Archive for the ‘Work’ Category

Alexander’s mom told me the other day that as soon as he sees a camera these days, he goes serious. Not at all as smiley as he used to be and maybe it’s the fascination with the camera itself that interrupts the good mood. He does chase the cell phones when he gets a chance :p

However, in this photo he’s competing with the sun :D Granny’s cutie :))

We have a grey and overcast day today, not at all nice. But at least we don’t have to be anywhere today. I’m going off screen in a bit to take care of some things that we brought in from the motor home yesterday. Among other things I’ve got a shower curtain to wash, some dishes to do and other things to tuck away. If I can find any space :p Robin’s got some books and games to take care of.

And I have to take a closer look at the coffee maker too. I paid a small fortune for that thing, so I have no plans on trashing it. Need to find that spring somewhere in the kitchen first :p That should be fun.

A few weeks ago I found a company that is specializing in selling custom made jewelery. They were looking for designers, so I sent them an email with a link to Steampunk Box just for the heck of it. A couple of days later I had a reply where they confirmed my email to them and that they would get in touch when they looked a bit closer on all the applications. And this morning when I sat down I had a note from them in my inbox and they want my designs :D
However, they are located in Sweden and I’m not, so I’m not 100% sure that I can sell through them. I’ve written back asking about that bit so we’ll see what they say. If not, it’s not a huge loss, but if it would work out I would have to start hunting for new/old watch parts again.

And I’m feeling a bit better today, probably thanks to a lot of time off the screen yesterday. Which is why I will continue in that same way today. There’s a lot of waiting time when you work with the web. Clients rarely understand deadlines other when they set them themselves, and requests on quotes can take weeks before it all ends up at a point where a client decide to either go with us or not. That’s why I paint. It’s something I can let go of whenever I need to, unless it’s on commission of course, and at the same time it’s fun. It’s also a learning period that I value a lot :)

But if needed I can put it away and rest instead, and that’s what I’m going to do today. Then I will be back here tonight again :)

I hope your day is a lot warmer with more sun than ours :D
Have a good one :))

A long time ago I was taught that copyright is sacred. It’s the very heart of any artist who works with originals and who sell nothing but one copy of everything he/she creates.
However, sometimes it’s not easy to tell when copyright is kicking in and when it’s valid.

Selling paintings as prints is a new thing to me overall since I’m originally a traditional artist who focused on painting for exhibitions where I’ve sold only one of each painting. Also, the subjects I’ve used have in no way been connected to any other creative form before. In other words, I rarely used photo’s in the past as a reference for a painting.
That changed when I began to paint using Photoshop and went from traditional media to digital.

A perfect example of how copyright can flip you around and hit you really hard if you’re not careful is the case with artist Shepard Fairey and when he admitted that he based his famous poster of Barack Obama on a photo from AP. The original photographer who took the Obama photo that was used and who was assigned by AP at the time of the photo shoot didn’t mind that the photo was used. He was perfectly happy that the photo was used for another creative installment. However, AP’s view on fair use doesn’t always rhyme with the creativity and mutual understanding that artists and photographers sometimes have in common.

So what is fair use? And when does it apply?
Well, first of all the work has to be copyrighted by someone, otherwise there’s no point with fair use.
Also, fair use only applies to works from the US since that’s where the law is valid in the first place. The UK and other countries have similar laws, and at least the law here in the UK is a lot more restrictive and less forgiving than the American fair use law.

Fair use is a doctrine in United States copyright law that allows limited use of copyrighted material without requiring permission from the rights holders, such as for commentary, criticism, news reporting, research, teaching or scholarship.
It’s also a law that can be very flexible since not two cases are the same in the eyes of a court. They are all treated separately and the law applies differently to all of them if they end up in a court room.

Since this law has got nothing to do with fairness in general, and unless I can get those famous faces I’ve painted during the past year or so to actually turn up in person and let me redo the paintings of them…there’s no way I can sell any prints of what I’ve got.
And that is the main reason why you won’t see any paintings of Merlin, Bette Davis, Marilyn Monroe or Doctor Who/David Tennant in my print store in a near future. And if I was to abide by the law completely, I shouldn’t use those reference photo’s for anything really. However, very few artists has got a photographic memory :p
Also, I’ve used all of them for the purpose of practicing, so the purpose was never commercial use from the start.
That said, it doesn’t really matter much in the eyes of the law.

Just thought I’d make this clear before the store is up and running, and before I have questions why I haven’t included them.
It’s simply not worth the risk and the hassle.

I’m not quite sure if the drill on the floor besides Alexander is a real one or just a toy, but I think it’s a toy. It’s way too small for the real thing.

Picture is from the play date they had at a friends house yesterday :)

Today’s been hectic and we came home a while ago after meeting up with a client and show him how to take care of his shiny new store online. Or at least how to add products :p
The maintenance is our bit to do later.
The training itself took about 3 hours, and by the time we came out of his windowless office, it was pitch black outside. We headed straight for town to do some shopping and then back here.

Right now I’m cold and exhausted. The new glasses are working great and I’ve had them on since we picked them up earlier today, and still no headache. Not even that client could give me a headache today :D
Instead I’m having problems with Sciatica, so I guess the headache went south towards my butt instead…haha

But anyway…
It’s already 9 PM and I’ve got a feeling that unless there’s a miracle or something tonight, there won’t be any painting done. That’s more likely to happen tomorrow :) We got a movie to watch as well. “How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days” was in the mail this morning. Might be good or it might be perfect to do some snoring in the meantime :p

Time to move around a bit or I’ll get stuck in this chair :p

Hope your day was/is a good one :D

We were suppose to be at a meeting this morning, but it was postponed by the client. No surprise there, but utterly annoying. So to calm my inner angry self, I thought I’d post another hide and seek photo of my grandson…hehe

He’s got so many faces and I assume that this was taken shortly before the one I posted yesterday.

We still need to go out a bit later, but there’s no rush. I’m sippin’ coffee at the moment. Need to set up a maintenance contract for a client and Robin need to get in touch with the bank again. They are charging us for accounts and overdrafts that in theory should be free, so there’s a lot of phone calls to the guy who’s handling that account right now. At least once a month since they keep trying to put on charges that shouldn’t be there.

I guess that’s how they make a lot of their money….relying on customers who get sick and tired trying to get the fees back. So far they actually refunded the fees within a few hours, so I have no complaints about that.

Anyway…I might be back later this evening with some more progress on the Colin Morgan painting.
Don’t forget to have a great day :D

I’m working today, which is why it’s a bit quiet both here and on Twitter from my end.
And nothing works today…one of those days.

Right now I’m waiting for an installation of an e-commerce to upload to the server, so I thought I would add some photo’s of Alexander that his mom put up on her blog last night (I think it was). It’s a mix of photo’s and he’s a sweetie as usual, no matter if he’s showing his tummy or trying to eat the cat…hehe

I might be back later tonight…unless I managed to break this computer of course. Or the server :p
Until then I hope you will make the best of your day no matter where you are. We got more snow last night, so there’s a couple of more inches out there. No plans on going anywhere today, so it can be chaos all it want on the roads :p

But drive safely IF you have to go out there.