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Author Topic: Need Help w/ New SymbioStock Website (ShazamImages)  (Read 3898 times)

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ShazamImages

  • ShazamImages.com
« on: August 06, 2013, 12:58 »
0
First off, I would like to say "Thank You!" to Leo, and everyone else that helped make this project come to life, for their very hard work in making the Symbiostock theme, and for the generosity in making it an open-source project.  This project has given me back the passion that I used to have for creating images (which I lost over the years as the major stock sites have short-changed us time and time again).

I have been working on creating a new Symbiostock website for the last few weeks.  It isn't finished yet (will it ever be?), but I think that it is ready to open up to others.  I don't have all of my images up yet, but I thought that there were enough images for someone to get the look and feel of the website.

I was hoping that some of you could take a look at the website and give me some constructive criticism and feedback.  After you look at something day after day, you can overlook some things that should be relatively apparent.  I am hoping that a fresh set of eyes will be able to see things that I have overlooked.

In addition, I have made a few modifications to the code and would like to get your opinions on them.  Here are some of the changes that I have made:

- I have added text above each image thumbnail to show whether it is exclusive.  See here for an example:
http://shazamimages.com/image-type/exclusive-category/

- I have added a section below each watermarked image (called "Notes Regarding This Image") that includes text about licensing and watermarks.  See here for an example:
http://shazamimages.com/image/fractal-infinite-wall-records-cds/?r=http://shazamimages.com

- I have removed all references to "Royalty Free" from the website.  I never liked that term and think that it is very confusing to customers.

- Since I wanted to make this a pure stock image sales site, I removed all references to blogs and comments.

- I changed the number of images displayed for most of the widgets and search results.  For example, I felt that displaying 24 images for a search result was too little, so I increased it to 48 images.  You can see that here:
http://shazamimages.com/?s=&post_type=image

- I changed the default image sizes, since I felt that I wanted to be in line with what most of the major competition is doing.  I would eventually like to make this customer-definable.

Please let me know what you think.  I would greatly appreciate any and all constructive feedback that you might have.

Finally, I was hoping that a few of you would be so kind as to add my website to your network.  I would be extremely honored.


« Reply #1 on: August 06, 2013, 15:07 »
0
Hi Shazam,

I just spent some time looking over your site.  Looks great!  Here are a few thoughts I had:

I don't think you need the colorful bar across the top with the under construction message.  Just my opinion but I think it is distracting and the homepage would look much cleaner without it.  As you said, the site will always be under construction behind the scenes and it looks great now and seems to function well.  No need to apologize for the appearance.

In your footer, on the right hand side you could/should add some links to outside authority sites.  It could even be links to your twitter, facebook etc. profiles. I would also add in the footer section somewhere a link to a privacy policy statement.  It's unlikely anyone will click on any of your footer links but these will give your site legitimacy in the eyes of google and help your seo.

How did you increase the number of images displaying on searches?  Did you use the plugin that Leo made or did you do it some other way?

Are you planning to add your own watermark?  How about a picture or logo for your symbiostock icon?

I liked the addition of the "this image is protected by copyright..."  I think I may add something like that.

I didn't read every word but I didn't see any obvious typos or anything.

« Reply #2 on: August 06, 2013, 15:16 »
0
Hi Shazam,

I just spent some time looking over your site.  Looks great!  Here are a few thoughts I had:

I don't think you need the colorful bar across the top with the under construction message.  Just my opinion but I think it is distracting and the homepage would look much cleaner without it.  As you said, the site will always be under construction behind the scenes and it looks great now and seems to function well.  No need to apologize for the appearance.

In your footer, on the right hand side you could/should add some links to outside authority sites.  It could even be links to your twitter, facebook etc. profiles. I would also add in the footer section somewhere a link to a privacy policy statement.  It's unlikely anyone will click on any of your footer links but these will give your site legitimacy in the eyes of google and help your seo.

How did you increase the number of images displaying on searches?  Did you use the plugin that Leo made or did you do it some other way?

Are you planning to add your own watermark?  How about a picture or logo for your symbiostock icon?

I liked the addition of the "this image is protected by copyright..."  I think I may add something like that.

I didn't read every word but I didn't see any obvious typos or anything.

I more or less agree with CrackerClips.

I have to add that the mouseover icons below vertical or square images with that exclusive banner on top show up mixed with content below (Firefox/Windows 7).

Good site, great images. Would network with you but my 10 slots are filled  :(

Leo Blanchette

« Reply #3 on: August 06, 2013, 21:28 »
0
Great great looking website. I'd drop the "under construction" notice though.

Mostly I have only good stuff to say - its extremely basic, easy to navigate. I'm actually impressed with just how useful the simplicity can be.

Sorry, I don't have any more suggestions. You're doing great!

I love this one http://shazamimages.com/image/closeup-water-drop-blood-red/

marthamarks

« Reply #4 on: August 07, 2013, 00:31 »
0
How did you increase the number of images displaying on searches?  Did you use the plugin that Leo made or did you do it some other way?

...

I liked the addition of the "this image is protected by copyright..."  I think I may add something like that.

Shazam, I also think your site looks just great, and I'd also like to incorporate those two things snipped from Cracker Clips' post.

Please do tell us how you increased the number of images per page. I'd really like to do that.

Congrats on the progress you're making and... thanks for sharing!

marthamarks

« Reply #5 on: August 07, 2013, 00:35 »
0
One more thing...

You wrote:
- I have removed all references to "Royalty Free" from the website.  I never liked that term and think that it is very confusing to customers.

I agree completely with that and have dropped the Royalty Free term wherever I could manually do that. But somewhere (that I can't remember right now) I saw the term pop up automatically when I clicked from point A to point B. Not sure where it was, but if you saw that too, please let us know how you removed it.

Thanks again.

« Reply #6 on: August 07, 2013, 01:56 »
0
There's "royalty free" hard coded in files

archive-image.php

and

Inc\Classes\network-manager\interpreter.php

You can edit it like I did for my site or just wait for Leo. I believe he is onto it for the next version of the theme.


ShazamImages

  • ShazamImages.com
« Reply #7 on: August 07, 2013, 08:24 »
0
I don't think you need the colorful bar across the top with the under construction message.  Just my opinion but I think it is distracting and the homepage would look much cleaner without it.  As you said, the site will always be under construction behind the scenes and it looks great now and seems to function well.  No need to apologize for the appearance.

Thanks.  I will remove the bar for now.  I was thinking about using the bar in the future for messages about sales events or other newsworthy items.  Do you think that would be alright?  Or do you think that the message bar is just ugly?

In your footer, on the right hand side you could/should add some links to outside authority sites.  It could even be links to your twitter, facebook etc. profiles. I would also add in the footer section somewhere a link to a privacy policy statement.  It's unlikely anyone will click on any of your footer links but these will give your site legitimacy in the eyes of google and help your seo.

Good idea.  As I stated, I haven't finished the website yet.  I was planning to add something to the right-side of the footer section, to balance it out, but I hadn't come up with anything concrete yet.

I already have a privacy policy on my To Do list (along with a whole bunch of other stuff).

How did you increase the number of images displaying on searches?  Did you use the plugin that Leo made or did you do it some other way?

I modified the code to make the changes.  I have been in the IT industry for almost a few decades.  I have never worked with PHP and didn't have much knowledge of WordPress or CSS, but I decided to tackle it.  It has been a struggle for me, since I haven't done any real programming in about 10 years, but it is starting to come back to me little by little.

One of the hurdles with the Symbiostock code is that it is object-oriented.  That makes development a little easier, but harder on someone that is trying to reverse engineer it.

Are you planning to add your own watermark?  How about a picture or logo for your symbiostock icon?

Yes, those are on the list.

Thanks for taking the time out of your day to take a look at my website and give me some feedback.

It is much appreciated.

ShazamImages

  • ShazamImages.com
« Reply #8 on: August 07, 2013, 08:28 »
0
I have to add that the mouseover icons below vertical or square images with that exclusive banner on top show up mixed with content below (Firefox/Windows 7).

Thanks.  I never would have never noticed that.  I will see if I can fix that.

Good site, great images. Would network with you but my 10 slots are filled  :(

Thanks for the wonderful comment.  If you ever have any of your network slots free up, I would be honored if you would consider my website at that time.

ShazamImages

  • ShazamImages.com
« Reply #9 on: August 07, 2013, 08:33 »
0
Great great looking website.

Thanks for the wonderful comment.  That means a lot coming from someone with your experience.

I'd drop the "under construction" notice though.

Done.  As I stated above, I was thinking about using the message bar for sales events or other newsworthy items.  Do you think that is a good idea?  Or should I just drop the message bar entirely?

Mostly I have only good stuff to say - its extremely basic, easy to navigate. I'm actually impressed with just how useful the simplicity can be.

Someone on the Symbiostock message boards mentioned that a stock image website should let the images sell themselves.  I agree, and therefore try to keep things as simple as possible.

ShazamImages

  • ShazamImages.com
« Reply #10 on: August 07, 2013, 08:36 »
0
How did you increase the number of images displaying on searches?  Did you use the plugin that Leo made or did you do it some other way?

...

I liked the addition of the "this image is protected by copyright..."  I think I may add something like that.

Shazam, I also think your site looks just great, and I'd also like to incorporate those two things snipped from Cracker Clips' post.

Please do tell us how you increased the number of images per page. I'd really like to do that.

As I stated above, I modified the Symbiostock code.  If anyone is interested, I could provide the code change required.

ShazamImages

  • ShazamImages.com
« Reply #11 on: August 07, 2013, 08:46 »
0
There's "royalty free" hard coded in files

archive-image.php

and

Inc\Classes\network-manager\interpreter.php

You can edit it like I did for my site or just wait for Leo. I believe he is onto it for the next version of the theme.

There are also references in:
wp-content/themes/symbiostock/inc/classes/symbiostock_image_processor.php

But that change will only affect new images that are uploaded.  In order to change the currently uploaded images, you will also need to execute a few database queries.

Ron

« Reply #12 on: August 07, 2013, 09:10 »
0
How did you increase the number of images displaying on searches?  Did you use the plugin that Leo made or did you do it some other way?

...

I liked the addition of the "this image is protected by copyright..."  I think I may add something like that.

Shazam, I also think your site looks just great, and I'd also like to incorporate those two things snipped from Cracker Clips' post.

Please do tell us how you increased the number of images per page. I'd really like to do that.

Congrats on the progress you're making and... thanks for sharing!

I purchased the code from Leo for the infuser. YOu can set any number you want and then hit infuse and its done. And you change the number any time you want without any coding to be done 15 dollar.


 

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