I have so much to be thankful for, I have my health, a warm home, a terrific extended family and many many friends. As I sit here at my desk on the evening before Thanksgiving, waiting for Dan to get home from work I realize I am most thankful to be loved by a man that has always loved art and animals as much as I do. That is really no small thing, no small thing at all. I love my husband and our 4-legged family. We are so fortunate in so many ways.
I threw together a small video of my guy and a few of the animals he has loved over the years. I know he will be embarrassed by it, but I don't care. Nobody is reading this blog the evening before Thanksgiving anyway. If you are reading this then I do wish you all a terrific Holiday!
Art Paw will be closed tomorrow, but I will be back at my desk on Friday working on holiday portraits.
Wednesday, November 26, 2014
Thursday, November 13, 2014
Sending Images At Full Resolution
It is that time of year again, the holidays are upon us and that means I will often be working with whatever pics people can get their hands on. That usually means compressed low resolution images sent from a friend of a friend or downloaded right off of facebook. It also means celebrating pets that have passed on using whatever photos are available. I always do my best to create something wonderful with whatever images people can send. If something just will not work I will tell my clients that. When I can I will encourage folks to send again and try different menu options.
What Clients Need to know about sending phone pics:
• Texting your image to my e-mail is going to auto-crunch your image and reduce the file size. Try to use an actual e-mail ap to send your image to me.
• The auto send or share feature on most phones sends low resolution pics for speed.
• Most phones these days take great high resolution images.
• There is a way to send at full resolution and a google search for "send full resolution images from my: insert name-brand phone ", will yield a plethora of tutorials.
• There is no way to auto fix a low resolution image, it will pixelate like crazy when enlarged. Using the smudge tool a good artist can smooth out the jagged pixelation that occurs. It is time consuming, and requires smoothing and smudging every single pixel.
Today I am posting a Video tutorial I found on-line that may help iphone users send us their images at full resolution. This fellow walks you through it with a lovely British accent.
What You Need to think about as a Digital Artist:
I always tell my Photoshop students that you learn ten times as much trying to create something from low res. poor quality images than you do by working with stunning photos at full resolution. Any hack can take a stunning high resolution photograph and make it even prettier, the challenge is working with lower quality images. With that said I too prefer a minimum of 500KB and I love it when I can get my hands on an image that is at least 1mb.
Tips For Other Digital Artists:
• If you plan to stick to your image size requirements when working with clients plan to do half the pet portrait volume you could be doing.
• Always give help and tips when trying to get good images from your clients, but be prepared if they can not follow through.
• Know that sometimes all a client will have is a photo that was e-mailed from a pal at low resolution and asking their loved one to jump through hoops for the original image at actual size might just spoil the gift giving surprise.
• Your clients are not dumb, they are often very busy professionals and probably have not ever needed a full resolution image before. Many people are on their 3rd or 4rth phones and you never know, they may have a brand new phone that they are still learning about.
• Respect your client's time and know that at the end of the day your flexibility and skill at working with all types of images will pay off in the amount you will learn about Photoshop and in your ability to build great relationships with your clients.
What Clients Need to know about sending phone pics:
• Texting your image to my e-mail is going to auto-crunch your image and reduce the file size. Try to use an actual e-mail ap to send your image to me.
• The auto send or share feature on most phones sends low resolution pics for speed.
• Most phones these days take great high resolution images.
• There is a way to send at full resolution and a google search for "send full resolution images from my: insert name-brand phone ", will yield a plethora of tutorials.
• There is no way to auto fix a low resolution image, it will pixelate like crazy when enlarged. Using the smudge tool a good artist can smooth out the jagged pixelation that occurs. It is time consuming, and requires smoothing and smudging every single pixel.
Today I am posting a Video tutorial I found on-line that may help iphone users send us their images at full resolution. This fellow walks you through it with a lovely British accent.
What You Need to think about as a Digital Artist:
I always tell my Photoshop students that you learn ten times as much trying to create something from low res. poor quality images than you do by working with stunning photos at full resolution. Any hack can take a stunning high resolution photograph and make it even prettier, the challenge is working with lower quality images. With that said I too prefer a minimum of 500KB and I love it when I can get my hands on an image that is at least 1mb.
Tips For Other Digital Artists:
• If you plan to stick to your image size requirements when working with clients plan to do half the pet portrait volume you could be doing.
• Always give help and tips when trying to get good images from your clients, but be prepared if they can not follow through.
• Know that sometimes all a client will have is a photo that was e-mailed from a pal at low resolution and asking their loved one to jump through hoops for the original image at actual size might just spoil the gift giving surprise.
• Your clients are not dumb, they are often very busy professionals and probably have not ever needed a full resolution image before. Many people are on their 3rd or 4rth phones and you never know, they may have a brand new phone that they are still learning about.
• Respect your client's time and know that at the end of the day your flexibility and skill at working with all types of images will pay off in the amount you will learn about Photoshop and in your ability to build great relationships with your clients.
Thursday, November 06, 2014
Holiday Pet Portrait Deadline
It is that time of year again. Time to post my holiday deadlines.
Order by 11/18 .... and get my very best unhurried creative work with a guaranteed delivery by Christmas.
Ordering now means that your pet will get the time they deserve and I will even have an extra pad of time so I can make a few color changes if they are needed.
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