peripheral vision

I got a nice package in the mail tonight: my new business cards, which I ordered from Moo. They look great. Some of the pictures lost their blacks, probably because of the very matte paper. But most of the images look really good, and the backsides are fantastic. What I like about these cards is that you can import many pictures from flickr, so you have a big selection of images on the front. Designing the layout of text and logos on the back of the card is intuitive and pretty easy, although I was really glad I had my husband on hand to tweak my logo to suit the card. And the price is way more cost-effective for my quantity needs than having cards (with only one image) printed at a local print shop. So if you have any need for business cards, check out Moo.
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Imagekind is about to start a Valentine’s Day promotion. From February 10 to 16 you can get 25 percent off their custom framing.

I finally got around to ordering a media kit from Imagekind, so I could see firsthand the differences between their paper options. Which means I can finally make confident recommendations for choosing a paper.

Just going by visual appearance, my favourite paper is, somewhat surprisingly, the modestly priced Epson Premium Photo Glossy. I expected to prefer Epson Premium Photo Lustre paper, but it has a faintly textured surface, which I personally didn’t like. Mind you, I was inspecting the papers a lot more closely than I think anyone in real life ever would.

I also quite liked the Hannemuhle Fine Art Pearl, which is pretty much the most expensive photo paper Imagekind offers. It seemed to carry more detail and sharpness than the glossy, so I’d probably use it for exhibition prints.

I would most definitely not recommend the Epson Enhanced Matte for my photos; it’s just too flat. It’s really more of an art paper than a photo paper, much to my surprise. And I wouldn’t bother with the Hannemuhle Photo Rag 308 for the same reason. It feels more like card stock to me than a proper photo. If you want a flatter surface than the glossy, go for the Epson Premium Photo Lustre.

So now I have to update my prints page…

Ok, just one more note about my calendars, and then I’ll shut up about them. My coworker brought her Cuba calendar in for me to see today, and I was blown away! The print quality is amazing. So I can endorse them with 100% confidence. Besides the great quality, my favourite thing about the calendars is that vertically oriented images as big as the horizontal ones. It’s the only calendar I’ve seen like that. I’m totally getting myself a Parking Meters in Lunenburg calendar.

Wow, Redbubble is fast! One of my coworkers bought several of my calendars on December 11, and she received them YESTERDAY. That’s only six days to produce them AND ship them from Australia, and she didn’t even choose express shipping. Now that’s service! She said they look amazing (and yes that’s a direct quote). I’ll see for myself on Monday, when she brings one in for me to see. I can’t wait.

I’m working on creating four calendars for 2009. Hopefully this week I’ll be able to put them up for sale.

I’ve decided to use redbubble for my calendars. There are lots of options for calendars out there, but I chose redbubble because I think the quality is the best. And I really don’t think it’s in my interest to have poor-quality stuff out there. I figure redbubble is looking to fill the art niche, and all the reviews of I’ve read of its calendars are enthusiastic.

Cafepress’s website was totally un-intuitive to use, and I ended up having to create my test calendar twice. I wish Imagekind made calendars, because I love being able to just import my images from flickr, titles, tags and all. Redbubble’s site is pretty handicapped because as far as I can tell, you can only upload images one at a time, which is a REAL pain in the ass.

I’m a bit concerned about pricing my calendars. Redbubble’s base price is $19 CAD. My first thought was that this is way too high. Who’s going to buy a calendar for more than $20 plus shipping when you can pick up any old calendar for $15? And that would leave me virtually no profit to donate. But then I thought about how my prints start around $20, unframed, and go up depending on the paper and size.

It seems to me that if the images are reproduced well on good paper, a calendar is like buying 12 unframed prints, and getting to look at a new one every month. Or like hanging pages from a photo book on your wall. Now THAT is worth more than $20 to me. So I’m pricing my calendars at a 50% mark-up, which sets them at $28.50 CAD. That leaves between $5 and $9.50 for donation. So stay tuned for calendars…