
With EveryArt (YC W12) you don't have to be afraid of commissioning art  - jmcannon
http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/21/with-everyart-you-dont-have-to-be-afraid-of-commissioning-art/
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zach
Easy access to spectacular concept art through EveryArt would be a big win for
smaller game developers. Great concept art really helps bridge the gap from
"pretty cool" to "amazing" and amplifies the inspiration driving the game
concept.

Having worked on the early production stage of Blizzard's next MMO, concept
art definitely seems like the most fun part of the design process, for both
the artists _and_ those who commission them. With concept art work, you can
find mind-bogglingly talented people who, when you give them ideas and let
them roam free, will do these face-meltingly awesome concepts that inspire you
so much you just want to make huge posters of them and jump inside.

People just get so excited hiring amazing artists and seeing what they can do
with few limits in place. That's what EveryArt will really have going for it.

BTW, is there's anyone who has taken on commission markets for musical groups?
Been wondering for a while: [http://www.quora.com/Is-there-a-service-that-
allows-people-a...](http://www.quora.com/Is-there-a-service-that-allows-
people-anywhere-to-commission-a-band-or-musician-to-cover-a-song)

~~~
jmcannon
Absolutely. We were our own first customers and sometimes have to restrain
ourselves from blowing all our YC money on commissioning our own artists. Most
of the work so far has been for the wall, but some people have commissioned
pieces that they've used in a site design. No games. . . yet.

~~~
JMiao
this looks great, justin! i'm looking forward to game artists hosting their
work here instead of blogspot :)

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staunch
I come from a family of artists so I've always hoped that we day see a world
where most regular people to have nice art on their walls, at home and at
work. At $1000/piece that idea is still out of reach for most people, but it's
a good start.

Interestingly enough, I think you could learn a lot from tattoos. Millions of
people get tattoos because it's a way to express themselves in a meaningful
and unique way for a couple hundred dollars. If you can make art culture
something more personal and approachable, like tattoo culture, you may unlock
a huge market and make the world more beautiful to boot.

~~~
itmag
There's loads of stuff on Deviant Art, for instance, that I wouldn't mind
hanging on my walls.

The problem is the total overload one suffers when browsing around that site.

I'd totally use some kind of smart discovery service to find me cool art. But
how does one algorithmize subjective visual aesthetics? De gustibus non est
programmandum :)

~~~
zb
> I'd totally use some kind of smart discovery service to find me cool art.

So find a dealer gallery you like and develop a personal relationship with
them.

~~~
itmag
But that's not what I want. I want a better filtering/discovery mechanism for
DA. There's a lot of great artists on there but it's too much work browsing,
not to mention deciding.

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prawn
I have used painters in China for this. For about $270, including shipping of
a large tube from China to Australia, I got a 2x1 canvas. It cost more to
stretch/frame the piece than it did to paint and ship it.

There is an entire village where many of the occupants are dedicated to the
craft. They will copy photographs of your family, recreate old classics,
emulate a sketch you did or copy an image you found on the web.

In my case, I wanted a copy of a piece that was to otherwise be €1,000 just
for an unframed print, edition of 400+. I emailed a JPG, gave dimensions and
the painter sent a couple of progress shots before sending it over. Unless you
compare it and the original images side by side, the differences are not
noticeable.

I think the demand is there. I have actually thought about building something
that sits between consumers and the Chinese artists, to capitalise on the
unease some might feel in sending money abroad with little idea of what might
come of it. Shuffle some emails around, load the quotes a few percent, etc.

~~~
bostonvaulter2
Is that through a website?

~~~
prawn
Yes. The city is Dafen and you should be able to find a few options by
Googling or email me for a specific contact.

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jackfoxy
Another art-related idea I would like to see: take a picture of the signature
on a piece of art to look up the artist. I have 3 original pieces I really
like. The artists are probably complete unknowns. If such a DB could grow to
world-wide that would be a great boon for art lovers and artists. I think it
would shift the balance of power held by powerful art critics, making what is
recognized as fine art more democratic and making it easier for talented
artists to attract a following.

~~~
replicatorblog
I actually did that this morning! The new Google image search is neat in that
you can drop an image into the search box. I saw an unattributed piece on
pinterest this morning, dropped it in GI and out came the artists name.

~~~
jackfoxy
Great suggestion, only in my case the contrast of the signatures to the
backgrounds is not good, and this would be a problem with many works saved by
Google as well. But it does give me the thought implementing this idea might
be technically easier than I thought. Implement the saved signatures as images
with the background whited-out and provide tools to easily bring a requested
signature image into that state.

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waterside81
Yet another great example of how a relatively simple service can take out the
middle man and create transparency for the parties that are adding value.

Never fails to amaze me how many of such niches could benefit from the concept
of a targeted marketplace for X.

~~~
jcampbell1
This service is a middleman. Most people just found an artist on Deviant Art
and commissioned the piece directly from the artist. I have commissioned
plenty of digital art this way.

This is a case where a middleman steps in and provides a service that is
useful to both the artist and the customer.

A middle man is not always a bad thing.

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tibbon
I like it.

Wasn't this essentially happening less officially through Deviant Art?

~~~
jmcannon
Yep. We considered that a proxy for demand.

~~~
replicatorblog
DA is a really interesting proxy - It's a pretty large market. I'm a RISD grad
and can imagine TONS of my classmates using this. ETSY = Craft Majors,
EveryArt = Painting, Illustration, Sculpture.

This is going to be huge, Best of luck!

FWIW I took notes on a panel that the DA founder gave at ComicCon last year.

[http://replicatorinc.com/blog/2011/08/how-deviantart-has-
cre...](http://replicatorinc.com/blog/2011/08/how-deviantart-has-created-an-
amazing-art-community/)

~~~
jmcannon
Thank you!

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webjprgm
I have no idea how the fine art world works, but when I saw the HN headline I
thought of places that let individuals sell T-Shirts with their designs. So on
that note, would it make sense to have a free-for-all section of the site, or
a separate sister site, where anyone can join, then have them earn reputation
points and those that become reputable there are candidates for you to invite
to your fine-art section? That could bring a source of small revenue and
source of cheap art to the bottom end of the market, as well as create a way
to discover artists who are ready to move up.

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ScotterC
This a really cool product. I'm so glad someone is tackling this space because
we get requests for it at Artsicle all the time but it's really not our focus
at all. Glad to see other companies looking to tear down the artificial wall
between artists and collectors.

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oakenshield
This is awesome! I had never thought of commissioning artwork previously, but
checking out some of the already commissioned postapocalyptic artwork made me
realize I'd love to recreate custom-made versions of scenes from my favorite
science fiction or graphic novels for not much more than some random painting
I could buy at Target. I'll definitely be using EveryArt in the near future!

Is there a way a user could suggest / recommend an artist for EveryArt to
source? I personally follow several digital artists on DeviantArt and similar,
and would love to have artists in those available to work with me through
EveryArt.

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mtalantikite
I'd like to see more in terms of an artist's profile, something like a CV
along with their statement. While a couple thousand dollars isn't much for
art, people are still going to approach it as an investment, and as such
probably would like to know where they studied, where they've shown, who
represents them, etc.

On the other hand the work on the site seems kind of kitschy, so maybe you're
targeting more of the decoration market?

Either way, nice concept.

~~~
jmcannon
You've touched on a really interesting point here, and one that we've thought
about really hard. In building the company, we had to decide what sort of
portfolio we wanted to represent. We were gaining the most traction with work
that's often described as narrative or illustrative, and we discovered that
the people most excited weren't even thinking about their pieces as
investments (in the sense of future resale value). I wouldn't describe this
work as kitschy, though - it's got a broad appeal that most people are able to
connect with quickly. The narrative aspect is important for motivating people
to commission, too - it's not as easy to commission an artist that works in a
very minimal style. Even then, I don't think the kind of people that would
prefer that sort of work are going to be early adopters.

You will notice that we do represent some more contemporary styles. Like any
smart startup, we're measuring and exploring different niches. We'll recruit
artists based on what people respond to. Moving up the ladder to more
expensive and established artists that people regard as investments isn't out
of the question as a part of our future.

Having said all that - we are working on including more background information
in our artist profiles. Good feedback.

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bootload
_"... Artists get a new source of income... targeting a younger audience —
people who have a little bit of money but aren’t yet connected to the fine art
world ..."_

Smart. The _'traditional'_ art world is primarily analog & conservative so
targeting the younger can create a new online market. Interesting the early
artists are curated but with an eye to a broader selection. An online art
gallery.

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nitrogen
Just one point of feedback on the EveryArt site: the slideshow I saw when I
loaded EveryArt.com advances slides just a bit too quickly. I wanted to look
at several of the examples, but I was only about 40% done "taking in" the
picture.

That said, this is a great concept and I'll be passing the site along to the
artists I know.

~~~
jmcannon
Thanks for the feedback. Sounds like others feel the same. We'll slow it down
a bit.

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psychotik
This is great.

I've been looking for an artist to commission a piece of art that I have
sketched out on paper and in my head for a while. I just didn't know who to
ask. Found an artist on there who might just be the perfect fit, based on his
portfolio. So this solves a real need, at least for me.

I hope it works out, for EveryArt and for my art.

~~~
jmcannon
Perfect! Let us know if we can be of any help along the way.

~~~
psychotik
Got shot down. "Not interested" says artist. Boo!

~~~
jmcannon
Ahh, I saw that. I'm sorry - our artists' personalities are as diverse as
their styles. We've done our best to screen for people that will work well
with clients, but we will be watching closely to make sure they're all a good
fit. I'm following up with an email to you now.

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adamtmca
For the founders:

When you click on a piece of work on /browse/ it takes you directly into the
"gallery view" for that piece, rather than to the artist's profile page. This
is a bit jarring. I would consider taking users to the artist's profile first
and letting them enter the gallery view from there.

~~~
jmcannon
Thanks for the feedback. It actually used to work that way, but users were
telling us that they wanted to go directly to the image that the clicked on.
We'll work on a happy solution.

~~~
PieSquared
Two more comments: I was about to email you about it when I noticed you
actually have something about gift cards on your website. Make it more
prominent! I think gifts would be really awesome here, but you make it so hard
to find :)

Also, it'd be nice if you could somehow give an example of artists' price
ranges. I don't know if I'll be paying $15, $50, $500, or $1000, and
especially for someone new to art commissions, this could be a point of
serious confusion.

Either way, awesome idea. I really hope this takes off. Consider me a hopeful
future customer!

~~~
jmcannon
Thank you! I think you're right on both points.

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InfinityX0
Don't mean to hijack the thread but it's interesting how these "HN TC launch
articles" have died down to such a large degree on HN. Not as many companies
launching, TC not covering Y Combinator, TC just being bad, or some
combination of all three?

~~~
prawn
I've been seeing a fair few of them. Seem to be a couple on the front page now
that are new today, and there was a another a couple of days ago.

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mhartl
What a cool idea for a company! Congrats on the launch. I hope you guys kill
it.

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mehuln
I know my wife will love it. Perfect for her to decorate our new home!

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Causalien
Wow, Exactly what I need at the right time. My game is progressing smoothly,
but I've been having nightmares about not being able to find an artist to make
game art.

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greendestiny
Isn't this kind of what pg and rtm wanted to do as a startup before viaweb? Or
something similar. Seems satisfyingly full circle if it was.

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twfarland
The decision not to target the Fine Arts world is wise - an egalitarian
marketplace would go against everything they stand for.

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gghootch
I love this. Finally a place to spend the art gift card my parents gave me.

