The Avatar element builds a face rather than holding a picture of one. Shoppers pick a style and adjust features, and the drawing is made from those choices. It suits family portraits, pet-and-owner prints and team mugs, and it avoids the whole problem of customers uploading photos that are too small, badly lit or not theirs to use.
Build the first one
Add the element
Open Elements and click the Avatar tile. Unlike the other smart elements, this one opens a builder rather than dropping straight onto the canvas.
Pick a style
The tabs across the top are the parts of the face. Style comes first because it decides everything else: an illustrated style and a pixel style do not offer the same hair.
Styles are grouped as People, Robots & monsters, Abstract and Initials.
Adjust the features
Work along the tabs: General, Skin, Head, Hair, Hair accessories, Eyebrows, Eyes and the rest.
Shuffle generates a fresh combination, which is faster than clicking through options when you just want a plausible face. The Seed field below it is what that shuffle produced. The same seed always gives the same face, so noting one down is how you get a specific avatar back.
Add it to the design
Choose Add to design and the avatar lands on the canvas as a normal layer you can move, size and rotate.
On the Design tab, Content shows the avatar with Edit look to reopen the maker and Shuffle for a fresh face. The Look section shows the styles as a gallery, so you can switch style without opening the maker. Roundness and flip for the frame itself are in the maker.
Give shoppers a head start
An empty avatar builder is a lot of choices for someone who wanted a mug. Starting looks on the Personalize tab fix that.
Starting looks are avatars you build in advance and name, so a shopper opens the product and sees recognisable options rather than a blank face. Use Add starting look and give each a name such as Dad or Grandma. Click a look’s tile, then use the row below the tiles to rename it, change it with Edit look, reorder it with Move earlier and Move later, or delete it with Remove.
Choose what they can change
Three switches under What customers can change decide how much freedom the shopper gets:
- Shuffle gives them the shuffle button, for a random look in one tap. On from the start.
- Parts opens the feature tabs. On from the start.
- Style lets them switch to another style altogether. It starts off, which keeps every avatar you sell in the style you designed around.
Switch on Style and a further section appears: Styles they can pick, where you choose which styles a shopper may browse. Every style starts on; click a tile to turn that style off. Narrowing it to two or three keeps a family portrait consistent, so the four faces on one print look like they belong together.
While Parts is on, the row under it (for example “13 of 13”) opens a page where you go finer and pick which feature groups they may touch. All are on by default. Turning off Skin while leaving Hair and Eyes on is how you keep a brand illustration consistent while still letting the avatar look like the buyer.
The Field section, at the top of the tab, sets the Label and Help text the shopper reads, and Required to order makes building an avatar compulsory before ordering.
Credit the style
Avatar styles carry an attribution line, shown in the maker under the style name. It credits the artist whose style set the avatar is drawn from. Leave it in place.
Next
For the elements that draw themselves from a date or a place instead of a face, start at What smart elements are.