Gallery Interface (Guest View)

This page documents what guests actually see and can do when they open a gallery — the layouts, the lightbox, the feedback controls, the search/filter UI, the download flow.

For the admin-side configuration of these features see Themes & Branding and Creating Events.

Layout variants

PicPeak ships seven gallery layouts. Each has its own configuration tokens (gutter size, columns, row height, etc.) that the admin sets via the Theme Customizer.

Layout	Best for	Distinguishing feature
Classic Grid	Mixed content, mobile-first	Equal-size tiles in 2–4 responsive columns
Modern Masonry	Variable aspect ratios	Pinterest-style columns, no cropping
Justified	Editorial galleries	Photos stretched to fill rows of equal height (Flickr-style)
Carousel	Single-photo focus	Auto-advancing slideshow with optional thumbnail strip
Timeline	Multi-day events	Photos grouped by day / week / month with date headers
Moments Mosaic	Lifestyle, magazine layouts	Mixed-size tiles in a structured pattern
Story Mode	Reveal-style storytelling	Vertical full-screen scroll, one photo per viewport
Gallery Premium	High-end product showcase	Carousel + lightbox hybrid with custom transitions

The active layout is set per-event via the theme preset or by overriding the layout key explicitly.

Opening any photo opens the lightbox — full-screen viewer with navigation, zoom, and feedback controls.

Navigation:

Click left/right arrows — desktop
Single-finger swipe left/right — mobile (50 px threshold, dominant over vertical, < 600 ms)
Keyboard: ←, →, Esc

Zoom:

Pinch-to-zoom on touch devices (2-finger gesture)
Click or use the +/- buttons on desktop
Zoom range: 1× to 3×

Toolbar (bottom):

Photo counter (3 / 12)
Zoom out / Zoom in
Download (if downloads enabled for this event)
Like (if feedback enabled)
5-star rating (if ratings enabled)
Comment / Open feedback panel (if comments enabled)

iOS:

Toolbar respects env(safe-area-inset-bottom) so buttons sit above the home indicator.
Close button respects env(safe-area-inset-top) so it stays clear of the notch / dynamic island.

Feedback

If the event has feedback enabled (per-event setting in the Edit Event → Feedback panel):

Control	Persistence	Visible to other guests?
Like	Per-device (or per-guest if `identity_mode=guest`)	Like count yes; identity no
5-star rating	Per-device or per-guest	Average rating yes; individual votes no
Comment	Per-guest (always requires name)	Yes (after admin moderation if `moderate_comments=true`)
Favorite	Per-device	No — always private to the guest

Identity modes:

simple — device-based via localStorage. All visitors on the same device share state. No name prompt.
guest — visitor-based. First feedback action shows a modal asking for name (and optionally email). Future actions on the same device skip the modal.

The setting lives on the event, not globally — different events can use different identity modes.

Search & filter

The filter bar (toggleable globally; default on) gives guests:

Search — full-text on filename
Sort — by upload date, capture date (EXIF DateTimeOriginal), filename, size, rating
Sort direction — toggle ascending/descending (defaults match the per-event default_photo_sort setting)
Date Taken picker — filter to a specific day or range based on EXIF capture date

When feedback is enabled, additional filter chips appear:

All — no filter
Likes — only photos the current guest has liked
Favorited — only photos the current guest has favorited
Rated — only photos with at least one rating
Commented — only photos with at least one approved comment

Bulk download

The Download All button at the top of the gallery zips every visible photo into a single .zip. Behavior:

Streamed — the server doesn’t buffer the entire archive in memory; it pipes file-by-file into the response.
A size estimate is shown before the download starts (“Download will be ~340 MB”).
For very large galleries (hundreds of photos / multiple GB), expect the download to take several minutes — the browser is downloading the original files at full quality.
For events with Pre-zip enabled, the zip is generated once at upload time and cached, making the download instant. See Creating Events → Downloads.

If the per-event “Allow downloads” setting is off, the bulk-download button is hidden and individual photos can’t be downloaded either.

Language

The language toggle in the gallery header offers any of: English, German (Deutsch), Dutch (Nederlands), Brazilian Portuguese (Português), Russian (Русский).

The choice persists in localStorage per origin. If the guest hasn’t picked one, the gallery falls back to the global default set in General Settings.

EXIF metadata display

For each photo in the lightbox, the metadata panel (toggleable) shows:

Capture date + time
Camera make + model (if EXIF present)
Lens model (if EXIF present)
Aperture, shutter speed, ISO (if EXIF present)
GPS — stripped at upload time for privacy. Never displayed.

Client access mode

Per-event option that issues a separate share link with a different password. Use case: send the photographer or client a “preview” link before the gallery goes public, so they can hide individual photos.

When a guest opens the gallery via the client-access URL:

The full gallery is visible immediately, regardless of the public publish state.
A “Hide from gallery” toggle appears on each photo (admin only).
The toggle is persistent — hidden photos stay hidden when the public link is opened.

When the photographer publishes the gallery for guests, they have already curated it.

What guests don’t see

For completeness, here is what is hidden from the guest view (and only visible to admins / via API):

Per-photo upload metadata (uploader, exact upload time)
Photo id (slugged in URLs instead)
Hidden photos (when not in client-access mode)
The internal feedback moderation queue
Other guests’ identities (only their feedback aggregates)