A Proofing Gallery With Comments on Photos

Comments are off by default.

You switch them on gallery by gallery, in the gallery’s settings. A delivery gallery for a finished wedding can stay quiet. A proofing gallery for a headshot session can take notes.

That choice matters. A comment box on a finished delivery invites a second round of edits nobody priced. A comment box on a proofing gallery is exactly where those requests should go.

Colour labels are a separate switch, also off by default. You can run comments without labels, labels without comments, or both. The colour labels guide covers the five Lightroom colours and how to agree on what each one means.

Comments sit behind the gallery password. If the gallery has a password, nobody without it can read or post a note.

The client opens a photo and writes a note on it.

The client can also draw on the photo. The drawing travels with the note, so you see the circle around the stray hair, not a description of where it is.

A note can be a drawing alone. A client who cannot describe the problem can simply mark it.

The comment panel shows the photo’s file name in its header. The full-screen view shows it too, when the photo has one. That file name is what maps a note back to a frame in your catalog.

One caveat on names. Photos uploaded from the iPhone app get generated names rather than your camera file names. If the file name is how you find frames, upload from your catalog instead.

The client installs nothing and logs in to nothing. The gallery is a web page on your own subdomain, with your name and logo in the header and no platform branding.

The page never asks the client for a name before they comment.

Every client note is signed with the client name set on the gallery. If no client name is set, the note is signed “Client”.

You set that name in the gallery’s Pro proofing settings. Set it before you send the link, so the notes read as the person you expect.

When the client sends their picks, the name they type replaces the client name on the gallery. Later notes are signed with that name.

Your own replies carry a photographer tag. The client can tell your answer from their own notes at a glance.

The practical consequence: if three people share one gallery link, all three sign as the same client. There is no per-reviewer identity. The answer on several people choosing in one gallery covers how to run that honestly.

A new comment sends you an email.

The email is throttled to at most one per gallery every 15 minutes. A client who leaves twenty notes in one sitting does not send you twenty emails.

Comments do not send a phone push. The iPhone app’s push notifications cover sent picks and the full-resolution ZIP download, not notes. If you rely on your phone to know a client is active, watch your email for comments.

More on alerts in the guide to getting notified when clients pick photos.

When you have handled a note, you mark it done.

The client then sees that note struck through, with a “Retouched” chip on the note itself. Nobody has to write back to say the dust spot is gone.

Done is per note, not per photo. A frame with three notes can show two struck through and one still open. That is the honest state of the work.

The retouched badge on the photo is a different thing. It comes from a separate per-photo flag that you set on the gallery’s retouch round page. Marking every note on a photo done does not set that badge for you.

The client also sees an “X of Y picks retouched” count with a progress bar. It appears only after picks are sent, and it counts the per-photo flag across the picked photos. It is not a count of finished notes.

Use both layers. Mark each note done as you clear it. Flag the photo when the frame itself is final.

When the client sends picks, the selection locks. Stars and hearts disappear, and the client cannot change the set.

Comments keep working after that lock. So do colour labels. The client can still add a note on a picked frame while you edit.

That is the useful order for most rounds. Picks first, so you know which frames to work on. Notes on those frames next, so you know what to do to each one.

If a client wants to change the selection, you can reopen picking. Their old picks are kept, and they are not notified, so tell them yourself. The answer on changing a selection covers the wording.

• Set the client name and switch comments on before you send the link.
• Tell the client what a note is for. One request per note, on the photo it concerns, with a drawing when the spot is small.
• Give a window. A fixed number of days to leave notes keeps the round finite.
• Sort before you edit. Separate corrections from preferences and from paid retouching. The revision requests guide sets out the three bins.
• Reply on the note when a request needs a price or a question. The answer stays attached to the frame.
• Mark notes done as you go, then flag each finished photo on the retouch round page.

For agency work, where an art director signs off a list, the art director proofing workflow shows how the approved picks reach Lightroom Classic through the two-way plugin.

Section share links carry no comments and no labels. Only the full gallery link does.

There are no per-section passwords. The gallery password covers the whole gallery.

There is no seat model. A two-person studio shares one account, so replies from either person carry the same photographer tag.

Comments are notes and drawings on a proof. They are not a layered markup tool with versions of each file side by side.

If your team needs named reviewers, each with their own login and approval trail, a dedicated review platform will serve you better. If your studio earns much of its income from print or wall-art sales, keep a platform with a store. clientgallery.io has no print store.

Comments are part of the one plan. There is no add-on for them.

Hosted galleries do not expire. A comment thread stays with the gallery for as long as the gallery and the account exist.

• clientgallery.io home page and pricing, monthly price and “Nothing expires” statement. https://clientgallery.io/ Fetched 16 September 2026.
• clientgallery.io product behaviour (comment switch, drawings, signature, email throttle, done marks, retouch flags, yearly price, fair-use ceilings, colour labels, push notification scope), confirmed in the product on 16 September 2026. https://clientgallery.io/

No competitor prices, caps or policies are cited on this page, so none are listed here.