Photo Seller – Download Gallery as Zip File

[appxconnor]

Hey there,

We’re using this plugin to offer downloads for wedding photos. The client is allowed 400 images for free, so we’re using a coupon to offset the cost of those first photos, then they pay for the rest.

The problem then becomes the delivery. We’d like the option to send the client a zip file containing all of the images that they’ve chosen, as it is incredibly inconvenient to click through 400 download links in an email.

If there is an option for this, we’d love to be able to enable it.

Thanks in advance.

[admin]

You should be able to use the following “sell the complete gallery” feature to do what you want:

http://photography-solutions.tipsandtricks-hq.com/sell-complete-photo-gallery/

[Peter]

Hi,

There is currently no option for this. The main reason is that the process of creating the zip file on the server can be quite resource-intensive. There are many considerations to factor into such a feature such as if someone chooses to buy a resized version of the photo gallery, the plugin would need to firstly resize every photo in the gallery and then make a zip file. Note that the plugin currently resizes photos on-the-fly on an individual basis when a customer clicks the download link but it does not store the resized photos.

The process of resizing every photo in a gallery and then zipping these into a zip file could take quite a while to do and require a server capable of handling this, but from past experience, most people are not willing to invest in servers which have more resources.

Therefore if such a feature were to exist, we would be constantly inundated with support requests, most of which would be due to the inadequate resources on peoples’ servers and not this plugin.

I hope you can see my point regarding the reasoning behind this.

ps: when I speak of “capable” servers I mean having at least a VPS or dedicated server and not a cheap shared hosting plan.

[appxconnor]

Yes Peter, that makes perfect sense.

We may be willing to sacrifice server resources for convenience, but we’d have to write the code ourselves, no?

I can’t quite think of a better “one-click” solution for downloads than a zip file.

Thanks again.

[flori3003]

Dear Peter,

I have the same request as appxconnor. I love your “sell the complete gallery” option, but would expect it to send only one link as a zip file for download. That is the feedback that I get from the customers of professional photo shootings.

My idea of a simple implementation without any server performance impact is that you allow to select a zip file from the bulk import folder similar to the selection of the Gallery thumb ID selection. So in case a zip is selected (like in Image attachment settings) then the ZIP is offered for download, otherwise the individual links are sent.

I believe there is no need for you to process the images on the server and compress them as zip. The whole gallery is usually anyway already available due to the bulk upload process on the server and only needs to be linked.

I am convinced there are more customers of your Plugin interested in such a feature.

Thanks in advance.

[Peter]

Hi flori3003,

Yes that will work but only for the cases where the customer has chosen to buy the whole gallery where each photo is full sized.

If you wanted to offer a complete gallery purchase but with varying digital variation sizes then it will be tricky because somehow there will need to be extra zip files containing the resized photos.

[flori3003]

Dear Peter,

thanks for the feedback.

In my environment it is not a typical use case that somebody would want to buy varying digital variation sizes when choosing a complete gallery. The complete gallery purchase is perfect in case the customer is interested in all images in the same quality.

In your case I would leave it up the responsibility of the creator of the zip file to decide how to bundle the complete gallery. I believe your customers using the WP Photo Seller Plugin are very often professional photographs, who just sent a zip to their customers, before starting to use your plugin. So by implementing this feature you would just make sure they can move completely away from their historic way of working and shift to all photos being sold via WP Photo seller.

I would really appreciate it if you could add this feature to your development roadmap.

[Peter]

I would really appreciate it if you could add this feature to your development roadmap.

Ok will do.

[Author]

Posts