Custom Vantage Web™ How to Create Round Daters and Round Custom Stamps
by Amanda Katon
Introduction
In last month’s issue we demonstrated creating different stamp layouts. In this month’s segment we will discuss creating round stamps and round dater stamps.
Steps to Follow
First, sign into your website with an administrator’s username and password. Once you have signed in, you will see the admin area of your website with the blue tabs along the top of the page. Click on the CPD Config tab; this is our starting point in creating our custom round stamp (Image 1) and custom round dater (Image 2).
This section should be recognizable to you as it was covered in our discussion on creating custom attributes in the July issue. Let’s began by clicking on Custom Attributes from the left-hand menu and creating our new custom attribute for our custom round stamp. First we must name our new attribute and then click the New button to the right of the new attribute name field. You may name your attribute whatever you choose, I have called mine “From Kitchen Stamp”. Now that we have created the new attribute, follow the guidelines below to create the custom round stamp (Image 1).
This stamp requires us to set up a background image which consists of the cooking pot and ladle you see in the middle of the stamp as well as the three dots on either side of the pot, see Image 3. To upload this image you want to click the Select button to the right of the input field for the background image. You can then browse your computer, find the image to upload and then click Choose This Image. More information on working with images will be discussed in an upcoming issue. Next we need to keep the Allow ClipArt option set to False. Lastly we need to choose the font set definition (FSD), the shape, and the custom type. For the FSD, I simply choose Self-inking Stamps which is a pre-loaded FSD option (you may choose to create your own). For the shape we’ll want to set it to Round, and for the custom type we want to set it to Stamp. See Image 4 for details. Then click the Update button to save your changes to that Attribute.
While we are on the CPD Config tab, to save time let’s create our custom attribute for our custom round dater (Image 2). For the round dater attribute, it is similar to the round custom stamp, there are only minor differences. Just like the custom round stamp, name your new attribute and click the New button next to the attribute name input field. From here you will want to insert the background image shown in Image 5. Rectangular daters require you to input an insert image on the custom attribute, but for round daters in order to get the stamp working properly, you need to put that image in the background field. Next set the allow clipart feature to False, the FSD to Dater (a pre-loaded FSD), the shape to Round, and the type to Stamp. Remember to click Update to save your work. See Image 6 for details.
Great! So now that we have created our attributes it’s as simple as creating the products and applying the new attributes accordingly.
Let us continue by creating the custom round stamp product. First, let’s go to the Products Tab. This should also be another very familiar section within the admin. This section was discussed in the June and August issues. As previously discussed last month we are going to make this product type Customizable with Layout. So enter a New Product ID and then choose the Customizable with Layout as the type. Next click the Add New Product button. As you may remember you will need to fill out all the basic information under the general info section such as name, price, description, and so on. Save those changes. After the basic information has been added we need to go to our Custom Product Design link to add in the proper dimensions of our stamp and select the attribute we created earlier. Let’s set the height and width to 1 inch (for a round impression the height and width measurements are the same), the max lines to 2, and the custom attribute to the one we created earlier (From Kitchen Stamp). See Image 7 for details. Then click Save Changes.
The last step to creating our custom round stamp is to go into our Edit Product Layout link and lock a few of the options on our stamp. Begin by adding the words From The Kitchen Of to the text column for the first line of customizable text. Then choose your font, in this case we chose Zapf Chancery Medium, set the font size (example: 8) and lock all the locks for that line of text. As for the second customizable line, you can either leave everything as it is or lock certain aspects of this line such as font, font size, label, etc. If you set the Start Angle and End Angle the customer text will automatically compress if it is too long. To avoid the text running into the dots, we will set the Start Angle to 245 and the End Angle to 120. Be sure to lock those as well as the font so it matches the top line of text as in Image 1. When you have finished making these adjustments you need to click the Preview Layout button. If all looks good, click Save Layout (See Image 8 for details). As a side note if changes still need to be made, make the adjustments and then click the Preview Layout button again. You can do this as many times as necessary until you get your stamp the way you’d like it.
Now that you have created a custom round stamp, let’s proceed with making our custom round dater! Creating a round dater stamp is very similar to creating a round custom stamp. The difference between the dater stamp and a regular customizable round stamp is all within the custom attributes which we already established earlier in this segment. It is mainly setting the background image of that attribute to contain a round circle with a date in the middle (refer back to Image 5). So instead of going through and creating a whole new product from scratch what we will do is clone the From The Kitchen Of stamp and change a few of the settings.
To create a clone of a product the first place we want to go is the Products Tab. Here, we already know how to create new products, but right below where we do that you will see a section that reads Find Existing Products. This is where you can search for, edit, clone, or delete products that have already been created, and that is just what we will do! To accomplish cloning a product, start by searching by Keyword/SKU for the Product Id which you used to create your custom round stamp. Then click the Find button to the right of the input area. You should see your product appear in the list below your search. You will want to check the checkbox to the left of the product id (this selects the product). Next, to the right of the search field you will see a Clone button. Where it says clone as ID, type in a new Product ID number for your custom round dater. In this case we will keep the as type to “Same as Original”, although you do have the option to change the product type. Next simply click the Clone button (Image 9).
Now all we need to do is change the product name, pricing, and anything else which is different on the general info section that now is displaying on your screen. Save those changes. After those modifications have been made we need to go to our Custom Product Design link and change the impression height and width if necessary. For our example it remains the same, and the same goes for the max lines. The field that must be changed on this product is the custom attribute. Go ahead and set that to the attribute you created for your custom round dater. Then click the Save Changes button.
Finally, the last part to creating your custom round dater is editing the fields under the Edit Product Layout link. Per our example we have no locks that need to be made to our dater, but yours may. Maybe you have the word Received or Shipped on your dater that must be locked; you would do so here just as we did on the custom round dater.
Hurray! You are now an expert at creating both customizable round stamps and customizable round daters! Next month we will go into what it takes to create 2-Color or Multi-Colored impression stamps. Keep on tuning in to learn more about all you can do in Stamp Shop Web!