spielglocken

Empati Tamako

Empati Tamako is a grid theme that’s curated perfectly for photoblogs or portfolio-esque in mind. The posts have a fixed width and height so the photoset and photo will be distorted automagically (optional). This theme offers an option to toggle the posts in a grid layout, lists layout, or masonry layout depending on your mood. A redesign of an old theme was made in 2016, under the same name.

Preview blog and install here

Features

Easily choose among grid layout, lists layout, or masonry layout. This can be configured on the customization page. For more information, please go here.

Responsive layout and looks good on mobile screen

Dashboard-like reblog chain posts

Support NPF posts hopefully

Unlimited custom links as you want through Tumblr pages

Highlighted photos

About section (optional)

Social media buttons (optional)

Localizations

Credits

Art used for the icon is by birries

no.js photosets by annasthms and espoirthemes

tumblrControls.js by rachaelthemes

npfPhotosets() plugin by codematurgy

undoPhotoset() plugin by annasthms

Expanded Tumblr localization by codematurgy

Minimal Soundcloud player by shythemes

io by mercurythms

preview 1 | preview 2 | download

features:

adjustable post width and height

full height sidebar with adjustible width

adjustable post margins

customized audio player in posts

credits: 

base code - @seyche

system uicons - corey ginnivan and @glenthemes

responsive videos - @nouvae

css photosets - @annasthms and @eggdesign​

mobile photoset fix 3.0 - @glenthemes

custom like and reblog button inspired by @shythemes

custom audio player - @annasthms

minimal soundcloud player - @shythemes ​

tippy.js tooltips - atomiks

fade in effect - cory laviska

remove tumblr redirects - @magnusthemes

smooth scroll - gblazex

customization tips:

Font choices can be found on google fonts. All you need to do is type the font you want in the theme customization panel.

Icon shapes can be found on the system uicons webpage. All you need to do is type the name of the icon in the theme customization panel.

theme 71 / preview + code

contained theme with 400px and 500px posts, custom font sizes, a lot of colour options and image wrap within text posts

sidebar with an image (300 x 250), tweet as description and updates tab popup with an image (260 x 330), up to eight links, weekly schedule and to do list

Theme -  Whispershot; [preview] [code] [magnusthemes] [buy me a coffee?]

Colorblock accordion theme inspired by Kain from MapleStory! A fun and interactive sidebar meshes with vibrant accent colors and subtle underglow tones to make the blog stand out.

Features:

Theme is responsive!

Best demonstrated in preview: Fun, interactive accordion sidebar with panels for: description, menu, search

Battery meter and health bar (custom percentage)

Search panel has room for 3 featured tags with previews, enter your tag of choice in the text boxes

Like/reblog buttons

Custom post size from 250px to 540px

Option to hide captions and tags on index page

Optional infinite scroll and manual load

Optional fading and/or monochrome images

Optional sidebar image, 350px height (cropped automatically)

QoL features: smart chat posts, native HTML5 audio posts, optional lazy load images

Notes:

Sidebar based on a tutorial from Codrops

To insert links, simply create a page and check “show a link to this page”.

Please turn off the default mobile theme in Advanced Options if you want to use the mobile version!

Full list of credits: here

koi no yokan: blog theme by @taezs

blog theme inspired by various messaging platforms. responsive for smaller screens and mobile devices, and fairly npf-compatible (but not perfect). options: post size, post margin, hide tags on index, popup with more info, sidebar image, colours. 

credits: base code by @seyche, npf photosets by @glenthemes (and also heaps of assistance using it tysm), css photosets by @annasthms and @eggdesign. feather icons also used and a bunch of codepen scripts credited in the code. full list of creds on @creatre/creds

[ Theme #05: Rose Wood ]

Preview 1 + Preview 2 + Code

An archive-inspired theme!

Features: 

Responsive

Grid layout (two or three columns)

Full post will be shown when clicked on!

Day and night mode (will stay in night mode until you turn it off)

Like and reblog buttons

One photo photosets

Supports page links

Updates tab

Options:

Infinite scroll, manual load or pagination

Updates tab icon choices (notification, megaphone, bell, and more!)

Rounded corners

Show or hide the full post for chat, audio and/or text posts on the index page

Dropdown menu (4 custom links)

Show or hide random link

Show or hide tags

Theme 41

static preview | code ( pastebin, github )

Features:

responsive

400px, 500px, 540px post sizes

custom fonts and font sizes (compatible with google fonts)

auto link pages with 3 additional custom links

like / reblog buttons

supports new post types

dashboard style captions

optional show captions / tags

optional monochrome posts

optional spinnable menu wheel

search bar

sidebar image ( width: 150px )

photosets.css, by @annasthms and @espoirthemes to everyone who balks at having to use javascript and pxu to style photosets, we hear you

photosets.css is a CSS stylesheet (compiled by JavaScript, ironically) that lays out all photoset layouts using solely CSS and a nifty photosets variable, {PhotosetLayout}. The photosets’ pictures are arranged using the CSS grid layout, though a fallback using inline blocks has been provided, in case anyone is using a browser that doesn’t support CSS grid.

[Premium] Theme — Primadonna by extasisthemes Preview: Blog Posts, Permalink | Download: Ko-Fi, Patreon

Features:

300x100% sidebar image

100x100px icon image

custom blog title

custom blog subtitle

five custom links

search bar

events section (200x200px event image, event link, event name, event date, event description)

option for projects (projects title, 70x70px project image, project title, project description, project link)

option for members (members title, 50x50px member image, member name)

option for 350/400/450*px blog posts

option for multiple font families for heading and body

option for 1/0.9*/0.8rem body font size

option for 0.9*/0.8rem uppercase font size

option for hide tags*

option for show tags

option for back to top*

Notes:

Original images by acuite, zipcy.

* denotes default features.

Neither ask or submit links would show if you don’t allow people to ask you questions or allow people to submit things to you.

I don’t claim any of the fonts, scripts and/or tutorials I used unless stated otherwise. See full credits here.

If it’s not the like to reblog ratio, what do we do going forward?

This is only reflecting of posts in the theme making community.

In the first post in this series, we compared theme maker posts from 2020 with ones in 2016-2018. The end result was that the like to reblog ratios were similar in both groups. I’ve continued comparing posts since the original post, and this has still been consistent.

It’s reassuring that themes aren’t getting worse like to reblog ratio over time, but this doesn’t really answer the question about how to gain exposure. The new tagging system makes it harder to find new themes, especially if you don’t know how to make sure your posts get seen.

This post is going to cover how to help solve this!

Sections of this post:

How many people do our themes really reach?

What makes a theme successful?

General tips

The audience your themes reach is not limited to the note count. It’s possible to have several times more users than notes, so don’t let notes alone discourage you!

There are several measures of success for themes, and it’s important to make sure yours is realistic and not hurting you.

General tips for getting your work out there:

Making sure your themes are tagged appropriately (don’t ramble in the first 5 tags or so) and make sure they’re showing up in the tags.

Being active in your communities through networks or even just a solid group of mutuals is not only beneficial to widening your audience, but also to share tips and give mutual support!

Don’t be afraid to tag creators if you use their tutorials, widgets, etc! A lot of us will reblog it, when we normally would not have seen it on our own. 

The Like to Reblog Ratio

I’ve seen a lot of posts pop up throughout the past few months (rightfully) upset about how much worse the like to reblog ratio has gotten. I decided to dive deeper into that to see how much it changed and when this change happened.

I am really only active in the theme making community, so this post will be specific to this community, so I expect this will have different results for others.

This will be a long post, separated in the following sections:

Comparing the likes and reblogs - new and old themes

What does this mean?

Why is this happening?

What do we do with this information?

base code — one column, sidebar base code. originally posted in November 2020.

preview / code: pastebin, github.

features:

dashboard-style captions following the blocks in undocumented documentation by @bychloethemes

responsive for smaller screens; sidebar will convert to a header for mobile devices

some CSS styling to stop npf posts from overflowing

like and reblog buttons

post sizes: 400px, 500px, 540px.

notes:

Tumblr’s customization page is buggy as hell and it disappears/screws up the captions. don’t panic, just open your blog in a new tab and remember to check the tab rather than the customization page so you can see your edits properly.

since this has all the basic Tumblr blocks, you can use it as a simple theme if you want, but use at your own risk. I won’t provide support for this like I do my other themes, since this is a base code, not a fully customizable theme.

terms:

feel free to replace my credit in the bottom right corner with your own if you make your own significant edits to it. if you use this as a standalone theme without significant edits, leave my credit in place.

if you use this to make your own theme and release it, I would appreciate a credit somewhere (in the code, on a page on your blog, an @ in the post; the medium doesn’t matter). also, please don’t claim this as your own base. 

theme #56: life goes on by pirateskinned ↳ check the source link for the preview + code

contained theme with 400px or 500px posts

left sidebar with a title, an image ( 240 x 240 ), description and colour accents

right sidebar with two counters and an image ( 120 x 360 )

muse popup with an image ( 240 x 100 / 290 x 100 ), a timeline, statistics and a title

about popup with a title, text area and an extensive navigation / tag system

custom font sizes ( 11px - 15px )

toggle option for the background image to be pattern or cover size

toggle option for image wrap within text posts — this feature is only for roleplaying blogs with a lot of text. does not work well with one liners!

lots of colour options

everything can be edited without going into the code but basic html knowledge is useful when editing the popups

How to find and support theme makers

It can be hard to decide on a theme that fits your blog, and because the tag system hides most links, it can be even harder to find something that fits your aesthetic.

There are ways to ensure that these posts are still accessible in search results, but not every content creator is aware of them. This makes their posts almost impossible to find. This is also a disadvantage to users who are missing out on what could be the theme that matches their aesthetic.

Here are some ways to make sure you’re seeing all of the options (and support new creators who might not know about the tag filtering):

Periodically check resource blogs such as @theme-hunter, @codingcabin, @allresources, @resourcemarket, and more! They usually have tagging systems to narrow down your searches.

You can also search in the tags for these blogs, as theme makers will usually use these for the resource blogs to find and reblog.

Similarly, if you follow theme makers, most will have a recommended tag where they reblog from other creators.

You can use @findtags​, a tool I made to display posts that are normally hidden from search results. This can be beneficial for finding newer theme makers as it displays the most recent posts first.

Narrow down your searches to your aesthetic/preferences like #rp theme, #cute theme, #multi column theme, and #fansite theme. Not every theme maker will tag their themes with generic tags.

While you are not obligated to, you can contribute to helping by reblogging a theme post to increase a theme’s audience.

If you already have the theme you want, all of these apply to theme assets/extras such as widgets, icons, headers, and backgrounds!

lilo theme by engelthm

preview ― code

a minimalistic, semi-responsive theme designed for writers.

five color selection options, six font faces, and seven text sizes.

header image, favicon image, and four custom links

optional tags, lowercase text, dark controls, and fixed header.

lilo page by engelthm

preview ― code

a minimalistic, matching wip page designed for writers.

book cover image, status bar, and wip details.

four extra, wip links, a character section, worldbuilding dropdown section, and external images section.

peek-a-boo: simple theme made for @codingcabin‘s hallowtheme challenge.

preview and code

features

500px posts

dropdown menu with 6 custom links

infinite scroll or simple pagination