Free Trial - Getting Started Guide

This guide covers the basic elements of Asset Bank, helping you get the most out of your free trial. Please note though that there is a huge amount of features and configuration options not covered here, as the document would run into hundreds of pages. As a result it is best to use this in conjunction with a short Asset Bank training session to ensure your initial requirements are taken into consideration.

If you are new to Digital Asset Management, then please have a look at our glossary of terms first.

Step 1: Setting up attributes

Here you will see a default set of attributes that we have set up. These all tend to be useful for standard Digital Asset Management purposes, but you may want to add one or two more if there is a key piece of information that you believe would be useful when searching for an asset.

For example, say a University wanted to tag all of their images with the campus they relate to (let's call them Middle, East and West), then they could add a new ‘Checklist’ attribute to achieve this.

To do this go to: Admin > Attributes
And click on the ‘Add new attribute »’ link at the bottom of the page.

Change the type to ‘checklist’ (as there is only a finite amount of values, this is the best attribute type to choose on this occasion). Label it ‘Campus’, and optionally choose for it to be mandatory. Once created, you can now view this attribute on the attributes page. Now click on [edit values] next to it. This is where you can add the values (e.g. Middle, East and West in this example). You now have a new attribute.

Fig 1. Admin users can create new attributes in Asset Bank

Step 2: Embedded data mappings

If you already have data embedded inside the images you are about to upload (e.g. if a Photographer has added keywords in Adobe Lightroom or the like), then you can extract this at point of upload and map this data into an Asset Bank attribute. (Note, you can always overwrite or correct any of this data during upload if necessary.)

You can access this functionality here: Admin > Attributes > Embedded Data Mappings

You will see some existing ones. This is how we extract the date taken and orientation information directly from the image that is uploaded.

You can optionally embed at point of download. E.g. embedding information added to Asset Bank into an embedded data field such as IPTC Description.

Step 3: Deciding what to show on asset panels

Asset panels are the things you see when browsing, looking at search results or looking at assets in the lightbox (i.e. before stepping into an asset page itself). See image below.

Fig 2. Asset panels that are visible when viewing search results or browsing

As an admin you can determine which attributes to show here. So it’s worth having a think about which of your attributes would be useful for your users. In the example above I’ve decided to show Copyright, unique ID, filename and Description. Note, the value will only be displayed if it exists for a particular asset, hence only one of the above has ‘Copyright’ details.

The key is to choose information that will be of value to your users, saving them having to click in and out of each asset.

Step 4: Create category structure

Visit the following location: Admin > Categories

Here you can:

Add categories and create a folder structure
Re-order categories
Add in sub-categories by first clicking on [open]
Add images to represent categories (only do this if they add value rather than visual noise)
Optionally add in text to introduce a category (this will appear the top of the category in question when someone browses into it). Only add this in though if it is of genuine benefit.

Step 5: Upload some assets

Single upload lets you upload one asset at a time. Bulk upload is used to upload many assets at one time. Step 1 of Bulk Upload allows you to set metadata that is common to all of the assets you are uploading (e.g. category or access level). Step 2 of Bulk Upload then allows you to step through each of these assets individually, adding in any unique metadata (such as title) to complete the upload process.

Step 6: Managing the homepage

The homepage is obviously a very important area as it allows you to present your assets in the most helpful way for your users.

Homepage configuration options include:

Edit mode – changing the welcome text and other items

To make changes to any of the text you see in Asset Bank, log in as an admin user and turn on edit mode.

Go to: Admin > Content and click the 'Turn on edit mode' button

Now browse back to the homepage and update the welcome text, changing 'Welcome to Asset Bank' to something you’d prefer. You can go crazy with this and change the naming convention for any piece of text that is visible to normal users, e.g. changing 'Promoted Items' to 'Editors Picks' or the like. Have fun with this, and when you are finished don't forget to turn edit mode off.

Featured image

This is the image in the top right of the page. Edit an asset and tick ‘Featured Image’ for it to appear here. Choose as many as you like and Asset Bank will swap between the set you have chosen.

You can manage this set via: Admin > Content > Manage featured images [edit]

Promoted items

This is an optional set of images that appear under the featured image. This is a good way to promote really popular assets or to just highlight something new. Admin users can decide which assets to show by editing them and ticking 'Promoted Item'. You can have as many as you’d like. Users can click through from the homepage and 'See all promoted items'.

Recently added

This stream is automatically updated when you add new assets. An interesting point to note is that, as with ‘Promoted Items’ users will only see recently added items that they have permission to see.

News and announcements

This is a good way to communicate with your user base.

You can add news items via: Admin > Content > News (tab)

Featured Saved Search

As an admin you can optionally display the results of a search as a panel on the homepage. Please try this to see what it looks like, you can delete it after having a play. To do this:

Run a search, then click on ‘Save search’, give it a name and click on ‘Featured Search’. Now add a description and click save. When you next visit the homepage you will see the new ‘Featured Saved Search’. This is another way to present some key information should you need to. E.g. displaying logos if these are the most downloaded items for example, making it easier for your users to find.

Step 7: Setting up download options

This is one of the most powerful aspects of Asset Bank. Here you are able to set up download pre-sets that may be of genuine use to your user base. For example, say that very often you need to download images to be used on your company website that have to be resized to fit 500 pixels by 500 pixels, RGB colour-space and in JPG format. If this is the case then Asset Bank allows admin users to set this up as a pre-set.

If you go to: Admin > Download Options

You will see the default set. Please feel free to delete, edit or add new ones. Once created, click on [edit sizes] to set up the re-size dimensions. If you only set one option, then this will be used by default. If you set more than one size per download option, then the user will be presented with these to choose from.

TIP: Try and make your pre-set names as useful as possible. E.g. if you want to have a medium sized version of the asset for electronic use (e.g. for a PowerPoint presentation), then why not call it: PowerPoint (800 x 800)

This way users who understand pixels will have a quick idea as to the dimensions of the resultant image. (They can also click ‘preview’ of course, but this is less immediate.)

More information on download options can be found in this blog article.

Step 8: Setup some user groups

*Logged in users - every registered user is a member of this group. You can use this group to manage base permissions for all logged in users.
*Public - this group is only used if you want to open up your Asset Bank to users without forcing them to log in first. We use this group to make our own Asset Bank demo site visible for example.

To get started, you could just upload some assets, set permissions for the '*Logged in users' group, and then add some users.

Let's set permissions for the '*Logged in users group'.

If we browse to:
Admin > Groups > *Logged in users > [edit]

You will arrive at the following page:

In my example I have set Download Permission as 3 (which allows the user to view and download all assets), I have given members of this group no upload or edit permissions (I'll only allow admin users to do this for now), and I have selected Advanced Permissions 1 & 2 (Advanced download - giving them access to the re-size and crop options, and Download originals - giving the user the ability to download copies of the original asset that was uploaded).

Save this and then we are ready to create some users and let them use and evaluate the system.

You may also want to create other groups (e.g. one for people who you want to upload assets).

Step 9: Create some users

There are a couple of ways to do this. The easiest is to email your test user group with a link to your Asset Bank registration page. They then complete all the required registration fields and you just have to approve or reject them. If approved, Asset Bank will send them an email with details of how to log in.

To do this, first log out of Asset Bank and click on the 'register' link on the login page. Now that you are here, you can copy the URL and send this to your test user group saying 'Please register for the Asset Bank trial here: <insert link>'.

IMPORTANT: for you to receive a notification that someone has registered, you must be an admin user and your user profile must have both your email address present and 'Receives Alerts' must be ticked. You can visit your profile page via the link at the top right of Asset Bank when you are logged in.

Note, you can manage what fields appear on the registration page via: Admin > Users > User Fields (tab)

The other way to create users is to just add them manually yourself. You can do this via: Admin > Users > 'Add a new user>>'

Here you would fill in all the fields and decide what groups they are in. You must ensure you tick 'Send notification to user?' so that they receive an email of course.

Congratulations. You now have now completed the basic Asset Bank set up. You just need to upload some images, add some metadata and then let your users have a play. This has only scratched the surface with regards to what can be configured, so please be aware of this when trailing the product. If you have any questions or would like help with some deeper configuration, then please email your sales contact. They will be pleased to help.

Contact us for a free trial