The 4 Best Free Photo Themes for WordPress

As anyone who has spent time playing with the WordPress platform knows, it is extremely flexible and can be used to achieve a lot of different purposes. One use of WordPress that has continued to gain popularity is creating a photoblog. Whether you are a professional photographer or just a photography enthusiast, WordPress makes it easy to publish and organize your photographs.

Although photographs can be added to a blog with any theme, I’ve tracked down the best free themes for individuals who want to use WordPress to create a true photoblog.

Snapshot: Although all of their other work is premium themes, WooThemes was kind enough to release a top of the line photo theme for free. The main page of the theme displays the most recent ten photographs added to the blog at a size of 330×190px. When one of these photographs is clicked, the main photograph is displayed, which can be up to 690px wide.

The theme takes advantage of the WP-PostRatings plugin, which allows users to rate each photo on a scale of one to five. This theme includes a theme options page, which allows you to change the logo, add your Google Analytics information and add your Feedburner details. Snapshot is available in three different color schemes.

Revolution Canvas: Although the Revolution line of themes used to be premium themes, Brian Gardner has just recently made the transition to an open source model that offers free themes and the ability to purchase paid support. Luckily for you, this means that you can get an amazing photo theme for free.

The Revolution Canvas theme is available in Black or White versions. It’s a simple but elegant two column theme that does a great job of showing off photos. Both versions of this theme support widgets, and a “Recent Photos” stream can be displayed at the bottom of the theme.

Nishita: If you are an active user of a photosharing service (such as Flickr, Photobucket, Shutterfly or 23hq), Nishita may be the perfect WordPress photo theme to fit your needs. Nishita was created specifically to give individuals the ability to post photos directly from Flickr or other photosharing services. The Nishita theme is clean and minimalist, and provides plenty of space on each page to display a large photograph.

I think the best feature of this theme is that the main photo and thumbnails are sized internally, so you can post any photo and the theme will take care of all the necessary sizing issues. Also, in addition to photos, Nishita makes it just as easy to post videos.

Free Photo Gallery: Like WooThemes, ShutterThemes normally offers premium themes, but the Free Photo Gallery is an exception. This photo theme is available in Light and Dark versions. The Free Photo Gallery theme gives you control over how many thumbnails are displayed on the homepage of your photoblog. Given the design of this theme, it is a perfect choice for individuals who want to display wide photographs.

No related posts.