- Car Photography
- Solo Developer
Erik Olsen is a part-time developer who uses Cosmic to manage content for his image-heavy websites, thoroffroadtx.com. He needed a CMS that was easy to understand and quick to use, as many were too complicated for his needs. He found that Cosmic has a low barrier to entry, allowing him to get up and running within a day or so, while also being very powerful.
Pain Points with Previous CMS
Erik found most CMS options too complex for his needs. He was using Astro Content Collections and MDX files, but it began to feel cluttered, and he wanted a UI to build his content. With his old setup, he would be months behind updating his site, which potentially lost him clients as the site looked out of date.
Key Requirements
Priority support for managing media was Olsen's top requirement, as his sites are image heavy.
Excellent support for loading media and gathering metadata from those images was crucial.
He needed flexible pricing that would allow him to scale up as he goes.
Why Cosmic?
Erik loved the JSON metadata attached to each image, which he uses to load details of each photo (shutter speed, ISO, aperture, etc.).
He also appreciated the flexible pricing, which did not lock him into an unaffordable monthly fee.
How Cosmic Helped
The UI has been a pleasure to work with to create his content structures.
The core of his site is a collection of photoshoots, which are structured around different metadata, content, and a gallery of images.
He was able to create the structure and start adding content within minutes.
The API has been a pleasure to work with. He uses it to update image JSON metadata in bulk and to pull content and images.
He now uploads photo shoots within days instead of months.
Cosmic has an Imgix implementation for responsive image generation with WebP and AVIF formats.
Cosmic provides height and width for images pulled from the API, which is used in an image modal with zoom feature.
Key Features
JSON metadata alongside images
Height and width for images pulled from the API
Imgix implementation for responsive image generation with WebP and AVIF formats
As a solo developer, Cosmic has been a game-changer. The intuitive media management has saved me countless hours, letting me focus on building the actual site, not wrestling with uploads and file organization.
— Erik Olsen, Owner
