Makio & JRoses
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DexGallery Announcement | Features | Roadmap
🕑 Added 2024-06-27 22:26:52 +0000 UTCHello everyone,
It's time for a BIG preview, and you are the first to see this! 👀🔥
I’m excited to present a little demo of the new DexGallery, both for mobile users and desktop creators. But first, let me give you a brief overview.
What is DexGallery?
DexGallery is a new section dedicated to artists and fans. Creators can compile their own collections of artwork, both original and fan art. The platform will feature two main categories:
Fakedex: A collection of original monsters and Fakemon, which can be new creations, evolutions of existing Pokémon, or a Pokédex based on an entirely new, invented region.
Artdex: A collection of fan art of existing Pokémon. Many artists recreate entire Pokédexes in their unique art styles or, for example, in pixel art, and this would be a perfect place for them.
Users will be able to like artworks, support artists’ projects, and follow their favorite creators. There will be a very social home page with a timeline showing the latest artworks uploaded to the respective Dexes. It will be possible to navigate through the various Dexes or search for specific artworks. For example, users can filter for all Artdex entries featuring “Bulbasaur,” etc. Additionally, there will be a personalized timeline displaying all the artworks from artists and projects you follow.
Creators can link their main social profiles or support links (Patreon, Ko-fi, etc.), making it easy to support their work if you enjoy it.
Customization
Artists are creative. The best way to create art is to give them the freedom to be creative. We have tried to implement as many customization options as possible so that every artist can modify their Dex to their liking!
Custom backgrounds for the entire page
Backgrounds for the Pokémon cards
Size and shape of the cards
Adding new types and modifying existing icons
Displaying or hiding information
And much more to come in the future!
For individual Pokémon, various information can be added:
Name, Pokédex number, and order
Typings
Evolution line and method
Statistics
In the future, we are considering adding abilities and moves, but we will first see how it goes with the current information.
Development
Technically, it is already functional. Most of the customization is complete, and the home pages are working. The only major feature missing is social interaction (likes and follows), which is quite complicated. We still need to check the content upload process and ensure everything is in place.
As you can imagine, it is always somewhat risky to give users the ability to upload content publicly. Initially, not everyone will be able to create their Dexes; only selected artists will have this capability, or requests will be evaluated if they come in. For moderation and control reasons, we will monitor uploaded content in the initial phase to ensure it adheres to the guidelines before making it public.
We are also very cautious about AI-generated content and artworks. We will not limit uploads and will leave content choices to the artists (as long as they respect the guidelines), but it will be necessary for artists to INDICATE and MARK which artworks were created using AI. These artworks will be clearly labelled, making it evident how all content was created.
Roadmap
I believe the platform's release can be divided into four additional phases:
Phase 1: Completing Development
We will take some more time to finish development and ensure everything is ready.
Phase 2: Closed Test
We will conduct closed tests with selected creators to test the editor and content upload. You Patreons will have early access to view and interact with the initial content (or if anyone has great projects they want to share, contact me privately). This phase is crucial for two reasons: to ensure everything works correctly in both uploading and navigation, and to start having content uploaded before the public release.
Phase 3: Public Availability but Creation by Request
We will announce the release of this platform and make it available and visible to everyone. Users will be able to start browsing through various artworks and projects from some creators. Requests will be open for artists to submit applications to upload their content, and once approved, their content will be made public.
Phase 4: Open to Everyone
Once the platform is fully functional and problem-free, we will open it up to a broader audience of artists for content creation.
Monetization
We will always keep everything completely free and accessible to everyone. However, we need your support, as uploading ALL this content and interactions occupies a lot of server space and can become very costly and unsustainable for us.
Viewing content will be completely free, and creating a profile will allow interaction with the content. For artists who want to create content, there will be limitations on the free plan. Limitations include the number of Dexes that can be created and artworks inserted, as well as customization options. MOST of the main features will be free.
We haven’t defined everything 100% yet, but here’s a quick overview of features that might be limited to PRO accounts:
Limit of 3 Dexes (🌟 for more, to be defined)
Limit of 150 artworks per Dex (🌟 for more, to be defined)
Logo
Cover
Support links
Card dimensions
General card backgrounds
Custom card backgrounds 🌟
Custom page background 🌟
Displaying and hiding information
HD uploads 🌟
Limit of 3 custom typings (🌟 for more)
Modifying existing type icons 🌟
Pokémon typing
Description
Evolution line
Statistics
And more
As you can see, these features offer GREATER customization, but even with the base plan, you can create Dexes that meet your needs. In any case, everything will be at the lowest possible price, with only the $2 Premier Ball tier for supporting our project. The limitations will be calibrated based on artists’ needs and our costs.
This is just a “brief” overview of our project and what I have been working on so far. We have many more ideas and things we want to do, but for now, we are focusing on these main features. We will certainly provide the option to add more information and further customize the Dexes in the future. If you have feedback or suggestions, let us know, and we will consider implementing them for Phase 3.
We hope you like the project and that it will be used by many artists in the future. There isn’t a place for Pokémon artists to upload their content, and we hope this can fill that gap!
Please DO NOT share these videos to anyone 🙏
Thank you so much for your support!
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Makio & JRoses
All the artworks I used in these videos and for the tests I have done in the development so far was kindly granted and sent to me by Dadrake, super talented Italian artist! https://www.instagram.com/dadrake95/
