1. Most of the shapes have quite complex surface. Therefore small and rounded image tags are preferable because they fit better to the shape. Thus they don't hide it but bold its beauty.

2. It's good to take in view following recommendations for your Shape choice:
- A*: Read the footnote.
- Antenna is a compound shape and is suitable for image tags. Not suitable for Recent posts, Archives due to the length of their tag text. By the same reason not suitable for Authors, unless they are presented with their avatars only.
- Apple - 1: Suitable for bigger cloud size and small number of tags (20 or 30), preferably icons. Even though the tags at the vertices may overlap.
- Apple - 2: Good for bigger cloud size and number of tags, but due to the shape's specificity the tags at the vertices may overlap.
- Axes: Suitable for relatively small (18 - 36) number of image tags - Links, Pages, Authors and Menu. As well as for Post Tags and Categories when tags are short words.
- Balls: Nice shape, good for any type and number of tags.
- Balloon: Good for any type of cloud content and tags.
- Beam: Suitable for very small (5 - 10) number of image tags - Menu. First tag in the beam is anchored (it could be the Home page). Set Depth to 1 for better result. Pages and Authors are suitable too if their number is up to 10.
- Black Hole**: Read the footnote.
- Blossom: Better for bigger number image tags: 80 - 160. The stem of blossom grows with increase of tags.
- Bowtie**: Read the footnote.
- Bulb: Good for any type and number of tags.
- Butterfly**: Read the footnote.
- Candy: Good for any type and number of tags. Those in both ends overlap each other due to specificity of the shape.
- Capsule: Good for any type and number of tags.
- Circles: One more flat shape where the tag in the center is still. This feature can be used for important tags - special pages, authors or links. Suitable for image gallery. Good for bigger number of tags (30+).
- Crown: Good for big number of tags (100+), preferably images.
- Cube: Good for any type of cloud content and tags.
- Cylinder that starts off horizontal & Cylinder that starts off vertical are good for any type of content and tags.
- Dancers: Good for bigger cloud size, for any type of content and tags.
- Diaminity**: Read the footnote.
- Diamond: Good for bigger canvas (960x960 and over). 40-50 tags give best results. Even though those at vertices overlap each other.
- DNA that starts off horizontal & DNA that starts off vertical: Most suitable for about 30 - 40 image tags or 60 - 80 text tags.
- Domes: Nice shape, good for bigger number of any type of tags.
- Earing**: Read the footnote.
- Egg: Good for any type and number of tags.
- Egg Box**: Read the footnote.
- Excavator: Good for bigger canvas (960x960 and over). 100-120 tags give best results. Even though those at vertices overlap each other.
- Fir: Better for image tags. Nicer for rotation around Y-axis. In that case the top tag stays still and could be used for an important link.
- Fish - 1: Good for image and short text tags. Best results with 50-80 tags. Some tags at fish tail overlap each other.
- Fish - 2: Good for image and short text tags. Best results with 100-150 tags. Overlapping of tags at the fish tail is reduced.
- Glass: Best for 90+ number of any type of tags but those on the stem overlap each other.
- Globe: Good for any type of content and tags but bigger number of latter make shape nicer.
- Heart: Suitable for bigger cloud size and small number of tags (20 or 30), preferably icons.
- Hexagon (Bee cell): Another flat shape where the tag in the center is still. This feature can be used for important tags - special pages, authors or links. Suitable for image gallery. Good for bigger number of tags (30+).
- Horizontal ring & Vertical ring are suitable for any type of content and tags. Good for rotation around one axis - X or Y.
- Infinity - 1**: Read the footnote.
- Infinity - 2**: Read the footnote.
- Insect**: Read the footnote.
- Knot: Good for any type and number of tags.
- Lemon: Good for any type and number of tags.
- Lissajous**: Read the footnote.
- Love: Nice shape, suitable for bigger cloud size and number of tags around 40-60, preferably icons.
- M*: Read the footnote.
- Möbius**: Read the footnote.
- Monster**: Read the footnote.
- N*: Read the footnote.
- O*: Read the footnote.
- Owlish**: Read the footnote.
- Pearish**: Read the footnote.
- Peg top that starts off horizontal & Peg top that starts off vertical (Twin Cones) are suitable for bigger number of image or short text tags. Good for rotation around one axis - X or Y. Not suitable for Menu, Recent posts and other types of content with small number of tags.
- Pillow: Suitable for bigger canvas (960x960 and over) and big number of tags (120+). Even though tags at vertices may overlap each other.
- Rim: Good for any type and number of tags.
- Rings Knotwork: Beautiful shape, good for bigger number of tags of any type.
- Roundabout**: Read the footnote.
- Sandglass: This shape needs more tags. Looks better with images. Not suitable for Menu, Recent posts and other types of content with small number of tags.
- Saturn: This shape is nice for big number of any type tags, but in the same time is suitable for mixed image and text Recent Posts when their number is 20-25 and canvas is over 700x700 px. - Sphere: Good for any type of cloud content and tags.
- Spiral: A flat shape where the tag in the center is still. This feature can be used for important tags - special pages, authors or links.
- Spring: Suitable when number of tags is around 30 - 60.
- Square: Also flat shape, preferable for image tags. No anchored tag in the center. Not suitable for too big number of tags. Good for image galery.
- Staircase: Looks great when rotates around Y-axis and is built of bigger number of tags (preferably images) - let say 60-70. Not suitable for Menu and Recent posts and other types of content with small number of tags.
- Star - 1**: Read the footnote.
- Star - 2**: Read the footnote.
- Stool: Good for any type and number of tags.
- Star Wars 1**: Read the footnote.
- Star Wars 2**: Read the footnote.
- Star Wars 3**: Read the footnote.
- Star Wars 4**: Read the footnote.
- Teardrop: Suitable for small number of tags (20 or 30), preferably icons. Even though the tags at the vertex may overlap.
- Tire: Good for any type and number of tags.
- Torus: Good for any type of tags. Bigger number of tags gives better results.
- Tower of rings & Roller of rings are good for any type of content and tags. Nice for image gallery. The difference between them and both Cylinder that starts off horizontal & Cylinder that starts off vertical is in distribution of tags on their surface.
- Triangle: Flat shape. No anchored tag in the center. Not suitable for too big number of tags. Good for image gallery.
- Triangle pyramid (Tetrahedron): Good for any type of cloud content and tags. - UFO**: Read the footnote.
- V*: Read the footnote.
- W*: Read the footnote.
- Wall-E's Eyes**: Read the footnote.
- Walnut: Read the footnote.
- Wings**: Read the footnote.
- X*: Read the footnote.
- Y*: Read the footnote.
- Yin Yangish**: Read the footnote.
- Z/S*: Read the footnote.
======================
* These are shapes with limited practical usage. They don't give enough space for the tags even in a big size cloud - tags look packed. Therefore it's difficult to use them as separate links. Better results can be obtained by dressing up your cloud with hundreds copies of one link only (preferably a single character or a small rounded image - Image Scale about 0.3-0.5). Thus the entire cloud itself becomes a link. In this case the canvas may have very small size (90x90) because there is no necessity of looking for separate links in it.
** These shapes have complex surface with sharp vertices and/or hedges. Due to it if you use small number of tags they can't show the beauty of the shape, and if you increase their number, those at the above mentioned places start overlapping each other. So the best results can be achieved by:
- creating a big canvas (960x960 +) up to full screen size
- usage of small, rounded image tags (Image Scale about 0.3-0.5);
- increasing number of tags up to several hundred by Repeat Tags;
- playing with Magic option for getting better tags distribution.

3. Don't be surprised that Radius Z option has no effect when a 2D shape has been selected. If the shape is Beam both option Radius Y and Radius Z have no effect.

4. Be aware that some shapes need specific number of tags in order to look completed. These are: 3D axes, Christmas fir, Circles, Cube, Hexagon (Bee Cell), Beam, Antenna, Peg top (horizontal & vertical), Sandglass, Spiral, Square, Triangle and Triangle pyramid. Because of that if the tags in your cloud are less than what you have set in corresponding Number field the plugin will build a level smaller shape. When tags reach that number, plugin will build a level bigger shape. Here is an example: You want shape Cube for your Post tags and the Number you have selected is 26. But the real number of tags you have is 15. In this case plugin will build a cube of 8 tags (2x2x2). When tags in your blog increase to 26, plugin will build 3x3x3 cube cloud (26 and not 27 because it is a shell only).

Cloud Content Tips

1. Through WP Links panel you can create content for your cloud that consists of images instead of text. The URLs may be those of menu options, post categories, pages, archives, selected posts or even post authors. For "how to do it" look in How to... Tips section below.

2. If you want to use Recent Posts option bare in mind that post titles are much longer than a single word. So you have to apply it with Split Width option, giving a value of around 80-100px to the latter. In addition keep the Number of Posts around 10.

3. Be aware that any post without title will make your Recent Posts Cloud Disappear.

4. When you create a menu in WP through Appearance > Menus panel you may not use it in the Header of your WP Theme. Instead add it into a cloud via Content > Menu option and locate the widget instance in preferred place of your Home Page. You may not use even WP Menus panel, because you can put menu's options in the WP Links section and create category of hidden links that will be used only by the cloud and presented as rotating 3D Menu.

5. If there is a Portfolio, a Slider or an Accordion in your WP theme or you have added them via plugins, Accordions, Portfolio Categories, Portfolio Items, Portfolio Filters, Slider Categories and/or Slider Items can be Cloud Content. For that purpose create a menu in WP through Appearance > Menus panel. Click on Screen Options (top right corner of the page) and tick the Accordion's, Portfolio's or Slider's Custom Taxonomy you want in the cloud. Then create a menu with them, save it and go to your widget instance. Choose Menu for CONTENT of your cloud, select the Menu Name you've just created and save the instance.

6. Be aware that Page/Post Links will load in the cloud ALL links from current Page/Post, which may include navigation links, comments, meta tags etc. To avoid this specify a custom HTML container (div, table, ul etc.) so that only the links in it will be loaded.

7. Be known that Menu, Pages and Page/Post Links CAN NOT be subject to weighting.

Coloring Tips

1. You have to insert 4 colors for using Gradient, but you don't have to insert 4 different values! For example you may choose: color at 0: #ff0; color at 0.33: #33ff00; color at 0.67: #33ff00 and color at 1: #006633. In this case the #33ff00 color will take longer part of the Gradient and it will become more greenish.

Sizing Tips

1. In order to fit your Cloud into widget's frame you can use not only Radius X, Radius Y and Radius Z but widget's Height or Width. This is because clouds are calculated for square space. So when one of widget's sizes is smaller than the other it determines the space for the cloud.

2. By changing one or two of Radius X, Radius Y and Radius Z you can modify the shape of the Cloud.

3. When you use Archives or Authors for Cloud Content, there might be a big difference between number of posts in the months or between authors' publications. Since those numbers are base for weighting that will lead to extremely big size of some tags and extremely small for others. That is why you have to put limits using Weight Size Max and Weight Size Min. Good practise is to limit maximal font height to around 24px and minimal to around 9px.

4. The size of your images in the Cloud can be changed by Image Scale. Nevertheless you have to know following: Plugin automatically resizes them to 96x96px for Authors, Blogroll, Page/Post Links & Menu or 120x120px for Pages & Recent Posts. Due to perspective images become smaller at Cloud's back but bigger at its front. So if their real size is 96x96px (respectively 120x120px) their resolution will worsen at Cloud's front. That's why use images that are at least 10% bigger than the above sizes. Increasing Image Scale over 1 may also worsen resolution if it is not considered with the real size of images, so don't forget it.

5. By applying a proper value for Image Radius (49 or 61) the images can become circles.

Speed Tips

1. The best Initial Speed is between 0.1-0.4.

2. Reduce Max Speed to 0.2 for nice results with Drag Control.

3. Do not get confused by units of Max Speed. Think about it as a multiplier of speed.

Tooltips Tips

1. If you want to apply a Canvas tooltip but your Menu or Link tags also have their own and it becomes a mess of tooltip pop-ups, then remove links' Description (in Links panel) and Title Attribute of your menu items (in Appearance > Menus panel). Thus Links and Menu tags will not have title attribute. Hence there will not be tag tooltips.

How to... Tips

1. How to add tag clouds via Shortcode

- Go to Widgets page of your WP Admin Panel and open the widget.
- Set the options for your cloud and save that widget instance in Inactive Widgets.
- A message with a Shortcode for adding the cloud in a page/post will pop up.
- Copy & Paste it where you want it to appear.
- For a later use the Shortcode will be available at the top of that widget instance in WIDGET OPTIONS section.

2. How to create a Tag Cloud of images

3D WP Tag Cloud can show images if it consists of Links, Menu, Pages or Recent Posts. In the case of Recent Posts and Pages you have to provide your posts and pages with a Featured Image. The Menu case is explained in tip #3. For making cloud of images via Links, in other words for creating a rotating blogroll you have to:

Create a Link Category in the Links Section of WP Admin Panel. Fill it up with some links. Attach images to them. Its good to use one size for all. 80x80px would do fine. Make all links hidden. By this they will not appear elsewhere but in your widget instance. The text of the link does not matter - it will not be shown. If you type into Description field of a link it will become a tooltip of its tag.

As a matter of fact, this is another way to create a cloud of Menu Options, Pages, Archives and/or Post Categories but this time presenting them by images.

3. How to create a Menu of images for a Tag Cloud

Let's suppose you have created a menu in Menus panel. You'd better keep it switched off (i.e. not located on your theme as Primary or whatever). Click on the first menu item to edit it. Add an HTML tag for your image in Navigation Label field, where the text of the menu item is. Let's assume this menu item is for your Home page, and the text in Navigation Label reads Home. After you add the HTML tag the content of the field should look like this:
<img src="http://your-domain.com/your-folder/your-image.jpg">Home
It is good to use small square (let say 108x108px) images. Repeat the above operation with all items and save the menu. Now go to your widget instance. Check Menu box under Include & Start with option in MENU & WIDGET ATTRIBUTES section. After that continue to MENU CLOUD section and play with settings under MIXED IMAGE & TEXT.

4. How to anchor an important tag?

An easy way to anchor a tag is to set Shape to hring and Lock Rotation to y-axis. When tags are odd number one of them will stay still (the one at the bottom). In case of even number two will be anchored (those at the bottom and at the top). This is suitable for creating a cloud of Pages or Menu, where you want the most important menu item or page (let say 'Home' or 'Contacts') anchored at the bottom. In case of Menu this will be the first item in Menu Structure (WP Appearance > Menus). In case of Pages it will be the first in alphabetical order. When menu items or pages are even number, the one in the beginning of second half will be anchored at the top. See this example.

5. How to create a Slideshow Imitation

Usually Slideshows are like a ribbon - short and wide. So how to create a short and wide widget instance that imitates slideshow?

1. Make sure you have enough wide sidebar for the widget;
2. Choose Single Cloud mode;
2. Create list of Image Links in the Links Section of WP Admin Panel (See above "How to create Tag Cloud of images".);
3. Create a widget instance with following option values:
- Widget Height: ... (We assume that it must be short, so start with the shortest value plugin offers: 160px.);
- Shape: vring;
- Content: links;
- Links Category: ... (the category you created for the purpose above);
- Radius X, Radius Z: ... (Set equal values about 6.5 or above for both, assuming that images are around 140x140px. If images are wider increase Radiuses. No need to play with Radius Y.)
- Drag Control: on;
- Widget Tooltip: Drag or Click;
- Lock Rotation: y;
- Min Opacity: 0;
- Initial Speed [x,y]: 0.15, 0 (or [-0.15, 0] depending on initial direction of rotation you prefer);
- Min Speed: 0.005
- Max Speed: 0.01

6. How to put your logo in the center of the cloud

Use Center Function option in MENU & WIDGET ATTRIBUTES section. Choose function image_cf() and enter URL of your image (http://your-site.com/your-folder/your-image.png). It is advisable to use png format images due to advantage of transparency. It is good if image sizes are equal to widget's Width, and Height or bigger but in same proportion. Opaque part of it should look compact and be in the center. Plugin will resize image so that tags pass along without "bumping" in it. For creating your own functions you need to be fluent in HTML5 and particularly in <canvas> drawing. If you are not - learning is easy. Here are two useful tutorials:
LET'S CALL IT A DRAW(ING SURFACE)
and
HTML5 Canvas.
For time being now you can use and modify following ready made samples that give you the three basic possibilities: to add image, to add text and to rotate created object: Samples of Center Function

7. How to stop tag outline pulsation?

Set Pulsate to Opacity option value to 1.

8. How to ask a question or make a suggestion

Email me.

General Tips

Shape Tips