The photography portfolio CMS that gets out of your way.
Choose from 7 distinct homepage layouts. The Classic template supports both horizontal and vertical scroll directions.
 Classic (Horizontal) |
 Classic (Vertical) |
 Modern |
 Parallax |
 Gallery Wall |
 Masonry Wall |
 Snap Albums |
6 ways to present your albums:
 Classic Grid |
 Masonry |
 Masonry Full |
 Magazine |
 Dense Grid |
 Large Grid |
Share private client work without making it public. Each album can have its own password—clients enter it once and browse freely for 24 hours. Clean URLs like yoursite.com/album/wedding-jones, no ugly tokens. Rate limiting prevents brute-force attacks. Perfect for client proofing, private events, or pre-release work.
Show mature work responsibly. Thumbnails are automatically blurred until age confirmation. Visitors must confirm they're 18+ before accessing content. The setting is per-album—mark individual galleries as NSFW while keeping the rest public. Server-side enforcement means the blur can't be bypassed by inspecting HTML.
For maximum protection, combine both. Visitors must confirm their age AND enter a password. The age gate appears first, followed by the password prompt. Ideal for private boudoir sessions or commissioned figure work.
One-click toggle inverts all frontend colors for a dark theme. Near-black backgrounds (#0a0a0a) with near-white text (#fafafa) for optimal contrast. Applies to all home pages, galleries, albums, and login. Smooth 0.3s transitions when switching modes.
Customize fonts for your portfolio with live preview. Choose from curated font pairs—serif options like EB Garamond, Playfair Display, Cormorant Garamond, or clean sans-serif like Inter, DM Sans, Manrope. Set different fonts for headings and body text. All fonts are served locally for GDPR compliance.
Full-screen image viewing with smooth animations. Caption and equipment metadata displayed below (camera, lens, category). Dot navigation shows position in gallery. Keyboard navigation, zoom controls, and share buttons. Clean minimal UI that doesn't distract from your images.
Technical details panel shows focal length, aperture, shutter speed, ISO, and capture date. Automatically extracted from your uploads. Toggle on/off from settings. Film photographers can manually add stock, developer, and lab information.
Multi-criteria filtering lets visitors explore by category, tag, camera, lens, film stock, location, or year. Combine filters: "Show me all medium-format Portra 400 shots from 2024." Every filter combination creates a shareable URL.
Browse all albums with collapsible filter panel. Each card shows cover image, category badge, photo count, title, and description preview. Breadcrumb navigation and result count.
Rich album headers with colored category/tag badges, title, date, description, and equipment used. Social sharing buttons for Bluesky, Facebook, Pinterest, Telegram, Threads, WhatsApp, X. Template switcher lets visitors change gallery layout on the fly.
Customizable About page with bio text and contact form. Portrait placeholder, rich text description, and contact form with name, email, and message fields. reCAPTCHA v3 protection available.
Create and organize your albums with drag-and-drop reordering. Each row shows cover thumbnail, title, categories, publish status, and SEO slug. Quick actions: view grid, edit, unpublish, delete. Switch between manual order and date order. Full metadata sidebar with Cameras, Lenses, Films, Developers, Labs, and Locations for film photographers.
Visual grid of all uploaded images with batch selection. Right panel shows photo metadata—assign camera (Hasselblad 500C/M shown), lens, film stock, developer, lab, location, and custom fields. Bulk upload 100+ images at once. Click any image to edit its metadata or view in lightbox.
Full i18n system with separate Frontend and Admin Panel scopes. Import/export translations as JSON. Search and filter by context. Inline editing—click any value to modify. Preset languages (English, Italian) or upload your own. Every text string in Cimaise is translatable.
Privacy-first analytics that keep data on your server. Sessions, page views, lightbox opens tracked over time. Date range filtering, comparison with previous periods. No Google required, no third-party tracking.
Extend functionality with plugins. One-click install from the plugins directory. Available plugins include Analytics Logger, Image Rating, and more. Each plugin shows version, author, and description.
Configure which social networks appear on album pages. Drag to reorder, toggle to enable/disable. Supports Bluesky, Facebook, Pinterest, Telegram, Threads, WhatsApp, X, DeviantArt, Behance, and more. Preview shows exactly how buttons will appear.
You've spent hours in the darkroom, days on location, years perfecting your craft. Your portfolio platform shouldn't fight against you.
Cimaise is built by photographers, for photographers. No bloated page builders. No plugin hell. No monthly fees. Just a clean, fast, beautiful showcase for your work.
Blazing Fast — Your images load instantly with automatic AVIF, WebP, and JPEG optimization. Six responsive breakpoints ensure perfect delivery on any device. No more visitors leaving because your site is slow.
Film-Ready — Unlike generic CMSs, Cimaise speaks your language. Track cameras, lenses, film stocks, developers, and labs. Whether you shoot Portra 400 on a Hasselblad or digital on a Leica, your metadata is organized and searchable.
SEO That Works — Server-side rendering, structured data, automatic sitemaps. Google actually understands your portfolio. No JavaScript-dependent pages that search engines can't read.
Privacy First — Built-in GDPR-compliant cookie consent, privacy-focused analytics, and no third-party tracking by default. Your visitors' data stays yours.
Truly Yours — Self-hosted, open source, MIT licensed. Install it on any PHP host. No vendor lock-in, no surprise price increases, no features held hostage behind premium tiers.
Choose the homepage layout that matches your style:
The editorial approach. A dramatic hero section welcomes visitors, followed by an infinite scroll masonry grid of your albums.
- Hero Section — Full-screen welcome with your logo and tagline
- Album Carousel — Smooth horizontal scrolling through featured work
- Masonry Grid — Pinterest-style layout respecting each image's aspect ratio
- Infinite Scroll — Seamless vertical discovery, no pagination
- Configurable Animation — Scroll direction (up/down) and speed
Ideal for: Wedding photographers, portrait artists, commercial studios with diverse portfolios.
The gallery approach. A minimalist split-screen design with fixed sidebar navigation and a scrolling image grid.
- Fixed Sidebar — Category filters are always visible, never scroll away
- Two-Column Grid — Clean, uniform presentation with smooth parallax effect
- Hover Reveals — Album title and description appear on hover
- Mega Menu — Full-screen navigation overlay
- Lenis Smooth Scroll — Buttery 60fps scrolling experience
Ideal for: Fine art photographers, minimalist portfolios, those with well-defined categories.
The immersive experience. A three-column grid with smooth scroll parallax effects that brings your images to life.
- Three-Column Grid — Responsive layout (3 → 2 → 1 columns)
- Parallax Motion — Images move at different speeds as you scroll
- Hover Overlays — Album info appears on hover
- Smooth Scroll — Custom lerp-based scroll smoothing
- Full-Screen Cards — Each image takes 400px height for dramatic impact
Ideal for: Landscape photographers, travel photographers, visual storytellers.
The pure gallery. A CSS column-based masonry layout that fills the screen with your work.
- Configurable Columns — Desktop (2-8), Tablet (2-6), Mobile (1-4)
- Adjustable Gaps — Horizontal and vertical spacing (0-40px)
- Infinite Scroll — Automatic cloning creates seamless infinite loop
- Fade-In Animation — Staggered reveal as images load
- Responsive Priority — Above-fold images load first with high priority
Ideal for: Street photographers, documentary work, high-volume portfolios.
The presentation mode. Full-screen split layout with synchronized vertical scrolling between album info and cover images.
- Split Layout — 45% info panel / 55% cover images (desktop)
- Scroll Sync — Left and right columns scroll together
- Album Details — Title, year, description, and photo count
- Dot Indicators — Visual navigation between albums
- Mobile Optimized — Stacked vertical cards on small screens
Ideal for: Editorial portfolios, project-based work, photographers who tell stories.
The horizontal experience. A scroll-linked horizontal gallery that transforms vertical scrolling into horizontal movement.
- Sticky Container — Gallery stays in viewport while scrolling
- Horizontal Motion — Scroll down, gallery moves sideways
- Aspect-Aware Sizing — Horizontal and vertical images sized proportionally
- Hover Details — Album info overlay on hover
- Smooth Animation — Lenis-powered buttery smooth movement
Ideal for: Exhibition-style presentations, photographers who want something different.
Switch templates anytime from Admin → Pages → Home Page. No content migration needed.
Each album can use a different presentation style:
|
1. Classic Grid Clean, uniform thumbnails in a regular grid. Perfect for consistent series where uniformity matters. |
2. Masonry Pinterest-style layout that respects aspect ratios. Images flow naturally without cropping. |
3. Masonry Full Full uncropped images in CSS columns. No cropping, no resizing—your images as you intended. |
|
4. Magazine Three-column animated scroll with direction control. Editorial spreads with dramatic presentation. |
5. Magazine + Cover Hero cover image with magazine-style scrolling content below. The best of both worlds. |
6. Slideshow Full-screen presentation mode. One image at a time, maximum impact. |
Each template offers fine-grained control:
- Columns — Desktop (1-6), Tablet (1-4), Mobile (1-2)
- Gaps — Horizontal and vertical spacing
- Animation — Scroll direction, duration, effects
- Lightbox — Zoom, loop, keyboard nav, share buttons
Share private client galleries without making them public:
- Per-Album Passwords — Each gallery can have its own access code
- Session-Based Access — Unlock once, browse freely for 24 hours
- Clean URLs — Share
yoursite.com/album/wedding-jonesnot ugly token links - No Account Required — Clients enter the password, that's it
- Rate Limited — Brute-force protection prevents password guessing
Perfect for: Client proofing, private event galleries, pre-release work.
Show mature work responsibly:
- Blur Previews — Thumbnails are automatically blurred until age confirmation
- Age Gate — "I am 18+" confirmation before accessing content
- Per-Album Setting — Mark individual galleries as NSFW, keep the rest public
- Global NSFW Warning — Optional site-wide age gate that covers all NSFW content at once
- Session Memory — Visitors confirm once per session, not per image
- Server-Side Enforcement — Blur can't be bypassed by inspecting HTML
Perfect for: Boudoir photographers, figure artists, any work requiring viewer discretion.
Cimaise understands analog workflow:
- Cameras — Hasselblad 500C/M, Leica M6, Mamiya RB67, Canon AE-1...
- Lenses — 50mm f/1.4, 80mm f/2.8, Summicron 35mm...
- Film Stocks — Portra 400, Tri-X 400, Ektar 100, HP5+...
- Developers — Rodinal, HC-110, XTOL, D-76...
- Labs — Your trusted processing partners
Upload a digital file and Cimaise extracts:
- Camera make and model
- Lens information (including adapted lenses)
- ISO, shutter speed, aperture, focal length
- Exposure program, metering mode, flash
- GPS coordinates (if embedded)
- Artist and copyright metadata
When visitors view your images in the lightbox, they see the technical details:
- Camera and lens used
- Exposure settings (shutter, aperture, ISO)
- For film: stock, developer, lab
- Toggle on/off from Admin → Settings
Cimaise includes the complete Lensfun camera and lens database:
- 1,000+ cameras from all major manufacturers
- 1,300+ lenses with focal length data
- Autocomplete when adding equipment in admin
- Auto-fill focal lengths when selecting a lens
- Database updates available from Admin → Settings
For scans, manually add:
- Film stock and format (35mm, 120, 4x5)
- Developer and dilution
- Lab and scanning details
- Push/pull processing notes
Create your own metadata types:
- Text fields — Free-form input
- Select fields — Single choice from predefined values
- Multi-select — Multiple tags from a list
Let visitors explore your entire body of work:
- Categories — Wedding, Portrait, Landscape, etc.
- Tags — Multiple tags per album for cross-cutting themes
- Year — Filter by when the work was created
- Location — Where the shoot happened
- Equipment — Filter by camera, lens, or film stock
Visitors can combine filters: "Show me all medium-format Portra 400 shots from 2024."
Every filter combination creates a unique URL. Share yoursite.com/galleries?film=portra-400&year=2024 and recipients see exactly that filtered view.
Upload once. Cimaise handles everything.
Every photo you upload automatically generates optimized variants:
Your Upload (8000x5333 RAW/JPEG)
↓
Originals stored safely in storage/originals/
↓
Public variants generated:
├── Small (768px) → AVIF, WebP, JPEG
├── Medium (1200px) → AVIF, WebP, JPEG
├── Large (1920px) → AVIF, WebP, JPEG
├── XL (2560px) → AVIF, WebP, JPEG
└── XXL (3840px) → AVIF, WebP, JPEG
Before upload, Cimaise compresses images in your browser:
- 85% quality, max 4000×4000px
- 50-70% smaller uploads
- Faster uploads, same visual quality
| Visitor's Device | What They Get | Savings |
|---|---|---|
| iPhone SE | Small WebP (768px) | 95% smaller |
| MacBook Pro | Large AVIF (1920px) | 80% smaller |
| 4K Display | XXL AVIF (3840px) | 70% smaller |
Result: Fast loading everywhere. No manual resizing. No Photoshop exports.
From Admin → Settings → Image Processing:
| Format | Default | Your Choice |
|---|---|---|
| AVIF | 50% | 40-70% |
| WebP | 75% | 60-90% |
| JPEG | 85% | 70-95% |
Cimaise focuses on what photographers actually need:
- Logo & Favicon — Upload once, automatic generation of all sizes (16px to 512px)
- Site Title & Description — Used in browser tabs, search results, social shares
- Copyright Notice —
© {year}auto-updates each January - Social Profiles — Display your Instagram, 500px, Flickr, website links in the header
- Template Selection — 6 gallery templates per album
- Column Configuration — Desktop (1-6), Tablet (1-4), Mobile (1-2)
- Lightbox Options — Zoom, loop, keyboard navigation, share buttons
- Home Page Layout — 6 templates, switchable anytime
- Format Enable/Disable — Turn off AVIF if your host doesn't support it
- Quality Sliders — Balance quality vs file size per format
- Breakpoints — Customize which sizes get generated
- Lazy Loading — Above-fold images load instantly, below-fold on scroll
- Site Language — English, Italian (fully translated)
- Admin Language — Complete Italian backend translation
- Date Format — ISO (2024-01-15) or European (15-01-2024)
- i18n System — Easy to add new languages via JSON files
- Dark Mode — One-click toggle to invert all frontend colors for a dark theme
- Applies to all 6 home pages, galleries, albums, and login page
- Near-black (#0a0a0a, #171717) and near-white (#fafafa) for optimal contrast
- Smooth 0.3s transitions when switching modes
- Admin panel always stays in light mode for clarity
- Custom CSS — Add your own CSS rules for fine-tuning
- 50,000 character limit for extensive customizations
- Security-sanitized (strips scripts, blocks external imports)
- CSP-compliant with nonce-based inline styles
- Frontend-only (doesn't affect admin panel)
- Perfect for brand colors, custom fonts, or layout tweaks
- Debug Logs — View application logs from Admin → Settings
- System Updater — Check for and apply updates from admin panel
- Cookie Banner — GDPR-compliant consent (Silktide integration)
- Built-in Analytics — No Google required, data stays on your server
- reCAPTCHA — Optional spam protection for contact forms
Cimaise includes a plugin system for extending functionality:
Put your site under construction while you build.
When enabled, visitors see a beautiful maintenance page while you work on your portfolio. Admins can still access the site normally.
- One-Click Activation — Enable/disable from Admin → Settings
- Custom Message — Write your own "coming soon" text
- Site Branding — Automatically shows your logo and site name
- SEO Protected — Sends proper 503 status and noindex headers
- Admin Bypass — Logged-in admins always see the real site
- Multi-Language — Admin login button adapts to site language (EN/IT/DE/FR/ES)
Perfect for: Initial setup, major redesigns, temporary closures.
Every page outputs JSON-LD that Google understands:
{
"@type": "ImageGallery",
"name": "Autumn in Kyoto",
"author": { "@type": "Person", "name": "Your Name" },
"image": [/* all your gallery images */]
}- BreadcrumbList —
Home > Landscape > Autumn in Kyotoin search results - ImageGallery — Proper attribution and licensing info
- Organization/Person — Your professional identity
- LocalBusiness — For studio photographers with physical locations
When someone shares your gallery on social media:
- Open Graph — Beautiful previews on Facebook, LinkedIn
- Twitter Cards — Large image cards with proper attribution
- Pinterest — Rich pins with your images
- WhatsApp — Preview thumbnails in chat
- Server-Side Rendering — Every page is real HTML, not JavaScript-generated
- Clean URLs —
/album/autumn-kyotonot/album?id=42 - Automatic Sitemap — XML sitemap updates as you add content
- Canonical URLs — No duplicate content penalties
- robots.txt — Configurable crawler instructions
Your portfolio is your livelihood. Cimaise takes security seriously:
- SQL Injection — 100% prepared statements, no exceptions
- XSS Attacks — Automatic output escaping in all templates
- CSRF Protection — Every form has a unique token
- Rate Limiting — Login attempts, API calls, form submissions
- Argon2id Hashing — The most secure password algorithm available
- Brute Force Protection — Lockout after failed attempts
- Session Security — Secure cookies, proper expiration
Modern CSP headers prevent malicious script injection:
- Inline scripts require unique nonces
- External scripts whitelisted by domain
- Frame embedding blocked
- HTTPS enforced (HSTS)
All image requests go through PHP validation:
- Password-protected albums require session authentication
- NSFW content requires age confirmation
- Path traversal attacks blocked
- Only image MIME types served
A dashboard that doesn't insult your intelligence:
- Drag & Drop Everything — Reorder albums, images, categories with intuitive dragging
- Bulk Upload — Drop 100+ images at once with parallel processing
- Inline Editing — Click any text to edit it. No page reloads
- Real-Time Preview — See exactly how your gallery will look before publishing
- Visual Template Selector — Preview home and gallery templates before applying
- Equipment Browser — Browse by camera, lens, film, or location
| Layer | Technology |
|---|---|
| Backend | PHP 8.2+, Slim 4, Twig 3 |
| Database | SQLite (default) or MySQL 8+ |
| Frontend | Vite 6, Tailwind CSS 3.4, GSAP |
| Lightbox | PhotoSwipe 5 |
| Upload | Uppy 4 with Compressor |
| Scroll | Lenis Smooth Scroll |
- PHP 8.2+ with extensions:
pdo_sqliteorpdo_mysql,gd,curl,mbstring,json - Composer 2.x
- Node.js 18+ (for building frontend assets)
- Any web server (Apache, Nginx, Caddy) or PHP built-in server for development
# Clone
git clone https://github.com/yourusername/cimaise.git
cd cimaise
# Install dependencies
composer install
npm install && npm run build
# Start the installer
php -S localhost:8080 -t public public/router.phpOpen http://localhost:8080/install and follow the wizard:
- Database — Choose SQLite (zero config) or enter MySQL credentials
- Admin Account — Set your login credentials
- Site Settings — Title, description, language, logo
- Done — Start uploading your work
php bin/console installInteractive prompts guide you through the same setup without a browser.
php bin/console install # Interactive installer
php bin/console migrate # Run database migrations
php bin/console seed # Seed default templates and categories
php bin/console user:create # Create admin user
php bin/console images:generate # Generate all image variants
php bin/console nsfw:blur:generate # Generate blur variants for NSFW albums
php bin/console sitemap:generate # Build XML sitemap
php bin/console analytics:cleanup # Purge old analytics dataThe included .htaccess handles everything. Just ensure mod_rewrite is enabled.
server {
listen 80;
server_name your-domain.com;
root /var/www/cimaise/public;
index index.php;
location / {
try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php?$query_string;
}
location ~ \.php$ {
fastcgi_pass unix:/var/run/php/php8.2-fpm.sock;
fastcgi_param SCRIPT_FILENAME $realpath_root$fastcgi_script_name;
include fastcgi_params;
}
# Cache static assets aggressively
location ~* \.(avif|webp|jpg|jpeg|png|gif|ico|css|js)$ {
expires 1y;
add_header Cache-Control "public, immutable";
}
}Cimaise automatically detects subdirectory installations (e.g., yoursite.com/portfolio/) and adjusts all URLs accordingly. No configuration needed.
Contributions are welcome! Whether it's bug fixes, new features, translations, or documentation improvements.
- Fork the repository
- Create a feature branch (
git checkout -b feature/amazing-feature) - Make your changes
- Submit a Pull Request
MIT License — Use it however you want, commercially or personally.
- Issues: GitHub Issues
- Discussions: GitHub Discussions
Built with care for photographers who refuse to compromise.
![@coderabbitai[bot]](https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/in/347564?s=64&v=4){kind=small}