just give me a basic idea on these questions about making art websites:

does it cost anything to make a website?
do you have to copywrite art on it?
if so, does the website making company do it for you when you start?
what are some website makers and where can they be found?
whats premium?
do you have to use a massive art site like elfwood, or can you just do your own thing?
can i scan pictures right into the computer, or do i have to load them onto a disc?

before you ask, "how one earth does this guy plan on making a website when he cant hardly figgure out how to post", i will be paying a computer knowlegeable freind to do it for me, which brings to mind:

if you were paying somone to setup a website for you, how much money would be apropriate? i am willing to pay up to 300$.

I build sites for a living. It is actually pretty easy to do if you are just looking for an informational site.

If you need things like message boards or shopping carts it is often easiest to just have someone else provide the functionality similar to the forum here...

There are a couple different parts to a website when considering costs:

1. Creating the Site
2. Hosting and maintaining the site.

As far as creating the site, there are plenty of inexpensive programs out there that make website creation easier. I personally like Microsoft Frontpage for several reasons, although there are some that are anti Microsoft. Frontpage is innexpensive, specially if you are a student. It is easy to learn. You can create sites with templates(pre-created artwork for the site, you just add your content) If you go here for example of what I am talking about. It can save a lot of time, and if you are flexible with your design ideas, you can find a design that workd for you that looks great for 50.00USD.

You can also implement Visual Basic scripts to your site through FP. there are lots of nifty things you can do with a site when you get further along.

Creating costs can vary a lot. If you are not in a hurry, and think you can learn it yourself a copy of FP is about 100.00USD. Templates are about 50.00 if you choose to use one. The other added expense is your time, if you go that route.(if you get a good, I can tell you it is a great way to make a living) If you want to pay someone else to do it, you are looking at anywhere from 400-5000.00 dollars or more depending on what you are looking for. When I was in college I was getting 2000.00 per site. A lot of work went into that, and it wasn't always steady work, but it is out there...

Hosting and maintenance costs vary too. For a full on, no-adds site you will pay a monthly hosting fee from anywhere around 10.00 a month to 100.00 a month or more depending on how much traffic you get; and what kinds of addons that you want(shopping carts, message boards...)

If you are looking at just a very basic site and don't have much budget to work with, there are free host like Geocities that will put your site up for free, but there will be adds that the viewers see.

Copyrighting is a tough issue. If you are creating your own artwork/content and are concerned about others using it, than yes, you would want to copyright it. It won't keep anyone from actually stealing your artwork, but it would give you legal recourse if they did and made money off of it. Copyrighting is fairly simple, but there are legal fees associated with the filings of such things. Most folks put copyright at the bottom of their pages regardless of whether thay have filed for an actual copyright or not... It does show intent that you consider your content or artwork to be intellectual property and covered by the laws regarding said property. I could go on, but you get the idea.

I am not sure what you mean by the reference to elfwood, I am not familiar with that...

You can scan pictures directly into your computer, or put them on a disc, it depends on what you need to do with them.

If you are looking for someone to build your site, do a google search for website builders and just go see what is out there so that you know what you are getting into. Some get paid by the hour(Bad idea for many reasons) and some go by the page. It can vary a great deal. learn as much as you can, or bribe a computer geeky friend that can help you make sense of things so that you are getting a good deal.

If you tell me what you are trying to do I can give you more specific answers....

I hope that helps some.

If your going to make a website you have to be commited.

Every website i've tried to make, after about a month i can't be bothered doing it anymore and i usually delete the account.

If you want to make a website, message me and i'll tell you all the websites for free hosting (up to 150Mb free) and all stuff for menus, counters and all that other crap. Thats if your going to make it yourself.

thank you both very much. i plan on a very simple site (im into basics), just pictures, titles, and advertisements. if i ever get going on this thing, ill go with the free type with the ads included.
a 'computer-geeky' freind will not only be an advisor, but will be paid to do all of it for me - he is very greedy, therefore can be trusted to commit, and the fact it should be easy for him to do. he has already set up a site of his own.
design is pretty much unimportant, just as long a the pictures are there and people can see them.
im not concerned with copywrite, if its not necessary, and people want the pics bad enough to take them, they can have them, its a compliment on my doodles.
OK, 300 dollars to the freind, 50 dollars for expenses, he can keep whats ever left over from the expense money when he is thru.
i plan on just getting the pics up, and finis-not add anymore or change it later. only about 50 pics, he said he could do it in an evening. we will see.

thank you both so much again, MIM