Lots Of Posts, No Discussions! I Am New To This - Be Friendly :)

Still no comments... we seem to be quite a shy bunch? Well I think I will talk to myself! Yesterdays storm was truly spectacular, I tried to capture it with my telephones camera and found that the best way was to burst shot an area and hope for the best. I have no idea of how to take a decent picture of lightning but I am guessing you need proper equipment? I wonder if anyone has any comment on this? Does anyone care? Anyway, I managed to get a couple of shots that were acceptable for instagram.

Welcome Mario, love it when you talk to yourself... ;-) You have great work, I love this one:



There will not be much discussion here on Instaprints, most people do one 'Check out my pics' post and then they are gone... ;-)

If you have good photography equipment (DSLR or a good compact) you may check out Fine Art America (Instaprints belongs to FAA): www.fineartamerica.com

They have a vibrant discussion forum with lots of great artists.

Greetings from Germany

Matthias

Hi Matthias,

Thank you for your reply, I was hoping that there would be a few people on here interested in exchanging view... that is what makes a vibrant community after all :) Thank you for checking out my photographs and I am very glad you like them. Yours are excellent and you obviously have more experience then me.

Fine Art America sounds great, but my DSLR is an old, battered Nikon D40X and I have fallen into the trap of taking most of my images using various Samsung smart phones. Initially, my addiction to photography was caused by Instagram so most of my images are small in resolution and not much good for most photography websites. As I have become more creative, I have been told that I should try to sell some of my photographs. Someone told me of a site named Twenty20.com but it is Apple only, that is how I stumbled upon this site!

Having used it for a while, what have been your experiences with instaprints? My thinking is that I have nothing to lose by trying it out! Do you think it actually works to generate sales? I have tried to upgrade to the premium product but for some reason, the site won't allow me to process my payment and customer care have no answers for me!

Sorry for all the questions, it is really nice to have someone actually spark a discussion that I may have gotten over excited :)

Good evening to you from Cyprus,

Mario

Mario -- if you don't want to go to FineArtAmerica as Matthias suggested, then come back to this discussion board once per day to check in.

To answer your question about selling, we have another thread where we are starting to talk about this, jump in over there and lets talk about it!

http://instaprints.com/showmessages.php?messageid=2273447

Thanks Frank,

I will follow the link.

Just talking to myself here again... I think I will make this a habit, almost like a scrapbook, or IP Diary...

Today I am as excited by the possibilities of this site. I like the way most of the site works, uploading and editing is really user friendly, the way the site looks to visitors is great and the images look very nice. Also in Marioland today, I took a shot of a sunrise today, it was very colourful and fiery looking. I wouldn't really class it as a great shot as there is not much going on apart from the wonderful colours produce by the clouds and sun... but what makes a shot great? Is it public opinion? Is it composition, perspective, or simply how you feel about it?

Hey Mario...

I'd like to turn this monologue into a dialogue lol... I think what makes a great photo is how you feel about it. That's how it is for me anyway. I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder. But its always nice to get affirmed by others who see the beauty in your photos. Especially when they affirm you with purchases ;)

Haha, thanks for the comment Brandon!

I agree with you, a lot of the pictures that I take, tend to be because they feel right to me. Of course we all seek some sort of recognition and appreciation (especially monetary!) but if it doesn't look right to me, I am certain it will look worse to someone else! How long have been on here? How are you finding it?

I have only been on here for about a week. I really like it, but I'm finding out very fast that its going to take a lot of outside marketing to get anyone to buy my stuff. But its inspiring me to start taking photography a little more serious. I sold one picture to my mom. Haha. so maybe she will tell all her friends. How about you? Do you like it?

Yes, I like it a lot but like you say it needs us to market it and get traffic to the site and in particular our pictures. Good idea to sell one to your mum, it is a good way to trial run it and Mum's are usually real good marketers/cheerleaders :) You have some really cool photo's mate, so once you get people looking at it, I am sure plenty of sales will come.

Good to meet you!

You as well, Mario! Thanks :)

You guys are great. .... and you're in the right place to share your love of IG photos. InstaPrints is part of the FineArtAmerica family which is the Amazon or iTunes for the fine art world.

Have you looked at groups? They are like social media internally that you share through your outside marketing channels. This website is just a platform for you to present and sell your photography ... you have to bring people to your art. Just like in any business. I am presently the groups moderator, so when I can assist you with groups let me know. Look at the groups tab on my page an you should find the most active groups ... and adding to it.

Hope this is helpful to you. Enjoy your day.

Frank as always, thank you for the advise and information.

Hope you all have a great weekend!

Hi all, love it that there are some real discussions now in this forum! :-)

Mario, your Nikon D40x should be o.k. for FAA, some of the stuff I sold there was captured with my first DSLR, a Nikon D60.
I have sold only one pic here on Instaprints so far but I focus my efforts on FAA at the moment. But I just love it to make pictures with my iPhone (it's always with me) and the Hipstamatic / Oggl app so why not upload some of them to Instaprints... ;-)

Greetings from Germany

Matthias

Thank you all you guys, it is good to hear all the advice and I love the conversation. Matthias, I will start using the old Nikon more and have a look at FAA... I am really enjoying Instaprints though and the fact that it is so easy to upload pictures that I have already uploaded on Instagram.

Greetings from Cyprus to you all and thanks again for the advice and comments.

Mario

Hi Matthias,

Can I ask why you have only sold one piece here? You have lovely galleries and genuinely beautiful pictures and over 300,000 visits to your page. Do you think it may be the way that this site by potential buyers?

Thanks and best regards,

Mario

Mario -- he has over 300.000 page views because, as he said, he ( and I ) is on both InstaPrints and Pixles.com

InstaPrints it seems is formatted for square images from InstaGram where Pixels.com is for standard photography. You can still do both here, but their is a huge audience over there in comparison.

Hi Frank, am I right in assuming that what you upload on FAA, the image automatically uploads here too? Or is it just the visitors that overlap and are shared? Like I said, I am going to make an effort to take some normal size and shape pictures! So hopefully, I too will get on the FAA site too. Again I thank you and Matthias for the information that you share and all the advice you give.

Kind Regards and wishing you all a great week,

Mario

Hi Mario, when you are on FAA / Pixels you can use your existing login for Instaprints - what I did. Here on Instaprints are only the pictures I uploaded direct or via Instagram, but the views from both sites are added up. On FAA I have a larger portfolio (> 1600 pictures) and I promote it more...

"am I right in assuming that what you upload on FAA, the image automatically uploads here too? Or is it just the visitors that overlap and are shared"

Mario -- The left side panel with your visitor count and bio is shared on Pixels.com, however, your images uploaded here and your activities page are just for InstaPrints.

Once again indebted to both you guys - Matthias and Frank.

Thank you very much for the info and knowledge.