Play It Again, Sam
Good news!, Susan has posted More on My Business Card. Susan has put up some versions of her card as we are getting close, so close – yet so far – from the goal – PRINTED business cards. Your help has been so incredible!! Thank you!
Art Biz Card Buddha, Digital © Diane Clancy
Alyson Stanfield had a post the other day about If 2 heads are better than one . . . as she is asking artists for help in designing her new book. So I guess I can ask too … thank you!! At least you know that I really listen to your advice AND heed it. Sorry, Soul Fish, others pinpointed the intensity of the cat business card that bothered me so much. But there was plenty of feedback toward simplifying it again. So here goes …
Art Biz Card Conundrum, Digital © Diane Clancy
Aaron and Chris had been encouraging me (if you remember) and probably Soul Fish too … to get more creative and unusual. So that is part of where this journey has come from … also I wanted (obviously) to show examples of my work that I consider very different from each other.
If you remember, I tried a vertical version (partly to be able to show Conundrum I as a whole piece). It has been a long journey. If you want to see it, you can put “business card” in the search place and you will see all the various versions … well, the ones I put online – there were others that never made it to your eye.
We already decided against vertical for a variety of reasons … so that leaves horizontal – so I put part of Conundrum I in. I have thought of this particular piece as my branding image for a long time … so here is my version of the 1 image instead of 3. Hopefully, one of these 2 will do IT!
Please indulge me again (I hesitate to say one more time any more) and I am extremely eager to hear what you have to say!! Thank you!!!
~ Diane Clancy
Technorati Tags: Susan, business card
Did you paint the Buddha?
The Buddha is a stock photo that came with a Photoshop book (the Bible) I bought. I talked with the author and he said that the image was ok to use in a collage – that I had the rights to use that. A friend (JC) said that there were so many photographs of Buddha that I didn’t need to worry that it would be too close to the original.
The swan was another stock photo. The Lilies of the Valley and other plants were flowers and leaves that I scanned from my garden. The stars and other silver dodas are nozzles from Barb that I put on the collage in Painter.
Those are the author details …
~ Diane Clancy
I like these, I think you’ve made it!
Hi Chris and Soul Fish,
Do you have a preference? thank you!
~ Diane Clancy
I like the top one the best, the one with three images.
How are you going to reconcile the fact that the Buddha is a photo, not yours, with the statement: Diane’s vibrant paintings? I assumed it was a painting.
Hi Chris – I am glad you like that one because I do too.
Soul Fish, I have a friend (JC) who I worked through these issues with several years ago – he saw the original photo and the changes that I made … and he felt that the resulting image was plenty changed to be mine.
It is a collage – some of my paintings are collages and some aren’t. Some of the digital ones are collages and some aren’t.
I also went back to the author of the book that I got the photo from and showed him the result and asked his opinion on calling the collage my work. He felt that the work was changed significantly and that it was very appropriate to call the work my own.
To me, that is the issue – whether the work is mine or someone else’s. Years ago, both of these people – who I respect greatly – looked at the original photo and looked at the collage and said that the work was mine.
As far as calling a collage a painting, I have no trouble with that. In many categorizations, collages come under painting – as opposed to other types of art work.
I don’t paint the cats in my digital paintings of Fanciful Animal Images either. I make sure that I have the rights to use the animals. I didn’t paint the flowers either – but again I have rights to use them. I don’t put things into my paintings that I don’t have usage rights for.
I am willing to continue this conversation …
~ Diane Clancy
I was not talking about rights, I was concerned that in a piece where half of the image is a photograph from someone else, there was not very much real estate left for Diane to express herself.
If you call a collage, a piece in which more than half of the image is a photograph, a painting then I, of course, differ to your categorization. It depends what you mean by “is”. 🙂 I now see you are also calling some of your work, digital paintings, I had missed that. To photograph is also to paint with light.
We are all painters. Amen!
People often do call some of Susan’s photographs paintings … many people who see them have trouble believing they aren’t from a brush. And I think that many of her night light series are very painterly also.
I have always labeled “in the Garden” as a digital painting … on the cards I sell – it is always labeled “digital.”
The original photograph has a very different feel than the digital collage – I took a piece of that photograph and put it in a very different context – but the photograph is key to the collage for sure … that was one of my first ones … now I would probably make more changes ….
We Are all painters … I think Neda’s collages are incredibly painterly! Just amazing that they are collages!
Peace
~ Diane Clancy
Hi Diane,
Well, after watching you go through this journey, as much as I thought I would like to see Conundrum stand alone, I think I prefer the card with three images…as long as the images are distinguishable enough that small to be viable.
Otherwise….well, I’m not sure what, otherwise….hahaha
Happy Fourth!
~Sue
Diane,
I literally said “wow” when I saw the card with only Conundrum. The “branding image” concept is I think very valid. While I love the other images, Conundrum is so much stronger by itself, and so is the card, in my view. If you do do another round of feedback, I would show the cards in actual size somehow. I know everybody has different monitor resolution size, but maybe you could put a pdf there with a link so people to see this all squished down to 3.5″ x 2″. It makes a big difference.
Thank you again!!
I just sent Tom a pdf with the images … glad to send one to anyone else too – just email me … dianeweb@dianeclancy.com
thank you again!
~ Diane Clancy
How would it look with just 1 image, your name and your contact info?
Leave off the rest of the text, which honestly I have yet to read in all these posts with images of it. I never read all the blah blah blah on people’s business cards – I just write notes on it myself if I want to remember them and what they do and where I met them.) so lots of white space is important (and at least 1 side that isn’t glossy so I can write on it).
Do other people read business cards? Maybe I’m lazy or lack attention span.
Hi Lisa,
That is an interesting idea. All the marketing stuff I have been reading (and we took a 12 week business class for artists) say to put more info on the cards … but that doesn’t necessarily mean that is the best way.
I think a lot might be regional cultural stuff. I know I look at business cards and read them (not the contact info – but if they have other words). With our new graphic design cards, people have first been looking at the image and making a comment, then looking at the list of things I do and commenting that they didn’t know I did all those things, then turning it over and reading my USP (as Chris calls it) – but my statement of how I work with people – and then I get another …. I didn’t know you did this.
Then there is usually a comment that they will have to keep this. They look at the image again … and make another comment about the image and then stick it in their pocket.
This is only a small sample – about 18 people or so. (they are pretty new cards) – and it has some variety of course depending on the circumstance. And I think the graphic design business may be different than the artist card.
But I will think about your idea of leaving off all the info except name and contact info … I think with your quilts it is probably very effective. You are such a strong, dynamic quilter!!
I appreciate your urging to increase the size of the image .. you and a couple of others certainly nudged me in that direction!!
Thank you again,
Diane
Hello
I can’t be bothered with anything these days, but shrug. I just don’t have anything to say recently.
G’night
Hello
Looks good! Very useful, good stuff. Good resources here. Thanks much!
Bye
Hello
Looks good! Very useful, good stuff. Good resources here. Thanks much!
G’night
Hello
Not much on my mind lately. My life’s been completely boring these days. I’ve just been hanging out not getting anything done. So it goes.
Bye
The swan was another stock photo. I like the top one the best, the one with three images.