Selling prints on dA?

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~Mr8att3ry Aug 11, 2012 Hobbyist Traditional Artist

just doing some research for a friend. If you sell a print on dA do you make any money for yourself?

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^3wyl Aug 12, 2012 Hobbyist Photographer

FAQ #124: How much of each sale do I get?
FAQ #337: What are the base prices on prints and other products?

Please refer to this thread if you need help.

FAQ #801: Are there any rules for the Forums?

*Trezykx Aug 11, 2012 Hobbyist Digital Artist

Yes you can, as they say you can set your own price but that requires a premium membership, or atleast it use to. I have many top end prints for sale, from $2-$10 and have not sold a single one.

The problem lays in two areas.

Problem 1- The fact people can copy and print them for the price of the ink. So if sales are your goal you have to use the dA watermark selected in your Edit menu or when you upload, you must not watermark the art manually, because when you sell a print, dA removes it's watermark from it so the costumer gets a watermark free print. This cannot be done if you manually watermark it yourself.

Problem 2- And really the larger issue, is your art has to be good enough to pay money for, and look how good the art is here that is given away for free.

If you want to make money, well it lays in your fans pockets, how to get it is first get a ton of fans, over a few thousand, by doing a bunch of outstanding art for free and uploading it, then after a while upload every tenth one very small and watermarked, and make this one to die for, then sell it only as a print in much larger sizes. Because you can upload a picture far bigger than is shown, and just be sure not to allow download of the full size Image. That way the only way for your fans to get it is to buy it, but sell it cheap or they simply won't pay the price. Other ways in to sell books with your some additional art not seen on line at all, just advertised there.

But the real money is in commissions, I see artists make hundreds a month on them in here. You just have to find a style people get obsessed with, get super good at it so you can do it fast, and in decent quality, and then pump it out $20-$50 per picture. So basically people pay for you to fill your own gallery with thier commissions, and build your fan/customer base as well, all at their expense, just don't deviate from your style. If you get popular with wolf pictures, then only do wolf commissions, get it? I see it done all the time.

~KIMB00P Aug 12, 2012 Hobbyist General Artist

You're work is amazing. I've actually started a donation pool tonight to help
artists like you who aren't getting any buyers for prints.

*Trezykx Aug 12, 2012 Hobbyist Digital Artist

Thanks, that's very kind of you, there are many starving artists out there that could use a few coins in their pocket. I'm not so successful in selling prints mostly because I'm not really striving to a the moment, I'm merely building my fan base, once I have that then maybe some day I'll make some coin off my work.

`nosugarjustanger Aug 11, 2012

Yes, you do. You can set up your own prices. But you gotta do your part to market it, I suppose. So many people are selling prints, but I suspect there are not too many buyers - you gotta stand out from the crowd.

~KIMB00P Aug 11, 2012 Hobbyist General Artist

Yes. You set your own prices.

~RiseofGreenBean Aug 11, 2012

how do you change the prices though?

~KIMB00P Aug 11, 2012 Hobbyist General Artist

When you submit your photo as a print, it gives you the option there. If you've
already submitted the photo, you go to your print and click "edit print".

~RiseofGreenBean Aug 11, 2012

cool, thanks ^^

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