Kick start My Art?

I talked with Scott at Vada Color today. As I feared would be the case, the third hand information about pricing was a bit off. He was really helpful and his work is amazing. When he calls himself a color specialist he isn't kidding. And he is picky. PICKY!

That is just the kind of quality you want in your printer. Ultimately he will print whatever we tell him to print. But! But when it is his butt, his camera that takes the digital image AND he has to print that for a client, you better believe that he is going to make damn awful sure he has the color right. When I stopped in today he had a watercolor in the works. After he explained to me the whole process he showed me this water color. The concept was phenomenal, the work delicate and the colors even more so. He showed me the proof, the original and wow....

He was so close that if it had been my work I would have been happy with what came out. He was not. On a Pantone™ chart the color of his print and the original might have been 3 shades of barely perceptible difference (because Pantone™ is like that). He kept saying it wasn't right. And the goal was to keep as much of the original pinky white paper the pinky white that it is without loosing the cool in the celadon and olive colors.

So the start up cost per print is going to be 125.00 + wholesale pricing for each design. For that price he will take the photos in the highest resolution that he can. They won't have the hotspots that mine have. The camera he uses won't cast a shadow like mine does because I'M DOING IT WRONG! And he will be pickier about color matches than I will be. I just want it on the market.

For 60 he won't be so picky. Or he will use my own digital images. I chose from a variety of papers or canvas. And here is where I am most disappointed in my 3rd party information. A 16x20 print which is fairly standard for "larger" sizes will cost me 20.00 per print. So for me to sell it at reasonable mark up for a reasonable profit and charge 45.00 will require me to have a "name". Because I am unknown I will most likely only be able to charge 32.00.

An 8x10 size is infinitely more marketable, most common for the average sizes and will cost 9.00 to produce after the initial digitalization fee. And again, will only be able to charge 20.00 without the branding to justify the 36 others are getting in town for the same  size.

So this leaves me with the perpetual frustration of having done things bass ackwards (ass backwards for you non-English vernacular speakers) and still not selling anything. Or kick starting the art sales department in my life.

Kick start my art? Is that something that you can kick start? Would advance sales get me enough cash to get this done? But who pays for advanced art? People at home parties.... which is something else that I have been thinking about trying to do here in my home town. I don't know exactly how I would accomplish that either.

Ugh!!!!!!!!!!! Ideas? Anyone?