Master List

1. Design
2. Login
3. Image Uploader
4. Image Display
5. Jquery Image Preview
6. Image Details
7. Add to Cart
8. User Profile
9. User Created Folders
   
10. Image Download
11. Image Tagging
12. Tag Cloud

Categories

I have 14 categories of images right now, I think that should be sufficient. Anyone will be able to tag images with whatever name they want. Hopefully there will be an image cloud :)

Oh that reminds me, I need create that master list of what needs to be done. That will come.

Database

Set up my database so I can get a few dummy images in and test out a few php and jquery scripts. I'm sure I'll end up needing more than this, but right now I only have 5 tables. The first script I'll be testing is one that resizes the images upon upload. I'll need them in 3 sizes:
1. Thumbnail (60px)
2. Original (1000+px)
3. Preview (600px max)

All this testing will take more time than I'm realizing... I'll need a page that has an image uploader, one that displays, not to mention the login.

technologies

Going to try out a few jquery plug's this week. Want to see how they work, how hard they are to style, and if it's really what I want to happen. Might throw together a quick designed html page then to see how it all looks together. Right now everything is either too light or too dark.... Grrr....

2 designs later

I'm trying the navigation down the side (fixed). I think I like it better, but I'm wondering if I'm going to end up creating 3 dummy websites to test each design and see what really works best. Not the best use of my time, but it'll be better in the long run to do it now.

Design

I've completed one design, but I'm not in love with it. I need to do some research (probably tonight during class) as to a better layout and different color plan. I like the colors, but not the way I'm using them. I want a cleaner, sharper design, which isn't quite where I'm at right now.

Marketing Plan

Wow, are they full of charts, graphs, and text. I need to simplify for this quarter, and I can go into more detail later on (only 3 classes next quarter, one being a gen-ed, so I'll have more time).

Marketing Plan:
Vision
Objective
Target Market
Needs/Requirements
Distribution Channels

Charts:
Monthly Expense Budget
Sales Forecast
Key Marketing Metrics

Research

Looking up different hosting plans, SSL license, transfers, etc. I'm hoping to make a huge marketing plan, I need to find an example of one online, but I fear it'll be 10+ pages. My hope is that after I graduate my husband and I can really launch this (probably a name change, but after creating 10+ companies the past 2 years I'm out of ideas :)

Assisting Technologies

I want to use jquery in a few places to enhance the users experience. First off, I will have 2 tabs on the top of the page with the pull out divs. Secondly will be the tag cloud, although I'm not sure which page that'll appear on, but I did want to have it on there somewhere since it's really relevant to the subject matter. Third will be a detailed image preview, when a user hovers over an image, a lightbox will appear with a larger image preview, and a few details about that image (photographer, title, etc).

I also want to use Ajax with the searches, although I'm not sure if that's possible. I like that ajax can refresh a portion of the page and not the entire page. I'm sure it's possible just do I have the time. That reminds me, I have to make my todo list for next quarter.

Image Display

After looking at 5 stock photography websites, I think I'm going to layout the image pages as follows:
Rows of images, 6 across, and small icons below. The icons will be to add to cart and download.
When clicked, the page will show detailed information on the image. This includes the photographer, the tags, associated with the image, a larger view of the image (up to 700px tall or wide), and buttons to add to cart or download. If an item is added to the cart, in theory, the user will be able to batch download all images in their cart (in the beginning up to 5 images).

Wireframes

In lieu of traditional frames I've decided to make a set of very detailed (almost comps) images showing what content will be on the pages. This will be incredibly helpful for me when I start designing the website this fall. I have found that I've gotten significantly better at constructing a website from an illustrator file. It's been fantastic drawing up a website in illustrator, and then less than an hour later have a functioning html/css site (well page with dummy links). It's funny, but when I first started at this school, and had Judith yelling at us about process books, it seemed like a pain in the ass. At this point, I can't imagine coding my senior project without it!

Users

Once I'm in production, anyone from AI can get an account. I have photography students on standby to create accounts and upload images when I'm ready for that. Users who would be downloading the images would have to go through the subscription page, and pay, however since this is a student project I'm going to allow them to sign up for a base subscription, which will allow for 5 downloads a week. I want to have users be able to batch download (which no other stock photo website I found would let me do), and (of course), download on the fly.

Designs

One design done, trying to make it more bright than dark, considering I chose a bit of a dark palette that's a challenge, but it's a fun challenge! I'm also trying to have it be it's own unique website (obviously), but taking elements from previous classes that worked well. I want to have 2 tabs at the top that will slide in (jquery) to either log the user in or register them to use the website. I'll have to make a more complicated registration page for submissions, but this should work for now.

Process Book

Sorry! It's been a crazy week!


Process Book

Marketing

Since the users are generating my content, I need ways to attract them. The first thing I plan on doing is emailing all my photography friends, and have them sign up and upload some images. If this were a real website, I would be researching what magazine's I should be putting ads in to attract users for content, and to attract users to purchase images. I'm guessing the main users who would be purchasing content are web designers, graphic designers, and journalists.

I do have options for expansion (stock vector images and stock content, written by freelance journalists), but there's always more to add!

Information Architecture

It doesn't seem like I have that many pages, just a lot of behind the scenes action taking place. The main pages are home, photos, register, pricing, and submission. I'd like users to be able to batch download, but I'm still researching that aspect (how I can bundle their images into a zip file). I need to make a list of all the php I'll be using on the site, and make sure they don't interact with each other (an issue I've had for past projects). I would like photography students to be able to customize their profile pages, but that will only happen if all my code is working... too much to do, too little time!

Content

One of the aspects I really like about this project is that it's user driven content. I don't have to generate something to sell, I just have to figure out good ways to market the site. Once it's in production it'll only be usable by AI students (need the .stu.aii.edu email address to register), but it would've been nice to have some sort of verification service... If only there were time!

Payment

I've been doing research into the paying aspect. Part of my marketing is going to be about having low prices, but paying photographers well. It'll have to be a nice balance. Most websites seem to pay photographers around $.33/image downloaded, which was equating to around 20%. Then users purchasing the images were paying anywhere from $4.10-$10/image. I think I'll be "charging" $2.00/image, and paying photographers $.40/image. Subscriptions will be offered at a rate of $20/15 images, and $50/50 images.

A SSL for one website is $400/year (or $33/month), hosting with payment processing will cost around $110/month (via Amazon, which is based on usage, that quote would be for a website just starting out). This means I'd have to sell 90 individual images (at $2.00/image) per month to break even.