Two New Post Office Shipping Options

Thanks to a great suggestion from one of our artists who uses us on a regular basis to have prints dropshipped to her customers I am happy to announce a couple new shipping options. We wanted to help people like her who ship a lot of 16×20 prints avoid having to select UPS Ground. While I am overall happy with UPS Ground it costs $14.95 versus $9.95, won’t allow shipping to PO Boxes in most cases and in many cases has a longer transit time without Saturday delivery. Rather than raising the rates for Priority Mail and Express mail we setup offer an upgraded version to the two called “Priority Mail Large” and “Express Mail Large”. They are a few dollargs move but will these “Large” versions let you ship prints flat up to 16×20. In addition it can be a solution to those that want their paper prints shipped in a little more robust packaging than the normal flat mailers.

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Select Gallery Moderator

A few months back I had an artist tell me he was looking for a new site to setup a personal gallery. He said the site he had been using had been okay up until then but appeared to be going down hill or was not being actively moderated like it once was. He sounded disappointed when he said this so I asked him what had happened which had turned him off so much. He said the site was turning into a photo sharing site and was losing it’s art community feel. People were posting anything and everything from selfies (those are photos people take of themselves with their iPhones or other smartphone) to vacation snap shots.

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Scanning vs Photographing Artwork

Sometimes it seems we receive the same question from multiple people all within a brief time frame. In this case the common question we were getting last week and over the weekend was whether it was better to scan or photograph artwork when preparing images for printing. In a nutshell there are pros and cons for both options. Here I am going to list my own personal feelings however feel free to agree or disagree and leave your comments. For instance, I have a photography friend who would probably feel the photography option is better and if I had his skill in photography, especially when achieving proper color balance in photography I might feel the same.

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Soft Proofing Images Before Printing

Today I’m going to show you how to soft proof your images through Photoshop. Why is soft proofing important? Simply put, soft proofing your images before having them printed is a great way to simulate how they will appear based on specific printer and paper combination. In the long run it will save you both time and money.

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Make Your Buyers Happy

Having your orders drop shipped makes the process of printing and shipping your art to your customers easier than before. It eliminates some of the time and stress associated with doing it all yourself. When you consider the expense of materials to make a print, cost of shipping, shipping supplies, not to mention the time spent actually making the order and possibly time waiting in line at the post office to ship it, a service like ours is perfect if you are getting started in the art print market. With your printing and shipping infrastructure taken care you can spend more time on your art and your customers. Attracting new buyers and making them happy customers should be a top priority. Making them happy buyers is one of the best things you can do for yourself if you are building a successful art based business.

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