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Small Art Show Prints - Packaging

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
Gotta love Amazon —- for having professional products that were a challenge to find, and required expensive large quantity purchase in the past ——- and with next day delivery to our door (all the way from China 😝).

Complete well designed shipping package containing beveled mat, backing board and cellophane sleeve to make my prints available locally. 👌🏻

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When you have produced thousands of images that are either buried in feeds online where no one enjoys them once consumed —— or you print them to the point where your house becomes annoying full of them. The only option I’ve had is to give a few friends a print copy when they let me know they like a pic I have taken.

Last weekend, Anne and I went to see an outdoor display our oldest daughter Rachel had in a city a bit under an hour from us. Rachel is amazingly skilled with her yarn creations and has been booking more and more shows to sell at this year. I was sitting thinking about how I may be able to set up a tent to sell prints, but I’ve been through the years of manning my studio and so that doesn’t appeal to me. Nor does the effort of hauling around tons of gear and setting up and tearing down. Rachel suggested I make up a few prints and she would display them in one of her little wooden crates for people to thumb through.

I checked Amazon and ordered the package of 25 units, then spent an hour printing 25 5x7 different prints to mount in the mat. So cool and so effortless. I’m not at all worried about the need to sell any - just kind of fun knowing the exposure to people seeing my work and possibility of one sitting on someone’s mantle, is there. Plus it gives me purpose in printing and building a stock of them in my retirement.



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This was Rachel’s setup lastweekend

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Robert Watcher

Well-known member
Is it her tent, rented or what?

How expensive to be there?

Asher

Yes Rachel owns the tent and displays. Everything folds up and fits in her SUV. She travels to events in different locations, all different in price. This particular one last week was $50 for the one day I believe. Some are more expensive and can be set up for more than a day.
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
I’ve been using chatGTP to formulate wording for page content in web design…

… but hadn’t considered using AI to come up with Titles for the collection of matted prints that I am putting together.

Last week I started using Microsoft Copilot AI because of the limitations and wait time now imposed on the free chatGTP.

This morning my wife and I were agonizing over descriptive possibilities for the Titles of the matted prints that will be available at a craft show this weekend, when I considered the possibility of how Copilot might respond. I wasn’t after perfection, just uniqueness so that I could keep track of the prints that were selling as well as find the files quickly if needing to reprint. Kind of like a SKU for each one. Although I must admit that the pencil written title on the matting does add a bit of artistic flare and maybe even value. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Copilot provided 3 suggestions for each of the roughly worded queries that I entered. I was able to find something I liked out of the 3, for each of the 15 images that I used it on. I could never have come up with these satisfying results. 👌🏻

I took a screenshot of the results, for a few of the pics.
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
These are few of the other prints that I Titled so far.

This was the first image description that I struggled with before deciding to see what Copilot offered. This desktop shot that I took in our kitchen during Covid lockdown had the end of season dandelion placed in an ornate antique vase of my grandmothers, that we had sitting on a shelf. I was thinking of how I could incorporate the thought of relationship to the vase and describe the softness and airiness of the dandelion. As soon as Anne and I saw “ Wispers of Time”, we couldn’t believe it.

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Robert Watcher

Well-known member
Robert,

How you plan to price them? Where do you place your signature?

Asher

I’m not producing these as limited addition or fine art. Only printing in small sizes packaged up like this to have available for anyone who likes. My daughter is going to display 30 or so in a crate for people to thumb through. I haven’t tested yet but will probably determine $25 or $35 for this 5x7 size. I have my signature and contact info printed on a label on the back of the mat. Not hand signed.
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
After capturing more images this weekend to add to my matted print offerings, I realized an additional feature of CoPilot app —— where I can have the app analyze my image and generate a title and even short description based on the content. A very valuable tool that saves a lot of time when creating textual content to go along with my images

This example of an old sign post, provided very good results


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And it was really quite amazing to be provided with such a detailed description for this image

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I was curious as to how much info could be provided as so queried farther


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Robert Watcher

Well-known member
Where do you put the title?
It is written in pencil on the mat around the print. But I will also be adding these images to my website where it is nice to also have a short description.

I actually started making use of ChatGPT a year ago to create content for websites that I was building. My clients weren’t able to come up with effective wording for their webpages, and they weren’t willing willing pay for me to spend hours and hours coming up with the content or hire hire someone to do it. AI to the rescue.
 

Robert Watcher

Well-known member
My daughter Rachel has her tent set up this weekend for an Annual Volkswagen Festival that attracts VW enthusiasts from all over Canada and the U.S. Last year she decided to make up 4 small knitted VW’s to see if there was any interest. They sold out instantly. This year she made 15 and on last report most are sold.

She suggested that I print up some of VW pics that I shot in streets in Mexico - to include in the little box of 5x7 matted prints that she has made available in her booth on a few occasions lately. To my surprise, when I dropped in to see how things were going, she had set up a whole corner section to display my stuff. She told me that it was drawing attention and most people going in to see her stuff were thumbing through them. Some had already sold in the morning. She gets 30% commission for incentive, and the rest is found money for me. As much as anything, it’s just fun to know my photos aren’t just locked up on hard drives. People are enjoying them.

While there I wandered around and captured another 50 or so shots of the cars on display, to add to my print collection for next year.



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Robert Watcher

Well-known member
While walking around I grabbed around 50 new VW images to add to my collection. Detail shots are what appeal to people and what they were looking and commenting about, Rachel noticed. She also suggested that I should sell these small prints that I already have printed and matted, on Facebook Marketplace and possibly Etsy. I am enjoying the process of cost effectively putting them together, and people getting to see them and for a few so far, having them see enough value to display some in their homes.

Here are a few of the new stock:


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