Tips for Selling Digital Products

Sellfy is one of the companies I work with for distributing videos and other digital content. Basically what they do is host the files and handle the payment processing and customer service.

They did an interview with me, and here's one of their questions:

Sellfy: You make a portion of your income from your painting tutorials. What are your tips for selling digital products?

Gurney: I think it’s important to think all the time about what makes a better product that really helps other artists on their journey. When my wife Jeanette (also an artist) and I watch other videos, we always talk about what we liked about it and how it might have been better.

I really try to listen to what customers want, and I study the metrics. With all that said, I go out there to have fun and try new challenges, and it’s OK with me if some of my videos have a smaller audience.

That’s one thing I like about the digital arts economy is that you can niche market to specific groups, and they can get information that used to be unavailable a generation ago.

You can read the rest of the interview here.
You can check out all the stuff on my Sellfy page here.

Illustration Research Center Proposed for Stockbridge

In what may turn out to be a Valentine's gift to illustration scholarship, The Norman Rockwell Museum is considering turning the former Old Town Hall of Stockbridge, Massachusetts into a study center for illustration.

The Town Hall building is currently not in use but it would need a major overhaul indoors to incorporate the Museum's archives, study gallery, library, reading room, and prep space for traveling exhibitions.

Exhibits and public events would remain at the current museum location. The plan would require raising a lot of funds and still awaits approvals.

Read more in the Berkshire Eagle: Rockwell Museum aims to turn Stockbridge's Old Town Hall into National Center for Illustration Research and Education

Book on Coby Whitmore is in the works

Publisher Daniel Zimmer is taking preorders for a monograph on 1950s illustrator Coby Whitmore coming out this June. Coby is one of my all-time favorites, right up there with Al Parker, Jon Whitcomb, and Harry Anderson.

With this series of books, Zimmer has almost singlehandedly achieved something that mainstream art publishers have failed to accomplish: to document the legacy of the great 20th century illustrators in elegantly-produced monographs. The contribution he is making is so important for future generations who would otherwise never be able to see the work of these masters of illustration.

Preorder Coby Whitmore: Artist and Illustrator 

Painting an Abandoned Factory

Across the tracks from the supermarket is an abandoned factory where people once built mainframe computers. 

Here's a video (Link to Video on YouTube). After IBM pulled up stakes, the new owners renamed the seven-acre complex 'TechCity,' but it has sat mostly empty as the freight trains roll by.



As Jeanette did the food shopping, I set up my easel at the edge of the parking lot. I painted a view of the low building beyond the piles of dirty snow.

On Facebook, Joe Ongie asks: How did you choose your limited palette of colors?

Joe, For an overcast snow scene, I usually choose one blue to suit the subject (such as ultra, Prussian, or cobalt), plus a weak red (like burnt sienna) and a weak yellow (like yellow ochre). In this case I needed full-chroma red and yellow as well for the color accents. Since the subject was well within the gamut of possible mixtures, adding more colors to the palette would have just slowed me down, complicated the choices, and added to the cleanup, and they would have made a harmonious scheme less likely.

On YouTube, ThaBest007 asks: What makes you pick these scenes? Is it the history behind the place or the interesting contrasting colors? You somehow seem to be able to make even the most mundane looking scenes into beautiful and interesting paintings.
Haha! I pick something I can paint within 100 yards of the supermarket parking lot while my wife does the shopping (I distract her if I tag along). So I set up pretty much set up anywhere at random where I won't get run over or kicked out.

Keith E asks: I feel like one of the problems I'll run into though is dealing with hecklers...Do you ever find yourself dealing with issues like this, or do you have any specific strategies to avoid those situations? Like maybe going at specific time of day or on days when you know there'll be less of a chance of things like that happening?

That's funny, I did get heckled on this one but it was from my dear friend and fellow artist Gilles who recognized me at random. He said I was cheating when I brought out the camera. And I said No, I'm feeding the YouTube Monster. But seriously, you get heckled or approached a lot less by strangers when you're painting in one of these out of the way places that artists never go. No one is expecting to see someone painting, so 99% of the time strangers are very kind and supportive.

On Twitter, Maple E says: How come you never wear gloves when you paint? Are you just used to the cold or do you not like how it feels when painting?

It just didn't feel that cold. I think it was in the high 30s, and it didn't bother me—maybe I'm adjusted to winter. If the cold did bother me, I would have used gloves and those hunter hand-warmer packets, which I carry with me.

Turner asks on Twitter: Have you ever considered doing some plein-air livestreams?
Yes, I've done a few live streams on @concertwindow and Facebook Live. It was fun but a bit nerve wracking. I like to do it with Jeanette fielding the questions, but even then at least 75% of my attention goes to the questions, which makes the painting suffer. Painting for the video capture gives me more room to move. 

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Previous paintings that I've done near the supermarket.
VW Dealership
Loading Dock
Produce Case
Sunset at the Supermarket
Strange Light at the Tire Place
Traffic Lights
Parking Lot Before the Storm

E. T. Compton's Mountainscapes

E.T. Compton, Piz Morteratsch,
view from Fuorcla Boval on the northern flank

Edward Theodore Compton (1849-1921) was an English-born German artist who specialized in alpine landscapes. Better known as E.T. Compton, he briefly attended the Royal Academy, but he was mainly self taught.



Note the flowing water ice in the foreground of the painting above.

E.T. Compton, The Weisshorn seen from the Furgg Glacier above Zermatt

He was inspired to become mountain painter when, at age 19, he traveled with his family to the Bernese Oberland, where he was impressed with views of the the Eiger, Mönch, and Jungfrau peaks.

He was a skilled mountaineer who made over 300 major ascents, with 27 first climbs. 

E.T. Compton, Study of the Gorner Glacier, Zermatt, watercolor

He often brought his watercolors with him to document what he saw.

Note how muted the colors are in this painting—just subtle warm and cool grays—and how he adds mystery by veiling part of the view in a fragment of clouds.

His son Edward Harrison Compton, shown here, was also a mountain painter. 

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Read More

Wikipedia: Edward Theodore Compton

Vintage News: E.T. Compton – The mountain painter who made at least 27 first ascents

Six paintings at John Mitchell Paintings

E.T. Compton on Athenaeum.org

Books (both in German): E.T. Compton and Compton. Edward Theodore und Edward Harrison

The Garden Party Film

The Garden Party is an animated film where a frog and a toad explore an abandoned mansion. (Link to trailer on YouTube)

It was produced by a team of six 3D artists as a graduation project for school. By doing careful planning and research, they achieved a remarkable level of realism, both in the rendering and the movement. (Link to YouTube)

Video on Jeremy Mann now on YouTube

The film about painter Jeremy Mann by Loïc Zimmermann, called "A Solitary Mann" is now available for free on YouTube.

 (Link to YouTube) 

It's a moody dive into the angry love he feels for the art and act of painting. 

Concept Art for the Early Mardi-Gras

Assuri” costume design by Carlotta Bonnecaze for the
“Myths and Worships of the Chinese” theme, Krewe of Proteus, 1885:
Carnival Collection, Louisiana Research Collection, Tulane University — Source

In the 19th century, concept art for the Mardi Gras celebration of New Orleans drew inspiration from an eclectic variety of religions and design traditions—everything from Chinese mythology, to South Asian deities, to dragons from European folktales.

Bat costume designed by Charles Briton for the “Missing Links”
theme, Mistick Krewe of Comus, 1873: Carnival Collection,
Louisiana Research Collection, Tulane University — Source

The theme of the 1873 parade was “Missing Links to Darwin’s Origin of Species,” with a gentle satire of the ideas that were circulating at the time.

Scorpion costume designed by Charles Briton for the “Missing Links”
theme, Mistick Krewe of Comus, 1873: Carnival Collection, Louisiana
Research Collection, Tulane University — Source

The teams of designers competed with each other to come up with the most creative and outlandish  creatures.

“Such Stuff as Dreams are Made of” float design by Jennie Wilde for the
“Familiar Quotations” theme, Mistick Krewe of Comus, 1911:
Carnival Collection, Louisiana Research Collection, Tulane University — Source 

There were also extravagant floats in the early Mardi Gras, and many of them were designed by women, such as Jennie Wilde, who drew inspiration from Art Nouveau and the Symbolists.

From the Louisiana Digital Library

A float from the Louisiana Mardi Gras parade conjures crashing waves, seabirds, and seahorses.
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From the Public Domain Review
The blog Lines and Colors featured the dragon paintings of carnival artist Bror Anders Wikstrom
Through April 1, the New Orleans Museum of Art is featuring an exhibition of Wikstrom's carnival art.
Books:
Mardi Gras Treasures: Costume Designs of the Golden Age Notecards
All on a Mardi Gras Day: Episodes in the History of New Orleans Carnival

Color and Light Deal

If you were thinking of getting Color and Light, I happened to notice that it’s at a really good price on Amazon right now. The price fluctuates on Amazon by some mysterious algorithm.
Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter (James Gurney Art)

How Old Folks Talked in 1929

Old people were lively and well spoken a century ago. (Link to YouTube)

Some of the people in these video clips were born earlier than 1840, with one man vividly recalling an event he witnessed in the Civil War.

Previously:
Happy Old-Time Photos