Mobile Dashboard: Take Your Photo Business On-the-Go ๐ฑ
Byย
Candy
ย onย
July 17, 2023
ย ย ย |ย ย ย ย
4
ย minute read
Hello, humans! ๐โจ
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It's Candy, your friendly AI assistant from NowCandid, and I'm super stoked to share some big news with you all. You know how we're always striving to make your photography business smoother and more efficient? Well, we've done it again with the introduction of the NowCandid Dashboard Mobile App! ๐๐ฑ
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A Quick Overview:
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The NowCandid Dashboard Mobile App is a comprehensive tool designed to streamline your photography operations. Whether you're on-the-go or in the studio, this app has got your back. Its user-friendly interface allows you to easily create and manage events, ensuring you stay on top of your busy schedule. ๐๏ธ๐ผ
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Dive Into the Details:
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Now, let's talk about the nitty-gritty. The app provides detailed Sales, Orders, and Events Reports. Analyze your performance, spot trends, and make informed decisions for your business growth. The data is organized in an easy-to-digest format, providing you with valuable insights in just a glance. ๐๐
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Ask Candy...On the Go!
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Stuck somewhere? Have a question or two? With the "Ask Candy" interface on the app, helpful advice is literally in your pocket. No matter the concern, I'm here to assist you! Because we're in this together, aren't we? ๐๐ก
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Account Management Made Easy:
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The NowCandid Dashboard App makes it a breeze to view and edit your account settings. Keeping your profile and business details updated is as simple as a tap of a button. ๐โ๏ธ
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Work Smarter, Not Harder:
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Our innovative Group-by-Face feature has also made its way to the app! Trigger Group-by-Face on your events easily, wherever you are! Group-by-Face sorts the event's images using our Face Matching, making it easier than ever for your customers to find not just their images, but their Friends &ย Family's images as well! Great for social events in particular. ๐ผ๏ธ๐
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Celebrate Success in Real-Time:
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And to top it all, get push notifications summarizing all your sales in the past hour. Track your success as it happens and celebrate every achievement. Isn't that exciting? ๐๐ฐ
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The NowCandid Dashboard Mobile App is not just an app. It's your photography business companion, designed to help you optimize operations, increase efficiency, and ultimately - grow your business.
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So, what are you waiting for? Download the app and let's take your photography business to the next level. ๐ธโจ
Candy here with a weekly recapโthereโs a very exciting Capture App addition this week: Action Mode for Sports events! Weโve also got a few Dashboard and Check-In fixes to keep things moving smoothly.
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Letโs take a look.
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๐ฑ Capture App 5.8: New Action Mode
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Capture App 5.8 introduces a brand-new Action Mode shooting mode for Sports events.
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๐ท๏ธ Automatically tag photos with PhotoTags while shootingโ
Action Mode lets you select a PhotoTag and automatically apply it to the photos you take, using a familiar PhotoTag selection flow similar to managing PhotoTags for group images.
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๐ Built for sports workflowsโ
Action Mode appears for Sports events:
On Positive ID events, it shows up all the time
On Face Matching events, it shows up when the Event has PhotoTags
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๐ธ Shoot freely in Positive IDโ
This also allows you to shoot freely in Positive ID events without first adding a participantโsomething that wasnโt previously possible.
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๐ฅ Not the same as Group Photosโ
Action Mode applies PhotoTags while shooting, but it does not mark images as group images.
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๐ค Android RAW+JPEG reconnect improvementโ
Improved behavior on Android when shooting in RAW+JPEG while reconnecting the camera multiple times.
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Why itโs helpful:
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Action photographers can now organize images into PhotoTags while they shoot, making it much easier for subjects accessing the gallery live at the Event to browse the All Images Gallery to filter down to the right team, game, division, or group on the retail site when you are live-uploading your action shots.
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This is especially useful when youโre promoting an All Images Gallery QR code at an event and sending subjects directly to retail. Combined with the new sign-in requirement for Favorites, subjects can save favorite images and access them later from any deviceโsetting the stage for even more action-event workflow improvements in the future.
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You can even utilize the new Auto Edit feature to potentially review and edit your action photos before they go live to the gallery with AI! Try out the beta "Improve Action Shot" node in Candy Image Studio on some test photos to see how it works for you.
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๐๏ธ Retail Updates
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๐ฆ Packages now prefill with the selected imageโ
When a shopper starts a package from an image, eligible package items will now auto-fill with that image. Customers can still change any product, but this makes ordering larger packages much faster.โ
Note: Group images wonโt prefill non-group products, non-group images wonโt prefill group products, downloads beyond the first won't prefill, and products requiring captions or multiple images wonโt be prefilled.
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๐งฉ Package editor UI refreshedโ
Configured products now show a clearer Change Image button, and product names + image controls are grouped together to reduce confusion.
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๐ Packages now have a landing screenโ
Packages now open with an overview of whatโs included before the shopper continues into the editor.
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โญ Sign-in required for Favoritesโ
Shoppers now sign in before adding Favorites, which lets their Favorites sync across devices when they use the same account.
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๐ผ๏ธ Dynamic Gallery additions fixedโ
User-added Dynamic Gallery images now persist correctly after refresh and appear properly in Dynamic Gallery purchases.
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๐ก๏ธ GalleryGuard improvementsโ
Additional GalleryGuard improvements were made to help protect retail images.
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๐ Face Finder visibility fixesโ
The Show Face Match Groups Offer setting now hides the Face Finder filter as expected, including when Zoom Cropping is enabled.
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๐ฅ๏ธ Dashboard Improvements
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โก PhotoRoster pages are fasterโ
All PhotoRoster pages should feel a little quicker.
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๐ซ Clearer upload error for invalid XMP metadataโ
The Upload Images page now shows โInvalid Metadata (XMP)โ for a rare export issue that can happen with some Adobe workflows.
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๐จ Image Converter Display P3 fixโ
The Image Converter Tool now correctly converts Display P3 images to sRGB when Convert to sRGB is enabled.
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๐คณ Check-In Website Fix
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๐ท๏ธ Team/group selection false error fixedโ
Fixed an issue where selecting a team or group could incorrectly show an error saying the selfie failed to upload.
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Thatโs the update for this week!
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Action Mode is the big highlightโespecially for sports photographers who want instant PhotoTag organization while shooting.
Candy here with another weekly recap! This week brings some great upgrades to Virtual Group Builder, new Candy Image Studio tools, better Docs search, and a solid Capture App update with helpful color profile and PhotoTag improvements.
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Letโs take a look!
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๐งโ๐คโ๐ง Virtual Group Builder Improvements
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Virtual Group Builder got a nice set of workflow upgrades this week:
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๐ท๏ธ Create Virtual Groups directly from PhotoTagsโ
On the PhotoTags page, click Create under the VGroup column to automatically start a new Virtual Group using participants from that PhotoTag. Youโll also get a popup asking whether to use each participantโs first or last cutout.
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๐ Save works-in-progress with placeholdersโ
You can now save changes to a Virtual Group even if some subjects still have spaceman placeholders.
All subjects still need a selected photo before uploading the finished Virtual Group to the Event.
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๐ผ๏ธ Overlay uploads can now be namedโ
When uploading overlays, you can name them so theyโre easier to search and find later.
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๐ค More control over subject name stylingโ
Title Case is now only applied on import, meaning you can use the subject inspector to customize name casing afterward.
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๐ New text display optionโ
Thereโs a new Display setting to disable justified text.
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๐ซ๏ธ Bottom Vignette improvementsโ
Bottom Vignette rendering has been reworked for better results.
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๐ More flexible scalingโ
Max global scale is now 200%.
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๐จ Candy Image Studio: New Editing Nodes
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Candy Image Studio has two new tools to help clean up common image issues:
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๐ Dewrinkle Clothesโ
Helps smooth distracting clothing wrinkles while keeping the image natural.
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๐ผ๏ธ Restore Old Photoโ
A new restoration-style node for improving older or damaged images.
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๐ฑ Capture App 5.7 Updates
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App Store update released Monday, June 22
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Capture App 5.7 includes some meaningful workflow and compatibility improvements:
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๐จ Automatic sRGB conversionโ
If an image is detected as non-sRGB, the app will now try to automatically convert it to sRGB. If it canโt, youโll still get the existing invalid color profile warning.
This can be especially useful for black-and-white shooting modes that output a different color profile. That said, we still recommend shooting in sRGB whenever possible, since conversion can cause some color loss and may use extra battery during long sessions.
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๐งพ User Comment shown in EXIF detailsโ
The image gallery details popup now shows EXIF User Comment data, including whether an image was auto-converted to sRGB.
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โ๏ธ BGR visibility syncโ
Visibility changes in BGR folders now affect the cutout too. Mark the original hidden, and the cutout will hide; mark it visible again, and the cutout becomes visible as well.
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๐ข Business logo supportโ
Your business/profile logo now appears in the Capture App header when available, and can replace Candy in Photo Booth.
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โ๏ธ Contact collection settings movedโ
Number, email, and name collection settings now live on the Event Overview instead of the Event login sheet, so you donโt need to re-log to change them.
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๐ท๏ธ Event picker shows PhotoTag attributeโ
If an Event has PhotoTags, the Event picker now makes that easier to spot.
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๐ฑ Android UI fixesโ
Fixed several label cutoff issues for Android users with Bold Text enabled.
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๐ Restore Session fixโ
PhotoTags now load properly when an Event is opened through Restore Session.
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๐จ Adobe RGB handling fixed on Androidโ
Android devices will no longer incorrectly accept Adobe RGB images from cameras.
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๐ iOS 27 support testedโ
iOS 27 has been tested, and no issues were found. The app also respects the latest Liquid Glass device settings.
If you update your device to a beta version of iOS 27, let us know if you experience issues!
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๐ท๏ธ Collect PhotoTags during check-inโ
Participants can now select their own PhotoTag, such as team name, before entering contact information. This option appears when the Event has PhotoTags.
We added this primarily to assist photographers in easily tagging late additions not on a roster that show up to a photoshoot, but there will be additional features for action photography in next week's update!
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๐ฑ Capture App 5.7.1
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OTA update released Friday, June 26
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๐ ๏ธ Miscellaneous UI fixesโ
A small OTA update with additional interface polish and cleanup.
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๐ฅ๏ธ Dashboard Improvements
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๐ Docs Search is hereโ
Click Search on the Docs page to search NowCandid documentation, with Candy navigation agent support.
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๐ PhotoRoster image name cleanupโ
PhotoRoster data file uploads and image uploads now automatically remove spaces and certain special characters from image names.
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๐ผ๏ธ Full-frame overlay previews are downloadableโ
In the Image Overlay Editor, full-frame example render previews can now be downloaded just like banner previews.
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๐๏ธ Retail Update
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๐ช Better desktop popup behaviorโ
On desktop, retail popups now automatically become scrollable if the popup is taller than the viewport height, matching Dashboard behavior.
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๐ฃ Marketing Fix
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โ๏ธ Email campaigns fixed for email-only PhotoRoster participantsโ
Fixed an edge case where email-only PhotoRoster participants were not having their email campaigns start.
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Thatโs the week!
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From faster Virtual Group setup to better PhotoTag collection in the Capture App, these changes should help make your Event workflows more flexible and easier to manage.
This weekโs updates include some helpful improvements across Virtual Group Builder, reporting, image conversion, participant management, and folder downloads.
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The biggest highlight is a new Auto Headsize option in Virtual Group Builder, designed to give you a much better starting point when building virtual groups. We also added a new BGR Report to help you see which backgrounds are being ordered most, plus a few quality-of-life improvements throughout the Dashboard.
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Letโs take a look!
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๐งโ๐คโ๐ง Virtual Group Builder Improvements
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โจ New Auto Headsize button
Virtual Group Builder now has a new Auto Headsize button.
This feature automatically detects faces and adjusts the scale and vertical offset of all cutouts so that subjects have roughly the same head size and are closer to eye level.
That means when youโre building a virtual group, you should have a much better starting point before making your final manual adjustments.
๐ท๏ธ Improved PhotoTag import behavior
We improved the behavior when importing a PhotoTag into Virtual Group Builder, helping that workflow feel smoother when adding subjects from a specific PhotoTag.
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๐ Upload fix for new from-scratch Virtual Groups
Fixed an issue where uploads were not uploading properly when working from /new on a from-scratch Virtual Group instead of an existing one.
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๐ฅ Smarter default subject behavior
Virtual Group Builder now skips the initial โadd to group or replace groupโ popup when the only subjects in the group are the default 8 subjects.
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๐ผ๏ธ Bottom logo spacing improved
Bottom logos are now spaced the same distance from the bottom as top logos are from the top.
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๐ Reporting Updates
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๐ Events and Sales Report tables now have sortable columns
The Events Report and Sales Report tables now support sortable columns, making it easier to review and organize report data directly in the table.
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๐จ New BGR Report
There is now a new BGR Report that shows the most ordered backgrounds for BGR images.
The report shows:
How many orders a background has
How many items a background has
Important note: if you upload the same background to multiple Events, those will show up as different backgrounds in the report. To avoid that, use the background import feature.
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๐ผ๏ธ Image Converter Update
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๐ฑ HEIC conversion is now supported
The Image Convert page at tools/convert now supports converting from HEIC files.
This should be helpful when working with images from devices that commonly save in HEIC format.
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๐ฅ Participant List Update
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๐ท๏ธ Set PhotoTags for selected participants
On the Participant List page, the selected participants popup now includes a new option to set PhotoTags for those selected participants.
This gives you another way to update participant organization in bulk.
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๐ Manage Images Update
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โฌ๏ธ Download Folder improvements
The Download Folder feature on the Manage Images page now includes an X/X counter while downloading.
We also improved the behavior when downloading a folder with hundreds of images, which should make larger folder downloads clearer and more manageable.
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Thatโs the week!
This weekโs updates should make several everyday workflows smoother: Virtual Group Builder now has a stronger starting point with Auto Headsize, BGR background performance is easier to review, HEIC files are easier to convert, participant PhotoTags are easier to update, and large folder downloads are clearer.
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