Submitting photo URL's with Resize/Watermark

[primestudios]

I have just recently joined this forum and really like it so far. After trying to do some picture sharing I saw a distinct advantage to adding pictures through URL, or in essence hosting them on my own server. I knew that resizing, watermarking, and uploading every shot was too much of a process for me to be really active here, and I am all about efficiency. So the solution was to create a tool to automatically do this from my web server, and I wanted to share it with the people here at DPS.

My goals for this tool are as follows:

Goal 1. Allow me to use my FTP client FileZilla to drag and drop photos from my camera's memory card onto my server.

Goal 2. Provide automatic and high quality resizing to 600px with the option for a watermark.

Goal 3. Provide a list of URL's for the modified photos for easy entering in the DPS forum's "insert image" box.

So first off the finalized tool accomplishes this, and I have made it easy for you to implement! I will explain a little about it so you have an idea of what it does and how it works.

(1) There are many FTP clients out there, and these are basically desktop applications that are a portal directly to your web server. Generally they are the fastest way to get local files to your website, and for 5MB photos its almost essential if you want to be quick. As mentioned I like FileZilla, it is one of the best known and most used out there right now. It also allows me to drag-and-drop, which is great for transferring images right from my memory card to my web server. This takes care the first goal.

(2) My company does most it's work on the web, and a tool we have come to love is a PHP script called phpThumb that has tons of features, including resizing and watermarking functions. This is included in the zip file below, and has already been configured to allow you to share files with other websites (important!) and completes goal number two.

(3) Being that my background is web (getting my feet wet with photo!) whipping together little tools is a lot of fun. Also included in the zip file is a PHP file named "getlinks.php". This is a script I put together to read files in a directory, modify them utilizing the phpThumb functions, and printing usable links to the webpage to use in the DPS forum. This completes goal number three.


So thats it! Here is what you need to do:

1. Create a folder on your web server, I will be using one called "dps".

2. Download the zip file I made here, and put all the files into the folder you just created on your server.

3. I have left my samples in the folders to give you an example. You should be able to visit the "www.yourdomain.com/yourfolder/getlinks.php" file and see this:



Try it on my server.

4. If you want to use a watermark, replace the file "watermark.png" in the main directory with your logo (very important to keep this exact name). If you delete that file, a watermark will not be used at all.

5. Any file you put into the "/images" folder will now be listed on the "getlinks.php" page, and you can use the "GET" button to select the link to your resized and watermarked photo, leaving you a "ctrl+c" and "ctrl+v" (copy and paste) from posting in the DPS forum. If you want a different size or need to modify the URL, just click into the text box and change what you need (ex. w=600 to h=150 to restrict height to 150px)

Heres the final product of an image:



I have used my companies website in this for ease of following to the viewer; I appreciate anyone who views my website, but please don’t be malicious. From my end, these files are checked and safe, but of course I am not responsible if you use them. I hope this may have helped you provide DPS with some better looking, more protected photography!

For any questions, I am completely willing to help you at matt.gaidica@primestudiosllc.com.