Written from the ground up with new internal code and ideas, LRB Exhibition is a new ‘Website in a gallery’ plugin for Lightroom’s Web module. From the Portfolio family, it allows the user to create home, about, contact and general use pages, along with 6 galleries and 2 external links.
The main image area in the gallery is based around a single image preview in an enclosed space. Using jQuery, each slide can be navigated to either using the navigation arrows, or numbered links to the relevant slide. LRB Exhibition is far more mature that LRB Portfolio was at version 1.0, in fact it’s almost par with LRB Portfolio 2.51, and probably equal to 2.4. It does however have features not available to LRB Portfolio, such as per page image and text placement and a floating text box.
Install.
Mac: Double click on LRB_Exhibition.lrwebengine to install.
PC: In Lightroom Preferences (Edit>Preferences), click Presets. Click ‘Show Lightroom Presets Folder’. Open the folder. Look for a folder called ‘Web Galleries’. If it’s not there, create it and drop LRB_Exhibition.lrwebengine inside it. Restart Lightroom
Intro Video.
Here’s a quick look at using the gallery. Click through for the full size verion.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=047NxVFRBqI]
There will be more forthcoming.
Basics
A basic look at how this gallery works:
Create a collection of images you want on the website. Decide how many galleries you will have and then sort them into order for each gallery. You might have 35 images for the first gallery, 20 for the next and maybe 26 for the 3rd of the 3 galleries you’ve decided you’d like.
Next go to Web and select LRB Exhibition from the list. Make sure All Fimstrips Photos is selected in the Filmstrip, or that you’ve selected all the Photos. Go to the Gallery section and enter those numbers in each gallery section. Give the galleries names for the menu. Now go add details to the Home, About and Contact pages. Same for the Blank page, which can be used for pricing, or services etc. These page have individual text box sizes and locations, along with a choice of locations for the image on the page.
Once you’ve customised the gallery to your taste, be sure to save your settings as a Template. While Lightroom will remember the settings for the collection, if something bad happens, you’re better off with a Template to get those settings back.
A lot of the internal stuff works in a similar way to LRB Portfolio, so you can access that User Guide for more details. Like I say, there will be more video tutorials to add usage.
Features
- Home, About, Contact and Blank page
- 6 Galleries, 2 external links
- Google Analytics support
- SEO features built in
- Custom jQuery Gallery
- Multiparagraph, floating text boxes
- Clean layout
- 900X600 images
- Compatible with Lightroom 2 and 3
- W3C vaild (base code)
Sample Gallery
Click to view a sample gallery.
Buy
LRB Exhibition is €15 plus VAT.
For the first week of sales, you can get a 20% discount using the sales code LRBEX20. Remember to update the Cart after you enter the code, or it will not be applied. Please note the download allows for 9 updates, after which you require a new purchase.
The Future
Like any software, LRB Exhibition will take on a life of it’s own in the wild. Feel free to ask questions or add suggestions in the comments.
Hi Sean,
How can I find the version number. I don't see the changes you mentioned for 1.1 in the version I have downloaded, since I have only 9 tries I don't want to waste a download.
Love the new design, thanks.
Andreas
Sorry Kasper, no.
1) Try making a site with not enough images with Add Warnings ticked.
Ah, so that's what does that. I've been warned.
2) Right now, no. It's there to make text readable on pretty much any image.
I'd like to request the option to adjust them; as you can see in this Home Page design it would be cleaner if I could do so:
http://www.bobbaron.com/SnowDogs09_10/index.html
(The text 'The Snow Dogs' is from the Site Title; the text 2009-2010 is from Home Description; and, the text Oklahoma City is from Home Description 2.)
Thanks,
–Bob
Hi Sean,
Looks good! But is there any way to make the site adjust to different monitors resolution settings? So the bottom menu is always tied to the bottom of the screen and the top menu tied to the top – stretching the image in between. So the full browser window size is always used. I know it's very "flash-like" – but I need it 🙂 Possible with this? Or coming up?
Thanks!
/Kasper
1) Try making a site with not enough images with Add Warnings ticked.
2) Right now, no. It's there to make text readable on pretty much any image.
Regarding "Where do I go to remove the box around the frame (page)?" I figured it out; I just change the Portfolio Border color to be the same as the Portfolio Color.
But I have acquired two more questions:
1) Under General Settings, what is accomplished when the Use Warnings box is checked/ticked?
2) The Site Title, which is found in General Settings, and the Home Description, which is found in Home Page Settings, have a background color behind them that I would like to either change to the Portfolio Color or do away with altogether. How can I do this?
Thanks again,
–Bob
Where do I go to remove the box around the frame (page)?
And how are you coming on captions or a way to identify each image?
I'm waiting breathlessly for 1.1!
Having a separate control for the numbers would be great for my purposes. Can't wait for 1.1 – no pressure!!! Thanks again for a great product.
It's already in the colour palette Laura, top one.
Thanks, Sean — removing the BG image is good enough for now — that turns it black. In the longer run it would be nice to be able to set that color in the color palette section. (Now that I understand it I know I could set a background image of whatever color I want, but many wouldn't figure that out.)
Here's what I did … http://www.laurashoe.com/LRB_Exhibition
Hi Laura,
You can simply remove the reference in the Body Background Image in Font and Body Settings section of the Appearance Panel. AFAIR, I mention this in the video.
In the update I'm working on, I've added a checkbox for this to make it even easier.
Hi Sean, great work with this! Within 30 minutes or so I have a perfectly usable website, and for such a reasonable price!
Is there a way to change the white/black background gradient when the browser window is bigger than the page? I find this particularly distracting. I'd like to fill the background with the Portfolio Color (or the color of my choice) without getting into the code. It would look more appealing also to center the page in the window, rather than having it at the top of the window.
Laura
That's incentive enough to add a separate control for the numbers Michael.
Problem solved, the link color was set to white. Thanks for your guidance Sean
Out of curiosity, what is your link colour? Is it white?
Hi Sean,
Thanks for getting back to me, as I build the galleries in Lightroom the numbers just go away, I've tried to change the number of pictures in the galleries to see if it changes anything when it regenerates…no luck. I thought perhaps the problem was that I hadn't "selected all" the pictures in the collection, that made no difference either. Nothing changes when I preview in browser still no numbers. The browser I'm using is Shiretoko, FF optimized for an Intel Mac
Thanks,
Michael
Hey Sean – Great work on this plug-in! Purchased it earlier today and haven't stopped playing with its features and capabilities. My only feature request would be the ability to utilize the "Image Info" in the galleries.
Noting your earlier concern regarding the difficulty of finding an aesthetic placement/treatment might I suggest a hover above the "Menu Bar" at the fixed width of the menu bar and either a controllable or elastic height (determined by content). Transparency and BG color could be controlled with the PNG file in resources I would think and the text color in the color palette just as the other "content" areas are handled. The key would be to appear with mouseover and disappear on mouseout. I have an XML gallery at http://www.silverlumina.com/content/design_print/design_print.shtml that utilizes a similar Flash technique.
Thanks for listening – I can't wait for 1.1
– Larry
Hi Michael,
The gallery will regenerate when you add images. Are you sure it isn't just going back to the home page, which wouldn't numbers on it.
I've previewed in IE7, FF and Safari on PC, and Safari, Chrome and FF on Mac and not seen this. What browser are you previewing in?
Hi Sean,
Great product, I've really enjoy working with it. I'm sure it's something I'm doing, but as I build my galleries the number of images function disappears. I've started over a number of times, each time it's there when I start but disappears as add/edit the galleries. Anyone else had this problem.
Thanks,
Mike
Hi Sean,
I fixed the Page Header.
My portfolio is now online: http://www.luizaguiar.com/
Thanks, great job!