FAA Official Announcement

[luissantos84]

it worked out but this doesn't make any sense, I have made this right after their announcement regarding pixels / iPhone cases, does this mean we need to do such once in a while?

[ShadySue]

Tx, that worked. 

There are definitely bugs in the pixels.com setup - when I'm logged in, and can see/access/change all my personal settings, I still see 'login' at two places at the top of the page, but 'logout' in the white box next to Fine Art America at the very top left of the page. Also, depending on what I do, I seem to find myself back in FAA from pixels.com without too much difficulty. (I know they're one and the same, but we shouldn't get switched.)

[stockastic]

As a software developer I can imagine all sorts of problems in trying to maintain one site on 2 domains, depending on how the site code was originally written.  It might be a while before they get this all fixed.

Personally, while I think "Fine Art America" is a real loser of a name, I think there are much more important things the guy could be doing with the site than spending time trying to make it all work across 2 domains.    The whole site looks cluttery and dated, and the presentation of photos leaves a lot to be desired.   They're going to be left in the dust pretty soon, by new sites with a real 'designer' look.

Just my opinions, which are those of an aging crank.

[Ron]

I just had another 105 dollar sale, so I really dont care how the site looks

[Mantis]

I just had another 105 dollar sale, so I really dont care how the site looks

I had a $150 sale today, my fourth one in a few months.  I need to start uploading there more often.

[gillian vann]

Yup I did it and it's still not showing.

It's moot anyway. They charge $30 as a base price on iPhone cases, with the artist's markup on top of that.
I can go to Vistaprint and get an iPhone case with one of my own photos on it for �7.49. Virtually no-one (in the UK; the US seems to be a totally different mrket and I offer no opinion on that) will pay the pixels.com price for someone else's photo.

ditto re: australia as shipping kills us. but i love that i can sell to americans.

[ShadySue]

And another one:
"Do you want to offer your images for sale on DesignerPrints.com so that interior designers and corporate art buyers can purchase your prints at discounted prices for large-scale design projects?"
Full details/explanation when you log in.
Unlike certain other sites, the default is that you are opted out; it's all in or all out; you can change your mind at any time.
Our call ...

[KimsCreativeHub]

I just joined and got my site, customized it (was able to make it quite swanky with their options) and added some of my art

My only concern is the 528x701 no watermark preview, you can't right click but there are other ways to scoop a free image... Has any found this to be a big deal.

Congrats to you two making great sales!

[stockastic]

To me, this DesignerPrints thing seems like a non-starter.   You agree to huge cuts in your prices in exchange for the possibility of big quantity purchases.  But the 'big quantity' might include only one of your images - it's probably pretty unlikely that some designer will want 100 copies of one image.   So it's a quantity discount - except you don't get the quantity,  only FAA does. 

There's nothing stopping some reseller from buying hundreds of images at a deep discount, then reselling them for a nice markup. 

I think a lot of the people opting in think they're signing up for chance to sell 100 copies of something.  But all they're doing is letting FAA sell their stuff at wholesale prices.  Nothing else is guaranteed. 

[KimsCreativeHub]

@stoctastic. I agree 70% off... Not interested... I have "microstock" sites for that kind of thing

[ShadySue]

It's (mostly?) only microstockers who are bothered about the watermark - though I have a watermark on my images there (I thought that was available also on the free trial?). There are some big name photographers selling via FAA who do not have any watermark, and indeed, when you visit their own website they often have really big unwatermarked images on their galleries there.

But that's because they don't sell RF, so as soon as they find a usage they don't know of, they can be onto them in an instant. Once we sell RF, we really make it difficult to track abuses, as people can - and do - lift our unwatermarked image from sites which bought our image from the micros, often just with a right-click save.

Also, if most microstockers find a misused photo in a blog, we want to get our few cents for its use. A Fine Artist is probably happy enough for someone to blog, "X is a fantastic artist. I really like their use of light and shade in this image ..." It's all publicity. Even if the blog is unflattering, "How can Z even call themselves an artist? The proportion in these figures is totally wrong ...", it's still publicity, subjective and probably comes under the heading of 'fair use - criticism'.

"...quite swanky with their options"  oooh, I'll have to revisit, there were hardly any  options when I started in Feb. But to be fair, not having any buyers of my own, people will never visit my 'own' subsite - that's really for people who have followers/fans they can redirect from Social Media or an email list/newsletter.

Good luck!

I just joined and got my site, customized it (was able to make it quite swanky with their options) and added some of my art

My only concern is the 528x701 no watermark preview, you can't right click but there are other ways to scoop a free image... Has any found this to be a big deal.

Congrats to you two making great sales!

[Ron]

The owner of FAA doesnt give a flying feck about stolen images, he doesnt care, and made that clear, in not so many words, in a thread I opened on FAA.

People dont even know their images could be stolen from FAA with direct links to the image on the FAA server, 1000x1000, until I proved it to them and stuck the proof in their faces.

Even then they didn't seem to care, as I was selling to stock, so the problem was only for me, instead of people who only sell POD.

1000x1000 makes great postcards, in fact it can even be blown up to 2000x2000 and get a great canvas, or be submitted to agencies to sell as stock.

All I asked for was a customizable watermark, which has been a request by many people, and FAA just categorically refuse to implement it. Why they refuse to that is beyond me, but for sure they only care about FAA and couldn't give a hoot about their contributors concerns.

[ShadySue]

I discovered there is a referral scheme, whereby we get $5 for referring a new artist. Apparently when they open an account, the money instantly goes into our balance and we get an email.
All the banners they provide are to set up a free trial site, and there is nothing in their details which says it has to be a paid-for site (after all, if they sell something from a free site, they still make money).
A friend used my referral link to open a free site yesterday, and nothing is in my balance and no email. I will have to contact them about it.
This is what they say:
"Artist Websites Referral Program
Do you know any artists or photographers who might be interested in a new website?
Have you ever wanted to earn income from the traffic that you receive on your website / blog / Facebook page?
Now you can!   Take a look at the advertisements, below.

Beneath each of the advertisements, there is HTML code that you can copy and paste onto your website, blog, Facebook profile, Twitter feed, etc.   Simple copy and paste the code, and the corresponding advertisement will appear.   When someone clicks on your advertisement and then signs up for a new website on artistwebsites.com, you'll instantly earn $5.00.

Yes - it's really that easy.   You'll receive an e-mail notification whenever a new member signs up via one of your advertisements, and the $5.00 will instantly appear in your online balance.   Balances are paid on the 15th of each month for all transactions that occurred before the 15th of the previous month.

How does this work?   Each of the advertisements has your affiliate ID embedded in the HTML code.   Your affiliate ID is (XXX).   When visitors click on your advertisements, they'll be transfered over to artistwebsites.com, and the embedded ID tells us that the visitors were referred to us by you.   We can then track the visitors each time they return to artistwebsites.com, and if they sign up for a new website within 30 days of their first visit, you'll earn $5.00 per sign up.   It's that simple."

[KimsCreativeHub]

@ron  they have an option tic box for watermark I ticked it and no watermark .

What is strange is they have a statement next to it saying that buyers are les likely to buy if they see a watermark ? 

[ShadySue]

What is strange is they have a statement next to it saying that buyers are les likely to buy if they see a watermark ?

I've heard that said often on CreativeLIVE too, and I've checked the websites of the people who said it, often major-award-winning photographers, and they have large, unwatermarked images on their sites.
Fine Art / Commercial and Stock are totally different markets and mindsets.

I've seen occasionally people on FAA who write in their description in great detail about how they have registered their image with the US copyright service thingy, and if you abuse their (watermarked) images they'll drag you through the courts etc etc. It looks really unprofessional, unwelcoming and neurotic; tellingly, their work is seldom of the best quality (IMO).

Think about it this way. Imagine you were shopping in a quality store and there were signs everywhere warning you about how you'll be prosecuted if you shoplift, and the store detective keeps following you around. Even though you have no intention of shoplifting,  it detracts from the 'buying experience', which is as different at Walmart from Jimmy Choo, say than micros (buy it quickly and get on with the job) are from Fine Art (can I live with this on my wall for the next n years?). I can't find any fine art sites which watermark their images, and on these you can often zoom to larger sizes than FAA.

That said, I do have watermarks on the images I have on iS or Alamy; but not on many of the others, because as they're only on FAA, I can track their usage.
Of course, like Flickr etc, disabled right-click-saving means I can't just do GIS reverse checks to see if they are being misused somewhere.

[KimsCreativeHub]

@shadysue I just sent my cousin a  referral link, I will let you know how it goes for me

[Ron]

I know they have a watermark, its a tiny little FAA watermark in the corner. I want a customisable watermark text, which I can place in the middle of the image.

[KimsCreativeHub]

@shadysue I like that shopping analogy it helped me understand and explains peoples good sales.

[ShadySue]

@shadysue I just sent my cousin a  referral link, I will let you know how it goes for me

Thanks, Kim.
I wrote first on the discussion board, and got a peer reply, "I don't know how the whole thing works, I don't think it works at all, at least not with a banner. I know there are certain programs in place for that, but that's it.
You would have to ask contact about it."
Which I will do after I've heard from you.

[KimsCreativeHub]

Your welcome, I sent a simple raw ref. link and I put a banner on Facebook and a banner on my FAA site in ats. "Blog" we'll see

[KimsCreativeHub]

@ron I think I saw it in a "zoom square" of my image? The zoom square needs no wmark

[stockastic]

All I asked for was a customizable watermark, which has been a request by many people, and FAA just categorically refuse to implement it. Why they refuse to that is beyond me...

They won't implement it because there is no "they" behind FAA.  It's just one guy, and as you know, he's currently busy with things like signing up Ann Geddes, and pursuing big volume discount deals that pay the artists next to nothing.

[KimsCreativeHub]

Yay! I've been "live" 48 or less hours and just had my 1st sale!

Well what's there works... And I can see why, FAA makes it very easy for a person to pick art and accessories that go with it, flawlessly with out tricky measuring.

[KimsCreativeHub]

Meant to say "less than 48hrs"

[ShadySue]

Wow! Congratulations!!!

Added: very cute image!