YOUR PET PORTRAIT PORTFOLIO

Brussels Griffon. Colored Pencil - 5 x 7 inches

           © 2014. Anne Hier. All Rights Reserved.

Potential customers make a decision to order from you based upon your portfolio, confidence in your ability to perform professionally, and your prices. Arguably, the most most important business consideration for business success is great and reliable customer service. However, new clients will make their initial decision based on your actual work – your portfolio. Even though the artist's work product is of paramount importance, too many artists do not know how to put together a working portfolio that helps them sell their services. Let's discuss some of the common presentation problems:

Inconsistent quality. This is the most common portfolio problem and is a fatal flaw. Your work will be judged by your worst piece. Just because you spent 10 hours on a drawing doesn't mean it is any good. Every artist has produced mediocre work. As a result, some artwork is destined to be a learning experience only and should never leave your studio except via the circular file. Whatever your style, whatever your current skill level, anyone looking at a fair selection of your artwork – including those who know nothing about art - should recognize it was all created by the same hand. If you plan to have a successful pet portrait business, consistency is essential. More is not better if there is a noticeable range in the quality of the examples shown.


No recent work. Life happens. Plenty of people with art degrees get out of school and other demands take precedence over creating artwork. People have kids, get steady jobs, join the military, and so on. Whatever the reasons for giving creative activities a backseat, you artwork from ten or twenty years ago is not acceptable as a sample of what you can do today. The client wishing to have a pet portrait today is probably not interested in a retrospective of your artistic progress through the years. If you now have the time to pursue your dream of being a pet portrait artist, that's great news. But slow down. It takes time to get the rust out of your drawings skills if you haven't picked up a pencil or paint brush in years. Don't rush to the marketplace until you have at least a dozen quality examples of the type of work you can consistently produce today.


Not related to your pet portrait business. Even though your acrylic seascape painting won first prize at the state fair, it has absolutely no relevance to your pastel cat portraits (although you can legitimately add “award-winning artist” to your bio information). Consider your potential customers. They are already pre-qualified. They have decided to commission a pet portrait and you are in the running for the work. Your job is to close the sale and secure their business, not confuse them with subject material or media unrelated to your portraits. The average person already thinks artists are eccentric and unreliable. You must convince them otherwise. Show them samples of what they are looking for – pet portraits - not your nude figure studies from a first year drawing class in college, ink drawings of sports cars, or your six by eight foot abstract landscapes.


Too many pieces. Plenty of blogs and web sites advise the aspiring portrait artist to have as many examples as possible. This can sometimes be a mistake. Looking at your artwork should not be an endurance test for the viewer. Additionally, as just discussed, all your portfolio work should be of relatively the same quality. It is not necessary to publish every portrait you ever created.

So how many is too many? That depends. Where and how are you going to display your art? Are you showing your work in your studio? As an art fair vendor? On the web? Your portfolio needs to be specifically tailored for each venue. If you specialize in dogs there are over 400 individual breeds worldwide, as well as plenty of mixed breeds. If you have been at it a while and want to showcase the different breeds you can have a separate breed listing on your website. But, if you are showing a portfolio in person, no more than a dozen top-quality pieces should be shown. You want to leave them longing, not loathing. If you are exhibiting at an art fair, the actual work you have on display - and generally for sale, must be significantly more, and in different sizes and price points with pieces properly matted, framed, or wrapped. Indeed, at an art fair, you might also be working on a piece so the public can see a work in progress.

Finally, a picture is still worth a thousand words. If you are going to publish images of your work on the web do it correctly. Show photos that are in focus with no confusing backgrounds, well-lit, and with the picture plane in alignment with the camera. You do not have to be a professional photographer to take reasonable quality pictures with a digital camera.  All such cameras come with an owner's manual and contain helpful information to help you take quality images. A flatbed scanner is even better for smaller works. The price of this technology has come down so drastically in the past few years that you really can't afford to be without one. I have a professional high-end scanner that does resolution up to 1600 dpi. However, for everyday use on smaller images that need no more than 300 dpi, I use one that is a combination printer/copier/scanner. This was purchased new for only thirty-nine dollars, on sale. Never self-sabotage. Only present work that is your best and looks its best.

RUSH ORDERS – PART I

"In a Rush"
PBGV
Pen & Ink with Watercolor
Copyright 2013.  Anne M. Hier. All Rights Reserved.

Now that all the holiday commissions are completed you might want to rethink your policy (if you have one) on “rush orders.” There are two types of rush orders – those created by the artist and those imposed by the client. Let's discuss artist created rush orders first.

Artist created rush orders produce a lot of stress and are totally unnecessary. There are several common scenarios. For example, you receive an order and start the piece. Soon, another commission comes over the transom and you begin work on the new order. And another. Now you have several started works, nothing finished, and deadlines looming. So, you put the clients off and burn the midnight oil to either complete the work right at deadline, or worse, deliver the project late. Because you haven't allowed enough time, either you, the client, or both, are not completely satisfied with the finished piece. This is not good for your business.

On the other hand, you might be an artist blessed with more work than you can handle in the allotted time. Everyone wants a portrait for a Christmas gift, the orders are flooding in, and you must work around the clock. By the time Christmas arrives the orders are successfully out the door, but you are too exhausted to enjoy the holiday. Who needs that kind of stress?

However, the vast majority of artist induced rush orders are caused by procrastination. If you are a chronic procrastinator I'm not interested in why you torture yourself in this manner. You'll have to ask yourself the tough questions on that - which usually boil down to either a fear of failure or a self-sabotaging fear of success. You need to make the decision to change, and procrastination is a very tough habit (or lifestyle) to conquer. Nevertheless, I can offer several suggestions to help eliminate the stress of rush orders of your own doing.

1. KEEP REGULAR WORK HOURS. Too many artists spend more time taking their creative temperature than actually doing the work at hand. You can't wait for the muse to light if you told the client the commission will be done in two weeks. Whether or not you work at your art full time, part time, or as a hobby, set regular work hours for yourself and make the commitment to keep them. 
   
   
2. WORK A 50-MINUTE HOUR. If you go into hyperfocus and don't get out of your chair for five hours while you are working on a project you will be exhausted. This is negative feedback, making it mentally difficult to get back into the work. Buy a kitchen timer and set it for 50 minutes. When the bell goes off, get up from your easel and walk around, make a phone call or a cup of tea. Take a ten minute break and go back to work refreshed. Again, set your timer for 50 minutes. The added benefit is that you will become keenly aware of how much work you can accomplish in an hour's time.
   
   
3. LEARN TO SAY “NO.” If you have so much work coming in that you are pressed to complete it you have several options. When client demand exceeds the supply of your time to create the artwork you should raise your prices. Alternatively, and most importantly, you must be up front with your clients and let them know your order book for the month is full. Explain you cannot rush the order and produce quality work. If the portrait is for a gift, suggest a gift certificate. Let the client know when your calendar is available and take a small deposit to hold the date. Do not allow yourself to be pressured to cave in to impossible demands on your time and the quality of your artwork. 
   
   
4. REFER THE WORK TO ANOTHER ARTIST. Artists are surprisingly possessive of their clients to the point of disappointing a client or potential client by turning down work and offering no alternatives. With the internet and social media it is very easy to locate other artists whose work and price range are comparable to your own. If the client MUST have a portrait for a special gift by a specific deadline and you have no time to complete the job, refer the customer to another artist (presumably, an artist whom you know provides great customer service and delivers work on time). If you do so you can make two friends for life, even if the other artist never refers a future client to you. There is no sense being a dog in the manger if completing the client request is impossible for you. The great motivational speaker Zig Ziglar always said, “You get what you want by helping other people get what they want.” There are plenty of pets out there and you can't possibly paint them all. Share the wealth.
   
   
5. CREATE A WORK ORDER LIST. Create a form on your computer with the following categories: Date (order received); Deadline; Client Name; Description (size,medium, other elements); Date Started; Date Completed; Date Shipped. If you are a procrastinator it is extremely important to write this information down. Make several copies of your order list and prominently post the list over your computer, in your studio, or even on your refrigerator or bathroom mirror, if you are really a difficult case. You want to keep these deadlines before you and complete the work – preferably before the deadline, not at the last minute.
   
   
6. KEEP IN CONTACT WITH YOUR CLIENTS. With email, websites, free blogs, and Facebook it is easy to keep in contact with your clients while you are executing the commission. Many artists post work in progress (WIP) so that the customer can see the portrait as it develops. This is a great help to the artist to keep to deadline. It also reassures the client that the work will actually be completed. The principal drawback of showing WIP is that the beginning stages of an artwork may confuse the client who cannot visualize the finished piece. This is a minor consideration, however. Whether or not you show WIP is your choice. Nevertheless, if you absolutely cannot meet a deadline, for whatever reason, let the client know in advance. NEVER miss a deadline if the client has a drop-dead date unless you have dropped dead yourself. Good customer relations should suggest you find a way to compensate your customer for the inconvenience of late delivery, generally in the form of a discount.
   
   
7. UNDER PROMISE, OVER DELIVER. Exactly how long does it take you to complete a painting or drawing of any given size? 3 hours? 3 days? 3 weeks? One of the traits of procrastinators is the inability to accurately estimate how long it will take to complete a project. Invariably, procrastinators significantly underestimate the time needed. If you promise a painting will be done in two weeks but it really takes you four, you will quickly develop a credibility problem with your clients. Barring unforeseen problems, you should have a very accurate completion time frame for each size and each medium you produce. Artists get in trouble when they know a certain piece takes two weeks to complete and they tell the client the work will be done in two weeks. This leaves no breathing room for contingencies. Literally, don't paint yourself into a corner. Always add more time to the quote. For example, if you can complete an 18 x24 pastel portrait of two pets in three days, tell the client the work will be done in two weeks. The work will be delivered either early or on time, the client will be thrilled and you can remind yourself how lucky you are to be paid for doing something you love to do.

In Part II we'll discuss client requests for rush orders.

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THE BUSINESS CARD

      Despite instantaneous electronic communication with world-wide reach, the printed business card is alive and well. In fact, the lowly business card is still the number one method of getting the news out that you are serious about the artwork you create.

      Sooner or later, some stranger will ask what you do for a living. Don't be surprised if this person expresses real interest when you say you are a pet portrait artist and that they would like to see some of your work. At this point, you may be asked for a business card. Don't be reduced to reciting your website url or writing your name and address on a napkin because you either have never ordered any business cards or don't have any with you. What stranger would want to do business with you if you don't act like you are in business? When you lose the opportunity to reach a potential customer you lose more than one because satisfied customers tell their friends.

      From this moment onward, you are NEVER to go out in public without some business cards in your purse or wallet. And you are NEVER to come home without having posted some on a community bulletin board or, preferably, personally putting one in someone else's hands. Think of all the stores in your area that have public bulletin boards. If you do pet portraits you also have the vet's office, the pet food store, the grooming salon, and animal shelters. Additionally, every time you sell your art or pay your bills, include a business card. Those who send out bills include advertising flyers in their envelopes. There is no reason you can't do the same.

n.b. - I do not suggest including your business card with your IRS tax forms:))

      Prior to personal computers and the internet, business cards were relatively expensive for artists just starting out (I paid $90 for 500 when I began working professionally). Additionally, business etiquette rules dictated a horizontal format and engraved printing – black ink only - with dignified fonts on heavy-stock white or ivory paper. Information on the card was reduced to name, address, phone number and a line for your profession – doctor, lawyer, merchant, chief. Any attempt to break the mold with a vertical format, colored paper, illustrations, or “wild” type faces just about insured you would not be taken seriously.

      How lucky we are today. We can design our own cards digitally with no up-front typesetting charges. We can order them online with home delivery in three days. Colored cards are now accepted for most businesses, and it is possible to include small illustrations of your artwork that are of remarkably good print quality. While cards should still be printed on paper with some substance, it is no longer necessary to use the most expensive paper available. Indeed, business cards are now so economical to produce that liberally distributing them no longer produces pangs of budgetary anxiety.

      Pictured is the business card design I used for 2012. Since I wanted to evaluate the vendor quality, my initial order through Vista Print was for only 250, which they doubled with an advertising code and included free shipping – for only ten dollars. At that price, your business cards should be reorded frequently and given away like candy.

If you can only afford one type of traditional print advertising, it must be a business card.

26th INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION ON ANIMALS IN ART CALL FOR ENTRIES

Here is another excellent juried exhibition opportunity sponsored by the Louisiana State University School of Veterinary Medicine. Besides a $1,000 prize for best in show, as well as other prize money offered, the added perk of this show is that one entry will be chosen to appear on the cover of the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association. All media are accepted and must be priced for sale, with an extremely modest 20% commission taken on any sales. All animal subjects are eligible, include fish and insects. Entry fee is $15 for each piece and images are initially submitted digitally for jury.

The show website has posted images of artwork and category winners from past exhibitions. Although each juror is different, it is always valuable to review past winners to get an idea of the level of quality generally seen in each show. More information and the show prospectus are available at www.vetmed.lsu.edu

ENTERING ONLINE ART COMPETITIONS

German Wirehaired Pointer
Copyright 2012. Anne M. Hier
All Rights Reserved

If you want to showcase your artwork, various web and social media sites now give artists plenty of opportunity to do so. In many cases, the networking is great. You can see and compare your work to that of your colleagues and sometimes win prizes for your efforts. But, keep in mind, there are many types of art competitions online. You need to be aware of both the advantages and pitfalls.

One of the reasons for offering a competition is to build traffic to a particular site. Many legitimate art organizations or artist's websites have ongoing competitions for various media and subject matter. They may offer a nominal prize and charge no entry fee. Generally, the only requirement is that you enter your work in a particular digital format. However, the real goal is to have you either register or “like” the particular site. If the site offers you value in terms of networking opportunities with other artists, or the website provides interesting information, then there certainly is no harm in entering. However, even if you win whatever prize is offered, these types of exhibitions are usually not something you would add to your exhibition resume.

Other groups actually offer ongoing online juried art competitions and may or may not charge an entry fee. The advantage of these competitions is that they are juried, at least for the prizes offered. The advantage to the organization is they do not have any expenses to actually mount an art exhibition for the public in a brick-and-mortar building. Correspondingly, you do not have the expense of shipping your work for exhibition. However, you may not necessarily be exposing your artwork to a broader range of the general public that would be interested in either buying your artwork or commissioning a piece from you. And, there is a big caveat for these types of competitions – read the rules before you enter.

I peruse the internet for upcoming art competitions, particularly those that deal with animals as subject matter. At this time, there is one competition that I recommend no one enter, the Pets of the Homeless National Photo Contest, created by an organization called, Pets of the Homeless. This organization raises money to help feed and provide veterinary care for those animals owned by homeless people. There is no entry fee, the organization will post the images on its Facebook page, and it offers a first prize of $500. So, what's the problem? It's all in the fine print.

I have never entered a legitimate art competition in which I was required to relinquish my copyright, arguably, the most important part of a successful work of art. Not so with this competition. In part, the rules state, “[b]y uploading your Submission, in addition to rights granted below, you...hereby waive any so-called moral (e.g., creative rights) in your Submission.”

When the US signed onto the Berne Convention, visual artists gained moral rights protection that was then codified into our copyright laws under the Visual Artists Rights Act (VARA). In our country, these moral rights protect two things, integrity of the piece and attribution. VARA protects 2-dimensional original art but not prints unless they are signed and in editions of 200 or less. However, it is unclear if VARA protects any forms of digital art as protection is given to fixed works or art. You cannot sell or transfer your moral rights but you can waive them at the time of commission or sale. For example, if you are creating a work-for-hire piece you are waiving your rights to be credited as the creator of the artwork. Also, if a work is specifically commissioned moral rights can also be waived. It is a bit of a stretch to think that setting up the parameters for an art competition is a “commission,” but it certainly does not legally qualify as a work-for-hire. So what does this mean to you? Quite simply, it means that this “competition” is a rights grab for the sole benefit of the host organization. Rather than pay the going rate for potential advertising and promotional products, Pets for the Homeless has dressed it up as an “art competition.”

This fact is confirmed by the inclusion of a statement that the artist will be granting a non-exclusive license to the organization: “By uploading a Submission, entrant grants to 'Pets of the Homeless' (and “Pets of the Homeless” licensees and assigns) a royalty-free, irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive license to use, reproduce, modify, publish, create derivative works from, and display such Submissions in whole or in part, and otherwise exploit the Submission in all media now known or hereafter devised, throughout the known universe, in any way 'Pets of the Homeless' sees fit including, but not limited to, entertainment, instruction/education, promotional, advertising and/or marketing purposes.”

Further, “[i]n connection with all rights granted herein, 'Pets of the Homeless' (and 'Pets of the Homeless' licensees and assigns) shall also have the irrevocable right to incorporate Submissions, in whole or in part, into other works, in any form, media or technology now known or hereafter developed.”

I particularly like this sentence in the rules, “[i]f necessary, entrant will sign any necessary documentation that may be required for 'Pets of the Homeless' or its designees to make use of the non-exclusive rights entrant is granting to use the Submission.” This legalese is necessary because of US Supreme Court case law that held electronic rights are separate from traditional print rights and must be negotiated. They are not granted automatically with boilerplate statements in the rules.

A non-exclusive rights contract means that if you produced a successful item of art you could continue to market it in derivative form yourself but you could be competing – into perpetuity - with numerous other entities manipulating, changing, and marketing your work with no input from you. This is a great way to always remain a starving artist as you will receive no remuneration for this use. And with the waiver of your moral rights, your name wouldn't even be on the work you created. This seems an intolerably high price to pay just to enter an online art “competition.”

27TH ANNUAL ART SHOW AT THE DOG SHOW CALL FOR ENTRIES

The prospectus is now available for the 27th Annual Art Show at the Dog Show.  Art shows dedicated to animals are few and far between.  This juried show is one of the best, in my opinion.  I entered and won some prizes at the very first show - way back when -  and have entered several times since.  I also had the privilege of serving as a juror one year.  This show is held in conjunction with the Sunflower Cluster Dog Shows in Wichita, KS.  Before the exhibition at the dog shows the entries are split and exhibited at the Foyer Gallery and City Arts Building in Wichita.

Entries are due by January 9, 2013 and must be submitted digitally on CD.  All works exhibited must be priced and for sale.  Commission taken on all sales is a very reasonable 30% and there are prizes offered first through fourth in all categories as well as numerous other money prizes for representations of different specific breeds.  All entries in this show must depict purebred dogs. This is a juried show. Entry fee is $40 for up to 4 entries.  Images of last year's winners are also posted at the site.

UTILIZING TESTIMONIALS

AFGHAN & CORGI PORTRAITS
Copyright 2012. Anne M. Hier
All Rights Reserved

When potential clients visit your website or blog they are not just looking at your portfolio. They need to know they can depend on you to deliver quality work that accurately portrays their pets. As you build your website or blog, be sure to include a few testimonials from satisfied customers. I never solicit these but certainly love to receive them. You should consider testimonials an important marketing tool. Satisfied customers mean a lot, especially to others who are making the decision to hire you. You may think your clientele is interested in your work - they are. But they also want to know they can trust you. Testimonials help build that trust.

Practically all of your customers are hopefully going to acknowledge that they received the portraits and that they are thrilled with your work. Some will send you follow-up pictures of the work framed and in their home. These types of images can provide a real personal touch to your site.

There are two schools of thought on adding testimonials. The first is to go for quantity – listing numerous short quotes to indicate that the artist has completed a significant amount of work. The second method, which I prefer, is to list longer quotes that are quite descriptive and go beyond “Thank you so much for the beautiful portrait of Shep.” Actually, you can probably incorporate a mixture of both on your site. Periodically update these statements to ensure that the majority of your testimonials are current and not all several years old.

One more thing – unless you specifically ask permission, do not list the client's last name, email address, or other identifying information. I usually list the first name and an initial for the last name. If you have done portrait work for a celebrity you may publicly disclose this part of your client list, “Portrait Commissioned by (celebrity's name)." However, do not publish quotes about your work from the celebrity unless you first ask and get written permission to do so. This is because celebrities have a right of publicity to present themselves to the public in a specific manner that they control.

If you would like to read the testimonial for the commissioned portraits pictured above please go my Anne Hier Studio blog.