Q: What happens if I don't like a picture I receive?
A: You're covered! See our Satisfaction Guarantee.
Q: I want to send someone one of your framed prints as a gift. Do you ship to other addresses?
A: Absolutely.
Q: The price of your print went up before I had a chance to order it. Can you give me the old price on it?
A: Sorry, no. Life is too short to haggle. Besides, if the price had gone down, would you still be asking for the old price? ;-)
Q: Do your prints ever go on sale?
A: No, unless you see one on the secondary market somewhere. However, we will adjust our prices at least every month. The print you like today might be either more expensive or less expensive tomorrow. This all depends on our periodic analyses of price vs. volume.
Q: When I look very closely at the online images, I can see some compression artifact (checkering and banding around high contrast edges), even though you say that there is no compression artifact in the photograph. Also, there's not a lot of detail in the images. Why is this?
A: What you are seeing is compression artifact, but it is only present in the tiny jpeg images that we place online. (Jpeg images are used on web pages because they transmit quickly via the Internet.) The actual printed image will have much, much higher resolution and no compression artifact. In fact its digital representation requires around a hundred times the data present on the web site. It is literally the difference between listening to a musical recording from a CD on a nice stereo system and listening to it over the telephone. For obvious reasons, we don't want to put our high resolution graphic files out on the Internet for anyone to copy, which is why you get to view the low resolution images. When you purchase a print, it will be in high resolution.
Q: If I can simply download your images from the website, print them, and frame them, why would I want to buy your prints?
A: There are at least a few reasons: (1) The prints are copyrighted, with all rights reserved. In other words, it would be illegal for you to do so. (2) The images on the web are very low resolution versions of the "real" graphic images. They have substantially fewer pixels and are jpeg-compressed for rapidity of download. They really don't print very well, at least when you blow them up. Finally, (3) your prints aren't going to have the same archival properties. If you print them on a common inkjet printer, they'll be noticeably faded before long -- a few years, compared to the century or so that a Graphic Fusion print will last. You'll do better by taking the image to a photo lab, but even then, the fade time will be 10 or 20 years. Why do our prints last so long? It's because we print with pigment-based ink on a very high-end printer. You can read more about it here.
Q: Why don't you number your photographic prints?
A: Some photographers do this; we don't. The number of a silk-screened print, for instance, reflects its quality. The first prints are the sharpest and best. The last prints are of a lesser grade. Therefore, 1/100 has a far superior image to 100/100. In the world of photography, all prints in a series are identical in quality, so a series number is not only irrelevant, but also misleading. Unlike a number, the artist's signature is important. All of our prints are hand-signed by the artist.
Q: Do your photographs fade?
A: All images fade and deteriorate with time, with no exceptions. However, our prints should still look quite good in the 22nd Century, hanging over your great great great grandson's mantle. Our printing methods are quite a bit more technologically advanced than conventional photoprocessing, using professional pigment-based inks, rather than dyes. Pigment based imaging is as old as civilization, and it can be seen on the inner walls of the great pyramids and on the cave walls of our ancient Cro-Magnon ancestors. Epson has simply acrylic-encapsulated the pigments and put them into inkjet form for professional use. We are so confident of the fade resistance of our prints that we offer a generous No-Fade Warranty on all our framed prints. You can read more about our printing here.
However, do remember that any image can fade if abused. To ensure that our photographs retain their original vibrance, please keep them out of direct sunlight. We recommend framing with UV-blocking glazing (such as Cyro's Acrylite OP-3 acrylic) in environments with greater amounts of sunlight, but even this precaution will not prevent fading from direct exposure.
Q: My dog ate it. What do I do?
A: Relax! It won't cost very much to replace the print. Please see our "My dog ate it" replacement policy.
Q: [for Sarah] Can we hire you to photograph ________?
A: Probably. I've photographed weddings, home remodeling jobs, houses for sale, small items for sale, and much more. I will likely photograph anything that isn't obscene, offensive, or dangerous. Please contact me to discuss what you need photographed.
Q: [for Sarah] You've authored quite a few web sites. Can I hire you to do web authoring work?
A: Absolutely. I am fluent in HTML and JavaScript and write my code the old fashioned way (without an web page editor). If you need something unusual done, I'm probably a good person to do it. I am also good friends with a server guru who is excellent with server-side work, and we work well together as a team. Beyond hacking JavaScript and HTML code, I also offer photoediting services, and if you're local to me, I'll even do your photography. So this work could be entirely turn-key.
Q: [for Sarah] I notice that none of your web pages have frames. Why is that? Don't you know how to program frames?
A: I hate frames! It's not that they're hard to understand or program. It's just that I think they're an inferior solution. When windows are resized, scroll bars appear, chopping up an otherwise nice layout. When people link to the site, they usually end up linking to the wrong page. When search engines index the site, they, too, can link to the wrong page, confusing visitors who cannot find the content they were searching for. When people print the page, they often/usually end up printing just one frame, usually the wrong one. Frames are an obnoxious mess, but if you want to hire me to program frames, I can do it for you -- if that's what you really want. However, consider this page. It's laid out in simple table format and doesn't work too badly. The only thing this page won't do that a framed page will do is to keep the button panel ever-present in the left margin and the banner at the top. That's not a huge problem, in my opinion.
Q: [for Sarah] Do you do requests?
A: Only if you're paying to have them photographed! However, we we would enjoy hearing from you about what sorts of new pictures you would like to see available.
Q: [for Sarah] What does it take to produce one of your photographs?
A: A lot of hard work! First, I have to take lots and lots and lots and lots of photographs, only a few of which I will use. Usually this is pretty safe, but sometimes a farmer will think I'm up to no good when I take bizillions of pictures of his barn. (Nobody has ever shot at me, though!) Then there's the photo editing. This can be an extremely time intensive process, and really knowing one's photo editor (i.e. being one with it in a "zen" sort of way) takes a lot of experience. It requires an intimate understanding of light, color, reflectance, image noise, optics, and various mathematical relationships. Some photographs practically take themselves. Others can require days of editing and re-editing before they're right. Still others never become right, no matter how much time is invested in the editing.
Q: [for Sarah] How do you know what to take pictures of?
A: Honestly, I just wander around and observe. Most people don't recognize interesting subject matter in the world around them, but that's one of my talents. Almost all of my pictures are opportunistically taken.
Q: If your artwork is so good, why is it necessary for you to have a Referral Partners Program?
A: Most of this world's excellent products require advertisement and promotion. Isn't that the purpose of a web site? It's sober reality that most people would not bother to put up a link to Graphic Fusion on their web site without some sort of financial incentive. Without that link, you'd probably never have found us. We aren't bothered by the commission, though. Ultimately, our artwork must speak for itself. People will only buy our artwork when it's good, no matter what sorts of financial incentives we may offer!
Q: I heard that ____________. Is it true?
A: Quite possibly, but don't trust everything you hear! ;-)
