I’m using a WordPress Photo Gallery Plugin for client proofing on my website. I was originally using Zenfolio but switched to SmugMug. After SmugMug announced it’s price hike, I decided to switch to host my proofing galleries internally.
I wound up creating this feature because although I know that NextGEN Gallery Pro is going to contain a proofing option, I needed something more immediate.
Below is a video showing how I set up my client proofing gallery using NextGEN Gallery, the best WordPress gallery plugin available.
As I mentioned, to set up the proofing gallery, all you need to do is:
- Install NextGEN Gallery
- Install NextGEN Download Gallery
- Use the template=download option in your shortcode
- Create a custom post type
- Create a custom post type page template
- Install NextGEN Gallery
- Install NextGEN Download Gallery
- Use the template=download option in your shortcode
If you are using the WordPress Plugin, WordPress SEO Plugin by Yoast, you can easily hide individual proofing galleries from search engines. However, if you are using a custom post type, you can easily hide them all and not think about it in the future.
Feel free to comment below with your questions.
Thank you for reading the Scott Wyden Imagery blog. I am a Manalapan, New Jersey Photographer sharing my passion for photography any way I can. I am also the Community & Blog Wrangler at Photocrati, teaching other photographers on how to increase business with their website.
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11 Comments
Hi Scott – This looks great! I would love to implement it but I am not sure how to get started creating a custom post type. Can you recommend a resource for this? Or is it built in to the Next Gen plugins?
Thanks!
Tricia
It’s not built-in but you can do it without a custom post type. It can also be done just using regular pages. However, if you want to use CPT’s without modifying code, you can try a plugin like: http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/types/
Thank you Scott! Very helpful as always!
I’m a little lost about how best to use the plugin. I get these tiny thumbails images for the gallery page and the slideshow.
http://khurt.com/photos/mercer-park/
There are a lot of options and one of the things Photocrati is doing for 2.0 is simplifying it all. I am happy to show you all about the plugin if you want to grab coffee one of these days.
Hi Scott –
NexGen is a great option but there are some other neat ways to use custom image taxonomies to make galleries. The upside to using this method is that you can drive the galleries from meta-data embedded in the image by Lightroom of other DAMs. I use this technique a lot on my public and private sites and have an ebook about it here in case you are interested:
http://www.peteradamsphoto.com/?page_id=3148
Thanks.
Hi Peter, NextGEN Gallery has full metadata support coming in an update.
do you sell your images internally as well? i’m using photocrati now in testing and wondered how you do things like packages with your images of if you do them at all?
I sell prints to random visitors/customers using the Photocrati theme’s eCommerce gallery. When needed, I create an eCommerce gallery for a customers just photographed for. For packages, I sell offline. Photocrati does have an improved eCommerce system in the works that will have the ability to create packages.
Hi Scott,
That was a really awesome tutorial to implement a proofing solution to implement using NGG. What more excites me is that this is a part of the NGG Pro which you mentioned that its coming out soon. Is there a way you can let us know if there is a tentative date or timeframe when this will be released even if its not an exact date atleast something like few weeks or few months etc ?
Thanks a lot for your inputs,
Cheers,
Shiv
Unfortunately there is no ETA I can share, because of how much work is involved. Announcements will be made as progress continues.