Meet the new rating widget and play with photo data!

During the development of the Filtering and Sort feature for Tiger (and Photoblogger) my mental model was a web shop where you can sophistically filter the products. However, a few users has suggested another use: filtering images by their “meta data” – the data added by the camera. This is something I always wanted to play with too. You can do such in Lightroom with your source images, but now visitors can do this in your web albums. Isn’t this awesome? Beyond the fun factor this new addition can be extremely useful when you sell images or just learn/teach photography.

Another important addition in the latest release is rating. (Find in Settings / Tiger / Site / Extra / Display rating.) By rating visitors can easily gather the best shots before they put them in the cart, or give feedback on them. The rating widget shows up in both the thumbnail view and in the lightbox.

One more thing. The search box was perhaps too subtle – hiding in the top bar – for a webshop use. Now you can choose to place it right in the middle of the “Hero” area, so no one has a chance to miss it. Settings / Tiger / Header / Top bar / Move search box within the Hero area

Check out all these enhancements in this Tiger sample album:

What’s more Photoblogger skin has received the same enhancements (besides the search box) the same day. Check out here:

By the way, this is a good example of how an album with sidebar can perform much better on “Above the fold content” front. Just check out the two screenshots above!

When your switch between Tiger and Photoblogger you don’t lose the settings either – don’t worry –, because they belong to the same skin family. (Note, it’s always best to start experimenting with a fresh copy: use File / Clone project, available in jAlbum 19+.)

Both sample albums have an “Instructions” page, which shows the technical details. Find below all the jAlbum variables worth checking out:

Name	Explanation	Data type
fileCategory	Possible values are audio, folder, image, other, video, webLocation and webPage	Single/multiple string
rating	Inherits rating from the album creator, but visitors can freely modify it.	Numeric range
formatName	Type of image: PNG, JPG, TIFF, etc.	Single/multiple string
fileSize	Size of original file	Numeric range
fileDate	Date of original file	Date range
addedDate	Date of image added to album	Date range
originalDate	Date of picture taken	Date range
resolution	Original image resolution as written by camera	Numeric range
flash	If flash was used	Single string
focalLength	Focal length of the lens	Numeric range
focalLength35mm	Same as focalLength but converted to 35mm (film) equivalent	Numeric range
exposureTime	Exposure time	Numeric range
resolution	Original image resolution as written by camera	Numeric range
isoEquivalent	ISO equivalent	Numeric range
aperture	Aperture (F-number)	Numeric range
focusDistance	Focus distance	Numeric range
meteringMode	Metering mode (focus/exposure metering method)	Single/multiple string
cameraMake	Camera make (manufacturer)	Single/multiple string
cameraModel	Camera model (full model name)	Single/multiple string
sensorType	Camera sensor type	Single/multiple string
keywords	Keywords added in jAlbum and IPTC keywords	Single/multiple string
category	IPTC category	Single/multiple string
You can find all the fields here, in the "File metadata" table.

... and some of the metadata of interest found in my pictures:

Name	Explanation	Data type
Brightness Value	Brightness	Numeric range
Color Space	Color space of the recorded image	Single/multiple string
Contrast	Contrast	Single/multiple string
Exposure Bias Value	Exposure bias value	Numeric range
Exposure Mode	Exposure mode	Single/multiple string
Exposure Program	Exposure Program	Single/multiple string
Lens Model	Name and spec. of the lens	Single/multiple string
Lens Specification	Lens specification	Single/multiple string
Scene Capture Type	Scene capture type	Single/multiple string
Scene Type	Scene type	Single/multiple string
Sensitivity Type	Sensitivity type	Single/multiple string
Sharpness	In camera sharpening	Single/multiple string
Software	Software used to process the image	Single/multiple string
White Balance	White balance value	Single/multiple string
White Balance Mode	White balance mode	Single/multiple string
You can find the metadata recorded by your camera by Right-click → List metadata

But this is not all. jAlbum provides the possibility of adding custom variables to pictures. In Edit mode look for the "Variables" panel on the right. Here you can add a variable (and it’s value next to it) which you can refer to in the Filtering and Sort data. These variables also work for the Search and Tag cloud features.

Still, if you happen to stumble upon some tricky metadata – e.g. you would like to read out lens parameters from a complex string – you can use the Create custom slide variable tool to mine out data from any available field. Download the tool and read the instructions here.

I hope you’ll find as fun in this as I did. Moreover this is something you can try with a Standard license or (Premium account) too. If you don’t want to bother with filling in the Filtering box, simply import my settings by using the File / Import / Import settings from a published album menu, and provide the link to the sample album above.

Comments are welcome,

Laza