The Turning Gate (TTG) set of Web Module plug-ins for Adobe Photoshop Lightroom are what finally got me to post some image galleries online. Before that, it just seemed too difficult.
I’d finally gotten around to using Lightroom to manage my images, I sort of had to since I conduct photo workshops and the Lightroom questions were starting to come fast and furious, and adding the ability to create web galleries directly from Lightroom, keeping my workflow all within one application, seemed the perfect solution for showing my images online.
I bought my first TTG plug-in back in late 2010 and I’ve not regretted that decision.
Since then I’ve used the plug-ins to not only create galleries, but to create my entire photography website. I’ve created workshop pages, lessons pages that have before and after examples, product pages for my books, an Amazon affiliate page, video pages, a blog, several workshop specific WordPress sites, a workshops signup page complete with sign up buttons that allow folks to pay using PayPal, and more.
And now we have Backlight, which makes everything easier. Backlight is a departure from the Lightroom Web Module plug-ins. Using Backlight, all the designing work is done online. The only thing Lightroom has to do with the process is in use the Publisher to create image albums. And since the release of Backlight 2, Lightroom is optional.
Since I’m somewhat of a teacher by nature (that’s another story) I gravitated to the TTG support forum and whenever I saw a question to which I knew the answer I raised my hand, like the polite little student I once was, and offered solutions. And I’ve been doing that in a somewhat obsessive/compulsive way ever since.
And now that I’ve accumulated a pile of tips and tutorials full of varying degrees of wit and wisdom, I’ve created this site to pass it along. Note that this is not a support site. For that, please post in the TTG support forum where Matt and Ben (and others) are sure to see your questions.
This site was created on the WordPress platform. The theme was was designed In Backlight and exported using TTG WordPress Add-on.
Since then I’ve been learning “stuff.” And I’ve come across instances where I needed more than what the theme “out-of-the-box” could provide. So now I’m using a child theme of the original theme I created. It also employs some custom css as well as some customizing to theme functions.
I am also using several WordPress plugins throughout the site. That’s one of the points of WordPress, after all.
All this is made possible by the hard work of Matthew Campagna and Ben Williams of The Turning Gate. Between the two of them they’ve create what I believe is the best web site solution for photographers using Lightroom and wishing to have complete control over their own websites. You could pay a web designer a couple of thousand dollars, or you could pay a fraction of that and invest a little time and effort and end up with a professional looking site. Matt and Ben are sticklers for web standards and clean code and the results you can see at the many TTG powered websites proves it.
About me
I’m Rod Barbee, I’m a nature photographer, photo workshop instructor, writer, dog lover, and lately, a web dabbler. This site is mine. All mistakes are mine, even though there are none and never will be. But if you do find any, feel free to point them out. That way I can either fix them or ban you from the site, thus keeping up a veneer of infallibility.
