SlideRoomBlog

While the economy and foreign policy are the major issues this Presidential race, many arts institutions would like to know how McCain and Obama match up on Arts issues.  Americans for the Arts has published a very useful side by side chart to help illustrate where they stand.

*Roll call votes on 7/12/00, 8/5/99, 9/15/98, 9/18/97, 9/17/97, 7/25/94, 9/15/93, 9/15/93, and 9/14/93.
Source:  Americans for the Arts Action Fund, as of 10/03/08

Americans for the Arts Action Fund is the bipartisan advocacy arm of Americans for the Arts, engaging citizens in ensuring that all Americans have the opportunity to appreciate, value, and participate in the arts. Arts Action Fund members are citizen activists who are committed to helping make certain that arts-friendly public policies are adopted at every level of government and in the private sector. ArtsVote2008, a program of the Arts Action Fund, was created to secure bold, new policy proposals in support of the arts and arts education in America from candidates in the 2008 presidential campaign.

www.artsvote.org, or call 202-371-2830

Have you ever posted an image to the web and felt that it looked really different than how you saved it?  Not just different, but a real loss of vibrancy and color saturation?  This is due to the color profile in Photoshop not matching the color profile of your browser.

Below are instructions on how to fix this from Michael Fletcher in 2007, via the PhotoDoto blog.  Go to his original post for more technical info.

Converting the Color Space in Photoshop CS2:

In Photoshop, when you open your image, make sure to check the “mode.”  Go to Image>Mode and make sure 8-Bits/Channel is chosen. Then go to Edit>Convert to Profile.  Choose the settings that appear in the picture below (and uncheck all the boxes).  Now your image is ready to save.

Fletcher adds a very helpful note to those who may not have Photoshop CS2 or CS3:

If you don’t use Photoshop for post-processing, simply save the final image for the web in the sRGB IEC61966-2.1 color space. Although the exact method to select the proper color space varies from program to program, any serious photo imaging program or raw converter will allow you to specify the color space.

This is great information if you are someone uploading pictures anywhere on the web.  Whether you are using Flickr, SlideRoom, a blog or something else … all the same rules apply.  Good luck on maintaining beautiful color!

Art Business News annouces the growing popularity of SlideRoom for portfolio review:

“For decades, artists have submitted their portfolios via the postal service when applying for art school, grants and other opportunities. However, in the last year, SlideRoom.com has replaced decades of tradition for colleges, universities, art foundations and others that now receive and review visual media with an online system powered by SlideRoom.”

Now that websites are so easy to attain, simple artist registries don’t hold much value for artists.  However, a new breed of online community is beginning to emerge, a social network for artists built around the registry concept.  A prominent example of this is Myartspace.com.  Here is part of their mission statement:

Myartspace is the premier online social network for the art world. It is a fresh new community-based website for young aspiring artists and photographers; more established artists and members of the art world - teachers, collectors, curators, museums, galleries, and art buyers. Members will be able establish their presence in the community, build and display galleries of their works, promote their works and career, participate in dialog, competition and events, and build an online store to sell products.

Will this type of thing thrive?  Will it really help artists? Do artists want this? Will this type of thing cause the same problems the proliferation of social networks created?  I also have broader questions. How is the traditional (elite) Artworld going to react to the growing presence of the online Artworld?  Can critical acclaim and recognition come from an artist’s online self-promotion? Will the artists/critics/lovers tend torwards a few convergent mega-sites that are feature rich, or will the Internet remain a free-for-all with the burden on individuals to uniquely create interest?

I believe that if a business is going to be successful, it usually needs to be solving a real problem.  SlideRoom is solving a very specific problem for a very specific market.  In order for these online communities to succeed, they need to be constantly focused on helping artists do things they can’t do otherwise.

Technology makes art education a bigger draw
Why not take advantage of freshman’s digital skill?  No one is saying high-tech is better, but it can interact with traditional methods for a mutual deepening. (via eSchool)

Trends in Student Technology Use
College councilors, did you know just about all your freshman have a lap-top and a Facebook page … read to learn why this is such a powerful trend. (via Wired Campus)

Eyes Give You An F
Are you re-designing your website?  This is not only info you should know, it is just plain interesting. (via Butts in Seats).

At SlideRoom, we pride ourselves on beautiful design.  We don’t see this as a “surface” veneer, but rather something much more core to providing a great experience.  So, we have updated our site/brand to reflect this priority.  When we started the process of redesigning the website, we wanted an outside viewpoint for how to best communicate with potential clients. To do this, we paid several different designers to make an original concept for us. We wanted to hear what they thought our site should be and why.  Each designer submitted a concept for a new website one week later in any format.

Below is the winning concept design presented by designer Andrew Fitzpatrick. (Click full-screen in the bottom right corner to read the annotations).

The primary thrust of the concept was not the “look,” but rather the Information Architecture and the larger goals of the site.  However, the surface design also gave us a starting point.  Ultimately Andrew did refine the “look” and all the visual assets. But, here are a few basic principles we decided early on:

• Start by upgrading the Logo (the general look of our brand) and build around that.
• The main goal is to show how the system looks and works.
• Within features & benefits, each of our user groups must have their own section.

Later in the design process, we decided to use colorful visual assets to create emphasis, rythym and balance throughout the site. After many interations and focus groups, we feel that the final result achieves our goals and embodies our devotion to good design. We have worked hard to make the SlideRoom system feel luxurious to use, and now our website reflects that as well.

We have always believed in providing everything needed to create a worry free experience, including friendly support. But today, Mike McDerment CEO of Freshbooks, took it much further in an excellent post about how this is not only good for the user, it is always good for the business:

“For all the bean counters who see support as a cost center, think again. Telephone calls and email and the forums threads are research tools. Every person you connect with helps inform decisions about what’s working and what’s not, and gives you ideas about what to do next.”

While I always had an intuitive sense of this, I have never seen it articulated so well.  And like Mike, I am another CEO that believes in answering some technical support questions personally.  Nothing is more effective for getting the pulse of the business.  I highly recommend the FreshThinking blog for anyone who likes to read about entrepenuership and good small-business principles.