A gallery of images can be added to a post or a page. This is useful if you have a series of photos that you want your user to see. For example, photos from a recent sports event, fashion show, special event at the campus, etc. You can have multiple galleries, each with photos from a specific event or photographer.
Resampling
Photos should be resized before adding to the gallery. I would recommend a maximum width of 800 pixels and a landscape (not portrait) view. Resized photos should be resampled down (never resize up as you will be certain to lose image quality) and you want to make sure you are constraining proportions. If you don’t constrain proportions your images will be squeezed and distorted. Photoshop or Fireworks can be used to resize the photos.
In summary, use an image editor to resample down each photo to your desired width and constrain proportions.
Attribution and Licensing
All photos used should be properly licensed and attributed. If the photos are the student’s own work then a Creative Commons license (CC) can be applied. If no license is posted with the image then by default all rights are reserved to the owner of the image. I recommend that you apply a CC license to photos that you post that belong to you. Just follow the instructions on the link above and you will quickly have a license.
If an outside source is being used for the photo images then the photos can only be used if the photo’s licensing allows or if you contact the copyright owner and get permission. There are different types of licensing. Try this short activity—go to wikipedia and
- open an image on the landing page.
- Click [More details] and write down the type of licensing, for example Creative Commons.
- Read the license to find out what is required of you to use this photo.
- Repeat this procedure for each image on the page.
When I tried this activity (11/23/15) there were 6 images. Five of the images had Creative Commons Licensing and one of the images was in the Public Domain. GNU Free Documentation License (GNU FDL or simply GFDL), Licence art libre, and other open source licensing can be found in Wikipedia images but by far the most common licensing is CC.
Stock photo sites will provide their own licensing. For example MorgueFile has a section of free photos that can be used. Each image has a morgueFile license.
To attribute a photo I recommend Title, Author, Source, License (TASL). See Best practice for attribution. However, sometimes the owner will supply his or her own attribution guidelines. In that case you would use the copyright owner’s attribution.
Create a Gallery
To create a gallery of photos, select Gallery > [Add Gallery/Images] from the dashboard sidebar. Provide a name for your gallery and [Add Files], then [Start Upload].
Once uploaded select Gallery > [Manage Galleries]. From the list of Galleries select and edit the gallery just uploaded. Scroll down to the photo thumbnails and provide a title and description for each. The description box should include the photo attribution if the photos are licensed.
Insert Gallery
Open the post or page where the gallery should appear. From the text editor menu bar, click on the green, square icon for [Attach NextGEN Gallery to Post]. This will open a NextGEN Gallery window with several tabs.
For the window Select a display type you have a selection of 6 possible displays for your photos. The TagCloud and Album selections go beyond this quick introduction. Select from the first three choices (NextGEN Basic Thumbnails, NextGEN Basic Slideshow. and NextGEN Basic ImageBrowser) to see which one works best for you.
In the section What would you like to display? click in the field for Galleries and select your gallery. [Save]
[Update] your post or page and check your gallery.
To edit the gallery simply click on the thumbnail photo representing your gallery (when you are editing the post or page). You can further customize the display settings and sort or exclude photos.
See example at http://studentnews.nisd.net/ortega/?page_id=157