faq for members

Are my payment/credit card details secure?

Yes. All subscriptions and payments are processed through PayPal, an extremely secure site with an unblemished international reputation.

Can I download the videos rather than letting them stream to my computer?

Yes. That's one of the main advantages of being an Electric Artist Member Download the video to your hard drive and watch it as often as you like without paying the bandwidth cost. This is especially advantageous for people on slow connections who can download overnight and watch it uninterrupted the next day.

What's the advantage of high resolution? I can get low resolution videos and tutorials elsewhere for free?

A lot of computer graphics skill is in the details, and many of those details are lost when the resolution is too low. It's difficult to show subtle effects when the compression artefacts destroy the 'before' and 'after' differences. These videos are also unedited. In order to get videos on YouTube and other free sites, they are restricted on length and size. The Member's videos are not.

Could I create my own DVD of the videos to watch on my TV?

Sure you can. With a decent DVD authoring program you could make your own training DVD to watch again and again, or even to show to staff or colleagues. What you cannot do, however, is sell any product made with our videos. They're copyrighted and that would be a breech.

NOTE: we plan in the future to release commercial DVDs of all the most popular tutorials and will sell them for an outrageous price through the website - BUT we will make them available at cost to Members.

The membership fee isn't much. Why charge anything at all?

Yeah, it's not a lot. But it is something. The cost of hosting large file-size videos, and the bandwidth required for such large downloads is prohibitive.Without the few dollars we receive from subscriptions, we couldn't do it. The membership fee also prevents tens of thousands of visitors 'discovering' the site and plundering the bandwidth. Also, we will be paying additional experts (Members) for videos and tutorials, so the more paid Members that we have, the more we can pay out TO Members and the better the service becomes.

Can I cancel my membership?

Yes. If you're not happy with what you find on the Member's site, you can cancel your membership any time.

What's to stop me from joining up, paying one month and downloading everything I can, and then cancelling?

Nothing. Except that several new tutorials are added every week and you'll miss out on those. Not to mention the monthly special deals offered to Members. And of course the ability to request a tutorial to solve a problem you're having.

Yeah, how does that request-a-tutorial work?

If you've got a special problem, like for example your job sees you having to select models' hair from messy backgrounds all the time, and you want to know the best way to do it, you email us. If you have a sample image, all the better. Depending on several things, such as how common the problem might be, how many people have asked for a solution to that problem, how difficult it is to fix, and the sheer number of requests that we receive, one of three things will happen.

ONE: you will see a new tutorial on the site within a few weeks that addresses your problem.

TWO: you will get an email reply with the answer to your question (if it's something like 'what's the shortcut key place an image into InDesign?), and

THREE: we will contact you to organize some specific training for you or your company, or suggest a product (if your request is extremely complicated, such as 'How do I shift my small publishing company from QuarkXpress to InDesign?)

What do you mean by pre-release books?

The Electric Artist will be publishing several books a year, most of which will sell in the $40 - $70 price range. These are books on graphic design topics and the software used in the process. For example, the next book due is The Logo Handbook, which takes the reader through every step of creating a logo, including theory and practice. This book is due for release in mid-2008. The first people to see the book will come from among the Members and some will get it free, others for a token price (say $5) for evaluation purposes. Next will come the subscribers to the free newsletter who will be offered the book for around $25. Finally the book will go on sale to the public at its full retail price ($47).

How can I be paid to provide you with tutorials?

Once demand for requested tutorials rises, we will need to look elsewhere for supply. Also, if a lot of requests fall outside our area of expertise, we may seek out an 'expert' or two as subcontractors. What we're looking for is high quality, highly relevant tutorials that explain in full how to perform a particular task, and if along the way they also give other tips and tricks, all the better.

Only Members can offer their services. All tutorials will have to be vetted and (from what we've seen to date) many will be rejected. But if you become a regular, the income could be worthwhile. The payment schedule is subject to change, but will start at $10 a minute. That is to say, a 12 minute tutorial will fetch $120 for the creator. For screenshot tutorials, a flat fee of $20 for raw (that is, screenshots and text, no formatting) and $40 for formatted PDFs. We will supply a template.

How will you pay for these tutorials?

Because of international borders and other barriers associated with transferring money, we will stick to PayPal. If you want to be a supplier, you will have to have a PayPal account and we will transfer funds directly into that account.

Any more questions can be sent to membership@theelectricartist.com