Xref: utzoo comp.graphics:15329 comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d:11640 alt.artcom:13 rec.arts.books:16981 rec.arts.poems:9749 rec.arts.misc:1140
Path: utzoo!utgpu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!jarthur!bridge2!3comvax!michaelm
From: michaelm@vax.MCD.3Com.Com (Michael McNeil)
Newsgroups: comp.graphics,comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d,alt.artcom,rec.arts.books,rec.arts.poems,rec.arts.misc
Subject: Posting artwork to the net
Summary: how should art images be posted for general distribution?
Message-ID: <4110@3comvax.MCD.3Com.Com>
Date: 13 Jan 91 01:25:21 GMT
Followup-To: comp.graphics,comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d,alt.artcom,rec.arts.books,rec.arts.poems,rec.arts.misc
Organization: 3Com Corp., Santa Clara, CA
Lines: 41

A friend of mine is an artist who has taken up the electronic
easel.  She would like to make her artwork, combined with lyrics
for music (and eventually, after the hardware is more generally
available, music itself, integrated with the visuals), available
over the electronic media.  (At present, these works consist of
PC Paintbrush images with lyrics/poetry overlayed.)  Have any
such works of art been "published" over the Internet, and if so,
what would be appropriate newsgroups for these kinds of postings?
(Furthermore, what data format would such images be posted in?  
I would assume the usual GIF or TIF format, uuencoded like the
scanned photographs that are posted from time to time, but which?)  

Also, we probably won't do the following at first (rather we'll
post the graphic files themselves), but the artist has expressed an
interest in the future in incorporating something akin to software
shareware with her art -- i.e., distributing a restricted version
of the product having limited capabilities, with a request that
interested persons purchase the full-blown, unrestricted version
by mail.  I envision posting a program which either incorporates
images within the .EXE file, or else reads them in from encrypted
files, then allows the images to be displayed interactively at the
viewer's discretion.  However, it would not allow printing the
images, using them for wallpaper in Windows, say, etc. -- until the
interested party contacts the artist and purchases the .GIF files.

Has anyone actually done such a thing?  Also, do people here have
comments as to the suitability of proceeding in this way, or ideas
as to how this new medium for distributing art might be encouraged?

Comments welcome!

--
Michael McNeil			michaelm@vax.DSD.3Com.COM (3comvax.UUCP)
3Com Corporation		ucbvax!hplabs!oliveb!3comvax!michaelm
Santa Clara, California		work telephone: (408) 492-1790 x 5-208

	When that which is divine in us doth try
	To shape a face, both brain and hand unite
	To give, from a mere model frail and slight
	Life to the stone by Art's free energy.  
		Michelangelo