Collage Maker: before “pretty,” decide hero cell, read order, gutter/background policy, and export long edge
The browser tool arranges photos in a grid, tunes spacing and background, and exports one local PNG. Failures are informational and pixel-level: mixing aspect ratios forces awkward crops; one nuclear-bright tile steals all attention; social recompression turns tiny faces to mush. Transparent products on flat mats without a shared shadow read as stickers. You can only have one primary story; marketplaces add text-area caps and badge safe zones. Preview at thumbnail size and at the real placement before polishing aesthetics.
How to use Collage Maker: pick cell count and roles, normalize gutters/background, validate at thumb + full width, then export
- Write the channel and max long-edge pixels (feed, PDP hero, projector review). Classify inputs as hero, supporting proof, or mood filler, then place them in read order. If phone nights and daylight DSLR frames mix, balance exposure or align crop centers before layout so one cell does not look like a different season.
- Tune cell gaps and canvas color; check rounded masks do not bite logos or chins. For type overlays verify contrast and minimum size. Separate clashing white balances with columns, neutral rails, or stacked bands instead of global saturation boosts.
- After export inspect weight and long edge—if too heavy, drop cells or shrink non-hero tiles and ease sharpening. Ship source folders plus version ids for commercial work; print needs a separate low-cell, high-pixel export—never upscale a social file for paper.
Collage Maker FAQ: crop ratios, weak hierarchy, platform crush, rights, light vs dark skins
Everyone’s collage feels different—what minimum rules align a team beyond “taste”?
Lock hero coordinates, outer margin, cell gap, background or transparency policy, and a max cell count. Pin reference PNGs in shared storage with `v2` filenames so review argues rules, not preferences.
Looks premium fullscreen but turns to soup as a social thumbnail—bad export or too many cells?
Effective pixels per face drop when grids get dense plus platforms recompress. Measure hero face height inside the real preview frame; merge cells or let the hero span two columns. Do not rely on hair-level sharpening—it dies first under JPEG.
A portrait tile crops foreheads—reordering breaks the story. How do you prevent that?
Pre-crop each source to the destination aspect or change the template to give portraits a tall cell. Micro nudging inside the grid rarely fixes composition—geometry wins.
We mixed stock, user photos, and team headshots for a campaign—what evidence should we archive?
Keep licenses, model releases, and scope of use with the project id; hash the working collage and source folder together so legal can trace which asset landed in which cell.
One PNG for white PDP and a dark promo landing page—enough?
Usually not: translucent products look gray on white and float on black. Export light and dark variants—or document which storefront skin each file targets—in the design system.