Squared thumbnails and aesthetic appearance of the page

[cgc0202]

Hello,

People decide to crop photos that create different "width and length" combinations, in turn the differences translate in the thumbnails generated.  The presence of variable height creates a jagged appearance of the thumbnails when presented as a group in any of the albums.  This is more an issue with "vertical photos". In certain themes, like the "hardwired" -- one of my favorites -- in extreme cases, it resulted into two jamming each other (i.e., the vertical photo thumbnail at the top intruded into the sphere of the other vertical photo immediately at the bottom).

The "squared" thumbnail is a standard feature of flickr, and I just realized now how this can be of great help in solving the afformentioned problem  -- creating a more appealing uniform appearance for the thumbnails. 

Obviously, the  "squared" thumbnail  is not a perfect solution -- because photos with extreme differences between width and height may suffer.   To resolve this drawback, there must be an option to allow manual substitution of the photos that do not render well to automated squared  thumbnail  generation.

Is there an option to generate squared thumbnails now in the Coppermine Gallery?

cgc0202

[Stramm]

see sig

[cgc0202]

see sig

Hi Stramm,

I saw it work in your website.

I tried it two different ways.  First, I had the usual CPG1.4.4 uploaded.  Then, I uploaded the mod I got from your website "stramm_mod1.4.4.bridge.3", then merged the two.  And installed (did usual stuff).  I got the usual message (see below).  When I went to the next window (index.php), I got one simple answer:  Fatal error :

Now maybe I thought there was something I did incorrect. I had a fresh CGP1.4.4 (created other stuff, permissions, etc.)  Did installation.  It worked. I entered (index.php) and changed the configurations -- got the desired changes in layout I wanted -- including change in name of the gallery.

Then, this time, I did a fresh download of your "stramm_mod1.4.4.bridge.3", and entered the contents individually, main fdirectory, files to sudbir, etc.  When I tried to re-click the working gallery (index.php), I got one simple answer:  Fatal error :

Am I missing something?

cgc0202





**************
Installation completed
Coppermine is now properly configured and ready to roll.

Login using the information you provided for your admin account. Do not hit back, do not re-submit the installer form!

Your server supports the following image package(s): GD Library version 1.x (gd1), GD Library version 2.x (gd2), the installer selected 'gd2'.

Important : the GD graphic library supports only JPEG and PNG images. The script will not be able to create thumbnails for GIF images. If you want the script to create thumbnails for GIF images, you need to use ImageMagick.

[Stramm]

yup, a link to the modpack thread is on my demo site and here
http://forum.coppermine-gallery.net/index.php?topic=28367.0

you'll have to run update.php

[cgc0202]

Thanks very much Stramm,

The "Squared Thumbnail" feature is very good.  It makes a page looks much neater and more elegant.  I hope this gets incorporated as an option (rather than a mandatory feature) in the next version.  I  state as  "an option" because in extreme cases -- like panorama or extreme verticals -- the resulting thumbnail does not capture the essence of the photo. This is much like what happens to movies when edited get shown on more "squared television" versus the "panavision" that you get in movie theaters.  I should say, only the original photographer or those who are more discriminating may notice.  On the whole, I like the feature a lot.


I thought I would play with it before writing to you, to share some of my observations. 

First: I incorporated the mini-thumbnail in the "film strip".  [re: http://forum.coppermine-gallery.net/index.php?topic=28367.20  Re: your reply to: farhan on March 02, 2006, 11:50:56 PM]  Among the theme modules I have chosen, the mini-thumbnail appeared in the film strip of "Classic" but the normal thumbnail was what appeared in the other theme modules.

Second:  What feature option did you activate so that the mini-thumbnail becomes the default for the album photo.

Third:  I revised the layout of the theme pages, for example, to make it much easier for the visitor to remember, I placed the "theme module" for all those I selected at the bottom of the page.  My goal is to remove as much clutter at the top.  For the same reason,  I placed the "Greeting and Buddies" module info at the bottom, i.e,,

Welcome back [Name of User]
Private Messages: 0 unread, total 0
Friends: 0 request(s), active 0

Is there a way to have alternative format, e.g., a single line format, instead of a three-row and align right format  with no "positioning" so that it could be more easily integrated in any position of the page.

Fourth: I found the "anycontent.php" for the "custom footer"  but I could not find the one for the "custome header".  What is the name of the php file for the latter?

I have more questions and suggestions,  but I will post them later.  Thanks again, for this very useful module.

cgc0202

[Joachim Müller]

may I remind you that this is the feature requests board, not the support board...