Concrete Abstract

Is it just me, or is there a large number of people who struggle to connect with abstract / fractal art? One of the most powerful (and difficult) things about fractal art is that it is interpreted in different ways by different viewers. In that respect, its a lot like looking up at clouds with friends and saying "that one looks like ..."<sup>*

*</sup>OK, I know clouds are basically air borne fractals, but not everyone realises this - yet.

In order to help the audience connect more with my images, I've started to put some concrete visual cues on my wallpapers - and now I'm wondering if this is a good idea or not. Will the cues stop people's imagination, or will they help people "get" the images??

Ocean Rush



Melancholy Blooms



Windmill Wallpaper



Needless to say, the above images will feature on my personal blog in due course.

Selling Fractals -- My experience is a bit different

Within a few months of working with UF, I was making images that I just loved. I gave them away to friends (not a great source of serious feedback as they all said they loved them), hung a couple in my doctor's waiting room, and finally decided to try putting them in some place they might sell. Now I look back at those early prints and cringe, but even then they seemed to be attractive to other people like they were to me.

While having one framed at a local frame shop for a special purpose, I got to talking to the owner about how to find a place to display them for sale, and he offered to let me leave some there. I gave him about 20 8x10 prints which he just laid in a stack on a corner of his table, and within 2 weeks, he had sold 6 of them for $20/each, and even called me to come in and see one that the buyer had him frame. This convinced me that I could sell them and so I set about finding art shows to try.

The first one was at our local indoor mall (Binghamton, NY), and I took the plunge and bought some free-standing display panels for hanging art and some lighting. I spent 5 days in the mall, selling a few things each day, mostly being bored, but it was very satisfying when someone bought one. In the end, I had sold a lot of prints, framed pieces, and had orders for 2 16x20 giclee prints and 43 greeting cards. And this was a show that wasn't advertised or promoted -- buyers were people who happened to walk by and see the art amongst the other dozen or so craft booths in the mall. I wrote a daily diary of this show and posted to the UF mail list so if you're really interested, you can find it in the archives.

After that, I applied and was accepted to a really major outdoor juried art show in Rochester, NY (Corn Hill Arts Festival). I again sold lots of prints, some framed pieces, and some greeting cards I had printed up. The third show was another juried outdoor show (Lafayette Apple Festival) near Syracuse, NY. Again I sold quite well, both prints and framed pieces. I'll be doing one more juried show in December (Syracuse Holiday Arts and Crafts Spectacular), and since it's indoors, I went for a 50% larger booth, to see if being less crowded helps.

I have my prints made at Kinkos, and mat and frame them in off-the-shelf mats and frames from places like Michaels and AC Moore. I keep them to 8x10, 11x14, and 8x16, which are standard frame sizes. I have a brochure that describes fractals and the difference between photoprints and giclee prints, and I have 2 giclees (one glossy and one canvas) hanging. To anyone interested, I offer any of my prints in giclee for an sizeable additional cost, and I've sold several.

I charge $65 for an 11x14 matted and framed to 16x20. The cost to me is $3 for the print, $5 for the mat, $6-10 for the frame, and about $3 for the backing board, adhesive, and tape to mount it. So each one of those nets me $44-48. I sell unframed prints 8x10 for $20 and 11x14 for $28. These prints cost me $2 and $3 plus about $1 for the packaging I use. So even an 8x10 nets me $17 and an 11x14 print nets $24.

Show fees are typically about $50-75 per day, and the equipment has to be covered, plus some inventory cost, but there is enough profit available to make it worthwhile. I'm told by experienced show artists and crafters that if you can gross 5 times the show fee, you have a good show. I've been able to do that every time.

I'm convinced that a lot of really good artists are missing the boat here. It takes some self-confidence and courage to invest a little money into the display panels and lights, plus a table and tent, but the opportunity is there. I know the guy in the frame shop gave me the opportunity to find out, and with a little success, the courage to try a real show, and now I'm having a blast selling my fractals.

Fractal Fringe - My Auction Experience

Every so often, someone "out there" in the world of fractals contemplates selling their stuff, either online, at an auction or at some kind of art exhibition. I'm no exception and recently had the opportunity to offer some of my work up for auction to raise funds for a local school where I relieve.

The process started when I saw the auction being advertised at school and volunteered some artworks. The organiser was the art teacher who was passionate about art and very encouraging about my work. After consulting with her, I picked out three images and then had them printed up as A2 images, using archival ink (the expensive stuff that does not fade). After the effort of finding a "cheap" printer, I then had the fun task of getting the images framed. To cut a long story short, my next door neighbour, who frames stuff as a hobby, came to my rescue and made the frames for me.

I then took the works to the school and supplied them with "auction notes" which gave the names of the images and the technical specifications (info about the ink, stock and frames). I placed a modest reserve of $40.00 (NZ) on the artworks. This amount would not really cover the cost of printing and frames and I figured if the artworks could not fetch at least this, then they should not be sold.

With pictures printed, framed and submitted, I waited with eager anticipation for the big day. It finally arrived (on Friday). The auction itself was interesting. It featured work by both talented students at the school and some of the staff. Nibbles and drinks were provided and the atmosphere was lovely. All the other works were basically acrylic / oil on canvas and mine were the only prints. Needless to say, only one of mine sold and then it only just reached its reserve. The other two came home with me.

This was an interesting experiment for several reasons and it taught me quite at bit. Here's what I learned

• Printing and framing artworks can be quite expensive. Its worth it to first find a reasonably priced large frame and then have the work printed to fit the frame. Doing it the other way round makes life quite difficult as custom framing work can cost three to four times what it cost to print the work. Obviously one can print works and sell them unframed, but it might pay to talk to buyers and find out what they want and ensure that they realise framing can be costly.


• If you're going to auction work, it probably helps to make sure that the people attending the auction will know about fractal art / be eager to buy prints. If your work is very different to everyone else, then be prepared to see blank faces and no bids when it goes under the hammer (not fun).


• Set a reserve! I'm really glad I did this otherwise my work would have been sold for less than it cost to print and that would have hurt a lot more than it not selling at all.


• Before you print / submit work, have people who you can give your work to in case it does not sell. Nothing is sadder than going to all the effort to have work printed, failing in the attempt and then having the work lie around "homeless" after the event. Happily whilst only one of my works sold, all of them have now found great homes. One will go to my dad's office (he liked it even before it got printed) and the other now graces my mom's sewing room. She was so excited about getting the work that in a way, I'm glad it did not get sold.

I think at the end of the day, fractals are still on the fringe of the art world. Many people don't know what they are and when exposed to them for the first time, they often don't "get" them. My experience has been that the majority of people out there don't "get it" but the few that do will be passionate / enthusiastic about the images they see. Perhaps it is best to realise that fractals, for now remain the art of the future and unless you have the right audience, disappointment is a very real risk. Below are the three images that were auctioned off along with notes on their eventual fate:

Sanctuary (sold for $40.00)



Clockwork Orange (destined for my dad's office wall)



Liquid Dreaming (now happily residing in my mom's workroom)



Despite the disappointment of my work not being sold for insane amounts of money, going through the experience was still worthwhile. It gave me some indication of what the current market thinks of my work and was also valuable in that I now know where to get my stuff printed and how to go about doing it effectively. Perhaps the best place to sell fractal works is online, amongst people who have been exposed to the artform and have a clear idea of what they want. Of course, if there is anyone "out there" who would like to buy my images, they can email me and we can figure something out.

Fractal Dreaming

Thanks for the invitation to contribute here.

I've just rejoined the web for 1st time for about 8 years. Found lots of fractal generators had sprung up in that time and am busily learning Apophysis, Agony, Fractal Explorer, Tierazon, MBF, Chaos Pro, Ultra Fractal, etc etc etc. I'm on a huge steep learning curve....certainly I'm dreaming in million colored fractals!

As I am just starting out into this you'll be aware my work lacks the sophistication of the seasoned digital artist. It can only get better, as they say.

Can't get the Blogger to upload pix or even create links, so go here to see some of my recent creations:

http://flickr.com/photos/anua22a/sets/72157600710863506/

My Profile page also has links to my blogs.

Looking forward to the promises this site offers,
Cheers!
Anu.

Advice on website selling

I'm in the process of putting together a website of my own with Keith's much needed help and want a lot of its focus to be selling prints of my work rather than just being a site where I show tons of images and talk about myself a lot. While there will be some of that stuff, I want to see if I can't make a go of using the site as a portal for anyone wanting a print of one of my pix.

Most, if not all, of the fractal sites I've ever visited make it a bit of a chore to order anything and you have no idea at all what price range the prints would be sold at. They pretty much all say "send me an e-mail and we'll talk"(sic). Right off the bat, let me say that my prints will be priced close to art festival range prices, will be made with the finest archival materials available and so are definitely not of the "poster quality" prints on photo paper one might get at Kinko's for 25 cents or even the ones at DA for $59.95 where the artist nets a whopping $17.36 for a 30x40 canvas print. (biggest ripoff I ever saw...) It can be a lot of work and time spent running around on your lunch breakand weekends to get a decent print made and shipped and really not worth the hassle for 5-10 bucks profit except from the flattery/vanity standpoint that someone actually bought something of your's.

So my idea is to go ahead and name the prices right up front with stats for how many of the limited edition are left. I'm thinking it would weed out the folks who aren't "serious" about buying a rare - and I've always said fractals are rare and beautiful things - piece of art. I've made a few really large sales just from folks contacting me but 90% of the time I end up stressing over how much to ask for and then spend weeks scanning my inbox to see if someone even answered after I did quote a price. Granted, I might get zip-nada requests for prints being it IS the internet but at least I wouldn't have to spend time going round and round with someone who just wants a $20 print that they could just as easily make doing a "Save Picture As" and blowing it up to 8.5x11 to print on a laser printer.

Whaddaya think?
Rick

Selling Fractals as Stock

I've been meaning to post about this topic for sometime now - so here goes.

For the past 14 months I've been selling my work on Shutterstock. The deal works like this. You upload your fractals, they get reviewed and hopefully approved by SS staff. Then if a designer downloads them, you get get paid the grand total of 25c (US). Once you make over $500.00, you get a raise to 30c.

The process is not as simple as I've made it seem. To be able to post stuff on SS, you need to get accepted there first, which means going over to the site, registering, and posting 10 of your best "shots". This is followed by an agonizing wait to see if you make the cut. If 7 out of 10 "shots" get accepted, you're in business. Sort of.

Turns out that it can take quite a while to accumulate enough money to get a payout (the minimum amount is $75.00). Of course, there are many artists who feel that getting paid a whopping 25c per download is not worth their time and effort. They may have a point but if you're doing it as a hobby and want to see if your work is commercially useful, it can be a fun exercise. By uploading regularly and building up a portfolio, it is possible to make some "change".

In my foray into the world of Stock photography, I've discovered several things:

Not all Stock sites accept fractals - SS is the only one which "worked" for me

What I think will sell well, sometimes "bombs"

"Shots" that I don't personally like often do reasonably well

The whole process is quite fun, especially once the number of downloads gets to a certain point

Its one way to get a hobby / obsession to pay (but don't count on quitting that day job)

I've also discovered that I'm a hopeless photographer! I have lighting issues :( Happily, this has not prevented me from doing quite nicely from fractals.

So, has anyone else out there tried selling their stuff as "stock"? Its certainly one way to evaluate the merit of the pieces one produces. Its not the only way, but it can give some idea of what designers / advertisers find attractive / useful.