Using Download Image Watermark with Frontend Submissions

Frontend Submissions and Download Image Watermark (a third party extension for EDD) are separate extensions that serve different purposes for different store owners. However, it’s not uncommon that both are needed to create things like community-driven stock photography stores and the like.

These two extensions have been developed to work alongside each other and this documentation will help you get them configured correctly.

The first thing to note is that selling images with EDD is a slightly different process than selling most other types of digital products. Images create a special situation that requires a few additional steps to protect the image files. For complete description of this situation and its necessary configuration, please read 
Selling Images with EDD.

Configure the Extensions Settings

In setting up both 
Frontend Submissions you do not need to do anything in particular to prepare it for integration with Download Image Watermark. Simply follow the basic setup documentation.

The same is true of 
Download Image Watermark. Follow the extension documentation as if you were the only product creator on your site and you were not using FES. Concentrate on which image sizes you’d like watermarked and set them up accordingly.

At this point, it is important that you already understand the specifics of selling images with EDD as linked above. If you have not read that documentation, please do so.

Vendor Submission Form

With the extensions set up and an understanding of how to sell images with EDD, the final step is communicating to your vendors how to properly upload images that are both watermarked and protected.

Most single image products will have both the downloadable image as well as a featured image (preview) that is displayed on the product page for customers to look at before purchasing. That means you’ll want each product submission to include a 
protected download file (the image) and a watermarked preview of that image. This makes the details of your FES submission form the key to integrating these two extensions.

Vendor Instructions

When your vendors submit images to your store, they have to understand exactly how you, the store owner, will use them. Most vendors will expect to be able to simply upload the image that is for sale and be done with the process. That is not enough, though.

Be sure to add the “Featured Image” field to your submission form.

If you have already configured Download Image Watermark with your watermark images, explain in the “Help text” setting of the Featured Image field that this image will be used as a preview for customers and it will be watermark so that it is protected.

You can also specify max dimensions for this image upload. Especially for stores selling high resolution images, there is no need for the image preview to be large. 
Consider advising your vendors to upload a version of the image no wider than the width of your content. This will help with page load speed as well as make sure the watermark image is not too small in comparison to the image.

Compress the Prices and Files image file.

This far into the documentation, you know by now that image files are not protected by default in EDD and it is best that they remain that way. This means that your vendors will need to compress their image files into 
.zip format when they upload them to your “Prices and Files” field.

Again, use the “Help Text” setting in that field to briefly explain this to vendors. This is also where they will be uploading the full size of their image. At this point, they should understand that this product image will 
not be watermarked and therefore will not be used in any sort of image preview. Compressing the image file into .zip format protects it from customers.

Conclusion

This is more like a how-to article than it is documentation. But the main thing to understand is that both Frontend Submissions and Download Image Watermark will work independently and do not actually have to be integrated with each other in your settings.

That means it is extremely important that you understand what they will [automatically] do so that you and your vendors approach the system correctly.