The approach probably begins by saying that the scammer has seen your web-site and would like to buy a picture. They say that they want to give it as a gift to somebody else. Suspicious sign number 1: they ask you to email them some images. (If they have seen the web-site they have access to these for themselves.) Test the situation by sending only one image. Suspicious sign number 2: they accept your suggestion immediately. You name a price, which is accepted without question. Suspicious sign number 3: the purchaser wants you to send the picture to an address where it will be stored pending the occasion when it is to be presented. They promise to pay the cost of the picture immediately, but ask you to send money to the storage company to cover the costs of storage, festive repackaging and onward transit. The sum requested is suspiciously large. This indicates that they are not interested in the picture: they just want you to send some money. You respond by insisting that you are unwilling to make any payments to them, and that the full cost of the transaction must be in your bank a/c before you will take any action. Any resistance on their part at this point is a definite give-away that they are attempting a scam. Note that the initial approach might well be in impeccable English, but as the correspondence goes on and they are faced with possible departures from the script, the quality of the language may well start to deteriorate. If they have given you an address at any point it is always possible to look this up on Google earth. It may well confirm your worst suspicions. In one of the two attempts to scam me the address given for an “American businessman” was a run-down looking estate agent’s office. I gather that there is a lot of it about, so if you are an artist, watch your back!