My Gracious GuineaPiglets
I admit right up front I have little in the way of business sense and even less entreprenurial drive. At the same time, maybe I got more than my share of boldness in the self-promotion department. I have this thing I want to say with my life through my stories and images, so there is a certain amount of passion in that--some ego, perhaps; some, just expressive necessity. While deferral of gratification was about all there was in the frenzied child-rearing, income-accumulating years, my wife often reminds me now that, when we buy something that says it offers a 'life-time warranty', that particular widget may not have to last so long after all. Defer? Til when?
And so this long-winded preamble is to say that I'll be looking to make some things available for sale in the next couple of months and promoting them here, in moderation. I am asking for your indulgence, in advance, as our Shameless Commerce Division ramps up.
While the book-writing urges are likely to resurface this summer, the quickest "product" to make available to Blue Ridge Parkway and Floyd tourists would be a slide-show/screen saver CD that would let them share a piece of the Southern Mountain Experience with the folks back home.
There's a lot to consider: how many images to include per CD; how much text to add--maybe a phrase or two from the writing that the image inspired?; how much to charge; where and how to market and distribute; what music to use (public domain or permissions required).
So. I'd appreciate your thots. You can download the five-image-and-music file here (finalists in the photo contest) which will play with a single click on the downloaded exe file. For-sale versions could be both richer and more polished. A looping program of 20 images (at 15 seconds per image?) with some pleasant, authentic Appalachian music (from my friend Mac, perhaps?) might be worth--what?--six bucks? Another possibility is to ultimately have FOUR disks: one for each season. (The set on sale for $22!) The images could be a nice supplement to the eventual book as well. "You've read the book, now see Nameless Creek, the country lane, and Tsuga the butterfly-chasing Dog!"
Anyhow, this is a prototype and also lets you see the photocontest images again--a tiny thank you!
Please let me know of any problems you have with download or play. Note that if you move the cursor to the bottom of your screen while the program is playing, some controls pop up.
Comments
O Fred
It's WONDERFUL
Plays perfectly
(how did you do this???!!!!!
All five photos are wonderful
and the music is a purrfect audible match
(I love the page turning effect from photo 1 to 2)
I, for one, will certainly BUY
the finished product
Posted by: suzanne | March 26, 2005 9:09 AM
I like it. The photos were nicely placed, Autumn Morning is a great photo and I think it is the one you should use but I just love the “Two Walkers” aka “Frosty Morning”. I really like the music it was very clear and went well with the slideshow. I think acoustic was a good choice. As far as how many photos should be in it, for me the more the merrier. And yes I’d pay $7 for it. This would be one of those things you could sell at one of the art galleries it is a form of art.
Posted by: cindy lee | March 26, 2005 9:18 AM
Excellent! Really enjoyable.
A couple of irrelevant and petty observations:
When I ran it, it opened up full screen for some reason and I happened to have my sound volume cranked up high. Took me a few seconds to get things under control. The images were very sharp once they were in a resizable window.
It's probably not an option in whatever program created the show but maybe a 'sound off' button would be a nice feature for a purchased product.
Now these are just pointless observations. In the grand scheme of things it's really a great show.
Posted by: fletch | March 26, 2005 1:42 PM
Fred,
You have outdone yourself!
These pictures are breathtaking.
If it could be triggered as a screensaver, it would be perfect.
The nice thing about these is that you can sell them for $6.00 and make them yourself between blog posts for a healthy profit. One of the images would make a great CD cover. I would suggest that you put in 35 to fifty images, but arrange it so they are only excellent display quality, not capable of being copied and blown up to poster size.
Then you include a button that provides information on obtaining poster-sized images in printed form. You can then decide whether you buy a large format printer to publish high quality Fred First prints of Appalachia.
The other thing I would suggest is that your name appear in the bottom right corner and you watermark the images with a copyright notice.
More later. We will be in Floyd this next week. See you then.
Posted by: David St Lawrence | March 26, 2005 2:18 PM
Places in the heart.
Perfect.
Posted by: BJ | March 26, 2005 2:25 PM
That was really wonderful. All the pictures are so beautiful. I was hoping to see the picture of your home with the smoke coming out of the chimney. That would be a great last picture to the set.
Posted by: sandy | March 26, 2005 7:00 PM
Oh, Fred...these are truly wonderful...made me want to jump in the car and head for Floyd. We shall "play" these often and enjoy the images. Great music too.
Posted by: Gretchen | March 27, 2005 7:10 AM
What a beautiful gift.
Thank you
Michael
Posted by: Blogin Idiot | March 27, 2005 9:29 AM
Really, really nice. I vote for "Autumn Morning" as my favorite, but they're all outstanding.
Posted by: Trey | March 27, 2005 9:05 PM
Fred:
As always, I love looking at your photos. I vote for "Gold in the Blue Ridge" or "Testing Her Wings."
Tim
Posted by: Tim | March 28, 2005 9:06 AM