Customizing the appearance of your first gallery

If you have created a gallery with photos, you can begin customizing the appearance of the gallery using Customize Website View.

• The Theme of your Gallery will define the visual appearance. This includes colors, background image, and fonts. You can customize the theme at any time to your liking. A number of themes are provided to choose from. Zenfolio is continually adding new themes.
   
• Layouts define the elements and their placement on your pages. You can customize each type of page separately by changing the individual layout. A selection of layouts is provided.
   
• Options allow you to show or hide specific elements from the page. This is used to further fine tune the page. The available option will vary based on the layout applied to the page.

Selecting a Theme

The Theme of your Thumbnails Page will define its visual appearance. The theme controls the page's colors, background image, opacity of elements on the page, fonts, font sizes and font colors.

A number of themes are provided to choose from and Zenfolio is continually adding new themes. You can also create your own custom theme and apply it to the page. 

To get started, you'll need to first access the gallery in Customize Website View.

1. In your account, go to Photos.
2. Navigate to the desired Gallery under the Organizer.
3. Click on Preview. The website view of the site will be displayed.
4. In the website view, hover the mouse pointer over Edit and then click on Page.

The page will refresh with customization tools displayed in a menu across the top of the page confirming that you are now in customization mode.

1. In the Customize Page View drop down menu, make sure that Gallery Thumbnails is selected
2. Click Themes in the top menu. A popup window will open.
3. Uncheck Use Default Settings for Layout, Theme, and Options if necessary
4. View your Theme options as Large Previews or Thumbnails using the view selection icons. We will use Thumbnails for this example.
5. Select the Theme from the themes provided or choose a Custom Theme.
6. Click Apply to confirm and apply the selection. The page will refresh with the new theme applied. Review the page with the new theme applied. Repeat steps 2 to 6 until you are happy with the selection.
7. Click Publish to apply the changes to your live site and exit this mode.

See the Help section about saving new default website view settings to apply to new Thumbnails Pages.

Selecting the Layout

Layouts define the elements and their placement on your Thumbnails Page. To get started, you'll need to first access the gallery in Customize Website View.

1. In your account, go to Photos.
2. Navigate to the desired Gallery under the Organizer.
3. Click on Preview. The website view of the site will be displayed.
4. In the website view, hover the mouse pointer over Edit and then click on Page.

The page will refresh with customization tools displayed in a menu across the top of the page confirming that you are now in customization mode.

1. In the Customize Page View drop down menu, make sure that Gallery Thumbnails is selected
2. Click Layout in the top menu. A popup window will open.
3. Uncheck Use Default Settings for Layout, Theme, and Options if necessary
4. Click to select the layout you would like to use for the Thumbnails Page.
5. Click Apply to confirm and apply the selection. The page will refresh with the new layout applied. Review the page with the new layout applied. Repeat steps 2 to 5 until you are happy with the selection.
6. Click Publish to apply the changes to your live site and exit this mode.

See the Help section about saving new default visitor view settings to apply to new Thumbnails Pages.

Access Thumbnails Page Options

Through the Options panel, you can configure the different options available under the selected layout.  These options will vary based on the layout selected.  Try different layouts to see which options are available under each layout. To get started, you'll need to first access the gallery in Customize Website View.

1. In your account, go to Photos.
2. Navigate to the desired Gallery under the Organizer.
3. Click on Preview. The website view of the site will be displayed.
4. In the website view, hover the mouse pointer over Edit and then click on Page.

The page will refresh with customization tools displayed in a menu across the top of the page confirming that you are now in customization mode.

1. In the Customize Website View drop down menu, make sure that Gallery Thumbnails is selected
2. Click Options in the top menu. A popup window will open.
3. Uncheck Use Default Settings for Layout, Theme, and Options if necessary
4. Select the tab that contains the option that you would like to configure
5. Configure the selected element by setting it to Show, Hide or by entering in a value into the field provided
6. Click Apply to confirm and apply the selection. The page will refresh with the new options applied. Review the page with the new options applied. Repeat steps 2 to 6 until you are happy with your changes.
7. Click Publish to apply the changes to your live site and exit this mode.

See the Help section about saving new default visitor view settings to apply to new Thumbnails Pages.

Experimenting in Customize Website View 

Feel free to experiment with different combinations of preset, themes, layouts and options.  
Any changes that you make in Customize Website View are not applied to your actual site until you click Publish.

If you do not like the changes that you've made, click X then choose Discard.

If you've published your changes but you do not like the changes, click Restore to undo the last set of changes that were Published.

Also, click Save as Default to save the customization settings as your default settings for gallery thumbnails pages.  That way, when new galleries are created, the system will automatically apply the same combination of Layout, Theme and Options to the new gallery.


See this guide for more details on Restore and Publish.

 

Want to add a booking widget to your Gallery? Check out Zenfolio's booking tool, BookMe!

BookMe is an easy-to-use scheduling feature that allows your clients to book your photography services directly from your website.  BookMe removes the guess-work from availability requests and gives you the power to focus on what you do best - managing your photography business.