Iguanadon Posted February 6, 2018 Report Share Posted February 6, 2018 (edited) I revamped my website so that ordering Harvey's patterns is more automated. They're now able to be downloaded when ordered instead of me having to email them out. In doing so, I spent over a day keying in all 450 patterns and setting up categories, etc. I realized I need to add images of the patterns with each one so folks can easily see what it looks like. But if I simply stick the image of the pattern, it could easily be "stolen"... so today I tried various things including making the images low quality so they couldn't print, but that failed so then I started looking at watermarks and found a way to watermark with a "logo" so I'm using one of my business card images to cover a large portion of the pattern... Take a look... I've gotten the cats done... 12 patterns down, about 438 to go... Multi-step process... 1) Convert PDF file to JPG using online free service 2) Download JPG 3) Open JPG, rotate it 270 degrees so it's facing the right way 4) Upload JPG to online free service to add the logo watermark 5) Download watermarked JPG 6) Upload watermarked JPG to my website 7) Link it to the individual item You can view the 12 cats via the drop down... https://www.woodcraftbyscott.com/collections/all-puzzles/products/puzzle-patterns-cats Edited February 6, 2018 by Iguanadon wombatie, tomsteve, OCtoolguy and 1 other 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rdatelle Posted February 6, 2018 Report Share Posted February 6, 2018 Good job Iggy. That's a lot of work to do but it will pay off in the long run. OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jbrowning Posted February 6, 2018 Report Share Posted February 6, 2018 Any chance do you have photoshop Scott? I am able to apply my logo to my race pictures I have in a single folder all at one time. OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iguanadon Posted February 6, 2018 Author Report Share Posted February 6, 2018 1 minute ago, rdatelle said: Good job Iggy. That's a lot of work to do but it will pay off in the long run. That's what I keep telling myself Ralph... "It's worth the time, it's worth the effort... really..." LOL tomsteve and OCtoolguy 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iguanadon Posted February 6, 2018 Author Report Share Posted February 6, 2018 1 minute ago, jbrowning said: Any chance do you have photoshop Scott? I am able to apply my logo to my race pictures I have in a single folder all at one time. No, I don't JB. If my website would accept PDF images instead of requiring JPG that would save a few steps. And I have to position the watermark/business card manually to cover certain parts of the pattern. I want the head and the first letter to show. I have to size it and position it differently each time. OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Woodmaster1 Posted February 6, 2018 Report Share Posted February 6, 2018 Awesome job you are doing for us. I hope it pays off for you. OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tomsteve Posted February 6, 2018 Report Share Posted February 6, 2018 (edited) great idea there! Edited February 6, 2018 by tomsteve OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scrolling Steve Posted February 7, 2018 Report Share Posted February 7, 2018 You will get it done Scott !...Hang in there ! OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kmmcrafts Posted February 7, 2018 Report Share Posted February 7, 2018 (edited) Just so you know.. and maybe you don't care.. but google will throw out images that are watermarked or masked like this.. so it's going to hurt you in the term of SEO which will lower your ranking with google... Been there done that Aside from that.. it looks great as long as people will be able to find you Edited February 7, 2018 by kmmcrafts OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rob Posted February 7, 2018 Report Share Posted February 7, 2018 Good idea Scott. You can also add watermarks to photos in Gimp which would save you having to upload to an online service and back again. I think you can even do batches of images. Google is your friend, All the best, Rob Iguanadon and OCtoolguy 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iguanadon Posted February 7, 2018 Author Report Share Posted February 7, 2018 75 done... All of the small categories... Tomorrow evening will be the non-puzzle category. OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lawson56 Posted February 7, 2018 Report Share Posted February 7, 2018 Fantastic job Iggy It will pay off. OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
don in brooklin on Posted February 7, 2018 Report Share Posted February 7, 2018 Really looks great. It can be done in GIMP (free program). I don't know about batches but in Gimp. 1. Open PDF 2. Rotate 3. Paste in image of card. (I had a jpg of KISS). I already had in Clip Board 4. Export to JGP Iguanadon, OCtoolguy and NC Scroller 1 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iguanadon Posted February 7, 2018 Author Report Share Posted February 7, 2018 (edited) 2 hours ago, don in brooklin on said: Really looks great. It can be done in GIMP (free program). I don't know about batches but in Gimp. 1. Open PDF 2. Rotate 3. Paste in image of card. (I had a jpg of KISS). I already had in Clip Board 4. Export to JGP Thanks Don and Rob, I'll give that a look this morning. I have Gimp, but have never actually used it. Edited February 7, 2018 by Iguanadon OCtoolguy 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iguanadon Posted February 7, 2018 Author Report Share Posted February 7, 2018 (edited) Further proof why SSV is the best online community... Don and Rob, thanks for suggesting Gimp, I can do steps 1-5 all in there... It's saving me multiple steps and once I figure out the little nuances of the tool I'll be able to get the remaining 300+ images done much quicker. Edited February 7, 2018 by Iguanadon meflick and OCtoolguy 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iguanadon Posted February 7, 2018 Author Report Share Posted February 7, 2018 241 done... only the dogs left to go... 140 of them... Tomorrow... or Friday... meflick and OCtoolguy 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rjweb Posted February 8, 2018 Report Share Posted February 8, 2018 looks good Scott, how does woodenteddybear do it, so they don't have the picture blocked, i understand your reason but all i see is your card, I am not being crictial just a suggestion, sorry if i am stepping on your toes didn't mean to do that, RJ Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iguanadon Posted February 8, 2018 Author Report Share Posted February 8, 2018 (edited) 1 hour ago, rjweb said: looks good Scott, how does woodenteddybear do it, so they don't have the picture blocked, i understand your reason but all i see is your card, I am not being crictial just a suggestion, sorry if i am stepping on your toes didn't mean to do that, RJ Not critial at all, glad you asked. WTB has a tiny image of what looks like a cut puzzle. It can't be copied, so it can't be enlarged or anything. I didn't have that capability, nor do I have the time to cut all of the animals I have patterns for. Covering up a portion of the pattern was my solution. I made sure to leave the head and the first letter visible, and the legs or other features so people could get a rough idea of what the animal would look like. For the majority of them, they can see the actual puzzle that I've cut on my site. Edited February 8, 2018 by Iguanadon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kmmcrafts Posted February 8, 2018 Report Share Posted February 8, 2018 I personally feel you're blocking most of the image and most items I cannot tell exactly what it is.. Like thewoodenteddybear shows a very small image of the finished piece.. which I like to see the finished piece and decide if I want to purchase the plans to make the same thing.. Many people ( yes even scroll sawers ) have a hard time picturing what the drawing would actually look like in wood.. all they see is a bunch of lines.. Unless you're very experience sawer and do some design work can many people make out what it is.. Plus your hurting the web sites rank in searches because of the water mark / promotional business card being in the image.. Google and other search engines will throw the site off the searches for poor pictures.. See the link https://www.volusion.com/blog/7-major-google-shopping-image-mistakes/ Besides.. there is enough images of those puzzles all over the internet that one could print and cut their own puzzle right off of a photo if one was to want to steal the design.. Take a look on Etsy.. especially Duke's images.. most of his images are a straight on view.. that most anyone could cut the design out with just a minor tweaking.. Sure it probably wouldn't be exact.. but.. close enough that the average person isn't going to notice the difference.. I know you put in a lot of work doing this.. but I just don't think the effort is going to help you one bit in keeping people from stealing the designs.. and it's sure going to throw your site at the bottom of the list on searches.. I've been selling online since 1997.. and in the beginning.. I did a lot of trial and error.. mostly error.. and it's still a daily challenge to keep good search rankings.. Google indexes pages about every couple weeks.. if they index this page as is.. it'll get thrown out.. then you'll be waiting another couple weeks for them to put you back in.. however in an error violation as this.. you'll start at the bottom of the list and have to work it's way back up.. Hope you don't think I'm being harsh or a know it all.. after all the work you put in.. I'm just telling it from experience and training I've had.. Maybe ask some opinions from others on this.. see if they can tell what the image is.. but the few I seen.. didn't even show 1/3 of the puzzle.. it was a big freaking advertisement in the way..LOL Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kmmcrafts Posted February 8, 2018 Report Share Posted February 8, 2018 34 minutes ago, Iguanadon said: Not critial at all, glad you asked. WTB has a tiny image of what looks like a cut puzzle. It can't be copied, so it can't be enlarged or anything. I didn't have that capability, nor do I have the time to cut all of the animals I have patterns for. Covering up a portion of the pattern was my solution. I made sure to leave the head and the first letter visible, and the legs or other features so people could get a rough idea of what the animal would look like. For the majority of them, they can see the actual puzzle that I've cut on my site. You don't need to cut the puzzles to make them look like wood.. You can use gimp.. maybe insskape and use the bucket fill tool.. In gimp they have a wood selection and you can fill the pattern in with the wood colors of choice.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kmmcrafts Posted February 8, 2018 Report Share Posted February 8, 2018 Oopps I link to a blog on that last post.. as I was looking for the google image rules.. This is straight from google. https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/6101131?hl=en Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Iguanadon Posted February 8, 2018 Author Report Share Posted February 8, 2018 19 minutes ago, kmmcrafts said: I personally feel you're blocking most of the image and most items I cannot tell exactly what it is.. Like thewoodenteddybear shows a very small image of the finished piece.. which I like to see the finished piece and decide if I want to purchase the plans to make the same thing.. Many people ( yes even scroll sawers ) have a hard time picturing what the drawing would actually look like in wood.. all they see is a bunch of lines.. Unless you're very experience sawer and do some design work can many people make out what it is.. Plus your hurting the web sites rank in searches because of the water mark / promotional business card being in the image.. Google and other search engines will throw the site off the searches for poor pictures.. See the link https://www.volusion.com/blog/7-major-google-shopping-image-mistakes/ Besides.. there is enough images of those puzzles all over the internet that one could print and cut their own puzzle right off of a photo if one was to want to steal the design.. Take a look on Etsy.. especially Duke's images.. most of his images are a straight on view.. that most anyone could cut the design out with just a minor tweaking.. Sure it probably wouldn't be exact.. but.. close enough that the average person isn't going to notice the difference.. I know you put in a lot of work doing this.. but I just don't think the effort is going to help you one bit in keeping people from stealing the designs.. and it's sure going to throw your site at the bottom of the list on searches.. I've been selling online since 1997.. and in the beginning.. I did a lot of trial and error.. mostly error.. and it's still a daily challenge to keep good search rankings.. Google indexes pages about every couple weeks.. if they index this page as is.. it'll get thrown out.. then you'll be waiting another couple weeks for them to put you back in.. however in an error violation as this.. you'll start at the bottom of the list and have to work it's way back up.. Hope you don't think I'm being harsh or a know it all.. after all the work you put in.. I'm just telling it from experience and training I've had.. Maybe ask some opinions from others on this.. see if they can tell what the image is.. but the few I seen.. didn't even show 1/3 of the puzzle.. it was a big freaking advertisement in the way..LOL I appreciate the in depth thoughts and response. What I have to count on is that visitors realize they can see the puzzles in the puzzle categories for 75% of the patterns right there on my site. I'm simply showing what the pattern will look like for the animals in the pattern categories, particularly for the 25% that I haven't cut and show on my site. I could link/display the exact same puzzle image for the items that I do have photos of, but then it would be a mix of puzzle images and images of patterns. I'll have to take a look at what you're referring to as far as fake puzzle images. Considering that before I started this 2 days ago, there was nothing but a single spot to order patterns and you had to type in the animal/breed without seeing anything at all other than the puzzles I have cut and show. It's certainly a work in progress. kmmcrafts 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kmmcrafts Posted February 8, 2018 Report Share Posted February 8, 2018 (edited) 8 minutes ago, Iguanadon said: It's certainly a work in progress. Yeah I hear that for sure.. I've been trying to set up my amazon store.. that place is sure picky.. Photos have to have a white background.. and have to be sized a certain pixels etc etc.. so I've been spending these last few cold days in the house working on that.. was hoping to get my first listing up today.. but 4 orders came in all at once and they want these by Valentines day, LOL Edited February 8, 2018 by kmmcrafts Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rjweb Posted February 8, 2018 Report Share Posted February 8, 2018 Kevin, put your long underwear and booties on and go cutting, Rj kmmcrafts 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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