Originally published by the United States Faceters Guild in the December 2011 Newsletter
Reprinted here with permission.
This Green Gem Edition is slightly expanded from the original and is the first part of a two part series.
Since first publication in November, I’ve noticed more than one faceter take these concepts to heart.
Online Design Style by Jeffrey Hunt
The Insistence on Excellence
Faceters come from many backgrounds and disciplines and range from hobbyist to the professional. The faceting of gemstones is a precise art form readily accessible to those with inclination of focus and drive to create stunning objects of beauty. Rendered as art, faceted stones are a gift from the earth itself.
I’ve been working with colored stones for about five short years, and come to the field with a theatrical design and lighting background. It was an easy and smooth transition, and an extensive design background has provided many advantages in the colored stone field. One of those seemingly, is a fresh set of eyes. I also readily profess to not being a faceter – I consider myself a designer first. But of course I facet to become a better designer.
Personal Design Style in Faceting is an area that I think is often taken for granted and overlooked by many faceters when trying to determine and forge a market for stones. Design style can be simply described as “your own work,” it’s what makes your work unique and recognizable. With my theatrical design it was a number of years and a long learning curve before I realized this, but eventually I got to the point where I could recognize my own work. I know, this sounds a bit “funny. “
Style is partly the repetition of themes and the basic elements and principles of design. Line, shape, color, texture, volume and the methods of working with them. But style is not only these building blocks; it is also the approach to the work. Always starting with the insistence on excellence – the points have to meet in other words – or at least you have to try to get them to meet – or what’s the point? For faceters and designers, myself included, style is how you spend your time. Synthetics, natural material, round brilliants, fantasy cuts, cutting for speed and cash, cutting for precision, cutting a gift for a relative – there are many directions and distinctions of style. My personal description of style is that it is simply a way of working. Style quickly expands from the specifics of what’s on the faceting dop.
In just a few short years, we’ve seen a proliferation of websites across the U.S., expanding into Africa, Asia and beyond. When I signed up the One World Gemstone website to Facebook for instance, there were perhaps half a dozen Facebook pages with a faceting/gemstone emphasis, if even that – that was maybe two years ago. How things have changed! Style immediately becomes more than just the type of stone you cut, but how that cut is presented. Unlike just a few years ago, we all now have easy access to online presentation. Granted, the hobbyist or casual cutter may not have a need for a web site – and Facebook is readily available to post those photos of stones hot off the dop. And of course USFGfaceterslist and GemologyOnline remain important resources. (Be sure to respectfully honor the guidelines as a guest though!)
The professional finds an increasing need to stand out among competitors and the webscape is changing fast, the competition is barking at the heels in terms of website presentation. The barking is mostly coming from commercial cutting houses, and of course those new faceters showing up with increased online presence – a sometimes very strong presence.
For the professional, strong photos are a must for an attractive web site, and if you are first starting out, there is an immediate need to determine the photo convention you would like to use to present yourself. Many times this comes from necessity. Those gem photos can be darn hard to produce and who has time for it when cutting stones is the priority? I think the importance of professional presentation is grossly overlooked here and taken for granted. There is the occasional approach that the photo cannot look better than the stone because the online buyer darn well better be awed when opening the package for the first time. I agree with this to an extent, but only because the stone is really best viewed in person. Failing or weak photos relegate the competition for the professional to the overseas cutting houses and can actually blur the lines between custom cutters and commercial cutting houses. After all, both are trying to sell more stones. With the increasing quality of stones from the commercial sources that routinely use the same photographic convention as precision cutters – reduced scale, and presenting mostly color, increases the pressure to produce lower priced precision cut mail order stones. Precision cutters on PriceScope for instance are routinely compared to the Thai and Chinese cutters and eBay sellers. PriceScope is a great site with many wonderful individuals and buyers – but absolutely does not exist to promote Artists, Faceters or the Art of precision cuts. It’s an unapologetic commercial site. The cutter must rely more and more on showing the gem in person to compete.
This is where personal style can trump the overseas cutting. If your website shows stones on par with the mass produced stones you are regulating your sales to the same price range – custom cut or no. But it is not only the gem photo, it is everything about your website and design. Your website is a window to your personal style it’s a window to you as an artist. Do not take it for granted or fall back on the convenience and convention of showing photos just the same as everyone else at a reduced scale – or insisting on showing your stones on the white background just because you see everyone else doing it, or, because a handful of buyers think it’s the best way to see color. Sometimes white is best, sometimes it’s not – it’s that simple. It is heavily used on eBay – think about it.
Tell the story of the stone – this is the hands down winning combination against what I call “buckets of stones,” or even more telling “Costco stones.” There will always be a market for these less expensive mass produced stones, but I don’t think this is a viable place to compete as a hobbyist or even professional – unless you are that aspiring commercial cutter.
Strong online style will insure that your work stands out from the expanding crowd, so it is important. Building a website can be expensive and time consuming, and for some, the horrific task of fetching the Witches Broomstick, but my advice is to keep it simple. Identify your competition, or if a hobbyist identify your favorite artists, find out what works for them and work towards doing it better. There is no hurry but it should be a long-term goal with steady progress. But short of building a website how can you improve your online style to better show off those stones? I suggest these well-known sites as a great place to start – Facebook, USFGfaceterslist, GemologyOnline and the GemologyProject (the later will surprisingly catapult you into Google), Google Plus, Flickr, and The Custom Gemstone Studio. I personally think Twitter is dead – we’ll see. There are new emerging sites worth close scrutiny too. It is important to follow all posting guidelines on a few of these sites – these sites represent vibrant communities and it’s best to contribute rather than just start posting away!
Who has time for all of this? No one. But if you are interested in online presence, style is important. Pick one, maybe two of these sites and stick with it but keep working on that simple image of showing your stone off to best advantage. Keep improving those photos – Pick a photo style or convention and fine-tune it and your online style will emerge. Improving the photos can take time, but don’t stop trying. This can work for the hobbyist – but really, I see a greater need for the professional to stay ahead of the game here. This is where style profoundly represents the artist. The professional cannot endure a poorly presented website.
The webscape entry point for new and beginning faceters is relatively low; it is easy to join the fray. Check out the work of Justin Beveridge, Jordan Wilkens and Ryan Quantz (just to name a few) – three superb beginning faceters with very strong photo styles and execution. We’ll all be kept in check online with the quality of the work these gentlemen promise; along with more new faces on line soon I’m sure. In addition there are other rising faceting stars forging new ground: Jean-Noel Soni, Jim Rentfrow, Doug Menadue, and Uli Zeisberg – just to name a few. Custom Faceting is not dead by a long shot.
Online style leads to the emphasis of original content – or your unique work. Web presence craves original content – posting those quality photos of stones will do just that. The audience for your work will expand, whether for pure enjoyment or purchase.
-Jeffrey Hunt
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Additional Links and Sources
United States Faceters Guild Faceters List - A Yahoo Bulletin Board
GemologyOnline Forum
Google Plus Gemstones
Pricescope Colored Stones
Flickr Custom Cut Gemstones Try other search terms
Justin Beveridge Facebook and The Custom Gemstone Studio
Jordan Wilkins Facebook
Ryan Quantz Facebook and R.Quantz Jewelry & Lapidary Art Facebook
Jim Rentfrow and Facebook
Doug Menadue and Facebook
This entry was posted on Monday, January 23rd, 2012 at 12:30 am
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