CatStone recently helped a photographer to create a digital piece that will help her business in two ways. First and foremost, Anne Flinn Powell photography is well 
established in the Cayman Islands for publishing top quality photographic souvenirs, everything from magnets to mugs to beautiful calendars and notecards. The piece we created is a digital version of her Mini Coffee Table Book, a compilation of photography that highlights the Caymans. She went digital to save over having to use original printed items and pay for postage when shipping samples to her vendors. Now she simply emails them the link to this digital version which acts just like the book itself. The photographs look beautiful and she can also download and burn the entire piece to a DVD or thumb drive both for showing around or perhaps, selling on its own.
Creating a digital portfolio or sample album such as this is an excellent cost-effective marketing tool for photographers and artists. Why is this any better than a website? Well, for one, you can show off your artwork in a "book" form which is pleasant to view and can reflect the same book format as a print option that you have for sale (think wedding albums.) Also, a great link like this is easy to email so you can "direct market." Finally, you can include large visual jpgs without concern over the file size, which is a drawback to the pdf format sometimes used on websites to allow for a downloadable publication.
Here's Anne's piece for you to enjoy: http://www.catstonepress.com/afpminibook1
We'd love to hear from artists how we can help and any suggestions for improving the idea of digital portfolios.