Sticviews | Custom Decal Printing | Installation Tips and Decal Ideas | Car Stickers | Custom Laptop Skins

If you are a college student ready to display your school pride for all to see, sticviews provides excellent products, for a variety of uses, that you can customize any way you like.

We have discovered that college students may know what they want, but do not necessarily have access to a high-quality school logo to create college-themed laptop skins, car decals and room décor.

To help you out, we have compiled a short tutorial on where you can access a logo for your school (or university) and how you can get that image into the sticviews designer to create your own custom skins and decals. First try checking your school’s website to see if high-resolution logos are available.

(Disclaimer: This tutorial involves using school logos which are subject to copyright protection. Please check with your booster club or school officials to ensure that you have permission to use your school’s logo. Always respect all copyright laws, and be aware that by uploading images to sticviews, you are verifying that you have permission to use any images that are subject to copyright laws.)

Part I: Getting Started

To get started, visit Chris Creamer’s sportslogos.net website. Here you will find various logos for all types of professional sports teams, but our focus today is on the College and NCAA logos.

1)      Click on the NCAA logo on the homepage or on  the ‘College’ link under the ‘Sports Logos’ heading in the left-side menu.

2)      Schools are divided up alphabetically into categories, so click on the letter range that includes the first letter of your school name (Ex: Florida State students click on ‘NCAA Division I (D-H)’)

3)      Now you will see a page filled with school logos, in alphabetical order by school name.
Browse through to find your school and click on the logo image.

4)      You are now taken to that school’s page with various past and present logos.
Click on the logo that you desire to use for your skin or decal (Although several schools have older logos available, newer logos seem to have higher resolution for better print results in most cases).

5)      Now you should be viewing a larger version of the logo image, but notice how you cannot just right-click and select ‘Save Image as’ in your browser.
To get around this dilemma, you will have to use one of two methods (assuming your are running Windows), both of which are described below.

Part II: Saving the Logo

Method 1: Using the Windows Snipping Tool (Windows Vista, Windows 7)

If you are using Windows Vista or Windows 7, you have access to a neat tool called the Snipping tool. You can access this program through the start menu or quick launch bar in Vista, or directly on your Start bar in Windows 7 (Look for the icon below).

This tool enables you to quickly take a screenshot of a portion of your screen, to be saved as an image on your PC.

1)      Make sure your web browser (with the logo open) is visible and run the Snippin g tool.
Your entire screen should fade out and you will see a box appear in the upper-right corner of your screen (your arrow mouse cursor will also turn into a cross-hair cursor).

2)      Position your cursor at the top-left corner of the logo, click and hold down the left button, and drag the cursor down to the bottom-right corner of the logo. Now let go of the left mouse button (this may take more than one try to make sure you capture the entire logo).

3)      Your selection (the logo) will now open in a new window. Click ‘File > Save As…’ (or the purple floppy disk icon) to save the logo image somewhere on your PC. Be sure the save as a .JPG file or .GIF file, as these are the only file types allowed for upload on sticviews.

4)      You are now ready to move on to Part III: Uploading to Sticviews

Method 2: Using the ‘Print Screen’ keyboard button

Although the Windows Snipping tool is the simplest way to save a logo image from sportslogos.net, the ‘Print Screen’ button on your keyboard (sometimes PrtScn) will work as well, with a few extra steps. This key is usually right next to the Scroll Lock button, on the top right half of your keyboard.

1)      Make sure your browser window (with the logo) is visible and click the Print Screen button on your keyboard.

2)      Open any image editor of your choice (Paint,Photoshop, etc.) and press CTRL + V to paste the image (or right-click and select ‘Paste’). You will notice that not only is the logo there, but also everything that was displayed on your screen.

3)      Crop the image down to just the logo (process varies depending on image editor used).

4)      Save the image somewhere on your PC (Be sure the save as a .JPG file or .GIF file, as these are the only file types allowed for upload on sticviews), and move on to Part III: Uploading to Sticviews

Part III: Uploading to Sticviews

Once you have the logo saved on your PC, the rest of the process is fairly straightforward to upload onto sticviews.

1)      Go to the sticviews image upload page (http://app.sticviews.com/startuploadimage.aspx)

2)      Click ‘Choose File’ and find the logo image that you just saved on your computer. Click ‘Open’ to load the image.

3)      Agree to the conditions by checking the box, and click ‘Upload’.
Once the image details and screen shot appear, click ‘Continue’.

4)      You will now be taken into the Sticviews designer with your image. Here, you can add any text you desire (or add other images), finalize your design, and complete the checkout process.

Congratulations! You have now created your very own custom College skin or decal. Be creative and design one for anything!

Valentine’s day has become such a commercialized holiday – seems like it’s more about chocolate than anything else! Nothing against chocolate, of course! It’s a great gift, but why not celebrate this Valentine’s day by giving your loved one something a little more personal than just candy and flowers? It may be easier than you think to put together a thoughtful, personalized Valentine’s day gift. Here’s one idea I came up with of what you could do this Valentine’s with sticviews custom prints:

Step 1:

Find all your favorite photos of you and your Valentine:

Photos by Flickr user slemmon

OR set up a photo shoot with a photographer so you will have good quality photos to work with. Great photography is an investment – it’s something that archives your life’s story so you remember people and events worth remembering. Truly gifted photographers will be able to capture great moments that really show your personality. Here’s some of our favorite photographers:

• Sweet E Images
• Keri Meyers Photography
• Table 4 Weddings

Step 2:

Upload your photos to sticviews.com

sticviews prints photo-quality prints, both on several different types of adhesive materials and poster paper (we call it art paper on the website). All high quality, high resolution photos print beautifully on sticviews. This makes sticviews perfect for custom photo enlargements. It also means you can personalize any gift with your great photos by simply peeling and stic’in your photos on as decorations.

Step 3:

Give your custom photo enlargements as a gift or personalize another gift with your custom sticviews photo prints.

Here’s some ideas of what you could do with your custom Valentine’s sticviews:

Custom wall decals for your bedroom:

Photos by Flickr users slemmon, sonofgroucho

Custom laptop skin:

Create a personalized memory box:

Fill a box or chest with momentos from you and your Valentine’s love life and stic your sticviews photo decals on it. Create a custom sticker label with our text editor.

Photos by Flickr users brenda-starr, slemmon

Skin your coffee table or other furniture:

Create a photo collage straight onto your coffee table without worrying about messy glues or laminates. Just peel and stic your sticviews custom photo stickers onto a flat surface. Peel off and stic on again if you mess up – sticviews are always easily removed and come off clean. Check out how we skinned the sticviews’ office coffee tables with animal print in this blog article!

Decorate your their office space and skin their office desk:

Surprise your Valentine by personalizing their work space with your photo decals and custom photo enlargements.

I hope this gives you some ideas about how you can give a personalized Valentine’s gift this year!

Happy stic’in,
Sonya

tagged with [ custom laptop skins, furniture decor, home decor, photo decals, wall decals ]

Custom Table Furnishing with Sticviews

So, you have these boring tables around  your house and you’re not sure what to do with them to make them look better.  You could go the painting route, but why not pick a design that you can change easily over time.  Using sticviews you can create custom skins for your tables or other home furnishings.  We had two white square tables in our office and we wanted to spruce them up.  I want to show you how easy it is to re-finish your tables using sticviews custom table skins.

The supplies you need to re-finish your tables are simple: the custom sticker from sticviews, a spray bottle of water (or damp cloth), a small squeegee or credit card, a tape measure and scissors.

First you want to clean the surface of your table.  You never know what dust is on the surface and it can get stuck to the sticker and leave bumps.  If you want to make your skin fit really well to the surface of your table make sure to wipe it down with water or surface cleaner.  Having a clean surface allows the custom sticker to stick really smoothly to the surface of the table.

Next you want to measure the table to make sure your custom sticker will fit exactly.  Now, you can order the custom sticker to fit exactly to the surface, but we’ve found it to be easier to make the sticker just a little larger than the actual surface so you can trim to fit.  After you measure the table cut the sticker to fit.

Now that you have the sticker cut to fit your table it’s time to start skinning!  Using your spray bottle generously spray the adhesive side of your custom sticker and the top of the table.  Spraying the surface allows for you to easily slide the sticker on the surface to fit it to the corners more precisely.  Once you have the sticker on you can use the squeegee to smooth the surface out to avoid air bubbles. (I used a paper towel to catch the water as it came out from under the sticker.)

And there you have it your newly furnished custom tables!  Using sticviews to create a unique look for your tables is a great afternoon project.  It’s always helpful to  have another pair of hands – this is something your kids would love to help with!

You can select from the many designs we have on the sticviews website or upload your own design or picture.  We have everything from animal print to modern design or landscapes.  Maybe you want to skin a table with a family photograph or a picture of a beautiful flower – the possibilities are endless with sticviews custom stickers!! Amy over at Living Locurto also skinned her kids tables.  Check out her blog here to see her table skins.  What DIY projects could you use sticviews for?  I’d love to hear your feedback!

tagged with [ furniture decor ]

What to bring to a conference?

So, you’ve started a blog or a business and you’re building a following – now what?  Now is the time to start really learning from the experts.  Tradeshows and conferences are a great way to meet other entrepreneurs in your business area and learn from the best in the industry.  For example, conferences such as Blissdom and BlogHer are for the women bloggers, SxSW for music, film and interactive, Blog World Expo for all bloggers, and many more tradeshows are great opportunities to learn from others.  Sticviews is sponsoring Amy Locurto and Angie Arthur of I Heart Faces for the Blissdom conference this February, and we wanted to pass along some useful hints for being prepared to attend your conference.

1. Business Cards – We just got some really awesome business cards from moo.com and we’re really excited to get them shipped in. Hopefully we’ll have them in time for the next Social Media Club Dallas event with Chris Brogan on the 21^st!  Business cards are a great way to give your contact information to people you meet and helps you follow up with people after the conference is over.  You can always go with innovative creative designs like the ones on Web Designer Depot.  TIP: Make sure to put your social network contact information on your cards (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc) – many people forget! And you could always be creative. Amy Locurto handed out her business cards with a little Valentine’s Day sticker gift – no one threw those away!
   
   

   
   

2. Create a list before you go of questions you’d like answered or specific people you want to seek out. You don’t want to miss the opportunity to talk to someone who has more experience in particular areas that could really be of benefit to you and your website.  TIP: You can tweet about your questions too!  If you don’t have a smart phone or a laptop for the weekend I recommend you borrowing one for the weekend.
3. Laptop skins – If you are a known blogger, or a beginner, getting a laptop skin with your blog name or banner on it really helps people put a face to the name of your blog. What a great way to promote your blog through technology.  Angie and Amy from I Heart Faces received their laptop skins from sticviews. Remember…it’s hard to recognize faces, but it helps when people can recognize your blog banner or twitter profile photo.  Amy Locurto recommends putting your blog banner and your Twitter photo on the laptop skin works great.
4. iPhone skins – Do you have an iPhone or another smart phone? You can get custom decals to fit on the back of your phone (see below) to also promote your blog.
   
5. T-shirts – This is always a fun thing to have around. Another great way to make your brand known while walking around a conference. Nomee handed out free t-shirts at the Twestival event last year – great way to build awareness and recognition of your brand.
   
6. Camera – You never know who you are going to meet at the conference, and it’s a great way to showcase things you saw when you blog about your experience.
7. Do some research on the presenters of the conference. It’s good to come in well prepared to soak up the knowledge they have to offer without having to figure out who the people are before hand.
8. Mints or gum – you are going to be doing a lot of talking, and you should pay the favor to your neighbor!

There are always lists on the conference sites of extra things to bring, but this list is pretty comprehensive of things you need to bring!  Is there something you won’t go to a conference without?  Let us know – leave a comment or reach out to me on Twitter (@katfarmer).

tagged with [ custom laptop skins, tradeshows and conferences ]

Here at the sticviews lab in Plano, TX we’ve been pretty busy the last few weeks getting orders out in time for Christmas to be here.

And, last week we had wonderful white Christmas come our way down south and it was a refreshing change in the Texas weather!  Bryce (our CEO) installed some awesome snowflake tiles, featured below, that definitely fit well with the weather here in Plano for last week.  What a great way to use custom stickers for your holiday decorations!

He also installed a stic-on Christmas tree on a door in his kitchen.  It looks great!  He even topped it off with one of the tile stars as the tree topper.

These stics below are my favorite holiday treat.  Stic-on wreaths!  Bryce used them on the windows on the front of his house.  Much more affordable them buying a wreath (most of which the nice ones I saw going for at LEAST $60-$100) and definitely more convenient than making your own.  And these look great.  My mom “borrowed” my wreath and has it hanging on the glass door of a armoire in the living room.  All our guests loved it!

I know it’s after Christmas, but I thought these were pictures I just had to share with you all.  Sticviews are a great affordable and creative way to decorate for any occasion – Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Halloween and more!  I hope you enjoyed these ideas for using custom stickers to enhance your holiday decor!  Come to our site and check out our gallery for other holiday decor ideas!

Keep Sticin!
Kat

tagged with [ Christmas, diy, home decor, tile decals, window art ]