I’ve been taking pictures of Lake Gaston since 1982 when Mom and Dad purchased a small lake-house. Through the years I have built up relationships with a few vendors who sell my pictures and posters and paintings and greeting cards and postcards. (I will never get rich but I enjoy the work and the occasional infusion of pocket change.) During those same years I witnessed the inevitable trend of people switching to email over all other forms of preferred communication methods; in no time purchases of my postcards and greeting cards dropped to ZERO. I am now considering wallpapering my basement with the 23,000 some-odd unmarketable postcards I have in storage.
No wonder the U.S. Postal Service is going bankrupt.
While chatting with one of my vendor/owners yesterday, it was suggested that I do something special for Lake Gaston’s upcoming milestone birthday. So I tinkered and twiddled for hours with the above 8 1/2 x 11 inch Photoshop image, eventually printing 10 of them on exceptional acid-free paper and painstakingly inserting them into modest picture frames. (Nothing fancy, but the pictures will certainly outlive me.)
Framing photographs or artwork is a nightmare. Little speck-thingies and other sorts of fingerprint-thingies that weren’t there moments before, mysteriously show up under the glass as if you had performed the framing dance while sitting in a dandelion field on a windy spring day. When the pictures were nestled cleanly under glass, I was off to sell my wares.
My first visit was to some friends of mine who own a local Mom & Pop sign shop, for whom I do occasional freelance graphic artist work. I showed them one of my framed Lake Gaston Birthday photographs — was that a little speck-thingy hiding in the corner? — and asked, “Do you think they will sell?”
“Yes, they will sell nicely.” A strange kind of silence followed. “Fifty years from now…”
I lost interest in the speck-thingies and drove home. Lake Gaston was celebrating its 50 year birthday, not its 100th. Sigh. Just another senior moment kind of day.
Years ago I managed and Art Gallery…we sold and framed prints and here is the secret to keeping all those little specks out of the finished print…we had an air hose hooked up to a compressor and we “blew” the print and mat off and the glass before finishing it up. I’m sure that you could use the canned air for these small projects. And make sure that there are no finger prints on the inside of the glass before finishing…lol.
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Great idea. I have a compressor. 🙂
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I was wondering why I do not receive any more emails from you or Rich…I did not know where to look to see what had happened. They just ended. I miss you both…your recipes, your stories, your humor. Any ideas? Help!!
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Rich and RDJ now have a new blog: http://rdjour.wordpress.com/ We gave up on Topica. 😉 Glad I’m back.
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Thank you for the info about Rich. Thank you for coming back & regaling us with your stories & commentaries! I love ’em!
Rich must have told his “viewers” about the change …. I was in lala land.
You made my day….
(50 years… not 100? Old age creeping up on you, too? 😊❤)
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Thanks, Janice. I used to think there was a BIG difference between 100 and fifty. Remember when you were 10 and getting to eleven took FOREVER?
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Well, I like the picture. But I sure miss you Tim. Please come back more often.
jodie
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I will jodie, I promise. 🙂 Thanks for sticking with me.
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Oh, what a disappointment… not to mention a slap in the face! Sigh. Well, SOME of us appreciate your work NOW. :o)
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Point is, and now I realize I need to make this clear — it is the 50th birthday. NOT the 100th! lolol
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So…. lemons = Lemonade…. Write a short story of time travel, detailing how you’d zoomed ahead to the future, blinked back to current time…and while you were out, you snapped that photo… and doesn’t it PROVE that another 50 years will pass and Lake Gaston will remain unchanged; unfettered by the “modern” world…. Sell the STORY and include, for a modest extra fee, of course, a print from the future…. on acid free paper, no less….. (sorry, Tim… other than laughing in your face, this is the best I can come up with….)
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It is Lake Gaston’s FIFTY year birthday. NOT 100! I don’t know why I didn’t realize that!
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Sooooo….. Get you sum white-out……
HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!! Old age….mental and physical power surges…. Wasted time, wasted effort, wasted money…… Tim, welcome to my world…. Still say you should come up with a good ad blitz and sell them anyhow!!!
You still got it…..
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Do I know how to create a COLLECTOR’S ITEM or WHAT??!!!
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Sell ’em on EBAY!!!! Ask top $$$$!!!!! Half the folks out there will not REALIZE you’re way ahead of times….. Hang in, Tim…. it gets worse and worse… measure twice, cut once…. only these days, I have to measure 10 times, cut once. (and sometimes, STILL have to swear and start over again…)
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Mom, who is 93, says: “The Golden Years suck.” Pretty much sums it up. lol
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