|
| Using Dynamic Images |
Using the mod is easy. You can upload or manage your image(s) the same way that you always have within X-Cart Admin. You only need to upload one product image in the thumbnail slot but, if you have additional views of a product that you want to upload you can do this through the Detail Images section when you are editing your product. The image mod will work with these images also. They will be displayed to the customer as small thumbnails under the main image on the product page.
To control the size of the images that are created, there are 12 (or more) settings in Admin. They are located at "General Settings" -> "Dynamic Images Options" in the Modules Options section. The settings are:
- Image width on Product Page: (this is for the individual product)
- Image width on Product Listing Page: (this is for the products page)
- Image width in Shopping Cart: (this is for the shopping cart images)
- Detail Image thumbnail width: (this is for the thumbnails for the detail images)
- Detail Image popup width: (this is for the popup image)
- Image width bestsellers: (this is for the Bestsellers list)
- Display Detail Image thumbs below the main product image on the product page: (this turns on and off display of the small thumbnails below the main product image)
- Display Variant Images as Detail Image thumbs below the main product image on the product page: (this will display variant images as part of the Detail Images)
- Display Main Product Image as first Detail Image thumb below the main product image on the product page: (turns on and off display of main product image as the first Detail Image)
- Swap Main Product Image on Thumbnail Mouseover: (self explanatory)
- Watermark images that are over 100px wide with the company name as defined in X-Cart: (self explanatory)
- Watermark opacity (0-127): (This will control how transparent the watermark is)
- Use the Unsharp Mask when generating new images (not applicable for PNG images): (turns on and off sharpening of the images - some images look better unsharpened. This is global)
- Image quality level setting (for JPG images): (sets the quality level of the JPG files)
This Module can also also be turned on and off in "Modules" section of X-Cart Admin. When turned off (disabled) X-Cart will return to the default/original operation of product images.
Use the largest image size that you can get (within reason) for your product thumbnails and for the detail images. Using master images that are 1000px wide or 800px wide gives the best output. It may take a few seconds to generate the new image the first time, but once the image is requested the first time, you then have the new image in the cache and it will not need to be generated again. The product page will take the longest time to generate images the first time (depending on the number of detailed images being used). A good rule of thumb is to have images that are at least as wide as what you have the popup image set as.
Take the time (if you can) to make sure all your master images are the same dimensions. This means that if you are using 600x800 images, try to make them all that - or at least some derivation of...(600x800, 500x667, 800x1067...). This will help make sure that all your images have the same proportions no matter what size they are or where they are used. Sometimes I just add white space to the images to make them all the same proportions. This will give your site a tighter look.
|
|
|
