I really want is true honest feedback about my photos. They don't provide how many "likes" or "votes" your photo gets in any contest, nor really where it RANKED at all (unless you win, I suppose). You have to shuffle through the thousands upon thousands of entries until you find yours to know where you rank. This is dumb. Why don't they just tell me? Is this a premium feature?

I love Viewbug. I have been a member for 6 months. I have 400 photos and almost all of my photos have rewards. The community is friendly and help full. I am just a beginner photographer, so I get inspirations from all the great photos that are on there. Their is people from all over the world posting photos so completion is high. I have never won a contest but I am hopeful. This place is free to join and that's how I started out. If you are wanting to get some praise on your photos and get inspired this is the place.to join. It has been 3 years now that I have been on Viewbug. I have learned so much from them.

Not overly impressed with the service as some of the winners of the contests are not by any means the best within the community and or the contests. They seem to do very very little as far as running the site. They have two categories for there contests those who payed and those who did not. They do have a points system with unlocking badges but thats all they do is unlock they're useless trinkets. The biggest problem with the site as i see it. Is anyone who puts up the money can enter even the worst of quality or even no where near what the contest was about. So in order to vote for a favorite you have to go through thousands of pics by those not serious about photography what so ever. If the useless badges unlocked contests and then allowed you to the next level people might actualy talk and ask more about the pics and how they were done or want to grow as photographers. In todays age of cameras you certainly dont need to spend 10's of thousands to get a good shot. But to have all levels competing depending on the almighty buck is frustrating and very time consuming. Even when the voting is open or the second round theres still a ton of crap to sift through.