As I think I've mentioned before, I have
opened a second shop on etsy to sell my photos and related products. If you're not reading this through a feed reader, you can check out some of my new items over there <-- on the sidebar of the blog.
Getting this sucker ready to go has taken way more time and effort than I expected. After all, I already took the pictures - how hard could it be to get them listed? I didn't want to bother just listing one or two photos - nothing looks sadder than a store that's practically empty - so I wanted to be ready to populate it quickly when I was ready to go. That means that for the past few months, I've been going back through every digital photo I can locate, copying the ones I thought might be worthy of selling, and then winnowing the selection down to something reasonable.
I've been researching other etsy sellers to determine pricing, and shipping costs, and what sizes and products I might want to carry. I've been playing around with some different ways to present the photos, things that might set me apart from the 14 million other people shilling photos on etsy.
I've been editing the photos, cropping and color correcting and adding watermarks to keep the deadbeats from stealing my stuff.
And I've been procrastinating. The period of uncertainty at the beginning of any project is the worst for me ... I hate not knowing what I'm doing, I hate having to make decision after decision relating to things I know little about. If I could wave a magic wand and it could be DONE, that would be so much less stress-inducing. But that, of course, isn't possible, so instead I've just been ignoring it. I've been getting lots of knitting done, and cooking, and the house has been pretty clean for the past couple of months.
Until last week, when I realized that the two hours each week that I'm stuck sitting at the nature center while my daughter takes a science class is the perfect time for me and my laptop to have some quality time together. Two hours each week when I can focus, without any phones ringing or kids calling or wash that needs to be done.
I've been getting lots done, but my god, is it tedious.
open picture
edit to 5x7
correct color
save file
add watermark
shrink file
resave file
open etsy listing
copy and paste most of the description
manually select pretty much all the same options for the rest of the listing where I can't cut and paste
import pictures
save listing
repeat.
I just took a bathroom break to relieve the monotony - that's how boring it is.
But at the same time, it's really cool to go back through the files, picking the best of the best, seeing all the places we've been and things we've seen. Even if I never sell a single print, I've got some damn fine photos, and that makes me proud.
There are times when you have to knit a plain scarf for someone with a conservative sense of style. But "plain" does not have to equal "boring!" Pick the right yarn, like the subtly-fuzzy Aran weight Concept by Katia Cotton-Merino (which comes in several neutral colors and a few with subtle stripes) and you'll be done in no time and enjoy the process, too! Look how happy I am to be working on it ... and how cute those stripes look when they're knit up!
Directions:
