ViewBug

They deleted all my best photos and were IMPOSSIBLE TO CONTACT. Never heard from them. It makes me think they are lying about who they are and where they are based.

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!

There are so many things that I like about ViewBug. I am a senior with a strong passion for photography ever since I was a kid. ViewBug provides me the opportunity to keep learning from my peers, communicate with my peers and take full advantage of the enormous amount of data that the organizers of the site provide.

I especially like that hundreds of thousands of photographers at every level are volunteering their time to review and award photos they judge as good. It is especially impressive to see so many photographers with inspiration scores equal or higher than their own number of awards, given that the inspiration category is a good measure of how much effort they have put into awarding others. It is that effort that has a lot to do with the site's success.

The continually updated stats on our photos is extremely useful in helping us photographers figure out how we are doing. One additional piece of data I would like to see included is the percentage of peer awards relative to the total number of views for each photo. Having 35 peer awards for one photo and 20 peer awards for another for example does not mean that the one with the higher number is doing better. If the one with 35 awards has received hundreds of views while the one with 20 awards has only had 20 views the one with the 20 awards is really much better in terms of how it is being perceived.

It has been not quite two years since I joined ViewBug. When it comes to being awarded the ViewBug judges and volunteers have been very generous. It definitely has kept me highly motivated. It has been a bit of a struggle, but so far I have been able to stay in the top 10 percent category in terms of popularity week after week with very few exceptions. I have acquired over 11 k awards, won over 30 challenges or been a contest finalist, and accumulated over 500,000 points. The highlight was winning a Sony a3000 camera in a photo contest where the subject was Minimalism. It felt a bit like winning the lottery given that there were over 18,000 entries.

A big thank you to all the ViewBug staff and your very dedicated army of volunteers.

Paul J.

At first I really liked the page its an amazing place to get inspiration and see photos from all around the globe. So many talented photographers to learn from and get in contact with there. I used to be a paying pro member but one thing bugged me to the point where I just had enough and stopped enjoying it. When i discovered that multiple times photos kept showing up over and over under one contest so you could vote for the same photo over and over under the voting time and when I reached out to view bug about it they said NO thats not possible the system makes it that the photo will only show up one time, so i made shore to check the photos and ad the likes to them to see if i was wrong and NO it was the same photo taken by the same photographer and the same profile it hapend so many times that I just saied nope if viewbug dont even want to check in to the fact that there system have a problem or even say hey that should not happen lets see what glitch we might have and fix it instead of nope thats not possible then why should I pay for a membership so I closed my account and have not been back even do I miss looking at all the photos it was a fun site I just refuse to be a part of something that just want to take your money and not correct something that is clearly wrong. Would I recommend the site maby to get inspiration thats it BUT NEVER becoming a paying member dont waste you money

I definitely have new favorite photography website, they are so user friendly and offer so much. They even offer help to you to showcase your photos.

Great platform to display your work, connect with other photographers, and get helpful tips and tricks to improve your skills.

I have put much effort into my gallery and some challenges, community interaction and, guess what my photos. Been a paying member for 7 years.

First of all, they lure you into making points... even promising you a 'swag' after 500.000 points. I can assure you if you dreamt of an Aussie swag, there isn't even one for your beer tinnie coming up. Nothing. It's a lie.

There was a good forum where you could tell them about flaws, quirks and (View)bugs. Not anymore, it has been cancelled.
Challenges used to get a meaningful description. Not anymore.

Contests should differentiate between photos and digital artwork. Nope, a photo contest is won by a clearly fake, composite image.
In the middle of the pandemic, they do contests like 'haute couture' fashion in the city or Wedding moments which must have recent photos! That really tops it, weddings being limited to 4 guests and no reception.

Why not do a contest like 'health service at work? Heroes of the pandemic, enjoying at a distance, keeping safe, making the best of it. Might be more appropriate.

Which gets me to prizes. Win a podcast interview? The ' possibility' to get your photo published? Are you kidding? Why not donate a computer to poor kids who need to follow courses online if you don't want to give anything to the photographer?
Another good one
Get Your Photos Exhibited
As part of our mission to empower photographers Worldwide, we are running the first-ever ViewBug Virtual Exhibition Project with the goal to showcase unique images and feature the best creators of the community.

Now how is this a 1000 bucks prize value?

I wish I never had put all the effort in it.

Last but not least.
Now they want a GeoTag OK. Fair enough you should think...
Now WHY does San Carlos de Rio San Juan (Nicaragua) create a common tag with all the San Carlos in the world? Why does a very well know landmark in Australia not come up in the search abnd you have to use a town 200 kms away?
Why bother, let's use coordinates as in 9.45 N 91.23 W as in google.

I'be been a member about a year and like any site, it has its good points and bad points. People are friendly and I've found customer service response time to be excellent - usually within a couple hours. There's a variety of contests always going on and they've just started having more and more professional photographers as impartial judges.

As far as the contests go, the worst part is the member judged contests. He who has the most friends wins, regardless of what the pic looks like. One reviewer talked about the points system and how it was spam just to rack up points. To be fair, I recall that reviewer being atop the monthly and weekly points board the whole time they were there. They also had a mega load of groups they created, most of which were redundant. And you earn points for that so yet more easy points for that reviewer and quite hypocritical IMO. I can understand why they changed that rule.

This site is for all types of photographers. I believe if you're truly a professional, you wouldnt be wasting your time at photo sites anyway. I believe the site is more known for the contests and not for selling. There are plenty of other sites for that. I find it's easy to upload and consolidate my pics into albums. The site is easy to maneuver thru. I do not like that they allow minors and have highly sexual adult contests and pics without being able to verify a persons age (like requiring a credit card or driver's license at sign up).

All in all, I've been happy with it. You'll always find someone that doesn't like a particular site and sometimes it's just sour grapes. The only way to know is to try it for yourself.

I love the site its a great opportunity to get my shots out for others to see, but... I am becoming a little discouraged about the competitions. It raises a red flag when the last 3 contest (perhaps more) were won by people who have joined JUST BEFORE a contest submission period ends... if you go back and review several recent contest, you will find this is becoming the norm and these "activities" seem quite questionable.
Case in point:
>> Winter Photo Contest - The latest winners' "portfolio" consist of 2 shots, which just happened to be the maximum # of shots for the contest; they won 1st place (a BX2 Backpack plus a BX2 Holster) (new member)
>> Thunder Photo Contest - 12 photos in winners portfolio (new member)
>> Natural World Photo Contest - - 15 photos in winners portfolio (new member)
>> Joy photo Contest - 2 photos in winners portfolio (new member)

Now don't get me wrong, the "winning" photos are great shots... and I've placed a few "Judges Favorite", "Featured Shots", and even a few "Featured Store". 8 "Awards" in all... just enough to keep me enticed...

As others have mentioned, the sight really lacks proper critiques from peers and seems to be post/point driven. It (the site) also lacks the meta data to "see" how the shot was taken and/or what software was used to edit the shot. There are also still "bugs" with the site that will place images in the wrong category. I don't know how when or why it happens but I've had on several occasions shots where I went in to edit the title or description and found B&W in color category. Landscapes (Nature) in animal category etc...

Bottom Line: I will continue to use the site perhaps past my subscription... but will continue to keep watch over the powers that be... the "contest" prizes are variable from inexpensive 120mm Holga cameras, gorrilla pod tripods. Or the likes to several $1000 prizes. You be the judge.

Thanks Viewbug for your response.

Could you please give me some more feedback on the following.
As a paid member i can use more peer awards than a none paying member such as "magnificent capture". Could you advise what these are used for? They seam pointless as they do not effect any voting or gain you anything in regards to challenges of contests. If these are just to give a complement then why is it an upgrade when i could just say it in a comment on the photo as both have no effect on anything?
I am almost daily getting messages from other competitors saying "congratulations on becoming a curator". These as stated in my review we know are generated by viewbug and not written by anyone, this is solely so someone gains a badge for communicating. Its no better than dating sites using fake profiles of good looking people to send messages to new members to get them to pay. I have had a few real comments for others and find this really rewarding only to be diluted by the amount of fake ones.
As for being able to see how my photos are doing in a contest. First i could have 5 in each contest and would have to go into each photo one at a time to get any information, what i get is, Your doing great. Your photo is in the top 30% most voted!
Your photo placed ahead of 27,649 submissions. Witch really means i am somewhere around 11,849 th place if i bother doing the math. I don't see how may people have had the chance to vote or how many have voted for my photo. How could anyone see this as a transparent way of running any competition? And please remember this is not a free site like many others as to enter a lot of competitions you need to pay a fee.
If you could give more transparent information and site guideline it would help others make a more informed choice. Information as to what peer awards are for, the face that messages can be sent from viewbug with the click of a button from a curator not knowing what they will be sending or even having looked at your work. How and when dose a photo qualify for your hall of fame so it gets way more exposure than any other photographs on the site?
I feel all the above are reasonable to expect from a product i have paid for and should already be available to a paying or not paying member as to allow an informed choice. One that if i had to make again would currently be a none paying if at all member
Thanks

So I'm a pro+ and first I thought that the site was fun, and enjoyed participating in contests and challenges... Then I started noticing how most of the contests where just full of pictures that did not fit the contest description, and how you could have fantastic pictures, spot on at the description be lower than someones shaky phonepics that barely fit in the description. So maybe the winner was handpicked but everything else is just random.

I tried to make my own challenge, and thought that that would be nice boost for getting noticed... well the issue is, you can't find the non-sponsored challenges anywhere! So even after marketing it on the forum (I'll get back to that soon) I just had 10 pictures submitted. So, even though I'm paying a silly high amount of money for "exposure and extras" I get nothing for it. Except for a "logo" that pretty much was my name in a circle... That's quite a expensive logo.

Then the forum, starting off, the forum was full of ideas, help and shoutouts about new challenges, and it was fun. Then the tones started changing, more and more negative comments about viewbug, and how people aren't getting what they've paid for, how customer service is non-existent and how unorganized the site has become. VB responded to these with shutting down the forum without notice, so now you have no possibility to actually connect with everyone else. So now we don't have the forum to connect, the challenges are impossible to get upped, contests winners/placements are randomized but mostly I feel discouraged by having the feeling that they made enough money to just let the site die. Even here you can see that they still tried to answer peoples comments, but not anymore. I recommend that if you are searcing for a photography contest site, go somewhere else, this site is taking its last breaths.