Cindy has sent in her new Commercial Use Grab Bag to be critiqued. This grab bag is $5.00. One thing that I noticed immediately was the size of this bag. It is almost 200megs. Sounds huge for $5, right? Well, the previews are saved as .PNG files at 300 DPI 1815x1815 each taking up a large amount of room on your hard drive. So, the first thing I did was resize these images shaving 16 megs off the size of this grab bag.
Each of the 10 overlays in this overlay pack come as both a .JPEG and .PNG file. This is not necessary and again adds a tremendous amount of weight to your hard drive.
Each of these "Bits & Baubles" are simple shapes that have an Atomic Cupcake action run on them. Designers do not require premade elements for commercial use, this would be more of a personal use or scrap 4 hire element pack in my opinion. (As a side note, I have included 4 different of the Bits & Baubles on the image and was just labeling the frayed fabric.)
This glitter makes a really nice colored glitter "glue" when the right blend mode is applied.
23 comments:
Your blog is now in my google reader and I am so excited every time you post.
I am much more aware of the quality of products since I started reading this blog.
Thanks for educating us beginners and helping us sort through good and sub-par products!
again, a good constructive review.
Are you going to review other grab bags, or stick to the commercial ones? Just wondering.
Yes, I also will review personal use grab bags. I just haven't had any requests lately! If anyone has any they wish to have critiqued send them my way!
My goodness! Someone needs to learn the basics before she attempts to sell cu items!! This is terrible and sad at the same time.
GB Critique,
I wish to to heap a huge amount of gratitude on you because you have saved me some $$. I will now ONLY purchase bags that have gone through your power of inspection.
Forgive me but I'm a bit stunned at the carelessness of these designers. Maybe they don't care about their customers?
do you have any of PDW grab bags?
Designer please learn how to manage your graphic programm before selling your stuff.
The overlays are too dark grey and blurry.
The Bits and Baubles are basic shapes and the designer used Atomic's action to give them effect and they do not look realistic.
The Glitter Spills looks like you used some brushes and again Atomic's glitter action.
Packaging OMG look that staple and that thing behind is supposed to be plastic bag???
Pretty Petals?? jagged edges and unrealistic flowers.
Everything you used to create your commercial use products is Atomic's Action and including your own cardboard preview.
How could you think you have enough skills to offer stuff for commercial use, if you can't make your own metalic, cardboard or glitter effect?
I say bravo to Cindy for actually asking her grab bag to be critiqued. For goodness sakes, she's doing what we the public would hope. Not everyone wakes up and is a ready made top designer, they all started somewhere. She's actually WANTING to do the right thing and WANTING to provide what we the public want and WANTING to improve.
So I say good on you Cindy. I have absolutely no idea who you are, never heard of you, but I like this blog and I like to learn, much like the first reader said. And I think it takes a person who is wanting to do the right thing by the paying customer a lot of guts to put yourself out here like this.
"Not everyone wakes up and is a ready made top designer, they all started somewhere."
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Yes started somewhere creating freebies for the public or layouts for designers as a CT.
But starting creating commercial use products???? Why???
The products are not high quality and they are too basic for designers.
I think the comments left where constructive Cindy - basically everyone is telling you that you are not ready to sell CU and that you need to learn and hone your skills before you attempt it. No one is here to TEACH you these things, just point out what we, as customers (scrappers and other designers) are seeing and feeling about your products. Seriously now, how can you consider something blurry to be a good idea to sell? Some things are just common sense as well. While I applaud you for wanting to improve, it shouldn't be by selling to unsuspecting customers. Perhaps find a mentor/designer who is willing to help you out? Buy some books, do some tutorials, learn your programs. Watch what other CU designers are doing and how they are doing it. You can only grow as a designer if you are constantly in search of learning new styles and techniques. The bottom line here is that when you choose to sell CU (or anything really) before you are ready to, you ultimately hurt your reputation and it will be that much to prove yourself later. It's a truth of life that people remember the bad for far longer than the good. Were I you, I would pull what CU you have and really take a good look at what you're offering for sale.
Anonymous said...
"Not everyone wakes up and is a ready made top designer, they all started somewhere."
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Yes started somewhere creating freebies for the public or layouts for designers as a CT.
But starting creating commercial use products???? Why???
The products are not high quality and they are too basic for designers.
July 18, 2008 3:55 AM
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Exactly!
Cindy, you should go back to make freebies and maybe just personal use items for sale (even though I'm not sure you should sell at all). I know it sounds harsh, but it's just the TRUTH. No one should be allow to sell CU like these.
So I see you sell at http://digiscrapstation.com. I don't know that store. Who is the owner? She should really pay attention at what her designers upload. Not only it's bad for your reputation, but it's bad for the store's reputation. There might be other good designers there but unfortunately, I won't know because I won't buy from there. I bet I'm not the only one.
Store owners should really step up and remove bad products from their store.
Kudos Cindy for asking for a critique...that way you will improve quickly and sucessfully. Good solid critique, taken and acted upon, is the quickest way to learn!
You go Cindy!!!
Okay, not that I care, but can you preview Cindy Doerksen (Divine Digital) grab bag? I only ask because further down this blog, on "Shannon Fahrnbach Commercial Use Grab Bag" Comment page, she's insisting that she does not want her bag previewed, and "threatens" that she will not sell anymore grab bags if hers is previewed. Bring it on!!
I've never heard of her, but I think it takes some mighty big stones to come on this blog and make "threats" like that!
Oh, that's really funny! Like we care if she (Cindy Doerksoe) doesn't make any more CU bags? What is she so scared of? Oh please, please critique her bag!! You just can't let a threat like that go unchallenged! This should be good, can't wait to see if she carries out her "threat."
So, Cindy is learning? Apparently just how to trick more people into buying her lame bag. Currently she's got a promotion going that if you buy $20 of her stuff (how in the world could anyone find $20 worth of her stuff you would want is another question), you get her grab bag for free! How's that for nerve?
Just wanted to thank you for taking the time to critique my grab bag. I have learned some important things and will be making changes accordingly. Though I do wish that people leaving comments would be more constructive with their comments. I asked you to critique my bag to see what I was missing and what needed to be improved.
Quote : "My goodness! Someone needs to learn the basics before she attempts to sell cu items!! This is terrible and sad at the same time."
My response: How is a comment like this supposed to help me improve as a designer?
Quote: "Forgive me but I'm a bit stunned at the carelessness of these designers. Maybe they don't care about their customers?"
My response: It is because I care about my customers and want to provide top quality products that I asked to have my grab bag critiqued.
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I have to agree that these aren't constructive comments and aren't going to help you learn in anyway. These are the ones you ignore. GBC gave you some constructive advice here.
Hello all! I'm a fairly new designer and my question who's CU products do you recommend?
Constructive comments only work if the individual has some idea of what he/she is doing. It's obvious that this isn't the case. She's been told and stated it wasn't constructive.
For example: She was told to learn the basics and she asked how this was constructive? Isn't that pretty clear?
One poster broke down all the issues, yet she has not responded to it at all. Seems that she's not all that interested.
Running atomic actions on some shapes then selling them as commercial use items is not a wise step in the first place. It seems that you are out just to make a quick buck rather than caring about your customers!
I hate your blog at first, I'm so sorry... but now I could say thanks so much for the effort you're doing... now I'm even concerned on my freebies if they're good enough. I like good quality not quantity ofcourse.
actually there's so many cu's when you view them at 600px jpg preview you could say wow but when you buy and zoom them in photoshop.... what? it's worst that I thought :)
I think designers should review again each of their products in zoom so them could fix them before they sell the kit/product, even they use some CU, I saw some designers use items with poor extraction and they don't even edit the ugly part... :(
also, for the new designers or experience, maybe it's better if someone review your products first to check if there's any jaggy parts or excess pixels that you can't see but the reviewer could. kwim?
Purchasing commercial use products to create another CU product is not the better way to start this business.
If you want to create CU products then you need to know how to create them otherwise please stay away from selling CU stuff.
We designers don't need this kind of recycled CU product.
We designers don't need this kind of recycled CU product.
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Couldn't agree with you more!
Unfortunately there are a lot of new designers who are jumping into CU before they have mastered their craft - I partially fault digi stores for allowing this - I think they are more interested in cashing in on CU than making sure their designers are ready to offer it.
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