Photo gallery web site

[martinez_81]

Hi,
I'm going to create my own photo gallery web site. However, I was just wondering if there are any standard picture sizes on the internet. For example what should be the size for:
* a thumbnail picture
* a large photo (once someone clicks on the thumbnail to view it)

I would like the web site to be available for any pc, screen size etc.

Also any guidance to recommended image sizes would also be handy.

If any of you guys here has done a web site galley, please give me few tips, thank you...

Marcin

 

[dbrandon]

The general rule for websites is to design for users running at 1024px by 768px. But remember that the browser window will often eat away a few of those pixels, so usually the size to not exceed is around 1000px by 660px. Vertical scroll is most often considered more acceptable than horizontal scroll.

For your images, display them at whatever size you see fit (based on the above guideline), but remember it's easy for someone to illegally re-use a larger image. Thumbnails should be kept small, but keep it such a size that people know what theyre looking at !

I don't use thumbnails on my site, but the large images are a maximum of 680px by 400px and are most often saved at 70-80% JPEG quality. Which gives a nice tradeoff between image quality and page load speed.

At the end of the day, there are no rules set in stone, but there are things to be aware of (ability for people to steal the photos, page load time, etc). Hope that helps a little.

 

[ianm]

are you gonna use one of the gallery site apps, they'll do the math for you. i just suggest you look around generally on other peoples galleries and see what they have - it's all down to choice and common sense in terms of you viewers. mine are only small you see, to fit into my website style - 128 x 128 thumbnail and 640x480 (i think) for lightbox image.

 

[martinez_81]

dbrandon, I see you are a programmer too. Well, I'm going to create my own web site gallery, not use any site apps. However, I've got another question. Bacause you have mentioned that someone would re-use my image (simply download it), are there any ways to prevent people from downloading my photos? (I mean some scripting etc)

Thank you

 

[nicfargo]

Martinez,
There is a way to stop people from downloading your image. I've seen scripts pop up if you try to right click an image saying that the image is not downloadable. I don't know the script, I'd do a google search for it.

 

[dbrandon]

are there any ways to prevent people from downloading my photos? (I mean some scripting etc)

Fraid not, the best you can do is watermark them. There are a few ways to prevent someone downloading an image easily, but if someone wants an image and can't just drag it to their desktop, they'll just screenshot the page.

Flickr i believe implements a very clever download prevention system on some images (i've only come across it once, and no, i wasn't trying to steal an image for re-use ). It's beyond me how they do it though, but it still doesn't stop Apple + Shift + 4.

I'd go with a watermark, and not too large image size :thumbup:

 

[martinez_81]

I'd go with a watermark, and not too large image size :thumbup:

Thank for that, I might have an idea for watermark... and I also try finding some JS to prevent people from downloading my pictures. Even when someone screenshots my photo, there is still the watermark on it, so it's handy to have it.
Would be nice finding out how Flickr does the download prevention thing...

Thank for that to all of you guys. You have opened my eyes on some issues I've not thought about before.

I'll share my web site link with yopu shortly .. and no downloading!!

 

[dbrandon]

Thank for that, I might have an idea for watermark... and I also try finding some JS to prevent people from downloading my pictures. Even when someone screenshots my photo, there is still the watermark on it, so it's handy to have it.
Would be nice finding out how Flickr does the download prevention thing...

Thank for that to all of you guys. You have opened my eyes on some issues I've not thought about before.

I'll share my web site link with yopu shortly .. and no downloading!!

If you're going with the JS prevention idea, take a look here ... http://javascript.about.com/library/blnoright.htm :thumbup:

Good luck, and look forward to seeing the site up and running

 

[dbrandon]

Oh, and it turns out flickr's method of download prevention isn't too sophisticated. They simply overlay a transparent gif over the image. Have a look here (found through explore).

 

[JonnyB]

The watermark is the best way forward.

Using Jscript to disable the context menu is a waste of time and just annoying to users. To get round it all someone has to do is hit the print screen button on the keyboard and paste into some image editing software and crop out what they dont want.

Oh and by the way I'm also a web developer not just someone who know's this cos they go around stealing images all the time.

 

[martinez_81]

Oh, and it turns out flickr's method of download prevention isn't too sophisticated. They simply overlay a transparent gif over the image. Have a look here (found through explore).

Yeh, if you see the source code for that page (or any other with an image of your interest) you can find the image easily there (the URL path to it). It wont work if you simply save the image straight from the page, but once you find a URL to it, you can open it in new tab and save easily to your PC.

Well, not so sophisticated though

But coming back to the watermark, do I have to place it somewhere in the corner of a picture or across the whole photo? If it goes across the whole picture, well it spoils it but prevents from re-using parts of the photo by someone else.

 

[dbrandon]

I personally think it would be best to have the watermark in the centre of the image (or at least keep it consistent where you have it). Maybe about 25-30% of the image dimensions, but transparent enough to not distract to a great extent.

People watermark images generally for two reasons; to promp users of the copyright associated, and to physically prevent (to an extent) the copying of work. In your case, it is the latter, so the center seems like the most logical place to put it.

Since you're programming your own gallery, you may want to consider a script which watermarks your pictures on the fly (then you can always change the watermark easily). The downside is it requires a lot of processing power to do watermarking on lots and lots of pictures on each page request. Server side cacheing would overcome this somewhat and still give you versitality.

Depending on what size you've decided to display the images, i would still consider if it's necessary to watermark them.