As far as hugely expensive equipment needed, I think that the laptop you currently own is all you need. Take the photos, etc, to an outfit that will scan them and put them on a CD for you (Kinkos?), then all you will need is whatever layout or template Q.E.D. has offered. Keep us posted!
The only part of that I even vaguely understood is “I’ll re-iterate my earlier offer to help you out with something like this, if you so desire.”
Q.E.D. and caphis, is this so? If someone got my started with a template and “even a five-year-old . . .” instructions, would I be able to buy one of those “database-driven collection of information and images” sites and do this more or less on my own, with occasional bleats for help?
Eve Don’t let your fear of this make it more complex than it really is. There are some things that a five-year old can do that an adult cannot simply because the adult has spent decades telling themselves ‘I cannot do this. I will never understand it.’.
Confront the computer, and say in your best Hepburn 'I’ve survived Pwincess Pwecious, Bling Bling Jesus, and devilled ham. I refuse to be cowed by the bastard son of a Smith Corona and a waffle Iron!"
—I have one of those Edison wind-up computers, myself.
Eve, web design really doesn’t require any special equipment or software. You can use a regular computer, and you can write all the HTML code in a regular text editor. It’s a bit more complicated than writing an SDMB post, but not a world of difference. Microsoft Word and some other word processing programs have an HTML option that would allow you to set up a simple page and format the text without having to bother with any code at all, although you really do get better results if you know at least a little HTML.
However, I would recommend that you have someone else get you going, not because I think the work would be too difficult for you alone but because it would probably take more time than you’d want to spend. If you’re going to grad school (and congrats on that, BTW) and working full-time, you probably don’t want to spend hours building the site from scratch. If you have a particular look or layout in mind, you could find some examples or make a sketch that can be used as a reference.
You should probably give some thought to how the behind-the-scenes data organization will work. You could have a big folder for photos and a big folder for bios, but if this is going to be a large collection it may be best to split things into subcategories from the beginning. You could split up actors and actresses, or divide them by birth or death year or use pretty much any categorization system you like. It wouldn’t be necessary to organize the page itself along these lines, but if the files are organized in smaller groups it would help you to find where you put things more easily. Of course, if you hired a webmaster that would all be their responsibility.
Scanning photos is easy and can be done at copy or photo shops these days, my only concern in that department would be making sure they look good on screen. Scanned photos often require a little tweaking in an image editor to look their best. But I’m assuming these will all be black and white photos, or mostly black and white with a few color tinted ones. This gives you an advantage right away, as trying to correct color balance in scanned photos can be a big pain. With black and white the only likely problem is poor contrast in the scan, and this is something that a child really could take care of. I’d recommend asking an adult for help anyway if you don’t know how to do it, though! Probably best not to let sticky little fingers onto Auntie Eve’s keyboard.
Eve, what you’re looking to build is relatively easy for someone who’s been there once or twice, and there aresome good volunteers above. I wrote a simple site with my art (www.quoke.com) that does what you’re after, i.e. it shows a list of words and/or pix, and clicking on one sends you to a page with more info and a bigger picture. You’re welcome to the “stuff” that makes this work on my site if you’d like. Someone would just have to design the pages the way you like, then plug the pictures and data into a database.
But, as you say, the first step is really finding someone to put this all together for you.
Eve, sorry I went techno there. 
Basically, he’s right-- you don’t need anything more than a text editor at the core of it. HTML, PHP, all the stuff you’ve heared mentioned thus far is stuff that’s written by anyone with a text editor. If you were to do this by yourself, the hardest part would be learning how to take “what you want visually” and turn it into “how to represent it in code”. That is, you’ll need to start off by learning some HTML – if you want to go it alone, a great site is www.htmlgoodies.com, among others.
If you want to go at it that simplistically, then that would, indeed work. It is possible to write thousands of HTML pages for each individual person and link them together. BUT, that would be tedious, inefficient, and probably be a lot more work than you’re willing to take on. A lot of what’s been suggested thus far in the thread is using a ‘content management system’ – basically, you want a template for every person you’ll add to the site, and a simple interface where you can add, change, or delete entries. The upside to this method is that there is a LOT less menial work, if you want to change something about the layout then you only have to edit one page as opposed to thousands, linking between people is easy, you can add search functionality VERY easily, etc… the list goes on.
Anyway, the first step is indeed to get together with someone and discuss your goals for the site, what exactly you want, and then let them go at it as far as setting it up. If I understand you correctly, you’re more interested in letting someone else handle the technical side of things, which would probably be the way to go if you don’t want to deal with the hassle yourself.
Offer’s still up, if you’d like. 
Oh, something I didn’t address in my previous post-- yes, there are software ‘packages’ that will probably do what you’re after. However, my advice is to bypass all that and find someone who will custom-write your site. My reasoning is basically that the software you buy will probably be loaded with a lot of ‘features’ you don’t want or need for your site, will probably cost an arm and a leg, will rely on YOU knowing exactly how to set it up on the site, and will leave little room for your own layout and design unless you know how to modify it appropriately. Having someone write the coding behind the site for you, specifically, will let you choose exactly what you want and what you don’t want, will allow you more flexibility for how it looks and acts, and most importantly, will give you a direct link to the person who can fix it if something were to go wrong.
Once you learn HTML you’ll pick up new tricks. Lots and lots of tricks, even if you’ve had a webpage for years. So far in 2004 I’ve learned three new things: How to make tables, how to make what seems like a photo album with pages to “turn” sadly, it took me a while to “get” that the ones I’ve seen were a series of webpages. D’oh!and how to make drop menus (like the ones all over this site to forum jump).
Absolutely. As others have said, this isn’t so complicated that you couldn’t learn to do it yourself, but from the sound of things, you’re not going to have much time to invest in it. So, yes, my offer is still open for a limited time with the low, low introductory price of gratis. All you have to do is register your domain name and set up hosting. I can walk you through that, too.
Wear sunscreen. Keep an eye on scalability and upkeep.
If you’re talking about eventually being the “IMDB of snapshot-bios” you’re envisioning a pretty large collection of information that’s all searchable, cross-referenced, and freely accessible. Anything that can lower the processing overheard associated with searching or viewing your database should be taken NOW. Transfer load as much as possible to the client machines. Use XML. It may not be a concern in the beginning, when you only have a few entries and a few visitors… but if you make it big, bogging down your host’s servers is good way to get billed and booted. Speaking of hosting, be ready to change your ad/pricing scheme to continue to cover costs, at least… what works at a hundred visitors will not work at a hundred thousand. Prepare for when the exponential growth begins… you cannot hope to continue if your site is down every other week while you try to find new hosting or you can’t afford the bandwidth costs.
But trust me on the XML and sunscreen.
Eve, I know I’ll probably catch flak for suggesting such a low-tech solution, but do you know about free websites through such entities as Geocities (there are others as well. Google could turn up many of them for you). They include very simple, easy-to-use site building tools, photo pasting, and linking ability. The downside is there is a small clickable (and minimizable) advertising window to one side. But it’s quick, easy and free, and it can handle what you’re wanting to do with ease. And should you need it, you can upgrade to an actual site though them for around $15 dollars a year.
To go along with the recommendations for HTMLGoodies.com, I think this one is pretty good, too. And, it’s a freebie.
This is what I use:
Registering a domain (www.yoursite.com) : http://www.godaddy.com (I think it’s less than $10 a year.)
Web hosting for said domain: http://www.readyhosting.com ($100 a year for first domain, $50 for any additional domains.)
I have several websites. One has over 100 pages. The others have almost that much. I don’t update them regularly (just when I feel like it), but they are “content rich.” Tons of stuff.
I help pay for the maintenence of these sites by linking to books on Amazon.com and a few other affiliates (my favorite online store, for instance). These were things I was going to link to anyway—in fact, had been linking to prior to signing up as an affiliate. (I have always done a lot of “book recommendations” on my sites.) On my taxes this year, I had to declare about $1000 in earnings from Amazon.com and other affiliates. That definitely paid for the upkeep on the sites!
I don’t have any pop-up ads or obnoxious ads on my site(s). Just a few banners that are required by Amazon.com (I think one on the main page, always at the bottom) and a few other banners here and there. My site(s) appear to be mostly ad-free, and yet they are definitely paying for themselves.
It sounds like the site you are planning will be very content rich, and it sounds like a few well-placed book recommendations might help pay for the maintenence of the sites. If you do put some book recommendations up on your site, make sure they open up into a new window. That way, your visitor does not lose your site as they browse around Amazon. Also note that anything that your site’s visitors buy during their visit to Amazon.com (or other affiliate) will be credited to you. Just recently someone bought some pricey golf equipment, and I got something like 3% of the total they spent. Another visitor must have set up their movie editing studio after clicking on a link from my site—bought some expensive stuff—and I got 5-7% of that too. Nice deal.
Q.E.D. and caphis, I think I will e both of you to discuss hiring one of you to set this up for me—of course, I will be more than a year of leisurely writing bios and collecting (copyright-free!) photos before I am ready to put the site up. I’d start it with just silent performers, then eventually, over the next few years, inch up through at least the 1950s.
I’d want an opening page (the design of that would be important), linking to a TOC of alphabetical links: each name on the TOC would link to a smallish photo and one paragraph of (readable!) text. Maybe 500 names to start, building over the years. I’d want recommendations of the best place to buy web space, and what to buy? And again, I’d like to pay someone to set this up and—maybe every six months or so—to add more links.
yosemite, please tell me more about ads! I’d be happy to advertise most anything to break even—as long as it’s not pop-ups or sex toys!
. . . Oh, who am I kidding—to break even of course I’ll advertise sex toys . . .
It’s all about marketing. Consider adding a few lurid Clara Bow anecdotes and calling your site “Celebrity Sex Orgies”.
Well, it takes a little time for traffic to the site to build, but join Amazon Associates when you’ve got someone actually building the site. Look on Amazon.com for books that you’d recommend (your own, for instance!). When you write about your books, or mention any other book, link to it. (Have the Amazon link open in a new window.) I sell the majority of my stuff through someone clicking on a book link on Amazon and then surfing around to buy golf equipment or whatever.
Link to a lot of books. Have a page of book recommendations. Get one of those special Amazon ads at the bottom (or side—whatever works for the site’s design) which automatically displays small pictures and links from books, based on your keywords. (For instance, if you ask for an ad with the keywords “Lon Chaney,” Amazon will randomly pick 2-4 books about Lon Chaney and build a little banner ad with these books. And the Lon Chaney books they display will change every time the page is loaded.) I think those kinds of Amazon.com ads (“Keyword ads” is what I’d call them) and simple links would help a lot. Oh! And of course you can link to movies on Amazon.com as well! All these links and the few keyword ads are pretty unobtrusive—they don’t interfere with the design of the site and visitors don’t feel like you’re trying to sell them something. I have found that people like to have books recommended to them. I know I do.
Another affiliate to check out is www.cj.com (Commission Junction). I get a nice little check from them almost every month. Sign up (when you’ve got a site URL in place) and check out all their affiliates. They have other bookstores and online video stores as partners. And yet another place is www.linkshare.com. I just signed up with them—don’t know if I like them as much as cj.com or Amazon, but it doesn’t hurt to give them a try. You can also sign up as an affiliate for www.bn.com, but I think too many conflicting book links confuses things. Amazon.com seems more committed to making things interesting and creative for their affiliates, so I personally, I think I’ll stick with them.
I didn’t make all that much money with Amazon.com and cj.com at first—it took time to build. But it’s been steady ever since. I was amazed at first that I had earned that much last year, but reviewing my records confirmed it.
Oh! I also signed up for Amazon.co.uk, and every once in a while I get a commission check made out in pounds. The bank just loves that. 
All-in-all, these things add up. Oh—another thing—do you have any ideas that could be made into bumper stickers or t-shirts? Selling stuff through www.CafePress.com can also help.
Just found this site, which I hate to admit is really good. Hmmm, maybe I could start out with stars of the 1930s, then branch out in either direction?
Find a void, and fill that void. If you feel that the Golden Silents site covers some of the material you’d have done with your site, then go in a different direction. It looks like you believe a site covering stars of the 1930s (and then branch from the) is still needed. So do that!
My own most successful sites have been created because I was looking around for something on a particular subject, and found nothing that satisfied me. My thought process was, “Well, I may not be the absolute best person to write about this, but it appears that so far, I’m the only person to care to write about this!” So far, this line of thinking has worked very well for me.
And, after all, you are Eve and the subject at hand is old movies! You will put your own unique stamp on this project and it is most certainly a worthwhile project. Go for it!