“Making products that are un-desired and do not sell is un-sustainable from a financial as well as an ecological point of view, they become instant waste.” Team CraftNation.com
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JOIN CRAFT NATION! You're missing out :l! Follow him @kevincraft AND suscribe his Youtube Channel --> http://t.co/1NDgyQGA! REAL&FUNNY! :D!!
Thank you Sew n Hip! Amelia Strawson gave us a great write up describing “CraftNation.com the revolutionary way to bring crafters and buyers together”. They also featured 3 of our fabulous designers work by Izabela, Heli and Julia!
As part of the work I’ve been doing on CraftNation I’ve been looking into image cropping and resizing. I’m sorry to say that due to a lack of affordable photo manipulation software1 we often get images which have come straight out of digital camera, and are huge, about 3meg each. And with the facility to upload 4 images per deal, this can ( and has ) maxed out PHP’s maximum upload size which is 8meg. In addition images from the camera are not square, which is a bit of a pain when you are displaying square images on your site, and also in specific dimensions. The typical aspect ratio for your images shot on a digital camera are 4:3 or 1.33 the same aspect ratio of the pre-widescreen televisions.
This means that the image is 1.33 times wider than it is high. And if you’ve been cropping out the corner of the airing horse which is just in shot then the aspect ratio could be anything.
Here we have a pale pink rectangle which is in the 4:3 ratio and centred over it is a darker square image.
Now simply resizing a wide (or tall) image to be square will result in the image being squashed, or stretched in one direction.
For the last while we’ve been troubled with how to make it easier for CraftNation users to deal with their images. We’ve toyed with a cropping feature on the upload form but to be honest this isn’t practical, they are on the site to upload their deals not do image manipulation.
So instead I’ve been working on some functionality that will2 go on behind the scenes after the images have been uploaded.
The first stage involves resizing the image so that the shortest side is the same length as that of our largest square image (in this case 350px) – this is because we want to resize as well as crop – so we make sure that we retain as much of the image as possible.
The second stage then crops the resized image so that it is a square, the code I’ve written crops from centre. If you think of your image as the pink one above, the code creates a square image which contains whatever is in the grey block above.
I used imagecopyresampled() to make sure that the image quality is kept as good as possible.
[1] There are a number of good web based photo manipulation sites such as Picnikwhich are a decent alternative to Adobe Photoshop and allow you to resize, crop and play around with the white balance and exposure.
[2] This feature has not yet been implemented on the site.
<?$img = $_GET['img'];$e = $_GET['e'];list($w, $h, $imageType) = getimagesize($img);$imageType = image_type_to_mime_type($imageType);// target edge lengthif(!$e){$e = 350;}// initialise to settings for a square image$new_w = $e;$new_h = $e;$x_offset = 0;$y_offset = 0;// wide imageif($h < $w){$new_w = ($w * $e)/$h;$x_offset = ($new_w/2) - ($e/2);}// tall imageelse if($w < $h){$new_h = ($h * $e)/$w;$y_offset = ($new_h/2) - ($e/2);}$orig_image = '';switch($imageType) {case "image/gif":$orig_image=imagecreatefromgif($img);break;case "image/pjpeg":case "image/jpeg":case "image/jpg":$orig_image=imagecreatefromjpeg($img);break;case "image/png":case "image/x-png":$orig_image=imagecreatefrompng($img);break;}// images$resized_img = imagecreatetruecolor($new_w, $new_h);$cropped_img = imagecreatetruecolor($e, $e);imagecopyresampled($resized_img, $orig_image, 0, 0, 0, 0, $new_w, $new_h, $w, $h);imagecopyresampled($cropped_img, $resized_img, 0, 0, $x_offset, $y_offset, $e, $e, $e, $e);//output the image to the browserheader('Content-type: image/jpeg');imagejpeg($cropped_img, null, 100);?>
Test image – set to 350px wide, note the height is less than 350
Image forced to be square
When we set the width to 350px above the height was less than 350px. By forcing the image to be 350px square the height has been pulled to make it 350 as well, resulting in a horizontal squash and vertical stretch and a very unimpressed Amelia.
This is how it should look not squashed nor stretched but a nice centred crop.
So, you’ve got your twitter account sorted and you’re feeling positive this is going to change your life (somehow) but you want to use it for business (probably) and you’ve heard about hashtags, but not sure how or why you might use them.
What is a #hashtag? The “hash” is this: “#” you’ve all seen one of those. The “tag” is: the word you want to bring – entice, intrigue, tempt – people to you twitter stream.
Twitter automagically adds click through links to hashtags so you can click and view a stream of tweets related to that hashtag, for example #handmade. The most exciting part is if your hashtag is, if it’s intriguing enough, it creates a viral marketing effect. Many clicks and retweets can start a #hashtag “trend” on twitter.
Trends on Twitter today:
One example of the most memorable #hashtag trending campaigns I’ve seen, happened back in 2009. I’m not sure if anyone has been able to recreate it, but here lies a challenge.
The #moonfruit twitter campaign. A simple campaign created by it’s Chief Marketing Officer, Wendy Tan White to celebrate the companies 10th Birthday and increase the profile of the company www.moonfruit.com. Run to win several mac book pros, by posting your definition of #moonfruit in words, photos, websites, etc. onto twitter the most popular entries got chosen to win. #moonfruit attracted over 400 tweets a minute, which resulted in the 23,000 extra followers. Wendy Tan White: “The campaign has only been running for two days and after day one visits to our site were up 50%. By day two they were up 600%. The numbers of people trialling have also doubled.”
How can this apply to your business or campaign?
1. Think of a cool short hashtag which relates to your business. One or two words. Make it memorable, not difficult to remember or understand, but make it yours.
2. Chose a campaign, launch of new business, celebrating a birthday, opening a new store, Valentines, something you do daily?
3. Make the theme of your campaign related to the #hashtag. For example #watercoolermoment has been very successful for @bitsytalk and #elevenses is a great place to connect with people at the same time everyday! Both have trended on twitter.
4. Give your #hashtag a call to action: #moonfruit – what’s your definition of moonfruit? #elevenses – join us for coffee and cake. Get your twitter followers to do something for your #hashtag something simple or creative.
5. Give something away. This doesn’t have to cost much. It could be a piece of jewellery, cakes, iPads and bikes (for those with a bigger budget) or maybe your time or expertise perhaps?
6. Got some money to spend? “Promoted” trends work like this: Promoted Trends is the exclusive opportunity to feature a Trend related to your business at the top of this Trends list. When a user clicks on the Trend, they are taken to the conversation for that trend – with your Promoted Tweets pegged to the top of the timeline.
We would love to see some of your ideas come to life. If you have a creative business and would like to start using #hashtags we would love to hear and see your ideas. Get in touch email me at: louise at craftnation dot com
Happy #hashtagging!
We’ve been asked this question a couple of times and it came back as a feedback comment, so here’s a quick reason why.
We are committed to continuously improving your experience on our CraftNation.com. Facebook Login, formerly known as Facebook Connect, already exists as an option for members to login to CraftNation.com [plus 3 other options - Your Goolge Email Address, Twitter login and Yahoo]. The overall benefit of utilising these and Facebook Login is that users can immediately connect with those they rely on and trust most: their Facebook friend network [coming soon]. Also, Facebook Login adds simplicity to CraftNation.com by helping users streamline their friend lists [coming soon] and eliminating the need for users to have to remember multiple logins. Facebook Login has revolutionized login across the Web, and we’re catching the wave.
Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!
Time and time again we spot designers running into the same wall. Many designers who work from home and work on their designs part-time (whilst also holding down a part-time job and family) can save themselves much time and money by following a few simple steps, and taking a few leaves from the books of big fashion and design houses.
Some simple preparation can increase your conversion rates tenfold. Want to stop your online store from looking like a bazaar? Want to get your collections into the big stores? Read on.
1. Create 2 Seasonal Collections per year: Spring/Summer and Autumn/Winter (even if you make candles or chocolates – you can still do this!). You may not have to redesign your collection EVERY year but you can change colours to suit seasons. Satellite Jewellery Paris – are the masters at this - Look at the exotic names they have given their SS collection. They have four SS collections, but you only need to start with 1.
2. Create a colour mood board for each season – fresher lighter flavours and colours in the summer and darker more vampy colours, designs, flavours in the winter. Decide what colours you will use in advance. You may need to work six months in advance, but this attention to detail will increase your sales. Use Vogue.com fashion trends to see what colours are in fashion next season – it’s brilliant and fun!
3. Give your seasonal collection a NAME! eg: The Monarch Collection or The Strawberry Thief or The Deco Collection, something which people can use their imagination to purchase, based on the seasons trends.
4. Keep your lines to 12 items maximum (less if possible to start off with) don’t fill your shop with a bunch of random items that have no relation to each other, and if your shop looks like that, be ruthless remove old stock that never sells.
5. It is better to have 5 best-selling items from a coherent collection which TELLS A STORY, than 20 items which don’t relate to each other, bar the fact the may all be made of reclaimed wool, glass, hand crocheted.
People love stories, people want to have their imaginations captured when they go shopping, and repeate sales come fom “add on items” (Oh I bought the hat for my daughter for Christmas, she loved it – maybe I should get the the matching gloves for her birthday).
6. Photograph a collection – as a collection. Not as 12 different pieces all on different backgrounds. Look how Chanel have used a striking red background to COMPLEMENT their light coloured bags. You can do this, you are creative! Always remember the Golden Rule – shoot light items on darker backgrounds and vice versa.
7. Create one ’showpiece’ item a the pinnacle of your collection each season. All other items in your collection should be a spin off from that showpiece, using the same colours or fabrics.
This is a showpiece by Alexander McQueen he made it stand out. Your showpiece will be the item you send to all your Press contacts, make your designs STAND OUT! (Yes you can do this with candles, chocolates, jewellery, handbags and shoes!) Hook up with a fashion designer, who needs jewellery to complement their line. Make candles? Hook up with a homewares designer and shoot your goodies together!
8. Already have a best selling item or design? Create SS and AW colour-ways around that item don’t reinvent the wheel if it is doing well.
[Heli Designs from Ireland created this beautiful "Showpiece" Bolero Jacket. Unique and desirable. Items created around the "Monarch" theme could be: ear-muffs, gloves, scarf, hand warmer/muff, beret.]
9. Not sure what sells? Why not start by uploading an item or prototype onto the CraftNation.com Showcase? Gain valuable feedback on your designs before your collection production. Save yourself time and money.
Please feel free to reblog this post in your own blog if you found it helpful. Please make sure your credit us, with a link to our website. Original article by: Louise Campbell, founder at CraftNation.com – A Designer’s Best Friend. Thanks for reading.
Day to business behind the scenes at CraftNation.com is part web development, part strategy implementation and part domestic wrangle. Both Alice and I have families, but we’ve found it’s not necessarily a prerequisite for brain-death, in fact in our case the complete opposite. So if you don’t see us tweeting or blogging enough, that’s kind of why.
We are obsessed with e-commerce and giving designers an extremely valuable platform to sell their work. We are inspired by doing things differently, but humble enough to realise that this can take time. We have an integrated feedback system set up set up her for all your suggestions, we may not be able to reply to everything straight away (unless it technical bug – in which case Alice is on the case) but it’s on our to-do list, right away!
Over the next few months we hope to keep you posted on our business journey and how we do *stay focused* despite irregular urges to play Angry Birds, surf Quora, do Yoga and go cycling, you may even get a few twitpics of what that looks like done – in synergy 
I am a creative founder and Alice Still is our Technical Lead. Ameer Khan is our Marketing Officer (my secondary eyes and ears – I can’t recommend a pair of those enough). We are also extremely lucky to have one of the best mentors in the digital space in London, her name is Inma Martinez from Stradbrooke Investment Advisors. We met Inma last year at an Astia event (Astia is a network for female entrepreneurs in technology industries if you are interested in them drop them an email) Inma is Spanish and fabulous, and obsessed with delivering a great digital product as we are. We are very lucky, thanks for joining our team Inma!
Please take 5 mins to answer our questionnaire “What are Your Biggest Challenges”.
If you leave your address we’ll send you pack of “super-cool” CraftNation stickers designed by Marcroy Smith from the uber cool ‘People of Print’ collective.
A big thanks to Rach (aka @BalancedCrafts) who gave us a great write up in their fabulous online blog and handmade resource called ‘Balanced’. Much appreciated!
In business, being small has its advantages. You can move quicker, adapt and pass savings onto your customers. But it’s often a challenge to get yourself noticed amongst ‘the big guys’. Proving that size doesn’t matter, here are five ways you can ‘big up’ your small business.
One of the best and certainly one of the cheapest ways to promote your small business is by word of mouth. Write to some people you know but don’t see very often, like old friends and colleagues, and let them know what you’re up to. Ask for their feedback and introductions to contacts that might be able to spread the word about your small business. And don’t be shy! People love to help.
Networking can be quite scary, but the trick is not to feel like you have to sell, sell, sell. It’s all about listening, building relationships and helping others. Those are some of the best ways, ultimately, to sell your services and promote your small business.
We’re all familiar with using the web in our personal lives. Email, Facebook and Twitter are all excellent ways to promote your small business too. But networking online is a lot like networking in person. Remember to listen, to build relationships and help others. No-one likes a spammer!
There are places on the Internet where you can promote your small business to a targeted audience, like on Bitsy – one of the friendliest B2B marketplaces on the web.
You can promote your small business by doing a bit of PR yourself. Get started by writing a press release and sending it on to five websites or magazines that are popular with your target market. Remember to make the release focused, as anything too generic won’t get published.
If you’ve done a good job, let others know about it! Ask your existing customers for feedback and whether they’d mind you using a quote on your website. Make sure you let them know how you’ll use their testimonial and give them full credit. Anonymous testimonials aren’t that impressive! But positive customer experiences are a great way to promote your small business.
San Sharma
San is online community manager and web editor at Bitsy, the friendliest B2B marketplace on the web.
Photo credit: woodleywonderworks
Thankfully, long gone are the day’s when the art of crochet conjured up images of dusty old tables clothes in dank grey or faded white.
One of the coolest crafts – in our opinion – is the online revival of crocheting (pronounced crochet-ing with a silent “t”) revealed some 18M entries on the subject. With crochet patterns being the most popular entry.
One of the largest crochet groups on flickr is called The Happy Hookers!
Our personal favourite at CraftNation.com the hottest UK crochet designer we know: Izabela Ignatowska. Izabela is Polish and lives in Buckinghamshire with her young family.
We especially love her use of colour and design and over the last 3 years have watched her work develop into some fabulous designs. Each item is handmade and her Victorian inspired mittens are a bestseller and also featured as the leader of the pack in this weeks CraftNation.com showcase.
Inspired by Victorian and romantic fashion, spiced up to look retro, gifts handmade and created great with care, flowers, leaves, pom poms, bows, de luxe designs, made and designed (unless otherwise stated) by Izabela Motyl ♥ each item can be custom made for you.
Here are some fabulous examples of more of Izebela’s work we hope to see more of at CraftNation.com we especially love her shawls, slippers and berets.
