New Capabilities through Expanded Web Presence

Hello all,

 

The past several weeks have been spent updating our web presence in an effort to better connect with our friends and customers. As a web-based business, our on-line gallery at www.cityescapesphotography.com has always been our primary web site - however there are several additional capabilities that we have wanted to provide that required branching out from this site.

 

Of course, we started branching out about a year ago when I established this blog as a way to share information about the business. However, we also want: a way to provide general announcements directly to people who might not be interested in following a blog that is this general; a place to share snapshots with friends;  a way to foster discussions with our friends; and a way to obtain impartial feedback from our customers.

 

To that end, in addition to this blog, we have created a newsletter using Google groups, and established a company presence on Flickr, FaceBook and BrownBook. Over the next couple of blog entries, I will outline how each of these new activities provides a complementary experience for our friends, and contributes to our overall company strategy for customer engagement. While this information is similar to advice found in several books and articles, it is a condensed description of how those general strategies have actually been implemented in our case. Hopefully, you will find it useful.

 

Terence

City Escapes Nature Photography

 

Newsletter: Subscriptions and Archives

Hello all,

We are starting a newsletter where we will be posting regular updates about activities and special events here at City Escapes. We expect the newsletter to come out approximately monthly. If you are interested in subscribing to this newsletter, you can sign up at:

http://cityescapesphotography.com/newsletter-popup.html

We value your time and hope to make these newsletters both enjoyable to read and informative. Of course, we also value your privacy and loyalty; thus we have secured our subscriber list to ensure it will not be misused. While anyone may join our list, we have restricted access so that only City Escapes employees are authorized to access or send email message to this list. Rest assured that our subscriber list will always remain in-house; we will never sell it to any outside entity.

Archives of the newsletter are available at:

http://groups.google.com/group/city-escapes-newsletter

Sincerely,

Terence
City Escapes Nature Photography

How Our Limited Editions Work

Hello again,

As I highlighted in my previous post, we are pleased to now offering limited edition prints. There are, however, several methods to designate a limited edition run, and I want to outline our specific approach.

For each photograph in our gallery, we have identified both the number of total prints that we want to release and the dimensions in which we offer that photograph. We have then allocated a fixed quantity of prints to each size. Note that we do not further distribute an allocation based on type of print (traditional or canvas) or whether the print was framed. As all of the prints in a given dimension are purchased, we will remove the option to purchase that size print.

We have chosen this method in order that our clients know exactly what we mean when we say “Limited Edition”. If we have an edition of 1000, that means that only 1000 prints of that image will be made across all sizes and media. We have come across numerous other photographers and artists who will designate a “limited edition” run of (for example) 1000 prints, but who do not tell their customers that what they actually mean is 100 prints in a specific size, medium, or both. Once that release is sold out, the photographer simply re-issues the image at a different size or medium (sometimes with only minor differences from the previous release) as a new “limited edition” release. We find this approach to be quite misleading, and frankly, a bit insulting to those clients who purchase a print only to discover later that it is not nearly as limited as they were lead to believe.

We allocate the print numbers sequentially across all sizes, as each order is processed. Thus the first person to order a print, regardless of size or print type, gets print number 1, the second gets print 2, etc. The print number will be specified on the front of the print, along with Jodi’s signature. We will also provide a Certificate of Authenticity which contains this information. We do not currently support requests for specific print numbers on orders (e.g. multiples of 100, lucky numbers, etc.).

Finally, while our Gallery Prints are limited edition, we reserve the right to use the same images on non-Print products, such as on greeting cards or in books, which are not limited edition. This is a common exclusion which maintains the value of the prints while allowing others to enjoy the images in a different format.

Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions about our prints in general or this policy in particular.

Terence

City Escapes Nature Photography

Now Providing Limited Editions

Hi all,

I am extremely pleased to announce that, beginning with our Africa release, our Gallery Prints will be offered exclusively as limited editions – at no additional cost.

Over the past two years, we have contemplated how to improve the value of the products that we offer. We have worked hard to ensure that our printing and framing were of the highest possible quality while remaining affordable – our working definition of value. In fact, since we began operations in 2007, we have reduced our costs and passed the savings along in the form of lower prices.

Since our founding, we have often considered whether to limit the number of prints issued for each photograph. We have weighed various arguments, including the additional value to those who purchase a print early against the increased cost and potential disappointment to those who find a print they want only after the edition has sold out. While we are uncomfortable with the idea of having someone who adores one of our prints having to purchase it at an inflated price on a secondary market, or not being able to purchase it at all, we have decided that our primary loyalty must be to our initial customers – who are ultimately responsible for the success of our business – and that the additional value they receive by obtaining a limited edition print is worth the potential discomfort down the road.

Of course, a skeptic might postulate that we have only made this change in order to charge more for our prints. However, we are not making any pricing changes based on this conversion, nor will we in the future. Furthermore, we are making this change retroactive: we are in the process of contacting all of our customers who have already purchased prints from us, and providing them with certificates designating their print as a limited edition. We believe that it is only appropriate that those who have supported us as our business has grown benefit from the increased value a limited edition print has.

Terence

City Escapes Nature Photography

Upcoming Changes

Hello,

I wanted to update you on several changes that we are making to our product lines, timed to coincide with our upcoming major release.

We have spent the past couple of months evaluating the products available from several printing companies and as a result, we have been able to significantly expand our print options. In particular, we have selected several prints that we believe have the potential to act as anchor pieces for larger spaces, and we are now able to offer these prints in larger sizes than we have in the past. Expanding into these more substantial print dimensions required us to answer several important questions.

The first determination that needed to be made was what was involved in shipping such large prints. We were surprised by the limit imposed on box sizes by our shipping carrier, UPS. We were originally looking at offering extremely large sizes, up to 3.5ft by 5ft, but found that UPS would require these prints, when framed, to be shipped freight. This would add several hundreds of dollars to the cost of the print - an unacceptable burden on our customers. Because of this, until such time as we can identify a more reasonable shipping alternative or grow large enough to obtain significant discounts from UPS, we have decided to limit the size of the prints to those we can ship with standard ground.

Even within the set of acceptable sizes, increasing the print dimensions required custom ordering each frame for each print, as few frame suppliers provide premade frames in these larger dimensions. After extensive research, we have identified custom frame makers which meet our quality standards and are able to provide excellent frames in the required sizes.

The final challenge was to identify an alternative to glass for the largest of our prints. While reflection control and museum glass are used in our smaller pictures, the weight of glass makes it a prohibitive option for our largest prints. We investigated using acrylic for these prints, which is a common solution in the art world. While acrylic is lighter and is available with a similar range of reflective properties as glass, it scratches much more easily and can therefore be harder to maintain long-term. It is also still heavy enough to adversely impact both our customer’s shipping costs and their display options. As a result, we have decided to use an alternative for our largest prints: canvas. Most of our print sizes will be available in our traditional giclee prints with either our standard conservation or the optional museum glass as they have always been. However, our larger prints will be available on canvas. Canvas provides an excellent medium for large prints because it adds additional texture and depth to the print while not requiring glass or acrylic protection. In many cases, canvas will be an option in addition to our regular prints, allowing you to choose the medium that you prefer, but our largest prints will be offered exclusively in canvas.

We are excited about these new options and hope you are as well.

Terence

City Escapes Nature Photography

To Nikon or not to Nikon

Hello,

One of the most important decisions a photographer can make is what equipment to purchase. Once a decision has been made and a brand decided upon, it can be extremely hard (or at least prohibitively expensive) to change brands because camera lenses are frequently tied to a specific manufacturer. A professional will often have $10k - $25k in lenses that would need to be replaced, in addition to the body.

We selected Nikon equipment due to what has historically been a very good reputation. Unfortunately, we have had extremely mixed results and cannot offer a whole-hearted endorsement of their products. While their products seem to work fairly well in general, we have had a couple of instances where, we believe, Nikon is not living up to their reputation.

In the first case, we had purchased a D200 camera body. This camera was supposed to have a hardened body that would allow it to take more abuse than the next lower model, and it was priced appropriately higher (a couple of hundred dollars more). Our understanding was that this camera should take a reasonable amount of abuse without failing, as one would expect of any professional camera. Unfortunately, this does not appear to be the case. We took the camera on a kayaking trip where it got a little wet – no, it was not dunked, but rather splashed, and only slightly at that. It hasn’t worked since and the estimate to repair it was essentially the same as the cost of a new, and improved, camera. This is far from the robust behavior we expected of a hardened, professional camera body, and was extremely disappointing. (The lens continued to work fine.)

We have also had several problems with Nikon’s Nikkor lenses. In at least two cases, our lenses have lost their zoom and significant focusing capabilities (even manual focusing), presumably because a center ring has loosened or gotten dirty. It is also worth noting that with at least one of these lenses, no precipitating factors caused any damage. One frame the lens worked fine; the next, it did not, and it hasn’t since. The initial estimate to repair the larger of the lenses was about $450, while the smaller was just over $200. That is a lot of cash for lenses that have only been used for a year or two, and may be indicative of a quality issue.

In addition to the unreliable quality of the products, we have had significant problems with access to parts. Nikon appears to have a poor reputation among certain retailers for providing parts (including complete lenses) in a timely manner. This can lead to shortages and the inability to purchase or repair equipment on a reasonable, much less short, timeline. Furthermore, Nikon does not appear to provide accurate information about when they will deliver – meaning the retailers and repair shops cannot provide reasonable time estimates for delivery either. We have had multi-week to multi-month delays in both lenses and repairs due to supply problems. So far, this has generated only a couple of critical problems for us, but it has come close several other times and is always extremely frustrating. Since the same retailers are able to provide new Nikon cameras and standard, but cheaper, Nikkor lenses, this would appear to be a business decision on Nikon’s part about what products to produce and distribute.

At this point, we are continuing to work with Nikon equipment (now using a D300). However, we wanted to voice our concerns about the quality of both the service and merchandise being provided. It certainly does not appear to be providing the high quality products and service that its reputation (and pricing) would suggest it should.

Note: Though we cannot confirm this through personal experience, we have heard similar complaints from our vendors and repair shop about Cannon’s timeliness and service. We therefore suggest that, when choosing a manufacturer, you speak to a knowledgeable retailer about such issues as repair times, availability of parts, and common problems encountered in addition to the specs and capabilities of the specific piece of equipment you are considering.

Terence
City Escapes Nature Photography

Photo “Badge” for Web Site

Good evening,

For those of you who have visited our web site (www.cityescapesphotography.com ), you are sure to notice the badge at the top of our home page (the banner where pictures are dynamically filled in). This badge is similar to the common Flickr badges that have started to appear around the web. However, it is not directly associated with Flickr. This piece of Javascript was written by Joe Tan and is available open source at http://tantannoodles.com/toolkit/flickr-dhtml-badge/ (Our thanks to Mr. Tan!)

This script has a couple of important advantages over the classic Flickr badges. First, and most importantly, it can use images from anywhere on the web. You tell the Javascript which images to use and it displays them in random order. This was extremely important to us because it meant that we did not need to have a Flickr site in addition to our primary web site just to host images for the badge. This allows people who click on the image to go directly to our detail page which provides more information about the image and allows orders to be placed. This also minimized synchronization issues by ensuring the badge and the underlying pages point to the same images.

The second advantage this script has is its flexibility. You can specify exactly how large to make the banner, the size of the individual images, how many images appear, what the shape of the badge is, how often new images appear, and how often the entire badge is cycled through before going dormant. This level of flexibility was much greater than provided by the official Flickr badges that I had looked at when deciding what type of badge to use.

I have had no problems incorporating the badge into our site, and have tested it on both Firefox and IE without any problems (although I will note that IE requires Javascript to be placed outside of tables). I would highly recommend this badge for anyone looking to add a little interaction to their web pages without any serious coding.

Terence

www.cityescapesphotography.com