How do you get your designs to stand out in front of a client? The cropping tool may be your best advocate.
Available for both contest submissions and when cultivating your portfolio, the cropping tool is a unique way to call attention to your design thumbnails. It’s perfect for zooming in or highlighting a specific detail of your work to make your client want to click!
How to crop your contest submission
When submitting your contest entry, you’ll find yourself on this page:
Simply drag the cropping tool’s orange edges around your image until you’re satisfied with its aesthetic placement. The “Thumbnail preview” box in the right column helps you see what the design will look like on the contest page.
Submitting your design
We want to ensure your entries look their best – especially on retina screens. That means having your submitted entries adhere to the following standards:
- Minimum dimensions: 960 x 960px
- Maximum dimensions: 2040 x 8160px
- File formats: PNG, GIF or JPG
- Color mode: RGB
Remember: These requirements are for contest entries only. Once you’ve won the contest, you’ll still need to deliver final files with the correct color mode, file formats and dimensions.
How to crop designs for your portfolio
When you choose to add a design to your folio, you’ll be taken to this page:
Simply switch on the “Preview thumbnail” button to see the orange cropping tool. Drag the edges to focus on a specific part of your design and voila! Fill in the rest of the information, click “Add to portfolio” and you have a new shiny design ready to wow browsing clients.
Read more profile tips in our article, "4 ways to get your portfolio noticed by clients".
Cropping tips
Zooming
See the image on the right? Or rather… can you see the image on the right? Our thoughts exactly.
Use the cropping tool to zoom in on designs that would otherwise be too small in the thumbnail, so that clients can appreciate your work before they click to the full-size view.
Focus
The last thing you want is for your thumbnails to look too busy. If they’re not pleasing to the eye or feel too overwhelming, clients may skim right over them. So why cram this small space with your full design if you don’t have to?
Instead, focus on a particularly clear and impressive aspect of your work. When the client clicks into it, they’ll be pleasantly surprised to see all the other variations you’ve worked on as well – full-size and much more appealing.