Bringing history of photography to the masses, is it a crazy idea?

[elisa_hopt]

Hey fellow photographers,
we are a bunch of friends with some *basic* photography skills but a huge passion for it. We are also enthusiasts about the history of the medium and started self-printing some t-shirts a while back just for ourselves. Now we decided to check if others would be interested in proudly wear a t-shirt that makes you feel like you are bringing a piece of a gallery or museum wall around town, thus spreading a bit of culture and knowledge.
Come and check out our Henry Fox Talbot t-shirt, if you don't know who Talbot is I'll just say he invented the negative-positive process back in the mid 1800!

Talbot - Tree 1842

We are not here to sell the t-shirts, since this is a project driven by passion we would really appreciate some honest feedback so we can decide to invest more time on it. Tell us just anything =)
Thanks a million,
Elisa

 

[Derrel]

The web page is really good! Simple, with an excellent rollover zoom-in feature, and just a tiny bit of good information on William Henry Fox Talbot and his original process of "photogenic drawing"; I thought it might have been nice to mention too that he wanted to call the images "Talbotypes", but that never caught on. I mean Daguerre had no problem with self-naming!

 

[elisa_hopt]

The web page is really good! Simple, with an excellent rollover zoom-in feature, and just a tiny bit of good information on William Henry Fox Talbot and his original process of "photogenic drawing"; I thought it might have been nice to mention too that he wanted to call the images "Talbotypes", but that never caught on. I mean Daguerre had no problem with self-naming!

@Derrel , good point about the Talbotypes! And thanks for the feedback =)

 

[W.Y.Photo]

This is the best Idea I've heard in a long time, photography is so inundated in our culture nowadays that it wouldn't surprise me if people would be interested in learning this stuff. The T-shirt could be a huge conversation starter. I'd buy it if my financial situation was slightly better.

 

[MOREGONE]

Very cool.

I have been pondering an idea along these lines, but instead of the history of photography, it is a moniker/phrase of sorts to be the theme of the line.

Good luck with the project. Going to look into the vendor you guys are going through for the shirts!

 

[vintagesnaps]

I can't find anything to verify this is legit. It isn't showing up in a search on the state of California's website of registered businesses (as an LLC). What name is the company registered under?

The site refers to 'us' and 'we' and 'our' and all I can find is the first name of one person. I can't find a street address (which I believe a registered business must have) - the site says Pacific Heights which is just the name of a neighborhood.

I didn't see a date when the company was founded; the Facebook page appears to have started in March.

The Terms and Conditions don't even have the name of a company - it says '...govern [business name]'s relationship...' etc. And a .me website shows up as - Montenegro??

What charity is $1 supposed to be going to? The site mentions it would go to a '... charity organization whose mission is to maintain the heritage...' etc. etc. What charity would that be?? The site mentions a poll to choose one - what poll???

I can't find any indication this is a legitimate venture.

 

[elisa_hopt]

I can't find anything to verify this is legit. It isn't showing up in a search on the state of California's website of registered businesses (as an LLC). What name is the company registered under?

The site refers to 'us' and 'we' and 'our' and all I can find is the first name of one person. I can't find a street address (which I believe a registered business must have) - the site says Pacific Heights which is just the name of a neighborhood.

I didn't see a date when the company was founded; the Facebook page appears to have started in March.

The Terms and Conditions don't even have the name of a company - it says '...govern [business name]'s relationship...' etc. And a .me website shows up as - Montenegro??

Thanks for the feedback, all valid points. As I stated in my previous post and you might have guessed by now this is a dry-run to test both the product market fit and the market size, but don't let that stop you from buying the single test t-shirt we prepared so far, it is printed by spreadshirt.com (Spreadshirt Inc., a Delaware corporation) and is pretty rad. =)

Why are we doing this? As you might know, San Francisco has an unfortunate Tax of 800$ per year for setting up an LLC, since the main driver of this project is passion and not revenue (we all have our jobs and are content with our salaries) we would like to have a good idea if this is a viable idea before investing money (and time).

What charity is $1 supposed to be going to? The site mentions it would go to a '... charity organization whose mission is to maintain the heritage...' etc. etc. What charity would that be?? The site mentions a poll to choose one - what poll???

This is (I think) the cool part of the project, since we don't really need to make money out of these t-shirts (given that we cover the 800$ tax I mentioned + some expenses for the website) we can give the rest to charity. In our mind one charity will be selected by the users every year but to give you an idea of the kind of recipients we have in mind these are top of our list:

• rescuedfilm.com
• eastmanhouse.org

Thanks again for the time you spend giving us feedback, we are happy to reply to any other question you might have,
have a great day
Elisa

 

[elisa_hopt]

Very cool.

I have been pondering an idea along these lines, but instead of the history of photography, it is a moniker/phrase of sorts to be the theme of the line.

Good luck with the project. Going to look into the vendor you guys are going through for the shirts!

Thanks for your comment, lately there has been a surge in niche t-shirt lines (maybe people got bored of wearing unpersonal designs?) and we would like to mix this with our passion for photography, history and culture. Following the example of Andy Warhol we want to put iconic images in front of as many people as possible (and carry full attribution to the photographer).

We haven't looked yet into a proper vendor for printing the t-shirts (just using spreadshirt.com for now, not really great on quality and customization but for ourselves worked well so far). If we decide to develop the project further we'll spend some time checking other options. If you have any suggestion we are listening =)

Have a great day,
Elisa

 

[elisa_hopt]

This is the best Idea I've heard in a long time, photography is so inundated in our culture nowadays that it wouldn't surprise me if people would be interested in learning this stuff. The T-shirt could be a huge conversation starter. I'd buy it if my financial situation was slightly better.

Thanks!! We really need some words of appreciation (along with constructive criticism). Our goal is to bring photography and the PHOTOGRAPHER center stage in the life of people, millions of people are exposed to images every day and have no clue nor context what they are looking at. Think for example at “The Kiss by the Hôtel de Ville,” taken in Paris in 1950 by Robert Doisneau, if you walk in Paris you'll see t-shirts, mousepads, iphone covers and all sort of souvenirs with a reproduction of it and NO MENTION of the photographer. We would like to fix that, if possible.

Have a great day,
Elisa

 

[vintagesnaps]

You didn't provide any of the information I asked about.

Under what name is your company registered as a business? Who is involved in this business? What is your company's street address? Why does your company's website show up as .me??

 

[vintagesnaps]

And two of the photographers you have listed as 'the most important photographers of all times' are Durandelle and Genthe?? They aren't well known. That looks like you're just taking info. from the Getty Museum site.

 

[elisa_hopt]

You didn't provide any of the information I asked about.

Under what name is your company registered as a business? Who is involved in this business? What is your company's street address? Why does your company's website show up as .me??

Thank you for your strong interest in our project. Apparently I failed in explaining the situation. I'll try again, this time with simpler terms: there is yet no company, no address, no registered business. This is a product-market fit test (Product market fit - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia that we (as in "the bunch of us behind it") are running to see if there is any interest out there before investing time in creating the company.

Let me ask you something as well, why do you ask these kind of questions completely unrelated to the product itself? What is your interest in company registrations or website domains? Are you an attorney looking for a job?

FYI: .me - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia it's one of the many TLDs you can use when you register a website and it also sounds super cool when you read it aloud, try it: open your window and shout "hopt me!", you'll impress the passersby =)

Every other information is at the moment private.
Have a great day,
Elisa

 

[vintagesnaps]

I'm asking because I thought the site showed this company as an LLC, which would mean the company would be a registered business. You won't explain why you seem to have a domain name that indicates Montenegro - that makes no sense for someone who is supposed to be in San Francisco. That is not used by businesses in the US.

You keep referring to 'we' and 'us' and I can't find any info. to indicate anything about who is involved in this venture other than you saying your name is Elisa and the name on the Spreadshirt listing is different.

You say you aren't yet a business but you're selling the T shirt already?? You're willing to accept money? but can't seem to provide any of the type information a legit business would be able to provide.

If all you can provide is info. from Wikipedia that doesn't indicate that this is legit.

Phrasing like 'Every other information is at the moment private.' indicates to me that it's questionable that it was written by someone launching or developing or running a legitimate business in the US.

 

[elisa_hopt]

I'm asking because I thought the site showed this company as an LLC, which would mean the company would be a registered business. You won't explain why you seem to have a domain name that indicates Montenegro - that makes no sense for someone who is supposed to be in San Francisco. That is not used by businesses in the US.

You keep referring to 'we' and 'us' and I can't find any info. to indicate anything about who is involved in this venture other than you saying your name is Elisa and the name on the Spreadshirt listing is different.

You say you aren't yet a business but you're selling the T shirt already?? You're willing to accept money? but can't seem to provide any of the type information a legit business would be able to provide.

If all you can provide is info. from Wikipedia that doesn't indicate that this is legit.

Phrasing like 'Every other information is at the moment private.' indicates to me that it's questionable that it was written by someone launching or developing or running a legitimate business in the US.

Since we use Spreadshirt as our vendor William Henry Fox Talbot An Oak Tree in Winter History of Photography T-shirts - HoPT there is nothing more we need to do to comply with the law or details we need to provide (well, of course there will be tax season in a couple of months). If you are not sure, give it a try and print your own t-shirts there! Now it really looks like I'm the attorney giving away knowledge =)
If you live in San Francisco we can meet and have a coffee and I'll be happy to further explain our strategy.
All the best,
Elisa

 

[vintagesnaps]

Your privacy page shows HoPT as an LLC - so does the bottom of the main page on your website. To be an LLC you would need to be a registered business. You said you are not a registered business so why are you promoting yourself as being an LLC?

If your name is Elisa then who is Arjuna Del Toso? Businesses usually disclose their officers or board members.