Studio Magic · Composite sheets

Before you build — get the gallery right

Every check here has to be true before you download the metadata file, or the sheet has to be pulled again.

For: whoever builds the composite sheets Takes: a few minutes in the gallery, and saves a re-render

The six checks

  1. Upload the cut-outs first

    Every composite photo is a PNG cut-out, in the gallery before you download the sheet. Download first and the sheet names the original JPGs — the builder tells you, and nothing exports until you re-pull it.

  2. Everyone is in the right gallery

    A photo in the wrong gallery ends up on the wrong composite. Walk the galleries before you pull the sheet.

  3. One subject per gallery — one code per subject, per team

    A girl who plays volleyball and runs cross country needs two galleries, one per team. Combine her into one gallery only after the customs are built — condense early and you lose one of her teams.

  4. Mark the headshots

    Tag each headshot pose as a headshot. Two-photo designs pair a headshot with a full-body pose. Nothing tagged, and the builder takes the first photo as the headshot — a guess, and it says so.

  5. Mark anything you are not using

    Tag hype as hype and it stays off the composites. Same for buddy poses, coach shots, anything meant for one spot. Untagged is an ordinary pose.

  6. Tag the sideways shots horizontal

    A horizontal photo on a vertical template lands across her name. The gallery export carries no width or height, so tag those shots horizontal in the gallery, then point that tag at a template built for them under the design in step 1, Recipe (its photo rules appear once the roster is read).

    Until you point it somewhere, a horizontal photo is left off every design — an unfamiliar tag is never guessed onto a template. A freshly tagged gallery looks like it lost photos until you give them their design.

How tags become photos on a template

Tick a design in step 1, Recipe and — once step 2 has read the roster — every tag your gallery uses is listed, each set to one of three things:

SettingWhat it means
First photoThe headshot slot. Two-photo designs only.
Second photoThe pose — and the only slot a one-photo design uses.
Not on this templateLeft out of this design entirely.

Defaults: untagged photos are poses, headshots are headshots, hype is left out, a starred (Primary) photo counts as a pose. Anything unfamiliar stays out.

Hype gets its own design: set hype to the second photo and (no attribute) to "not on this template", and it builds from hype frames alone. Buddy and coach poses work the same way.

Remember this for <design> keeps the settings, so you set them once.

What the finished files are called

A two-photo design makes several rows per person — every headshot against every pose — so the file is named after the person, numbered: Juniper_BNNR_1.jpg, Juniper_BNNR_2.jpg. Named after the photo, every row sharing a pose gets the same name and each render overwrites the last.

First names only, unless two people in the run share one — then both get their last name (Juniper_Smith, Juniper_Vance) and nobody else changes. The check covers the whole run, teams included, because it all lands in one folder. Same first and last name: their online code is added, and the run says so.

The number always has an underscore in front — _IND_2, never _IND2, because _IND2 is a real design suffix.

One-photo designs are one row per photo, so they name from the photo. Switch either way on the design, under What should the finished files be called?

When something is held back

Nothing exports while a team-and-design combination has a blocking problem — it is held out and named, with the reason. Fix what it names and run again.