Just Starting Out on the Internet - What's My Next Step?

by Sharon Bertz
(Pennsylvania USA)

I make beaded and wire wrapped jewelry. I use mostly beach glass, shells and semiprecious stones.

I have been in different craft shows and do well.

The last craft show I was in I made just about as much in one day as I do in a week on my regular job.

This inspired me to start my own ebay store or website.

Right now the biggest thing holding me back is I can't get very good pictures of the jewelry. I thought about your idea with scanner but I don't think up close shots of beach glass would be good. It's very porous.

I don't have much merchandise left after the last show so I assume I need to sit down and start creating things.

What would be the next step? Pictures? Trying to design a website?

I feel so overwhelmed!

Sharon Bertz

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Just Starting Out on the Internet - What's My Next Step?

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Possible next steps
by: Rena

First, congrats on your craft show success! Woo Hoo!

If you've decided to sell your jewelry online, the next thing is to decide what sort of an online presence you want -

a blog?

an online marketplace shop (Artfire, Etsy, etc.)?

your own website?

If you're not sure, then take your time cruising around the web:

1) Surf through the various online marketplaces. Look at the shops in them, read their terms for sellers, perhaps even make a purchase there if you haven't before - to get a good feel for how these storefronts work. Does this type of online store feel like a good fit for you?

2) Spend some time reading and studying some well-done jewelry artist blogs. Does that seem to be a type of publishing that you'd enjoy?

3) Visit a variety of artists' websites. Look at the type of page content they have, and get a feel for what you might do if you had your own website. Does having your own jewelry website feel like the type of online presence you'd like to have for your jewelry?

While you think over these things, take the opportunity to further develop your jewelry photography skills.

That's a valuable skill regardless of whether you sell your jewelry online or offline.

A lot of it is trial and error while you discover what results in great jewelry photos with your particular camera. Write down the camera settings and circumstances that result in really good photos.

I think the most crucial elements of good jewelry photos are:

1) Put your camera on a tripod and use your camera's timer to take the photo, so the camera will be completely still for the shot.

2) Never use flash. Use indirect natural light as much as possible, and experiment with using a light tent.

3) Edit your photos. Crop out the excess area so the jewelry fills the frame. Learn how to use a photo editing program's adjustments for re-sizing, contrast, exposure, color temperature, saturation, sharpness, etc.

You can find links to further info on all of these photography aspects (plus more!) in Photographing Jewelry.

I wish you success on your "next step"!

Taking pictures
by: Kathleen Davis

Take a look at my website, www.kathleendavisdesigns.com I use a Sony cyber shot 7.2 megapixel camera with full HD 1080 digital camera. I also use a photo tent with two lights that I bought from Kim Komando's website. It was fairly inexpensive. I take three shots of each item, changing the settings on each one. Then I put the photo's in my computer, edit them with Microsoft photo manager and delete the pictures that are blurry or that I was not happy with. I can crop, resize and when i put them on my website. Most if not all of my photo's turn out pretty good. I hope this helps you.

Jewellery Photo's
by: Anonymous

My Mum and I take jewellery photo's in a light box using the macro mode on the camera. We find using 2 ligths pointing up and into the box works well. One light on the left the other on the right.

The photo's are then cropped, saturation changed and the brightness optimised. The photo's are saved as JPEG (best for photo images) and optimised for the wed so they don't take a long time to download.

Thumbnails always seem to to have less detail than enlarged images.

Our sizes are
Thumbnails =85px * 85px
Page Images =220px * 220px
Enlareged Images =440px * 440px

Earrings are best done hanging on fishing wire.
Necklaces are photographed on a bust.

Visit

www.unique-silver-jewellery.net

to see the results.

Lauren DeV

Photographing glass, etc.
by: divaPlanet

Here are a few things I've learned about photographing seaglass jewelry with silver, and semi-precious stones:
1. Nikon makes a better lens than Canon or Sony.
(which allows for better clarity)
2. 3 lights are better than 2, 4 lights are better than 3. I use a lightbox with a piece of vellum (translucent drafting paper) on it. I made a 3-sided frame thing out of wire and covered it with the whitest, brightest fabric I could find. There's an overhead light, two side lights, the lightbox (bottom light), and one from the front. I use a combo of full-spectrum lights, daylight bulbs and florescent.
3. I made a sleeve of the same white fabric and use the packaging from dustmasks (a perfect dome) as a support for photographing bracelets. Earrings and necklaces are hung from a wire resting across the top of the 3-sided thingie.
4. Photo-editing is essential. I happen to be a photoshop pro, so I enjoy tweaking photos until pigs fly (much to the dog's chagrin). Seaglass is tricky, due to its many nuances of color and texture, and I often separate the components of a piece into layers and adjust them individually.
But if you don't want to go that far, lighting is by far the most important component of making your work look good. Brightness/contrast and color adjustment (usually more cyan and yellow) are the most common tweaks in my experience.
5. Never give up! :)

Internet sales
by: Barbara

I too am just getting started to sell on the Internet, so I'm looking forward to reading all the comments.

Good photos are a must, and I finally bought a decent camera. I had been scanning my jewellery, but getting constant criticisms along the way.

As Rena said, check out the existing sales portals like Etsy.

I set up my website using a template provided by the hosting site through whom I buy my domain name. I also have a page on Deviantart.com, which is a lot of fun. I've "met" a lot of interesting artisans there and get a lot of comments and feedback on my jewellery.

In any event, if you don't have one yet, you will need to set up a PayPal account, and it works very easily. Tie it to a dedicated bank account -- I have an online bank account I use only for online buying and selling (a security precaution recommended by experienced eBayer pals). Any purchases I make automatically step down to the bank account if there's not enough in my PayPal account, and thence to a credit card if there aren't enough funds in the bank account, and that's really convenient.

The other thing I know I need to do is set up a dedicated packing and shipping table because so far it's taking me an hour or more to find everything I need. I have been keeping all the boxes that stones shipped to me come in, as they are standard shipping sizes with fixed rates. You need to go to your post office or courier company to get their rate sheets, and then come up with a fixed rate to include local/national/international shipping (will you use post or courier?) plus insurance, plus your packing time and costs. I also have to drive into the nearest town to get to the post office, and so I will be shipping orders only one or two days a week unless someone is paying extra for express post or courier.

You'll also need to set up a template for receipts/invoicing.

Good luck!

Barbara
www.barbaramacdougall.com
www.artefaccio.deviantart.com
www.artefaccio.blogspot.com

Images
by: Lorraine/Wired Orchid

Congrats, Sharon on your success!

The best tip I can give you is to brighten your whites in your images. Use a image altering program (like Photoshop) and in the Adjustments_Selective Color palette, select Whites and adjust the cyan, magenta, yellow and black until you get a nice true white. You'll see this brightens your entire images and makes it pop.

Also, take advantage of Etsy's 5 images their giving you. Take a few angles (the more interesting angles, the better) and one on a bust or form so your customers can see how it hangs. I also have an illustration showing how long a necklace is. Your customer can't try on your jewelry, so give them every opportunity to see how the piece will look when worn.

You can check out my site and see my images. I try to put good images on the site, but they can always be better! It's a work in progress...

Good luck!
Lorraine

www.wiredorchid.com

Internet Sales
by: Lisa Lee

Well done Sharon, for being brave and taking the plunge! I find a good way to have lots of variety without holding too much stock, is to make a piece, photograph it, then take it apart and use the components to make different designs. This way you're not having to buy a lot of raw materials at the start. Then, when you receive an order, just make up the piece to send away.
Also, having a lot of photos taken at different angles, so customers can see how it will look when worn. I totally agree about the white background, it really makes the details stand out.
To see how I use different angles check out my jewellery Zen Designs at www.zendesigns.com.au.
Good luck and always stay positive.

Good Photos
by: Vcreations

hi congrats on taking the plunge to sell on the internet, i am from Malaysia, but i do sell to the USA and UK and all over the world, but i agree A good camera is a must, you must invest in a good digital camera and use photoshop or some other editing program
5 years ago i was a newbie, did not even know how to post on the the internet, edit photos, i learned from my kids, imagine that, but life is like that, we learn new things everyday, i now sell on Local Malaysian internet sites, Ebay, and Etsy too
have a look at my HANDMADE Swarovski jewelry photos to get ideas on how photos should look
see them here
EBAY US
http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZvictoryalways66
Ebay UK
http://search.ebay.co.uk/_W0QQsassZvictoryalways66
NOW i also have a shop on Etsy Shop
http://www.etsy.com/shop/vcreations

Thank you!
by: Anonymous

Thank you for taking time to answer my question. Here is an update for you: I now have a business name,a blog and an account on Etsy. I also have a professional photographer who is going to take pictures of my jewelry when everything is ready. His fees are reasonable and I read that photos of the jewelry have to be the best you can get.

I will email again.

Thanks!
Sharon

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