Peter Jordan Posted April 22, 2014 Author Share Posted April 22, 2014 Thank you all for the comments here, the many responses have been very interesting and informative. I started this thread wondering whether putting images on FAA would be an interesting and worthwhile thing to do. I have decided to have a try on FAA, and once I have that established to also start an Artflakes account, thus hopefully getting access to both American and European Markets. A run down the “Latest Sales” in FAA shows that very few “straight” photographs are sold and the secret of success is likely to be in artistic interpretations. Betty LaRue and Sheila Smart – see I got the message! Allan Bell, UK based and offering perfectly good “straight” photographs has no sales and is planning to drop out. On the other hand John Mitchell, in Vancouver has a much larger collection of “straight” photographs and has worthwhile sales, but many travel images from distant places. My collection would be more like Allan’s than John’s, so I will start with “straight” photographs to get the sites up and running and then start working on more artistic interpretations. I have plenty of ideas but lack the software skills. I have not tried any of this for several years now and will have a steep learning curve. I will need to update my software, currently CS2 and LR5.4. I see Google are offering a complete suit of Nik Efex plug ins that should work in LR5 but not in CS2. http://www.google.co.uk/nikcollection/products/color-efex-pro/ I will take the trial version and see how it goes, although I think that Photoshop would be a better platform than LR. Many thanks again for all the comments and information (I have been giving appreciative greenies)… Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Mitchell Posted April 22, 2014 Share Posted April 22, 2014 Thank you all for the comments here, the many responses have been very interesting and informative. I started this thread wondering whether putting images on FAA would be an interesting and worthwhile thing to do. I have decided to have a try on FAA, and once I have that established to also start an Artflakes account, thus hopefully getting access to both American and European Markets. A run down the “Latest Sales” in FAA shows that very few “straight” photographs are sold and the secret of success is likely to be in artistic interpretations. Betty LaRue and Sheila Smart – see I got the message! Allan Bell, UK based and offering perfectly good “straight” photographs has no sales and is planning to drop out. On the other hand John Mitchell, in Vancouver has a much larger collection of “straight” photographs and has worthwhile sales, but many travel images from distant places. My collection would be more like Allan’s than John’s, so I will start with “straight” photographs to get the sites up and running and then start working on more artistic interpretations. I have plenty of ideas but lack the software skills. I have not tried any of this for several years now and will have a steep learning curve. I will need to update my software, currently CS2 and LR5.4. I see Google are offering a complete suit of Nik Efex plug ins that should work in LR5 but not in CS2. http://www.google.co.uk/nikcollection/products/color-efex-pro/ I will take the trial version and see how it goes, although I think that Photoshop would be a better platform than LR. Many thanks again for all the comments and information (I have been giving appreciative greenies)… Good luck, Peter. "Straight" can sell on FAA. Some people are just looking for a reminder of a place that they have visited (or perhaps would like to visit). Shots of quite ordinary things can work as well (e.g. I sold a print of CWFJFT not long ago). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Jordan Posted April 22, 2014 Author Share Posted April 22, 2014 John, CWFJFT???? Peter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Mitchell Posted April 22, 2014 Share Posted April 22, 2014 John, CWFJFT???? Peter Sorry. That's an Alamy image ID. Just cut and paste CWFJFT into the Alamy search box. You should then see a ship's propeller. -John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Linda Posted April 22, 2014 Share Posted April 22, 2014 Do 'art buyers' actually take seriously sites called,'Photo4Me' that just sounds like such a bottom of the bargain basement name,LOL! It would be nice if more serious outlets with a great catchy elegant name,great marketing,discriminating in what they accept(no filtered celebrity photos calling it original art!) and cultivating to the higher end of the collector world .And... with none of the member fanfare like FAA has. L Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Jordan Posted April 22, 2014 Author Share Posted April 22, 2014 John, Dammitt - I just knew it woud be something I really knew. I was trying to work it out as an acronym.... Peter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Mitchell Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 Do 'art buyers' actually take seriously sites called,'Photo4Me' that just sounds like such a bottom of the bargain basement name,LOL! It would be nice if more serious outlets with a great catchy elegant name,great marketing,discriminating in what they accept(no filtered celebrity photos calling it original art!) and cultivating to the higher end of the collector world .And... with none of the member fanfare like FAA has. L Good question. I checked out Photo4Me and decided it was Not4Me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sheila Smart Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 I have just discovered a superb software to "convert" a photograph into a watercolour and/or painting in a most realistic fashion. And best of all, its free! The site is Fotosketcher http://www.fotosketcher.com/ I have actually donated to David's site as I am so impressed with this software. Here is my first experiment with this software. http://fineartamerica.com/featured/portrait-of-the-rocks-sydney-sheila-smart.html Cheers Sheila Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Niels Quist Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 I have just discovered a superb software to "convert" a photograph into a watercolour and/or painting in a most realistic fashion. And best of all, its free! The site is Fotosketcher http://www.fotosketcher.com/ I have actually donated to David's site as I am so impressed with this software. Here is my first experiment with this software. http://fineartamerica.com/featured/portrait-of-the-rocks-sydney-sheila-smart.html Cheers Sheila Just to be aware, it's a junkware link, you end up with Adware trying to be installed. I installed it on Sheila's recommendation - Kaspersky didn't seem to dislike it or find viruses, etc. - nor the reputation report it offers had any comments (Kaspersky Security Network) - but less than a 100 users use it according to this. Having read your comment I removed the programme and installation files - until having found out further. http://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/42373361 http://www.softpedia.com/reviews/windows/FotoSketcher-Review-116917.shtml Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sheila Smart Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 I had no problems with it and McAfee did not have any problem either. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Miguel Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 I 've tried to download three times - won't allow me , quarantines the/a file and aborts Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Callie Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 Also downloaded and had no problems, I have Nortons installed. Will run spybot in a moment to check. But I did first click on the wrong link on the download page which was adware. Their website does say there is no adware included http://www.fotosketcher.com/. Just trying the program out, but looks like a good find, thanks Sheila! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allan Bell Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 According to Photosketcher it is not available for Mac. Allan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allan Bell Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 Do 'art buyers' actually take seriously sites called,'Photo4Me' that just sounds like such a bottom of the bargain basement name,LOL! It would be nice if more serious outlets with a great catchy elegant name,great marketing,discriminating in what they accept(no filtered celebrity photos calling it original art!) and cultivating to the higher end of the collector world .And... with none of the member fanfare like FAA has. L I did join PHOTO4ME in the last four weeks and with only 24 images up have had a good number of commercial hits. No actual sale yet but it is early days. As far as I can tell my images on FAA have not yet had a commercial hit over a period of at least a year. Allan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allan Bell Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 Allan Bell, UK based and offering perfectly good “straight” photographs has no sales and is planning to drop out. On the other hand John Mitchell, in Vancouver has a much larger collection of “straight” photographs and has worthwhile sales, but many travel images from distant places. My collection would be more like Allan’s than John’s, so I will start with “straight” photographs to get the sites up and running and then start working on more artistic interpretations. Thanks for looking at my collection on FAA John. In fact it is much reduced now, down from about 350 images, since culling out the zero and lower views and those I thought would be better elsewhere. Allan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Jordan Posted April 23, 2014 Author Share Posted April 23, 2014 Allan, At the moment I am busy preparing a submission for FAA. They seem to give rather a nice presentation of ones work and $30 per year is not much to pay for that. When I have it all up and running I will repeat the process on a European site. I was thinking Artflakes, but I am certainly open to other ideas. I will have a look at PHOTO4ME. What is what you describe as a "commercial hit" if it is not yet a sale? One problem I have is rather slow broadband, at the moment it takes 3 mins per image to upload to Alamy, OK if you are doing 10-20 at a go, but tedious if you have a lot. BT Infinity has finally arrived in my street and their technician is coming to install it on May 8th so that should be a big improvement. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Allan Bell Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 Peter, P4M is a british site so I went with them hoping for sales of my British images in this country. Cheaper postage than FAA, although I was hoping for sales to the States etc with them. P4M does not cost anything for hosting. P4M have a piece of software in their system which logs "Commercial" interest from potential customers of your work against your images. In all cases with FAA and P4M I only upload one image at a time, in fact I think it is only possible to upload one image to P4M at one time. The max upload to P4M is 10 images in 24 hours. This is because each image is assessed by one of a small team of photographers who run the site and they do not need to be inundated with images at the expense of letting "inferior quality" images through. Allan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Jordan Posted April 23, 2014 Author Share Posted April 23, 2014 I have just discovered a superb software to "convert" a photograph into a watercolour and/or painting in a most realistic fashion. And best of all, its free! The site is Fotosketcher http://www.fotosketcher.com/ I have actually donated to David's site as I am so impressed with this software. Here is my first experiment with this software. http://fineartamerica.com/featured/portrait-of-the-rocks-sydney-sheila-smart.html Cheers Sheila Sheila, Thanks for that, I downloaded it (and donated) too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SFL Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 Hope every photograph is not goint to be in watercolur on FAA from now on. (Well, I might as well try it myself.... ) Sung Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 I had no problems with it and McAfee did not have any problem either. It tries to add adware during download/installation - some of which is obvious and asked about, some like booly may not be. Booly is a PITA add-on for Firefox (maybe other browsers). Not dangerous, it shows as malware but adware does as such. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Jordan Posted April 23, 2014 Author Share Posted April 23, 2014 I uploaded it on WIN7 without any problems. Subsequently ran a scan which showed no threats.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Peter Jordan Posted April 23, 2014 Author Share Posted April 23, 2014 Peter, P4M is a british site so I went with them hoping for sales of my British images in this country. Cheaper postage than FAA, although I was hoping for sales to the States etc with them. P4M does not cost anything for hosting. P4M have a piece of software in their system which logs "Commercial" interest from potential customers of your work against your images. In all cases with FAA and P4M I only upload one image at a time, in fact I think it is only possible to upload one image to P4M at one time. The max upload to P4M is 10 images in 24 hours. This is because each image is assessed by one of a small team of photographers who run the site and they do not need to be inundated with images at the expense of letting "inferior quality" images through. Allan Thanks Allan, That explains the commercial interest. PHOTO4ME certainly feels much more local than Berlin... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Callie Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 Also ran scans with no threats shown. I have been testing the software this afternoon and am so far very impressed. I have also been trial-ing Topaz and Snap Art 4 over the last few weeks, so far I am liking FotoSketcher best and not just for the price! I'm particularly liking the results when combining effects (tutorial page here http://fotosketcher.blogspot.fr/2013/08/fotosketcher-250-complete-tutorial.html) and if it becomes possible to add photoshop brushes in, as David says he is working on in the comments on this page, then I will be extra happy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Number Six Posted April 23, 2014 Share Posted April 23, 2014 I've had a look through the Artflakes site and could see no mention of whether photo submissions have to be exclusive, or whether Model or Property Releases are required - do you get that level of advice when you join up? Also confess to being a little confused over their file size restrictions (max 25MB, 1200x1200 pixels). Seems very small for producing fine art prints etc - or am I just being dull after a long day?! Grateful for any answers Regards John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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