You all know the importance of having really good reproductions of your work on your website. This will be even more
critical once the Prints-on-Demand feature is live (4-6 weeks). We strongly recommend that you get a professional
photographer to shoot your work unless you are confident you can do this yourself. Probably a good idea to watch what the photographer does.

Incidentally, see news item #3 below for a scheduled online seminar given by F&W Media (The ArtistsMagazine, WetCanvas.com) on the topic: “It's a Snap: Taking Digital Photos of Your Work.” We have a limited supply of free coupons worth $59.00 for those of you who want to participate in this or any other upcoming online seminar.

Once the photos have been taken, many images need additional tweaking, so you should be comfortable with doing some digital touch-up and editing. There are a lot of photo editing programs available. The most well-known is Photoshop but that program retails for $699 (and you will not need most of its features). A much less costly version is Photoshop Elements which retails for $79. Here is a trial version to test.

You will probably need some training to make the best use of it. I suggest subscribing to Lynda.com. They have really good tutorials for every program under the sun. You can subscribe for 1 month for $25 and you will learn everything you need to know.

There are of course other image editors. I recently received an email from Keith Cushner, whose website www.guidetoartschools.com just reviewed “The 11 Best Free Photo Editing Programs.” In addition to the 11 Photo Editing software packages, 5 online image editors are covered.

The big news is that Rodney Oliver, who was responsible for so much of the programming in the early Artspan days, has rejoined us full time. This means that we now have two full time tech people and, in addition, have part time help that we can call on when necessary. We are now able to move forward faster on our major projects: the new servers, the prints-on-demand feature and the new templates for both regular and associate members. And a host of smaller enhancements to the sites that you have been asking for. We could not be more pleased to have Rodney back as a member of the team.

Regarding the server move, this has been a long process but is now almost complete. The move and the new database structure will minimize downtime and will have other advantages. For those using Artspan email , there may be some minor service disruption Sunday, October 4. If there is a problem, no emails will be lost.
We asked our members last month to change the DNS (Domain Name Servers) for some sites that had not been registered through Artspan (ie if you registered your site through Network Solutions, goDaddy, etc). We continue to ask this, but it is NOT an emergency. It is simply an additional protection to insure that your sites have minimal downtime, if any. This request only applies to a couple hundred of our members with stand-alone domain names (that is, web addresses that are not subdomains of Artspan – ie YourName.artspan.com). You can check your domain here.

If the record for your domain shows the Domain Name Servers (DNS) or Name Servers as
ns1v.datapipe.net
ns2v.datapipe.net

We ask that you go to the registrar where you registered the domain and change the DNS to
ns1.artspan.com
ns2.artspan.com
ns3.artspan.com
ns4.artspan.com
ns5.artspan.com

Again, there is no rush to do this. Making the change will minimize the possibility of any downtime for your site.

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Because of a partner arrangement we have with F&W Media (The Artists Magazine, WetCanvas.com, artistsnetwork.com, etc.), they are extending complimentary coupons to Artspan members, which will be good for $59 towards any online seminar. These seminars focus primarily on the business of art.

The next online seminar is October 6. The topic is “Art Critique: Improve Your Work Through Expert Advice and Learn the Language of Art”, and the presenters are Jamie Markle, the Publisher of The Artists Magazine and the other F&W publications, (Jamie is also a working artist), and Maureen Bloomfield, Editor of The Artists Magazine. Here is a description of this seminar: "Like any other discipline, art has its own language. In order to speak intelligently about art and in order to evaluate your own and other artists’ works, you need to know specific terms and their applications. This seminar will reveal the mysteries of how artists, instructors, and critics discuss art."

Tentatively scheduled for Oct 20 is “Gallery Success: A Guide to Finding the Right Gallery and Developing a Strong Relationship.” Being represented by a gallery has many benefits, but the artist/gallery relationship can be tricky if not handled with care. In this online seminar, discussion will center on what you should expect from galleries, what they will expect from you, and some pitfalls to be aware of.

This will be followed (again this is tentative) on November 3 by “Entering Art Competitions” and on November 17 by “It's a Snap: Taking Digital Photos of Your Work.”

Here is a link to the page which gives the definitive schedule and where you can register. If you want to sign up, please email us at ask@artspan.com and we will send you your personal code, good for one online seminar. There is a limited supply of these coupons and you must be an Artspan member. Our sincere thanks to F&W Media for providing this opportunity.

Many members want to organize their work into separate categories or galleries (for example, you could have Landscapes and People, if those are subjects you paint or photograph, or you may want to group your work by medium or by other criteria). You can also place the same image in more than one gallery (for example, you can have an image in a regular gallery and also in a gallery which has been activated for a slideshow). There is no limit on the number of galleries you can create.

To create a gallery, first click on the Artwork button in your Control Panel, then click on the My Galleries button in the upper right. Then, in the page that opens:

1. Click on Add Gallery.
2. Name the gallery (ie “landscapes”).
3. Choose the Gallery display order in which you want the galleries to appear on the main gallery page.
4. Click Save.
5. Click on the Edit Images link below the square (which says “No images added”) to the left of the new Gallery Name.
6. At the bottom of the new gallery page that opens, you will see, under Art Library, all the images that you have uploaded and that are not part of the gallery that you are editing. Add any of these to this new gallery by clicking on the Add to Gallery checkbox and then clicking Save.
7. Preview the site by clicking on view my website.

To add the same image to another gallery, go back to the My Galleries page and click Edit Images for another gallery, then follow step 5 above

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