North American Horse Encyclopedia

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is Feenixx Publishing?

   We began as a brick and mortar science and nature store in 1990 and in 1996 opened the first Internet science and nature store http://www.einsteins-emporium.com.
   Some of our departments became so popular that we spun them off into their own individual web sites. In 2000, this multi-store operation led to us to reorganize as Web-Shops.Net. One of our most popular E-stores is http://www.edugraphics.net, which offers the world's largest selection of educational and hobby posters.
   We were constantly receiving customer requests for subjects that were not covered and we felt many published posters could be substantially improved. These, and other factors, led to our expanding from poster retailing into poster publishing in early 2004.
   Our poster publishing business is a separate legal entity from our Internet business. It has its own web site http://www.feenixx.com. Here you may see the titles that we have published and those that are currently being prepared (work in progress).

What do you mean by the word "title"?

A poster is any large sheet of paper that is designed to be hung on a wall. It is a very generic term. We use "title" to refer to a specific poster, such as Animal Kingdom.

Tell me about your posters

We introduced a new type of poster. We call them "Content-intensive Info Posters." Each provides a comprehensive overview of the subject presented through images and text.

How do you determine which subjects / titles to publish?

   This is very largely influenced by marketing considerations. There is not a market for posters per se. The market is for subjects. An air and space museum is not going to carry posters of dinosaurs and a natural history museum is not going to carry ones of space craft. Another consideration is that retailers do not like to purchase only one or two items from a vendor. They want an entire product line.
   We identify potential markets, then plan an introductory collection specifically designed for it. For example, if we wanted to sell posters to garden centers, we would work up a collection of perhaps 12 titles, covering a variety of subjects, such as garden annuals, garden perennials, house plants, ferns, etc.. We would then design, produce and market the collection to that market.
   Depending on the success of an initial collection, we may or may not publish additional titles for that market. Today we are exceptionally strong in science and nature and are continually adding titles to the line. Our posters are now being carried by more and more types of stores and this promises to give us more flexibility in selecting subjects.

How do you publish posters?

   Our posters have a very high "up-front" cost. They have to be researched, written, designed, prepared, printed, and packaged before they can be sold. We have found that the most efficient way to do this is to simultaneously publish many posters. We refer to this printing of many new titles at one time as a "flight." So far each flight has been in the form of a collection containing related titles. Each such collection had its own brochure.
   We have been printing one flight / collection per year. It is printed at the end of the year for release the following January.
   In 2008, we hope to begin publishing two flights a year. Upon the publication of each flight, we will print and distribute a new catalog showing the full product line. This will give us more flexibility in adding new titles as all titles in a flight will no longer have to deal with the same subject.

How do you create posters?

   The first step is deciding what to publish. Our publishing plan contains over 700 possible titles, arranged by subject. We may decide that the flight should contain an earth science title, a life science title, one dealing with prehistoric life, another with birds, etc. Once we have the general list, we will then select more specific subjects from the publishing plan. For example, Prehistoric Life contains Pterosaurs, Prehistoric Sea Monsters, North American Dinosaurs, Synapsids and more.
   Once the individual subject / title has been selected, we then extensively research it. We have found it helpful to keep track of our research in an in-house web, as it lets us combine information and images. A major goal of the research is to identify the poster content - exactly what it will say and show. In many cases, we will make up a comprehensive layout showing everything assembled together. These "mock-ups" use images gleaned from various sources, mostly from the web and from books. We obtain the art work, then assemble everything through a process known as production art.
   In the course of product development, we often prepare PDFs of the full size poster which we send to authorities who work with us as consultants to ensure accuracy.

How do you obtain images?

   Creating posters requires a collaborative effort, so whenever possible, we try to work with artists that we have successfully worked with in the past. Often an artist may be extremely skilled in one area or may only be interested in a given subject, so we try to utilize his or her skills in that area. However, our "favorites" may not always be available, thus we may need to find someone else to do the job.
   As we expand our product line into more and more subjects, we often need artists that have experience and skills in new areas. We search for such artists through a variety of means.
   Once the artist has been selected and we have agreed upon the scope of the work and the compensation, we issue a purchase order for the art.

How much research does the artist have to do?

Generally very little or none. This web site Yummy-yum.com is our product development web site. We publish to it our in-house research web and the PDF of the completed poster, so everything is pretty well defined. Artists who specialize in a subject generally they have a rather extensive library of source material. .

What media do you require?

We strive to show an accurate and realistic presentation of the subject. It has been our experience that traditional media is the best way to render "soft subjects" such as birds and animals. Most artists doing such work first sketch the subject, then apply the basic colors through a watercolor wash, then add details with colored pencils. Others do the same thing with acrylics.
The last few years have seen many artists use various computer graphics programs. Our experience has been that the resulting images are can be excellent for "hard subjects" such as airplanes, automobiles, and space craft. These programs do not produce good animal pictures. In spite of the artist's best efforts, the images look "plastic" or "cartoonish."

What are your general art requirements?

   A poster contains many images and they are almost always superimposed over a common background. Thus each individual image must eventually have a transparent background.
   Artists using traditional media should prepare the image on a white background. When completed, they should send us a scan of it (see below). We use the "extract" feature of Adobe Photoshop to extract the image from the background.
   Artists using computer graphics should provide images on a transparent background.
   The image should be about 7" across and have a resolution of 300 dots per inch. As images are sent to us over the Internet, all extraneous white space should be cropped out to reduce file size.

How does an artist provide you the art?

We receive a great deal of art and have worked out what we think is the most efficient means of transferring it from the artist to us. The easiest and most efficient way is by email. Images created by traditional media can be scanned, saved as JPEG files and inserted in the email. Images created by computer graphics are generally saved in TIF format and thus cannot be inserted into an email. They can be sent as attachments. Images should not be placed in ZIP files or placed on a server for us to download. This creates additional time-consuming steps.
An email should include only one image. The subject line of the email should identify the subject. This permits us to quickly move the email and image to a folder for later processing.

Who owns the copyright?

We are purchasing all copyrights to an image. Often we permit the artist to keep the original art. In the case of images prepared using traditional techniques, then they are free to sell the original to someone else, subject to our copyright. We do permit artists to show the images on their websites, provided it is accompanied by our copyright notice.
The terms of all this are contained in a standard art buyout agreement that we enter into with each artist who does work for us.

What are your terms of payment?

In the case of a small job consisting of only a couple of images, artists that we work with on a continuing basis simply bill us upon completion.
However most of our posters require a great many images, which may take considerable time to prepare. It is certainly unreasonable to expect an artist to complete the entire job before being paid. Thus we use progress payments. We negotiate prices and terms up front on a job-by-job basis. The results are specified in the purchase order.
Progress payments work as follows:
1. We pay a good faith retainer up front.
2. Progress payments are made as a previously agreed upon number of images are completed. These are not for the full agreed upon per image price as we have had problem with artists completing jobs. Generally, we will hold back 25% of the price to help ensure job completion.
3. Final bill. Once the job is complete, we pay for the last batch of images and the funds previously held back to ensure completion.

How do you pay?

We pay promptly. Invoices are almost always paid within a few days of receipt. Many of the artists that we work with are in countries outside the United States. In such case, we pay electronically through an agency such as Guru or through PayPal.