I started to publish pictures in 2006. I then made extensive use of JAlbum 6.5 with a customized version of the ExhibitPlus 1.4 "metodi-black" skin.
JAlbum remains for me the fastest way to produce a great-looking web photo album from scratch but - as site grows - it becomes less and less efficient to update it (for each update, all HTML pages of the site have to rebuilt and reloaded).
I then imagined a web album which could be updated with a batch of pictures in a structured way while requiring as less actions as possible. The main question mark regarded picture handling (watermarking, resizing...) but fortunately the PHP GD library manages all this perfectly.
It was then only a matter of building a MySQL database to store the Exif data, comments (in 2 languages), and the folder tree.
I named this tiny project "Phpix" before I realized this name was already "taken". The "official Phpix" do however not fulfill my needs: it is mono-language and "text-based" (on the other hand, it is multi-user but that was not a priority feature).
The pages generated by Phpix are created on demand - always up to date - while keeping the original "JAlbum" look.
I used (lost, broke...) several compact digital and bridge cameras since 2002. I now also make large use of my mobile built-in camera which does not make the best pictures but is always at hand.