Microstock Photography Forum - General > Off Topic

American Frame Starting a New Line of Business

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admart01:
I'm not sure what price to pick -- trying out the 1 - 5 dollar range with 1 on shots I've never sold in print or in stock and 5 for some I've sold/auctined off so I know at least some folks liked them :)

I'm hoping we'll be able to share what's working what the site is open to the public.  T

admart01:
I thought some might be interested in an update -- especially on the watermark issue.  I've just received this update and throught I'd shrare.  T



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We wanted to bring you up to speed and clarify some things as we launch. We expect to send emails like this periodically, and you are always welcome to use the contact form at the lower right of any page, or email me directly at [email protected]. Please begin with “Art Gallery” in the subject.

So, here are some things to note in this first installment:

We will be working on actively marketing this site and will update you from time to time with new features and functions that will help you promote your art and yourself as well. We have some exciting things in the works.
 
Many of you have asked about watermarking. As you can now see, there are three sizes of images used in the customer-facing interface:
#1 - A small thumbnail is used when browsing by category, searching or reviewing by artist. This thumbnail has no watermark.
#2 - On an artwork detail page there is a larger image. This image features a watermark consisting of our logo, and two spirals, along with some hash lines. This watermark both lightens and darkens over an image. In most cases it is barely visible, but we hope you agree it would be very difficult to obliterate if someone were to right-click and save your image.
#3 - When clicking on a thumbnail when browsing or viewing the detail, users can see a large zoom of the image. This also features the unique watermark.
 
By the way, there is no real way to stop people from taking an image off a web site if that is what they want to do, so the watermarking is the only tool we use to protect your images in the two large sizes. However, site visitors can only grab it at the size it is shown. No one can ever access the high resolution images you have uploaded. Also note that the images you continue to see in "My Gallery" do not have watermarks, but no one else has access to those images.
 
On the artist main page we've randomly picked one of your items as a representation of your work, and added a reflection to the thumbnail image to help subtly convey that this isn't the only artwork you have. Soon, we will allow you to designate a piece of artwork as the most reflective of your work. When you make a choice that artwork will show as long as there is an item actively for sale made form that item.
 
We are also working to add copy and edit functions to allow you to more easily create versions of your artwork for sale.
 
Many of you have also asked about a suggested selling price. We are also working on some average reporting by size, printing material and category.
 
We are working on ways to creatively show your art in a more meaningful scale to each other, versus relying simply on the size noted next to each work.
 
Some of you have wondered why you have to create items at all, "why not just let the customers create and size themselves?" you have noted. Good question. Well, we've done some research and the one thing we found was that while people say they want lots of choices and want something unique, they don't want the choices to be too hard, and they want to select from a manageable number of really nice things. The fact is, many people don't really understand digital resolution, image quality and size, nor do they understand the different papers available. We hope you'd agree that when you browse our gallery, there's a lot of beautiful stuff (including yours) that benefits from being framed and matted well. People are more engaged when it's easy to browse, and easy to buy.

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