Services Archives - The Artists Print Room (Giclée Printing)

Successful Exhibitions

Perhaps you’ve decided 2020 will be the year you start attending and displaying your work at exhibitions. You could hold your own exhibition dedicated to your work alone or perhaps partake in one of the many organised across the country. Exhibitions can be a fantastic opportunity to show your work off in all its glory as visitors will come to you and they are the perfect opportunity for showcasing to potential clients and art buyers.

Preparing for a successful exhibition can be a very daunting experience, even if you’ve attended them before! There is a lot to consider prior and you should be prepared for things to come up that you wouldn’t have imagined! Here we have put together some top tips on holding a successful exhibition.

booking your space

The most important factor here is RESEARCH! If you’re looking at attending an organised exhibition, have you attended it before? If not, speak to your contacts, do they recommend it? Also take into consideration the type of visitors expected – would you work fit in with their tastes and budgets? When you’ve settled on this, speak to the event organisers and understand what is included in your stand fee. Your booking fee for space is a large overhead so ensure you are getting all you can from it. Is there suitable space to hang your work or would you need to provide this?

Additionally, what promotion will be involved from the organisers for you? Do they promote the event locally or perhaps nationally? It may be worth negotiating if possible on a stand location within the exhibition too. If you know who else is attending and where they will be located, consider work that complements yours and ask for a stand location according to this.

logistics

Perhaps one of the most onerous parts of preparing for a successful exhibition is working out how you are going to get there with all of your work. Will you need to hire a van for the occasion or perhaps ask a logistics company to undertake this challenge on your behalf – just make sure they are insured accordingly and have relevant experience to avoid any damages or potential issues. You will need to take a suitable amount of work with you to display, don’t over do it though!

Furthermore, if the exhibition is not local to you, ensure you book your accommodation in advance. Some large scale exhibitions attract vast numbers of visitors and local hotels and B&B’s get booked up well in advance.

You may also want to consider taking someone with you to help out. Do you have a reliable friend or colleague that can head over with you? It will probably be worthwhile having some assistance if possible so you can both take suitable breaks and explore the rest of the exhibition for market research purposes!

Also, never, ever forget items such as pens, paper and scissors! Trust us, you’ll will always need these at some point!

promotion

Both prior and whilst you are attending the exhibition, you need to promote that you are there! Using social media is a great opportunity for this as you can target people who are already interested in your work as well as others that may be interested in other exhibitors.

You should also ensure you have plenty of marketing material with you at all times too, this can include business cards or flyers. Include your contact details on these so visitors who can’t stop thinking about your work after the event can get in touch!

It would also be a good idea to have some information displayed about each piece of work you have with you. This can just be a couple of lines on a small label, it is also worthwhile including the price too.

during the event

No body knows your work better than you do! Be prepared to talk all day long about it and what your inspiration is. Be enthusiastic and approachable to all visitors. You need to enjoy your time at the event otherwise this will come across negatively to and visitors. All the hard work will be worth it and take a couple of days off afterwards to rest, you’ll be surprised how tiring these exhibitions can be! Don’t be tempted to take a seat though whilst you’re at the exhibition, it can come across very casual to potential clients so make sure you wear some comfortable shoes too!

If you are selling directly at the exhibition, it is worthwhile investing in a card payment facility. Fewer and fewer of us are carrying cash around and this can really make life much easier for you and your customers. There are many different options available now and many of these can be used through a mobile phone. Here is a comparison site that you can take a look at which details all the different options available to you.

most importantly

Things will go wrong, it’s inevitable, even if you’re a seasoned pro at exhibitions. But that’s fine! Learn from your mistakes and don’t be disheartened by them everyone forgets something every once in a while. Just remember, something may go wrong, but it’s highly unlikely that your visitors will even notice and inevitably you will have a successful exhibition!

Have you attended any exhitibitions recently? Which ones would you recommend for photographers and artists? Or perhaps you’re planning on attending some yourself throughout 2020 – let us know, we would love to hear from you and you never know, we may be able to pop along too!

Did you know that we are the only fine art printing company in the UK which has been accredited by Canson Infinity, Hahnemühle Fine Art, Epson Digigraphie, ILFORD and the Fine Art Trade Guild? Also, why not sign up to our mailing list to keep up to date with news, products and future competitions at The Artist’s Print Room – just complete the form below.

Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram too!

Photoshop and Lightroom Support

Are you hoping that Santa brings you something really nice this year? Perhaps a new camera or maybe even computer? You’d probably have to be at the top of the ‘good list’ for these unless you’re treating yourself instead! If you’re getting started and are looking to edit your photography, did you know that we offer both Photoshop and Lightroom support, bespoke to your requirements?

From the comfort of your own home we can provide a support service to help you ensure your image processing programmes are set up correctly and accurately. Alternatively, we can help run through some of the most common settings and tools you would need as either an artist or photographer. We can cover both Photoshop and Lightroom, whichever you require; or both!

Additionally, we can provide services to assist you in calibrating your monitor and installing or embedding ICC profiles. This is particularly useful when you are planning on printing your photography as you will be able to see a more accurate representation of the final colours, tones and hues to be expected in your prints.

Talking and showing you through each step, we can answer any of your technical questions. We want to help make your life easier so you can have more time and freedom to create your photography without having to worry about the technical issues which can be time consuming.

Furthermore, we don’t even have to come to your home as we can offer this service remotely, through Skype or by telephone and remote access.

Lightroom

This programme offers you the full set of tools for you to edit your image files to exactly how you would like them to look. You can find more about Lightroom here. We can take you step-by-step through the set up process and show you how to save your preferences and ensure that everything is running smoothly so you can take control of the image editing process.

Photoshop

Photoshop is an extremely powerful tool used for image editing and image manipulation which is used by many professional photographers and artists. We can ensure that Photoshop is set up correctly for you and show you how profiling and colour management works through this programme. More information about Photoshop can be found here.

Technical Support

Our technical support services are available either in person (travel expenses apply) by travelling to you or as a remote service. All our technical support is bespoke to your individual requirements and questions.

We charge a standard hourly rate for these services and you can book using our simple to use online booking form. When you book, please feel free to give us a brief description on what you would like to discuss or require assistance with and we will then be in touch to discuss further and arrange a suitable time and date for the technical support to take place.

Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram too!

The ‘Art’ of Cash Flow Planning

Now you’re up and running by promoting and selling your artwork or photography through your own website and social media channels. You should focus on the importance of cash flow within your business.

You have your pricing structure set up, so you know and understand how to price your individual pieces of artwork. However, you need to take into account your overheads and ensure you have sufficient cash flow to cover the cost of these.

Simply put, cash flow is the movement of funds in and out of your business. If you are to apply for a business loan or investment, it is highly likely you would need to provide a cash flow forecast. This document can help you forward plan and grow.

When taking a look at your expected cash flow, it is important to understand your expenses throughout the year. By forward planning and looking at things objectively, you can hope to eliminate any financial surprises. As the saying goes, ‘cash is king’! One of the first things you prioritise is any expenses you would expect to incur. This includes a vast array of items including any rent you may have (relevant if perhaps working from a studio), art materials, printing and postage costs, general utility bills and costs of any paid advertising you are undertaking. Then you need to consider your revenue, how much are you bringing in each month from your work? These need to at least balance out, but of course, ideally, your income needs to exceed your outgoings to ensure you are making a profit. The easiest way to look at this is, ‘I need £x to cover £x’.

Cash Flow Forecasting

By producing a cash flow forecast, this allows you to work out methodically and objectively what your expected income and outgoings are each month throughout the year. This can be produced using a simple spreadsheet, alternatively, ask your bookkeeper or accountant to help out if you are unsure. Additionally, there are many templates available online for you to download and use. List down all your outgoings month by month in this spreadsheet. From here, you can work out what you need to produce and sell to cover these costs. Of course, within the art industry, this can be tricky to work out as selling your work can be variable from month to month but if possible, look at previous years and check for any reoccurring patterns such as a sales peak in the run up to Christmas. Make sure you are regularly updating and reviewing your cash flow forecast so you can keep track of your business revenue.

Cost Savings

It is always a good idea to work out where you could possibly make cost savings. For example, can you purchase your art materials in bulk? By doing so, you can often benefit from smaller delivery charges or at least save on these by ordering once rather than having lots of smaller deliveries. Also, some suppliers may offer you discounted rates for bulk purchases. Further to this, when it comes to having your work printed, we offer a print on-demand service. Therefore, you are only paying to have the prints of your artwork or photography produced on-demand – when they have been committed to by your customer. Ideally, you will already have this cash in your bank too as hopefully your customer will have already paid for you to commit to the print order.

If you are shipping your orders yourself to your customer, can you negotiate your delivery costs? If using delivery services, perhaps you could meet with a representative from said company to try and reduce some of these expenses.

In summary, it is important to spend some time forward planning and understanding these aspects of your business. By having a plan, you are less likely to incur any unfortunate expenses and surprises. Also, never forget the tax man! Remember, as a self-employed artist or photographer, you must complete, file, and pay your self-assessment tax on a yearly basis and should be included in your cash flow forecast!

Did you know that we are the only fine art printing company in the UK which has been accredited by Canson Infinity, Hahnemühle Fine Art, Epson Digigraphie, ILFORD and a member of the Fine Art Trade Guild? Also, why not sign up to our mailing list to keep up to date with news, products and future competitions at The Artist’s Print Room – just complete the form below.

Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram too!

How to sell your artwork or photography – Part 1

Following on from our last blog post; how to price your artwork, how do you actually go about selling artwork online?

Selling Artwork Online

As an artist or a photographer, there are many ways to sell art online. Many decide to sell through third parties, however, there are a number of steps you can take to sell directly and take back some control of your work. Here we will give you our tips and advice on how to get started and what you can do to increase awareness of your work by selling directly.

Website

One of the most important things you should have is your own website. A website is your little unique space on the internet and provides the best place to showcase your work in a way you want to. Creating a website can be a daunting thought, however, there are many online platforms and packages (such as Wix, or Weebly) which provide an easy step-by-step website builder which makes the process straight forward for even the biggest technophobe! Furthermore, websites are relatively inexpensive to build and run. If you’re still feeling slightly worried about undertaking this work yourself, you can always outsource and have a professional create a website on your behalf. It is well worth the investment and you can then run and maintain from there or have your web expert do this on your behalf.

Having a website provides an opportunity for potential customers to see your work easily from their own home whilst giving you full control about the message and image you want to portray. It can also the best opportunity for your personality to shine and for potential customers to learn more about you and your work. It is also a very good idea to give information on your style and how you work (include photographs of ‘behind the scenes’ too!) People like to learn more about who has created the piece and the stories behind the work but keep it simple at the same time to not overwhelm them!

Things To Consider

There are a few very important factors to consider with your website to create the best experience and get the best engagement from your prospective purchasers:

Images

Ensure your images are of a high quality and show the full piece of work you’re selling. If someone is considering a purchase, they like to be able to see in full detail what they are looking at and hopefully buying. If you feel necessary and are concerned about people stealing your images, include a watermark.

Your images also need to load quickly, a slow running website puts people off there are various ways of ensuring this – speak to your website developer and highlight this point. Furthermore, websites are seen more favourable by search engines, such as Google, if they run quickly.

written content

Ensure your spelling and grammar is correct throughout! This helps build trust and again, doesn’t put people off. Ask a friend or family member to read through your work before publishing online, bribe them with a cup of tea and a piece of cake if necessary! It’s very easy to miss spelling mistakes when you’ve been working on a written piece.

Research

Check out your competition! Take a look at other artist and photographer websites, what are they doing well or not so well? Pick out the things you see they aren’t doing so well and implement them yourself but better! It’s well worth spending a fair bit of time doing some market research to understand what you are up against to really improve your chances of selling your art online.

regular updates

Update your site regularly -perhaps through blogging online. Let people know what you are working on or how you work. It helps build a great connection and relationship between yourself and potential customers.

payment options

If you want to sell directly through your website, ensure you have a web package which offers an online shop and can take payments. PayPal is a great and simple to use platform for processing payments when selling art online. Paypal also offers some protection for sellers and buyers online. Find out more about PayPal and their business services on their website.

social media

Set up social media accounts for your work. Ensure you link your website to these social media accounts. Again, it’s a great and simple tool for ensuring search engines pick up your website and helps you reach a bigger audience of potential customers.

So there are our top tips when it comes to selling your artwork online. Do you have any top tips to share with us that we may have missed? What do you find works best for you? Share your thoughts and ideas with us on Facebook and Instagram!

Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram too!

Ordering your fine art giclée prints

When it comes to ordering your fine art giclée prints, it can be a confusing process, with so many options to be aware of. Here at The Artist’s Print Room, we have tried our best to ensure our online ordering system is straight forward and easy to use.

Firstly, head over to our online shop. You’ll find this option at the top of our website. The blue box saying ‘Order Here!’ will take you directly through to our online ordering system.

By heading through to our online shop, you will see the following four options:

From here, to order giclée prints, head over to the printing option. Here you will see a number of different options, including deckled edge prints, poster printing, greetings cards and print proofs. If you’re not sure how your final print will look or your just starting out in the world of producing your artwork or photography as giclée prints, it might be worth considering print proofs in the first instance.

Print Proofs

Our print proofs are 280x120mm as standard (other size options are available though). You can order print proofs on any of the fine art substrates that we offer and prices start at just £7.50. Print proofs give you the best opportunity to take a closer look at the colours, substrates and quality of our products before committing to a full sized print.

Giclée Printing

If you’re ready to go ahead and order your giclée prints, then head straight to our online order form. Here you will be taken step-by-step through the options available to you. Firstly, you will need to select your print size. You can order generic paper sizes or alternatively bespoke print sizes. Prices here start at £9.00 for an A5 print.

Secondly, you can add a plain border to your print. If you’ve added a border to your print file already, please make sure to select the relevant option. Alternatively, you can ask us to add one on for you and let us know what size you would like this.

Then comes the exciting bit! Select from our wide range of substrates available. Take your pick from our gloss, matt or textured fine art papers. We have 15 papers to select from plus two canvas substrates.

Following on from your substrate selection you can add on the option of having a certificate of authenticity. These are a great addition, particularly if your print is part of a limited edition. Once you’ve completed all these stages you will receive a bespoke price according to your selections. Please note, we also offer discounts on multiple orders starting at six prints. If you have a print run of over 100, please do contact us for further information and pricing.

There you go! Ordering your giclée prints is as simple as that! Once you’ve added your products to basket, follow our simple instructions to upload your files, then sit back and relax! Your order will be on the way to you shortly. We will be in touch if there are any issues or questions, additional, please feel free to contact us if you have any questions too!

Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram too!

How to select a fine art printing service…

When taking that first leap into the world of producing your work as either artwork reproduction prints or fine art photography prints, it can be daunting. It’s also difficult to decide on who to trust with this specialist work. Here are our top tips in selecting a fine art printing service and some of the important factors you should consider.

Experience

Possibly the most important factor when selecting a fine art printing service. Ensure you are selecting a business with a good number of years behind them. This vast amount of experience speaks volumes in itself. A fine art printing company that has been around for several years, is more than likely to know their stuff, this includes overcoming hurdles such as technical issues. They are also more likely to understand your requirements and be able to advise honestly and truthfully when you need some assistance. If in doubt, it is always worth asking to see some examples of work they have previously printed for other artists and photographers.

Accreditations

There are many accreditations within the industry, in particular ones from paper manufacturers themselves. These large, global firms are not going to recommend fine art printing services of sub-quality. Therefore, shop around, ask the fine art printing companies which accreditations they have. These accreditations proves that they are up to standard and have close working relationships with some of the biggest manufacturers in the industry. Did you know that we are the only UK based fine art printer to be certified by Epson Digigraphie, Canson Infinity, Hahnemühle FineArt and ILFORD Imaging? We are also members of the Fine Art Trade Guild. Having these certifications really allows us to keep up with trends and news from these companies. Additionally, it also proves that we have been rigorously tested and checked in our print standards.

Options

It’s good to use a fine art printing service which provides you with different options. Although, not too many options! You want to use a business that can give you a range of different fine art papers so you have a few choices for which works best for your artwork reproductions or photography. A select number of industry leading papers should be offered alongside a few alternatives; giving you the artist, some variation. Having a select range of substrates ensures the printer knows how to handle each of the papers and understands the colour workflow processes to ensure you have the most perfect print. However, some fine art printing services decide to offer all the fine art papers known to man! This can be troublesome in that it can be confusing with so many options available. Furthermore, it could be likely that some of these lesser used or liked fine art papers could be sitting on a shelf exposed to the elements for a long time which is not ideal!

Convenience

An easy to use and simplistic ordering process is always a good start for time pressed artists and photographers. Being able to upload your images and know they are being cared for can create a great peace of mind for you. As an artist or photographer is important to free up your time so you can focus on creating your artwork. Therefore, always find a fine art printing service that you trust to take this hassle away from you. Also, it’s worth considering if your fine art printing service are easy to get hold of? If you have a pressing question, will they come back to you in a reasonable time period with answers, advice and suggestions? The art and photography industry can be incredibly subjective so it’s always great to have someone to validate your processes and work with. An excellent fine art printing service will do this for you and assist every step of the way.

It’s also worth remembering, cheap is not always best. You are looking for a fine art printing service rather than a photocopy shop! With a slightly higher price, you’re much more likely to receive a more personal service with great communication and advice in addition to the best fine art printing materials available.

Please feel free to contact us for a quick introductory chat, we would love to find out more about you and how we can help you as an artist or photographer. We pride ourselves on excellent customer service so you can also contact us on 07809 381 978 either over the phone or by WhatsApp. You can also get in touch through Facebook Messenger at anytime.

Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram too!

Technical Support

Did you know that we also offer bespoke technical support services alongside our fine art giclée printing?

Additionally, we can provide services to assist you in calibrating your monitor and installing or embedding ICC profiles. This is particularly useful when you are planning on printing your artwork as you will be able to see a more accurate representation of the final colours, tones and hues to be expected in your prints.

Talking and showing you through each step, we can answer any of your technical questions. We want to help make your life easier so you can have more time and freedom to create your art or photography without having to worry about the technical issues which can be all so time consuming.

Furthermore, we don’t even have to come to your home as we can offer this service remotely, through Skype or by telephone and remote access.

Lightroom

Photoshop

Technical Support

Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Instagram too!