Where They Are Now: Dimpled Rock and the Fine Art of Golf

Valhalla Golf Club Photography by Dimpled Rock
Gary Kellner of Dimpled Rock photographed Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville, Ky., for the PGA Championship, which returns to the club in 2014.

When you focus on a specific market you’re subject to its whims and cycles. In order to weather whatever storms that may batter that particular market you have to be flexible and creative.

Dimpled Rock, a company that specializes in golf course photography, has done just that. We first profiled Dimpled Rock about five years ago in the In Focus eNewsletter as the business was first starting to take off.

Dimpled Rock Canvas Print
Dimpled Rock uses Sunset Select Matte Canvas to create a painterly feel for golf club prints that are either framed or gallery wrapped.

With figurative economic storms and literal storms, like Hurricane Sandy, Dimpled Rock’s Gary Kellner says the photography side of the business has been stagnant as of late.

“The general economic conditions at some of the golf clubs have had an impact on our photography. We had also focused our efforts on New England and Sandy pretty much devastated the landscape in a lot of areas. They’re losing trees and having to re-do their bunkers, so they’re not ready to have their courses photographed until they can get them back in shape,” explains Kellner.

Fine Art Prints of Golf Courses
Dimpled Rock also produces black and white images of golf clubs, like this shot from Ravenna, that are printed on LexJet Sunset Velvet Rag or LexJet Premium Archival Matte.

However, the print production side has been growing steadily. With its comprehensive imaging program for golf clubs, Dimpled Rock elevates the way golf clubs present themselves and provides them with high-end photography that can be used in a variety of media, both online and in print.

“The clubs are fully engaged in using the prints as awards instead of glass trophies. Now they’re doing really nice framed photographs with plaques on them for club championships and event prizes. That has provided a huge influx of work into our basic production. It’s not just wall art anymore,” says Kellner.

Barrington Golf Club Photos by Dimpled Rock
Barrington Golf Club in Aurora, Ohio, photographed by Gary Kellner, Dimpled Rock.

Dimpled Rock typically prints on LexJet Premium Archival Matte Paper and LexJet Sunset Velvet Rag 315g for framed fine art prints, and LexJet Sunset Select Matte Canvas, either framed or gallery wrapped, for canvas reproductions.

“The business is definitely morphing into something more than what we started,” says Kellner. “We’ve been doing some pretty large prints. The biggest one we did recently was eight feet long for someone’s house.”

Dimpled Rock’s value is in the company’s ability to photograph, design and produce an all-encompassing visual program for a golf club.

Photo by Dimpled Rock“I’ve had several projects where I was shooting everything from the golf course to the interiors, including staff, food service, and so forth. They can have everything they need without having to hassle with 15 different people,” says Kellner.

The word about Dimpled Rock is getting around the golf market. Kellner recently photographed Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville, Ky., for all of the club’s promotional materials leading up to the 2014 PGA Championship.

“We’re in the infancy part of our relationship with the PGA. They’re blown away because they’re not used to getting the quality of files I’m giving them,” says Kellner.

The Next Dimension of Fine Art Reproduction at Bellevue Fine Art

Bellevue Fine Art Reproduction got its start as a way to solve a problem. For the company’s owner, Scott Moore, the problem was finding a way to reproduce his watercolor and pen-and-ink fine art. The solution was to do it himself, perfect the process and provide the service to artists and photographers in the Seattle/Bellevue area of Washington.

Spraying and coating canvas“At the time I was traveling a lot internationally and I tried places that did giclee printing in Japan, China, Canada and Paris. I wasn’t getting the color I wanted, and with the pen-and-ink I wasn’t getting the extreme detail I needed. Using my own artwork as a beta test I ended up making my own reproductions, and the more I looked around the more I saw that the Seattle area needed a business like this. There was a need for it, and there still is,” says Moore.

Moore opened the doors of Bellevue Fine Art Reproduction in April 2007, starting with a BetterLight scan-back system to scan and capture artwork, two Epson Stylus Pro 9800s and a software RIP for processing the files for print.

Fine art and photography reproductionSince that time, Moore has updated his BetterLight System, upgraded to two Epson Stylus Pro 9900s, moved his RIP workflow to ImagePrint and most recently added a 24″ x 36″ laser engraver table. Moore says that about 90 percent of his business is fine-art reproduction; the other 10 percent is photo reproduction.

Moore serves a narrow niche, but is expanding the options and opportunities of his client base. Moore sees himself as far more than simply an art reproduction company; his job is to help his clients find a wider market for their work.

Laser etching fine art“We look at each artist’s artwork as intellectual property that can be productized in different ways, from limited edition prints to cutting vector designs of their work into various materials,” explains Moore. “We want to take people’s existing assets and help them do interesting things with them.”

What that has translated to with the addition of the laser engraver is products like etching artwork into leather for purses, cutting patterns into Masonite that the artist then paints and has Bellevue Fine Art reproduce, die-cutting Photo Tex Repositionable Fabric for walls and other surfaces, and even etching urns for a local funeral home.

Reproducing fine art on canvasThe addition of the laser engraver is a perfect fit for Moore’s customer service philosophy. As he puts it: “Providing good service is more than calling back and being on the ball. We’re very well connected with the art community so we provide a lot of services to people you wouldn’t normally think of, like gallery introductions, suggestions on where to show their work, and advice on ways to display and sell their work. Service is a lot more than giving someone a cup of coffee while they wait for their print. We try to be connected and active in the art world so we can complement our services in other ways, such as introductions and industry knowledge. It’s symbiotic; the more we do for them to help them be successful the more they come back to us because they are successful. Service is all about that ecosystem around the artist; anything I can do to help them be successful makes me more successful.”

Of course it’s all for naught if Moore isn’t producing the output to the exacting needs of his client base, which is why he keeps up with the latest workflow and printing technology and spends additional time educating his clients and setting expectations.

Scanning artwork with the BetterLight system“When we evolved to the Epson 9900s we also went with the ImagePrint RIP. If you’re in the business of printing art all day long, you don’t want to think about how to get it out the other end. When you drag and drop those images into the interface and select the correct profile, that’s all you have to think about. It makes our workflow that much faster; anyone who values their time should be willing to spend their money on that,” explains Moore. “Printing is just like painting. One of the successful traits of painter is knowing when you’re done. You could re-do it forever, but you’ll probably be the only one to notice. When you’re trying to reproduce a masterpiece for sale you have to strike a balance. We’re working with aqueous inks, where the originals are sometimes made with ground gems or minerals, creating iridescents, fluorescents and metallics. The challenge is helping them understand the limitations of the technology and how to best utilize it. Some people don’t want the reproduction unless it’s perfect. The prints are as close as we can get them, but if it’s that important, buy the original, which is why an original costs so much more. There’s only one perfect copy of an original, and that’s the original. We spend a lot of time setting expectations, and we won’t just write an order and take their money unless we think they will be happy with it.”

Toward that end, Moore employs a variety of inkjet materials from LexJet, including Sunset and Hahnemuhle brand fine art and photo papers. Moore says the material choice is usually based on what comes closest to replicating the original. For instance, he’ll typically use Sunset Textured Fine Art Paper for watercolor art, Hahnemuhle Bamboo for “warmer” originals, and FineArt Baryta for acrylic originals.

“My personal favorites are Sunset Fibre Elite, Sunset Photo eSatin Paper, LexJet Premium Archival Matte and Hahnemuhle FineArt papers. Sunset Fibre Elite for black-and-white printing is stellar; it looks and feels a lot like the old metal halide papers. It’s a special, unique paper that, when placed next to other photo papers, really stands out; the color jumps out at you,” says Moore. “Our staple papers are Sunset Photo eSatin and Premium Archival Matte, which we use for proofing as well.”

Producing fine art in multiple=Though Bellevue Fine Art Reproduction has only been in business for about five years, the company is attracting and retaining business beyond its borders, especially from those looking for high-quality scanning services.

“We’ve invested heavily in making sure our image scanning and output is the best it can be. We pick quality materials and equipment, and we don’t worry about cost that much. How we do that and compete in today’s world is that we’ve captured a niche that is high margin and low volume. We’ll take the jobs other printers don’t want; we’ll do 10 watercolors, for instance, that a commercial print company would prefer not to bother with,” says Moore. “So rather than compete with larger print shops, we actually complement them. There are a number of print shops in the area that come to us for scanning, and they do things we don’t do, so we have a good complementary business with our would-be competition in the area.”