I am thinking about business cards to promote my nature photography. I am going to a couple of small art shows this fall with greeting cards and matted prints.
Is it worth putting a photo on the business cards? If so, does anybody have recommendations on where to order such cards?
Thanks,
Paula Dittrick
Houston
Posted by Steve Foss on October 1, 2007 at 4:37 PM
Paula, my business card for general purposes is a grayed-out photo of a wolf with my info on top. My cards for weddings are the same style, but with a faded image of a wedding couple as a background.
Does using a photographic image help? I'm not sure that it does, but since mine occupy the full space of the card they have decent size, and the design we're using incorporates the image effectively. I've seen some photography business cards with lots of little images on the back reflecting all the different types of photography the shooter does, and that can be effective as well, but we're always trying to economize, and printing four-color business cards front and back is more expensive than printing on only one side.
We get all our stuff done through Vista Print at www.vistaprint.com. They offer 250 free business cards, with only shipping paid. You have to ship them a camera-ready design for it to be free last I'd heard, but my wife is my Web and print designer, so that offers me no problem. We have been very happy with the quality.
I use a photo of a Grizzly Bear. It attracts attention and generates visits to my website. I print my own as needed using an Avery template on Avery cards. Very inexpensive.
Posted by Gary Minish on October 2, 2007 at 10:05 PM
My card is half photo and though it certainly could use some creative improvement it seems to help. I have handed it out to people and seen them later pulling it out of their pocket to take another look. Two looks should be better than one
It would be interesting to see a thread with pictures of member's cards. I suspect it would be a good source of inspiration for upgrading mine.
Posted by Bill Whitney on October 2, 2007 at 11:15 PM
About the most effective use I have seen for having images on business cards was a wedding/portrait photographer that would print up some business cards with the customers image on one side. You can be sure that the customer is passing on those cards more frequently than if they were given a standard business card to give to friends. I don't recall anyone showing off their photographers business card except this time.
Posted by Toni Lankerd on October 3, 2007 at 9:37 AM
I am currently using an image of a local scene. Using PS, I added a color filter, and a separate layer for text, then merged the layers. The image and text covers the whole card. I then use Microsoft Word (or Works) and Avery labels template to make one complete sheet which yields 10 cards on 8.5 x11 Epson Premium photo paper.
I use something like this with my website and e-mail written on the back. I like this because its clean and its easy to use a few different photographs. So i generally let people choose wich card they want
The first batch of cards that I had printed a couple of years ago, I used one of my favorite photos as a background, and had a local printer do a batch - ~$100 for 250. Since then, I've gotten much more proficient with Photoshop and other tools, and I now have the cards printed by Mpix.com, and the price is less than half of my local printer and the quality was much higher. Mpix (and, I suppose other groups) can print on both sides of the card, for added information distribution. So, my next batch of cards will have a nature image on one side and a wedding image on the other...
Discussion
8 repliesI am thinking about business cards to promote my nature photography. I am going to a couple of small art shows this fall with greeting cards and matted prints.
Is it worth putting a photo on the business cards? If so, does anybody have recommendations on where to order such cards?
Thanks,
Paula Dittrick
Houston
Does using a photographic image help? I'm not sure that it does, but since mine occupy the full space of the card they have decent size, and the design we're using incorporates the image effectively. I've seen some photography business cards with lots of little images on the back reflecting all the different types of photography the shooter does, and that can be effective as well, but we're always trying to economize, and printing four-color business cards front and back is more expensive than printing on only one side.
We get all our stuff done through Vista Print at www.vistaprint.com. They offer 250 free business cards, with only shipping paid. You have to ship them a camera-ready design for it to be free last I'd heard, but my wife is my Web and print designer, so that offers me no problem. We have been very happy with the quality.
Paula
It would be interesting to see a thread with pictures of member's cards. I suspect it would be a good source of inspiration for upgrading mine.
The first batch of cards that I had printed a couple of years ago, I used one of my favorite photos as a background, and had a local printer do a batch - ~$100 for 250. Since then, I've gotten much more proficient with Photoshop and other tools, and I now have the cards printed by Mpix.com, and the price is less than half of my local printer and the quality was much higher. Mpix (and, I suppose other groups) can print on both sides of the card, for added information distribution. So, my next batch of cards will have a nature image on one side and a wedding image on the other...
Good luck,
Tim!