A few questions about selling photos

Hello. I am new to Tradebit; just signed up today. I would like to put up some photos for sale, but have a few questions...(as I've looked around here for about a week before joining, trying to see how things work. I have already written the keywords for my pictures, so that part is out of the way.)

1. Do I need to make each picture into the different sizes myself? I ask because I notice most if not all of the photos are offered in different sizes .... 469X724, 1278X1972, 1805X2784 are three of the sizes I have seen. So do I do this or do I just upload the largest size and you do the rest?

2. If I need to upload the different sizes myself, how do I do that? Does the upload thingy have an option for different sizes with the same image?

3. What size should I make the "preview" picture, the one you first see in the catalog?

4. Do I need to add the watermark myself or do you? What size do I need to make the watermarked image?

Sorry if this is a lot of questions, but I would like to do this correctly.

I would like to sell ebooks later, but want to get the photos up first (as I have the photos now and I need to write the ebooks first before I can sell them. Is Microsoft Word OK for writing the ebook? That is the program I have, so I hope it is OK.

hi naturegirl - sorry for the delay in this post... a lot of questions!

if you do all in self-service: yes, that would mean you create the sizes, because we can not guarantee the quality of the output. If something is not like you, as the artist wants it, we are in trouble.

BUT: some things can be semi-automated! For example: tools like the XNviewer:

[www.xnview.com]

can BULK convert pictures AND watermark the results for you. You "throw" 5,000 pictures in there and tell the thing to convert it to a maximum size and/or tell it to add a watermark...

Then you could choose a standard naming procedure like:

PHOTO123_large.jpg
PHOTO123_medium.jpg
PHOTO123_small.jpg
PHOTO123_preview.jpg

something that repeats exactly the same way for each photo and then start bulk uploading... or upload via FTP....

if you have a basic naming procedure and the pricing set for all versions, we can take it from there, if you just mail us:


PHOTO123 - keywords, title, etc. - price

in a way that a computer read it (think Excel list, eg).

That way we can import the versions for you and it makes sense if you do that, if you have more than 150 photos coming.

Does that help? If you need more assistance, please email me to puzzler(at)tradebit.com

Ralf



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/30/2011 01:41PM by puzzler.

Hello Ralf,

Thank you for the reply. I did play around with uploading a few photos yesterday, mainly to see how it worked.... I found it easy enough (using the "normal" upload thingy with the form for keywords, title, etc) but I also saw the finished result was lacking a few features when compared to the other photo listings. Like it really didn't say it was a photo or what size it was (like in the other photo listings).

So I will do as you recommend, make the excel sheet (never knew I even HAD that on my computer - I'm so used to Microsoft Word - but it looks easy enough to use) and use the FTP to upload the photos. And yes, I DO have over 150 of them!

I will do the resizing and watermarking myself. It is easy enough. A bit tedious maybe but then I can carefully examine each photo while doing that, so it is not wasted time.

I will leave a few "creepy" photos on my account active for the moment and get to resizing the others. Thanks for suggesting a way to name them. That is VERY helpful!

Where do I find this FTP uploader? Can you give me a link? I tried ftp.tradebit.com but there was nothing there...just a "for sale" artwork in the upper left corner. Did I run into a dummy site that maybe stole my password, as I had to sign in to access it? Or do you own that site? If you do, I didn't see anywhere to upload pictures...there was nothing there but that "for sale" jpg in the corner. I simply copied the "ftp.tradebit.com" from the upload page and I ended up at the other site...

Where do I send the Excel list email to? Do I email it to you?

It will probably take me a few days to get it all ready, plus I just got an unexpected commission to work on, too!

Thanks!

Naturegirl (Sarah)

I will go change my password...

Sarah, before you go too far, send me the first steps to puzzler(at)tradebit(dot)com and I can take a look and help you to not waste precious time...

ok?

ralf