Editing101

vbVito

This page will serve as a resource for all the Editors of Polycount and continue useful information for making blog posts, articles/interviews/tutorials, images and so on.

Useful image information, relating to blog posts on Polycount.com

 

Page 1: Creating posts with Wordpress

Page 2: Important information regarding image types for Posts, and Polycount colours

 

Using Wordpress to create blog posts.

As an Editor at Polycount you will be using Wordpress for creating blog posts or adding content to the News page. Wordpress can be accessed from any computer, using your Polycount username & password.

To access Wordpress, click here. I suggest you bookmark this URL as well.

 

Content Types

There are 2 types of content you can create with Wordpress: Posts & Pages.

As an editor, your primary update will be a Post. Posts are the typical blog post and will show up on the front page of Polycount.

Within a Post, you can do any of the following:

• Write content
• Categorize your post
  • News, default
  • Article
  • Interview
  • Tutorial
• add images
• embed video (Youtube, Vimeo, etc.)
• Add tags
• Control when your Post goes live, or if it goes live right away (default).
• Maintain comments for your article if you need to

Pages are identical in creation as Posts, but they are not added to the blog queue or display. They are simply given a URL and contained within the same design rules as blog posts. Content pages are used for things such as important pages for Polycount (advertising, contact us, etc.), Contest pages, and so on. Editing101 - the page you're on now - was created as a page. As an editor you will likely not be creating Pages.

Both can be accessed from the left side menu of Wordpress. Take the time now to poke around in those menu's.

Adding Media to Polycount

As an Editor you will be uploading your own images to Polycount for your posts. While its not 100% set in stone, there are guidelines for what image sizes to use for which type of post and where to access them, found on here.

Adding Media to Wordpress is simple. There are 2 major ways of doing this: Through the left-side menu or directly in the Post editor.

 

Left side Menu

Clicking 'Media' from the left side menu will show you the current library. Any of these images can be clicked on to receive relevant information (URL, caption (if there is one), and so on). Any information saved here is universally used for this particular image. So if you drop this image in multiple posts it will maintain its properties set here.

With the Media button clicked, you will notice a drop-down menu appears with 'Add New' as the second available option. Clicking this will bring up the interface for adding new media to the library. It's fairly straight forward so I won't get in to details. I will suggest, though, that you use the Browser editor and NOT the Flash editor as it can be buggy from time to time. Also, check out all the available image options (justification, whether it opens in a new window (it should), and so on).

 

Adding images through the Post Editor

This is done while in the Post editor. Clicking this button will bring up the Image tool for adding images to the library. The tool is fairly straight forward so I won't go in to details. Once your image is upload, be sure to use the 'Insert into Post' button to that your image is added. Also, check out all the available image options (justification, whether it opens in a new window (it should), and so on).

 

 

Creating your Post

Rather than writing explicit details for creating a post - as its pretty straight forward as far as editors go - I'll hit important areas via an FAQ.

Q. The editor looks to not have many options for editing text. Are there more options available?
A. Yes, be sure to expand the kitchen sink. It's the button below or you can hit Shift-Alt-Z

 

Q. Where do I add Tags to my post?
A. On the right is a menu called 'Post Tags'. You can add new tags there. Common tags for our site will pop-up as an option as you type.

 

 

Q. Where do I control when my post goes live?
A. By default your post goes live when you hit the PUBLISH button on the right. If you look on the right hand side, in the Publish section, you will see an area that says, 'Published on'. Click the Edit button and change the date & time you'd like your post to go live.

 

 

Q. I'm writing an Exclusive post for Polycount, what do I need to know.
A. Exclusive posts for Polycount - that is, content that is 100% exclusive to us (like this interview with Ryan Clark) - have a few more areas you need to take care of. They are:

• Choose its category.
  1. Right side menu, Categories
     1. Tutorial
     2. Interview
     3. Article
• Using a banner image like this one here in this Exclusive interview.
  1. Custom Fields
  2. Choose 'Banner'
  3. Supply URL to your Banner image, based on the rules for "Image size example for banners within EXCLUSIVE Polycount post" on this page found here.
• Using a quote from the Exclusive post.
  1. Custom Fields
  2. Choose 'Quote'
  3. Copy/paste the quote from the Exclusive you wish to show case
• Supplying the quote with an author
  1. Custom Fields
  2. Choose 'Quote Author'
  3. Supply the name of the person who you are quoting
• Front page Exclusive image
  1. Custom Fields
  2. Choose 'Thumbnail'
  3. Supply the URL of the image you're using for the exclusive thumbnail based on the rules for "Image size example for imagines on the front page of EXCLUSIVE Polycount posts", found here.
• Multiple pages
  • You need to break up exclusive posts - and any long post - with pages. This is done by clicking the button below. The result is page breaks. Check out an example of this here.

 

 

Types of Posts

There are different types of posts you'll be making for Polycount, they are:

• Exclusives (Article, Interview, Tutorial)
• 3D Community news, bunched & single
• General News, bunched & single
• Polycount news

Here are brief descriptions for each Post type:

Exclusives

• Content made exclusively for Polycount.
• Tutorials, Interviews, Articles

3D Community News (Bunched or Single)

• News from other 3D communities.
• If you find news from other 3D communities that our members would find useful, informational or fun this is the type of post it goes in to. Full credit must be given to the community and its member that the link is going to.
• Example, bunched: http://satellite.polycount.com/2010/05/17/human-topology/

General News (Bunched or Single)

• General news that you think game artists will find useful, informational or fun
• Give credit to the source and the person/people within
• Example, single: http://satellite.polycount.com/2010/05/17/limbo/

 

Polycount News (Bunched or Single)

Q. Bunched?
A. Bunched posts are News posts containing multiple news bits. Generally 'low impact' items can be placed in here. Low impact meaning the post may not be for everyone but artists will enjoy it. Try and end each bunched post with a question for the reader, to entice commenting. Check out this bunched post for an example of how it was written.

Q. Single?
A. Single posts are News posts containing 1 news bit. Generally this is 'high impact' news that the majority of our user base will find useful. Check out this single post for an example of how they're written.

 

Click on to the next page for important information regarding image types, and the official colour swatch of Polycount

Colour Swatch

37864d

ffffff

999999

282828

1c1c1c

0d0d0d

 

Image size example for banners within EXCLUSIVE Polycount posts

This is the image size to use whenever using a banner internally of all EXCLUSIVE Polycount posts.

File location: Dropbox > Polycount > ~Website Images > exclusive_banner_template.psd

Example usage: http://satellite.polycount.com/2010/05/17/creator-of-crazybump-ryan-clark-2/

VERY IMPORTANT: You will notice that this image is outside of the blogs width, which is because it was placed as a typical image. This image specifically MUST be placed with this method.

1. From Wordpress, the Post editor/creator.
2. When writing your EXCLUSIVE article and you have your Exclusive banner ready (which is created in the mentioned PSD file above), go to Step 3.
3. Scroll down to 'Custom Fields'.
4. Choose 'Banner'.
5. Paste the URL of the image you're using as your banner. This can be found in the Media Library of Wordpress by selecting the image.
6. This image will now be posted to your Post without image padding, and fit perfectly in the blog width. Here is an example of this image used as an exclusive banner.

Image size example for imagines on the front page of EXCLUSIVE Polycount posts.

This is the image size to use whenever using an image on the front page of all EXCLUSIVE Polycount posts.

File location: Dropbox > Polycount > ~Website Images > exclusive_frontimage_template.psd

Example usage: http://satellite.polycount.com/category/interview/

 

Image size example for imagines within EXCLUSIVE Polycount posts

This is the image size to use whenever using images internally of all EXCLUSIVE Polycount posts.

File location: Dropbox > Polycount > ~Website Images > exclusive_internal_template.psd

Example usage: http://satellite.polycount.com/2010/05/17/creator-of-crazybump-ryan-clark-2/2/#start-reading

NOTE: This resolution is also the same that the front page images are for our exclusive articles. And while they are the same sizes, please use the appropriate PSD files.

 

 

Imagine size example for images within GENERAL news posts

For this sort of news there's 2 image sizes you can use.

SMALL:

LARGE:

This is the image size to use whenever using images internally of all GENERAL Polycount posts.

File location: Dropbox > Polycount > ~Website Images > general_internal_template.psd

Example usage: http://satellite.polycount.com/2010/05/16/welcome-to-the-new-polycount/