Bitcoin Forum

This thread was the home of Photo Hour - a bitcoin art project. For now, the temporary home is the flickr page. Here in the marketplace bitcoiners can buy my regular services at 25% off.  (see last post)

Im a bitcoin fan and user. But im also a photographer and i have decided to contribute to the bitcoin society as best as i can, by shooting photos. I will try to document the interests and maybe even the lives of bitcoin users and publish it as an art project on the flickr. To make this a bitcoin art project, however, i need your directions to get a connection to the community. Every week i will auction off one or more hours of my time at biddingpond for whatever fraction of a bitcoin people think it is worth to decide what and where i will shoot next. You may ask me to come to you, send me stuff to shoot or send me off on a wierd mission. You can even use me as a very cheap regular photo service, shooting your wedding or car or mining rigg or whatever and the pictures will be yours to use freely, as long as they can be part of the project too. You can even sell them if you like as long as you dont try to sell the exclusive rights.

I hope to capture and relay glimpses of the interests or lives of bitcoin adapters as the community develops. The current auction, for mission #4 is https://www.biddingpond.com/item.php?id=1035 (https://www.biddingpond.com/item.php?id=1035)

Pictures from former missions are here on the Photo Hour flickr page.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/69296392@N07/ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/69296392@N07/)

BITCOIN BOON, LOOK HERE!
Bidder for mission #3 kindly payed full amount so I will let the boon pass forward to mission #4.
First time bidders get a 1.01 bitcoin discoint, if the bidding stops before reaching 1.01 bitcoin, i will pay you the difference between the 1.01 coin discount and your winning bid after you win the auction and post a usefull mission here in this thread.

Here is a short progress report:
1. Since the auction is still going on, I still don't know what the first mission will be. There is a first bidder though so I will go out shooting very soon (the auction ends in 29h or so) and I am really curious what he has in mind for me. If You read this and are the current higherst bidder, feel free to share the intended photo mission here on the forum if you like, it would in itself contribute to the project.

2. I have been playing with a few designs for the web layout, but I will propobly not decide on anything until i have the first shots. The layout of the site might very well change over time and letting the first mission guide me on the first design sounds like a good idea. I will go for simple and clean though, the whole point of the project is to convey ideas, lives and things of bitcoin users through the pictures, so everything will be centered around them.

I'll pop a question out here too. Are there other art projects going on with bitcoin connection? Even similar ones?
Any other thoughts or ideas are welcome input too, ofcourse.

One hour left of the auction now, bid is still on 0.001. So it still costs nothing to become the first one to send me on a mission.

Too bad I'm nowhere near you...
I hope you still find a better offer from someone around Stockholm!

it would be nice if ppl could view your portfolio beforehand  ;)

I was contemplating that, but the idea is that the project will speak for itself. I am creating a flickr page for the project right now and the chosen pics from the first two missions will be up when i start the auction for mission 3 tomorrow or so.

Great news!!!
The flicker page is up with pictures from the first two missions:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/69296392@N07/
 (http://www.flickr.com/photos/69296392@N07/)
The auction for directing the third mission is here:
https://www.biddingpond.com/item.php?id=1033&mode=1 (https://www.biddingpond.com/item.php?id=1033&mode=1)

And this, i think, is the best image so far:
http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6237/6322448867_a6ddcd4099_b.jpg

Was that the exact wording of the mission requests?  Take a "portrait of the dead" and pictures of the "construction workers of stockholm"?  Just curious...

Mission #1 was had a long and complex description, it changed during the mission and included seeing a film before shooting.
Mission #2 was "Shoot portraits of the dead!"

Both directors are happy with the results and both payed a lot more than they had to :)

Cool.

I have to say, that "best image so far" IS pretty fantastic.

Bad news: There was zero interest in the first special mission. That and the fact that there is only one bidder on the mission #3 auction (and i have good reasons to suspect its a returning bidder at that) gives me good reason to doubt that this project can ever create interest enough in this small a community to go around. I am not yet ready give it up and open up for bidders on ebay or so, I really want this to work as a bitcoin project. However I need some help from you, since I have run dry on ideas.

Offering my time, my knowledge in photography,  the use of my equipment and sharing the ownership of the pictures with the winners, all this for alsmost nothing is obviously not enough for people to contribute to the project by directing missions. I hardly think that bidding more than 0.01 bitcoins can be an economical reason for not participating, even if the winner dont bother to sell the images. The project is simply not interesting enough to inspire people to be part of it.

I need input:
How can I modify the concept to motivate people to participate?
Or is there a reason I don't know of that make people not want to use biddingpond?
What could I do to make You personally want to be contribute with an shooting idea?

If not, can you think of a better way for a photgrapher to contribute to the bitcoin community?

Thank you!

It might be better to just offer your services and negotiate compensation rather than auctioning them off.

I'd be happy to send you a bitcoin or two for some coffee related photos. Even though I hope to use them on the BitBrew (http://bitbrew.net/) website to help sell my beans, I wouldn't want you to confine yourself to what might be "commercially viable." I would be just as happy being the inspiration for some photographic art related to bitcoins that doesn't fit in my business plan.

Being a regular at this place: http://www.dropcoffee.se/ (http://www.dropcoffee.se/) im a bit of a coffee person too. As such id be honoured to take pictures for your excellent business. Negotiating a price is definetly possible and buying my services is definetly doable too. However, even though I wouldnt be unhappy if my auctions ended with a bid of 1000 bitcoins each, getting a fair price is not the issue, if it was id be on ebay and getting whole lot more attention and higher bids. What im looking for is the connection between Photo Hour and the bitcoin community. For this to be not just any art project, but a bitcoin art project, i need the input and direction of bitcoin users. Anyway, the winners has so far payed a whole lot more than they have bid in the first place.

But suddenly i think i have an idea. Giving bitcoins away might work!

You can take orders for free directly and then sell your photos on bittit.info (http://bittit.info) too if that suits you. No fees at all and it's made for the purpose of selling pictures. The image will be visible in low res and users will pay to increase its resolution up to the maximum. You decide the price for the maximum resolution beforehand. Just make sure that you put the right price. For example if your picture at 1/5th of its resolution is still useful then you might consider putting a higher price for the max resolution.

I really like the idea of that site. Going to have to see what I can come up with...

Or you can bid in may auction, collect the bitcoin boon, give me a mission and sell the pictures you get on bittit. In that way, you earn money while you earn money in addition to supporting both bittit, photo hour and the bitcoin community at large at the same time. That is like a win-win-win-win-win-situation. How many chances like that do you get?

I like this idea even better!

"We heard you like money so we put..."

Update:

Good stuff

• Misssion #3 is on its way, shooting at Comics Heaven today
• Auction for mission #4 is set up to start wednesday (see first post), ending this saturday.
• I will apply for some fiat for the project here: http://www.firstfoto.se/fotonyheter/scandinavian-photo-instiftar-arligt-stipendium-pa-100000kr/ (http://www.firstfoto.se/fotonyheter/scandinavian-photo-instiftar-arligt-stipendium-pa-100000kr/) for som travel expenses, new equipment, flickr pro so that we can have exif and larger image sizes. I think there is actually a slim chance to get it if i can keep this going and the flickr page start to get more visitors.
• Mission #3 director kindly payed full amount, boon will be pushed forward to mission #4.

Bad stuff

• Special mission #1 was a failure, not a single bidder in the thread. I will try again if something really interesting comes up again. Gurus like Stallman don't show up that often here though, so there might be a long wait until we see a special mission again. I want to keep them for things with at least some ideological similarities with bitcoin. If sometime in the future, for example, there is a bitcoin conference here, there will be another one ofcourse. Suggestions are welcome too.
• Flickr is stupid, one dont get exif info in the pics unless one pays for pro and one cant pay with real monay, only fiat.

The auction for mission #4 is now open for bids.
https://www.biddingpond.com/item.php?id=1035 (https://www.biddingpond.com/item.php?id=1035)

Mission #3 pics are now on the flickr page.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/69296392@N07/ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/69296392@N07/)

Only 16 hours more to bid and still 1 bitcoin boon to grab.

Time for some marketing, maybe.
If someone in Stockholm happen to read this and wants a studiosession this is from yesterdays session in our mini studio:
http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6238/6357709971_6e9545b002_b.jpg

That's creepy looking as hell, I expect her skin to fall off and her to jump out of the screen shrieking like a banshee.

Ok, I won the latest auction on bidding pond.  My wife gave me the mission of anything to do with white and red flowers.  Not sure if that's possible this time of year, but good luck!

Ah, this is the hardest challange so far, actually. It is wintertime here but so far it has been very mild, I might just be able to find a rose somewhere that is still alive. One could think, how hard can it be, just go to a flower shop or an insidoor garden. I am however very allergic to flowers and such places are killing me. Ill do my best on this, it might be that I need more than hour for the first time and that flowers this time of the year in Sweden may not be exactly what You expected them to, but I will give it a try and come back to you if there is nothing to shoot.

This was unexpected, we got moved to Economy->Marketplace. Even though it comes as a surprise to me, I can see how it happened but it has grave implications. For me, this project has to legs. I was one of the lucky ones to sell off some coins @30 and I wanted to give something back to the community. I wanted to create something that could bring attention to bitcoin by using bitcoin and existing services and give up some  of my time to the community. I also wanted  to create a service that was only available for bitcoins so that the price was kept at a "for free"-level compared to hiring me for for over the value of 50 bitcoins/h in fiat. The other leg was collective art, gathering directors from all over the community to channel their views and interests through my photographies. Thus creating some kind of legacy over what bitcoin community was all about at this stage for the future.

I may be pricky, but I have a business to run too, I will not mix bitcoin hour with selling my time in a marketplace thread at donation value. Somehow that is further than I can stretch myself. In a maketplace, I sell to earn a living. This thread can no longer fullfill neither of the legs this project was standing on. It does not mean the art project is dead, but i will have to find another way to reach out to the community. Maybe going facebook/ebay and at biddingpond once in a while to make people outside the community aware of bitcoin. Ideas are definitly welcome here. When this has fallen to place in my mind and I have decided how to cointinue the project, I will make one last post in this thread on how to follow it.

For now, if you want to buy my time here it is SEK 840 fiat + VAT. I also offer a 25% discount if payed with bitcoins.

Update:
Bad stuff
* As noticed before, the thread good moved into Marketplace and this is the last Photo Hour update here

Good stuff
* Pictures from mission #3 are up here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/69296392@N07/sets/72157628219806623/detail/ (http://www.flickr.com/photos/69296392@N07/sets/72157628219806623/detail/)
* There is now a plan on how to continue the project and make it benefit bitcoin even better

From now on the home of the project is the flickr page, not this thread anymore, and there will be a facebook page as well. Every week there will be an auction as usual. The difference is that they will be on E-bay. People can pay with paypal or bitcoins at the going rate at the end of the action. This is because i want to reach more people and give them the opportunity to find out about Photo Hour and about bitcoin. Beginning in January, however, the first auction every month will be on biddingpond and you will only be able to pay with bitcoins. Hopefully this will turn one or two people into bitcoin users and spread the word about bitcoins to a lot more. There will still be a new thread on this forum that only shows one pic of every mission and a link to the photo set on flickr.

Props to actually finding flowers to take pictures of!  I have no idea what plant is in the middle picture, but eh, close enough.  ;)  Any way to get higher-res versions of those photos?  Like... 1920x1200 (or similar)?

So you charge about $125/hr for photography services?  Not bad... my sister is a photographer, though she just started a few years back.  She's done a few weddings and whatnot now though.  I think she charges per event for weddings though, not sure on the cost.  A simple photoshoot would probably come out to around the same amount you charge though.

Best of luck with your photo hours on eBay!

Its sweden, you know, everything costs twice as much as the us. First deduct 25% VAT, then fees and taxes for about another 50%. It all sums up to, keep 40% of what people pay you and give the rest to mr Björk.

I sent you a mail about where you want me to upload the picstures and where you can find previews of the rest of the them. If you didnt get it, could you please send me an email so that i know i got the right address.