We aim to create a social networking site centered around the Adobe Photoshop design community. The purpose of this application is to facilitate the learning and sharing of design technique and skill. We hope to develop a Ning application that enables Photoshop “contributors” to easily create photoshop tutorials by uploading .psd files, including the complete document history and annotations where appropriate, directly to a Ning community website. Photoshop “learners” will then be able to view a given .psd’s complete history, which will allow them to learn which commands resulted in which effects. We envision some kind of history slider that will allow users to ’scrub’ back and forth and see the image and commands change over the history of the document. A recommender system will allow users to recognize designers in their network. The site will also allow users to search by image type or technique from a library of designs posted by site members.
The “Market” (aka Target Audience)
Our target audience are users who have any level of interest in learning and/or sharing design techniques using Adobe Photoshop. Users cover a broad range of product proficiency and expertise. We have identified two primary user groups that are distinct but not mutually exclusive:
Novice (“Learners”) - Novices are individuals who have a vested interest in learning new design skills or techniques using Adobe Photoshop. They could be users who are using Adobe Photoshop for the first time or users who have used the product but want to learn or improve a design technique.
Experts (“Contributer”) - Experts are users who are proficient enough in using a Adobe Photoshop technique or design skill that they are able to provide community members with credible advice and sound critique. They may likely also contribute .psd files to the site in higher volume than those with less experience.
Key Features
Tutorial Creator – Allow “contributors” to easily create tutorials, annotate the appropriate steps, and share with the community.
Photoshop History - This feature displays the entire history of a .psd file. Users can visually see the phases of the document and commands associated with design elements. Content uploaders can annotate history commands and phases.
Search – Users can search for a design objects or key words (i.e. glossy button), or they can search by tool used.
Sort – We will present documents sortable by ‘newest,’ ‘most popular,’ and other criteria that is relevant to users.
Recommender System – As an incentive for designers to contribute to the site, we will create a system of attributing points/props to users for good design submissions and giving fellow community members helpful advice. This will recognize “good” designers in this online community.
Multimedia – In addition to providing .psds with complete history information, we want allow contributors to supplement their design file with optional video tutorial (either by adding to the site or embedding external videos).
Pho Fo – Support forum that allows “learners” to post questions, upload images and ask for support from the “contributor” community.
Platform
We plan to use Ning as a platform for our social networking site. Ning is an online social network that provides users with the resources to “create, customize and share a social network” (www.ning.com). Ning offers many robust product features which include member profiles, photos, videos, blogs, activity feeds and privacy settings. We are especially interested in Ning’s developer network (developer.ning.com), which offers tools and advice on building custom applications for the Ning platform. Ning applications are powered by Javascript, CSS and OpenSocial methods; we believe our team has the expertise to successfully work with these technologies. Since Ning provides many of the features required for this project ‘out of the box,’ we will spend additional effort and time on perfecting our application and ensuring that we have a well-considered community strategy.
Competitors
Adobe.com
A primary ‘competitor’ for our website will be the Adobe.com community site (www.adobe.com/support/photoshop/). This site already contains tutorials, videos, formal help, and a link to a gallery featuring designs made using Adobe products. Adobe.com also has a community publishing application (http://www.adobe.com/community/publishing/index.html, built on the Adobe Air platform) that allows users to directly upload content and create tutorials on the site.
NOTE: There seems to be some kind of business model of creating an adobe tutorials site, getting people to come to it through SEO, and serving advertisements. The below sites represent a mixture of ‘credible’ and ‘non-credible’ sites.
We have begun mapping out a timeline for our project on our milestones page.
Project evolution: new idea
After we received feedback on our original idea and discussed our concept in more detail, we decided to change the fundamental purpose of our photoshop community website. Our new idea is a community website that hosts photoshop competitions on a regular basis. The competitions will ask community members to begin with a source file and perhaps some file elements, and use Photoshop to create a unique design. Participants will then upload their final design along with their ‘process’ – how they used Photoshop to come up with the designs. Community members will judge the final submissions based on both ‘design’ and ‘process.’ Some of the contest products (perhaps a logo, header, advertisement, etc) could be incorporated into the community site, thereby increasing the feeling of participation and engagement in the site. We will continue to evaluate Ning as a platform for creating this website. We are interviewing Photoshop users over the next week, and after our interviews we will then assess and refine our idea.
Proposal
Due January 21, 2010
Project Idea
We aim to create a social networking site centered around the Adobe Photoshop design community. The purpose of this application is to facilitate the learning and sharing of design technique and skill. We hope to develop a Ning application that enables Photoshop “contributors” to easily create photoshop tutorials by uploading .psd files, including the complete document history and annotations where appropriate, directly to a Ning community website. Photoshop “learners” will then be able to view a given .psd’s complete history, which will allow them to learn which commands resulted in which effects. We envision some kind of history slider that will allow users to ’scrub’ back and forth and see the image and commands change over the history of the document. A recommender system will allow users to recognize designers in their network. The site will also allow users to search by image type or technique from a library of designs posted by site members.
The “Market” (aka Target Audience)
Our target audience are users who have any level of interest in learning and/or sharing design techniques using Adobe Photoshop. Users cover a broad range of product proficiency and expertise. We have identified two primary user groups that are distinct but not mutually exclusive:
Key Features
Platform
We plan to use Ning as a platform for our social networking site. Ning is an online social network that provides users with the resources to “create, customize and share a social network” (www.ning.com). Ning offers many robust product features which include member profiles, photos, videos, blogs, activity feeds and privacy settings. We are especially interested in Ning’s developer network (developer.ning.com), which offers tools and advice on building custom applications for the Ning platform. Ning applications are powered by Javascript, CSS and OpenSocial methods; we believe our team has the expertise to successfully work with these technologies. Since Ning provides many of the features required for this project ‘out of the box,’ we will spend additional effort and time on perfecting our application and ensuring that we have a well-considered community strategy.
Competitors
Adobe.com
A primary ‘competitor’ for our website will be the Adobe.com community site (www.adobe.com/support/photoshop/). This site already contains tutorials, videos, formal help, and a link to a gallery featuring designs made using Adobe products. Adobe.com also has a community publishing application (http://www.adobe.com/community/publishing/index.html, built on the Adobe Air platform) that allows users to directly upload content and create tutorials on the site.
NOTE: There seems to be some kind of business model of creating an adobe tutorials site, getting people to come to it through SEO, and serving advertisements. The below sites represent a mixture of ‘credible’ and ‘non-credible’ sites.
Credible:
Stinkers:
Timeline
We have begun mapping out a timeline for our project on our milestones page.
Project evolution: new idea
After we received feedback on our original idea and discussed our concept in more detail, we decided to change the fundamental purpose of our photoshop community website. Our new idea is a community website that hosts photoshop competitions on a regular basis. The competitions will ask community members to begin with a source file and perhaps some file elements, and use Photoshop to create a unique design. Participants will then upload their final design along with their ‘process’ – how they used Photoshop to come up with the designs. Community members will judge the final submissions based on both ‘design’ and ‘process.’ Some of the contest products (perhaps a logo, header, advertisement, etc) could be incorporated into the community site, thereby increasing the feeling of participation and engagement in the site. We will continue to evaluate Ning as a platform for creating this website. We are interviewing Photoshop users over the next week, and after our interviews we will then assess and refine our idea.