Salon - - What are you looking for in a website gallery?

brianeholland · #1 08-30-2006, 05:14 AM

Hello, I'm a software designer working on a web catalog/gallery project. My software will create a web catalog/web gallery for merchants and artists. I was given permission to begin this thread so I can get some input from all of you. Please - what are you looking for in a website gallery?

Thanks!
Brian

1STLITE · #2 08-30-2006, 10:26 AM

Just wanted to let you know I am really trying to give this some thought. I went through heck trying to find a program (preferrably free, but I woudl be willing to pay if I had to) for making my galleries. I finaly used JAlbum, once I figured out how to use it and foudn a style I liked enough.

You can see what I did on my website, under Photography. Initialy I had wanted something that opened up to one image, with maybe a small list of thumbs on one side or top or bottom. There was one like that in JAlbum, but I wan't able to add my header on that (not really HTML literate here). I would still be interested in a better program for the galleries.

Are you thinking of flash or something different with yours?

brianeholland · #3 08-30-2006, 04:18 PM

Definitely not flash. Mine will be a standalone program that will write the html page for you, based on what you tell it to do, and the formats/templates you choose for your pages. Then it'll put everything you need into one folder so you can easily put them on your server. What I'm looking for here is: what features do you want your gallery site to have, what would make the program itself easier for you to use, that kind of thing. I'm definitely writing this for people who know nothing about html...if artists knew html, what would they need me for?

Brian

Doug Nelson · #4 08-30-2006, 04:37 PM

Judging from the many comments here about Photoshop's WPG, I'm thinking easy WYSIWYG template editing would be the primary factor. Drag in a thumbnail object and that's where the thumbnails would appear. Drag in a comments object and that's where the comments will go.

A website where users can share templates and help each other would also be good.

Any sort of "security" that could be builtin would probably also be appreciated. Watermarking is probably the baseline, but anything else you can come up with to protect images would be good.

"Blog this" links are becoming popular, and provide some control over how images would appear when included in a blog.

More advanced website functions such as moderatable comments, registration, etc., would give you a significant edge. Some sort of marketplace module, either on its own or in partnership with another site might be helpful for those wishing to sell prints or license stock images.

1STLITE · #5 08-30-2006, 06:49 PM

Absolutely! What Doug Said!!

The dragging it in place thing would be really cool!

brianeholland · #6 08-30-2006, 08:08 PM

Yes..I'm only in phase 1 design, but I've already began to code some preliminary drag and drop objects for photos, textblocks, and html...the html blocks will be for cutting and pasting the text code for shopping cart buttons...all the good shopping cart and payment gateways use that, where their program makes the code for the buttons and you cut and paste them into your page..I want to make that feature as painless as possible. I hadn't considered the blog this...I'll have to look into that.

Yeah, I've been researching a copyright watermark feature, and I've already written copyright script in the plans for all pages...This is some really good input guys!

Brian

1STLITE · #7 08-31-2006, 08:47 AM

The shopping cart would be optional, right?

Yes the watermark thing would be great too. JAlbum's Chameleon skin I have been using is supposed to do that, but for some reason it never shows up. It woudl be so great to have somethign less time consuming and confusing to use for these!

Wait abou the shopping cart - would this only be for when youa re set up to sell prints through online services? I think it woudl also be great to have one set up for yourself, that I could personally take the order and deal with it the way I normally do. If it maybe had an order screen including payment, what size they want, their address,etc. but the order would be sent just to me so that I could place their order through whoever I use, get me? Did that amke any sense at all? lol

brianeholland · #8 09-02-2006, 10:04 AM

Yes, I'm setting it up so that it's all optional..if the user wants, they can use it to make a blank page. The shopping carts I was talking about are things like paypal and the paypal clones that are being used out there. They all have button makers so you can place the coded button on your pages. I hadn't considered a feature for mail-order, I assume that's what you're talking about. That's a good idea though, there are probably a number of people doing that. Sorry it took me so long to get back on that, I've spent the last 2 days working on the program..hadn't even checked email.