Smartimage

The fourth candidate is a subsidiary of the Enterprise Solution Widen Media Collective that belongs to Widen Enterprises from Wisconsin [15]. Smartimage [4] targets small businesses and workgroups that mainly want to collect and share visual content.

The cloud service is available in three sizes. Customers pay $50 per month for 50GB storage space and up to six administrative accounts. The Essential version does not provide access to the Smartimage API, and no customization is available. In the Preferred version, which costs around $200 per month, you get 200GB and unlimited admins, and users are allowed to customize. Smartimage Premium gives you access to the API, customization options, 400GB, and unlimited admin accounts for $400.

Anyone who needs more space can negotiate with the manufacturer. Non-profit organizations and educational institutions should also talk to the manufacturer to arrange a special price. Discounts are also available if users pay for one of the commercial versions 12 months in advance. Interested parties can test Smartimage for 15 days free of charge with 2GB storage and three admin accounts. When you create an account, you need to specify a company name, which Smartimage incorporates into the collection URL (e.g., http://bitparade.smartimage.com ). Users can also link the Smartimage account with their Google account.

Smartimage offers an English-only interface. Files can be uploaded to the vendor's server in All Files . The uploader is implemented in HTML5, and it proved to be pretty stable. We fed it around 5,000 images at once, and it dealt with them easily.

The Smartimage uploader uploads up to three files at the same time and processes them one by one. We did not have to wait long for the thumbnails either; the software generated them quickly. So far, it is only possible for Chrome users to import whole directories. Anyone using another browser currently has to select multiple files manually.

Smartimage reads metadata contained in the file and uses the title, the description, and the tags for its interface (Figure 10). You can adjust all of these properties on the DAM system. The evaluation of Exif information proved to be less successful. If something is wrong with the image alignment, users cannot correct it themselves in Smartimage. Instead, they have to delete the file, edit the original on their own computer, and upload it again.

Figure 10: Smartimage also imports metadata that other applications have used and displays the title, description, and tags.

In addition to preview images, Smartimage creates other image sizes that it offers along with the original download version. Depending on the resolution, the DAM system also provides up to three scaled versions.

Collective

Smartimage supports all popular photo and graphic formats and also manages some other file types, such as InDesign, Word, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF, and PostScript documents. The service does not accept OpenOffice and LibreOffice files. A similar thing happens when you attempt to upload files in supported formats but without the suffix. Users can only add videos to their collections if they are already available on YouTube or Vimeo. They can open a dialog via Embed Video , enter the link, and correct the description and the tags, as required.

Smartimage arranges the content in collections upon request. You can create these via Home | New Collection or by selecting the desired files in the All Files view, clicking on the Batch Actions button, and selecting Edit Collection & Section . In the drop-down menu, you then need to choose Add New Collection . You need to define a title, a URL, and a description and must also select whether or not to make the collection open to the public in the collection settings. Smartimage protects private collections with a password.

Optionally, users can set a header image and a logo. You can also determine in the configuration screen whether others are allowed to download. Only if the Download Action switch is set to Shown can third parties download a ZIP archive with all the files using Download All at top right. The admin can also decide whether other users can or cannot share files on social networks. To add more structure to collections, you can define Sections . Smartimage offers the Logos , Documents , Guidelines , and Videos sections inherently; users can also set up their own.

As previously mentioned, the DAM system inherits existing metadata. Users can supplement or correct the data conveniently in Smartimage. To do so, select one or more files with the checkmark at top left and then press the new Batch Actions button at the top right (Figure 11). In the following dialog, you can enter a description, define a section within the collection in which the contents appear, delete existing tags, or add new ones. If you open the editor from the single-pane view, you will also see information about the size at which the file is suitable for printing at 300dpi.

Figure 11: Smartimage shows a batch processing option for multiple files, once users have selected more than one file.

On the Back Burner

Search and filter functions are available both in the (Home ) collection view and in the (All Files ) overall view (Figure 12). If the DAM system does not find any content that matches the desired criteria, users can remove the criteria individually with a simple mouse click. There is no way to protect uploaded files on the system with a watermark, no version management, and no interface to external ordering systems or stores.

Figure 12: Smartimage filters by collections, file types, and tags. Users can also expand the drop-down menu and select criteria with the mouse.

User administration is similarly limited. Smartimage only supports one account type: the administrator. The owner of this account can invite other administrators, via Manage | Admins , who are allowed to add or remove files and create, edit, and delete collections. The invited admins cannot, however, invite other users or upgrade their Smartimage accounts.

All accounts also have access to the very spartan statistics under Analytics . In a table, Smartimage displays how often the individual collections were visited, how many visitors clicked on the share function (by email, as iframes, or through Facebook), how many downloads there were, and how many files and videos exist.

Smartimage does not grant individual users access to specific content. You can create small collections, password-protect them, and only share with selected users, but for most users, this would mean too much effort and clicking.