Managing images in ChurchSuite

Introduction

You can easily upload images for contacts, children, events, small groups, ministries, funds and bookings. Images are visible to Users when they are navigating the ChurchSuite modules and to your members within the member-facing My ChurchSuite. Event, small group, booking, plan and fund images also surfaced in the related public-facing Embed pages and Sunday-service-facing Connect applications.

This article explains how Users can upload, view, manage and delete images from within ChurchSuite. Users will need at least Write permission for each module they need to manage images for.

Note also that contacts and children can upload and manage their own (and their linked children's) profile images from within the member-facing My ChurchSuite. Images added in this way are visible to Users when they are working within the Address Book and Children modules or viewing those people in other modules, such as rotas, plan pages and small group member lists and giver profiles.

Enabling members to upload their profile images (or having users add images to profiles in the Address Book and Children modules with consent) has lots of benefits. As well as helping produce beautifully printed contact directories they're also really useful for staff, leaders and members to help recognise people they may not know.

For the best results, we recommend an image resolution above 300px, but make sure that the file size of each image does not exceed 5 MB. In this article, we also give guidance for the recommended image proportions (aspect ratio), which will ensure the best results when people view pages containing images. Both Windows and Mac offer free in-built tools for editing images, allowing you to crop and resize them. Images must be in JPEG or PNG format.

Managing images for contacts and children in ChurchSuite (users)

Images for contacts and children show on profile pages in the respective Address Book and Children modules in ChurchSuite, as well as on each member's profile in My ChurchSuite.

A smaller image avatar is used in listings of contacts and children. In the absence of an image, the avatar comprises the person's initials on a background colour-coded according to sex (blue=male, pink=female, grey=unknown).

Note: The Missing Data report can be filtered by 'Photo' to show you all Contacts/Children who don't currently have an image attached to their profile.

People's images are uploaded via their profile page in the Address Book or Children module. For best results, and to avoid images being stretched, cropped or incorrectly centred, we recommend a photo is edited to 500px x 500px (square) before being uploaded. From a person's profile page, click on the image avatar and select Edit.

On the Edit image pop-up, drag and drop a suitably-prepared image onto the drop zone or click to browse and choose the image file.

The image is uploaded and immediately applied to the person, with the pop-up closing on completion - job done! Clicking the image avatar again, note the additional image actions to View and Delete an image.

Managing images in My ChurchSuite (members)

Contacts and children with My ChurchSuite access can upload their own profile photo. Similarly, primary parents/carers with My ChurchSuite access can upload a profile photo for their linked children. Photo upload is enabled in the Fields section of the Address Book and Children module's My ChurchSuite Options - click Edit to make changes. Note that only parents/carers are able to see their linked children's profiles in My ChurchSuite. Additionally, if a child belongs to a rota or small group their profile photo avatar is shown in the rota or small group member list.

With Photo upload enabled for My ChurchSuite (see above), contacts and children with My ChurchSuite access can upload an image to their profile. Within My ChurchSuite, the My Details section includes the option to Edit image...

...and primary parents/carers have the same Edit image option in the My Children section.

Managing event and booking images

Event and booking images are re-proportioned to show in the My Events section of My ChurchSuite in a 16:9 aspect ratio but will show in their original aspect ratio on the event page and booking page. To ensure that important information or details of the image are not clipped or distorted, make sure that all event and booking images are saved in a 16:9 aspect ratio (e.g. 1280x720px). For help in calculating the aspect ratio of event images use this handy calculator.

In this section, we focus on bookings, but the process for adding images to events follows the identical steps within the Calendar module. Note that if your administrative process involves adding linked bookings for your events, an event image is carried over to the booking automatically.

From a booking's "View" page in the Bookings module, click on the image avatar and select Edit.

On the Edit image pop-up, select between Replace sequence image and Replace event image. Replacing a sequence image will apply to all future dates in the sequence from today. Replacing an event/booking image will just apply the image to the current event/booking date being edited. Drag and drop a suitably-prepared image onto the drop zone or click to browse and choose the image file.

The image is uploaded and immediately applied to the event/booking/sequence - job done! Clicking the image avatar again, note the additional image actions to View and Delete an image.

Managing small group images

Small group images are re-proportioned to show in the My Groups section of My ChurchSuite in a 4:3 aspect ratio but will show in their original aspect ratio on the group page. To ensure that important information or details of the image are not clipped or distorted, make sure that all group images are saved in a 4:3 aspect ratio (e.g. 1280x960px). For help in calculating the aspect ratio of group images use this handy calculator.

From the group's "View" page, click on the image avatar and select Edit.

On the Edit image pop up, drag and drop a suitably-prepared image onto the drop zone or click to browse and choose the image file.

The image is uploaded and immediately applied to the group - job done! Clicking the image avatar again, note the additional image actions to View and Delete an image.

Managing ministry images

Ministry images are rendered as circular avatars at a 1:1 aspect ratio (square, taken from the centre of the image) in the My Rotas section of My ChurchSuite but will show in their original aspect ratio on the rota "view" page. For best results, and to ensure that important information or details of the image are not clipped or distorted, make sure that all ministry images are saved in a 16:9 aspect ratio (e.g. 1280x720px) and that important image information is kept away from the corners of the image. For help in calculating the aspect ratio of ministry images use this handy calculator.

Here's an example of how a ministry image is rendered in the My Rotas list...

And here's how the image is rendered when viewing the rota page itself - displayed in its original aspect ratio on the individual Rota pages.

To upload a ministry image, head into the Ministries section of the Rotas module. From a ministry's "View" page, click on the image avatar and select Edit.

On the Edit image pop up, drag and drop a suitably-prepared image onto the drop zone or click to browse and choose the image file.

The image is uploaded and immediately applied to the ministry (and all rotas for that ministry) - job done! Clicking the image avatar again, note the additional image actions to View and Delete an image.

Managing fund images

Fund images are re-proportioned to show on Fund pages in a 16:9 aspect ratio. To ensure that important information or details of the image are not clipped or distorted, make sure that all group images are saved in a 16:9 aspect ratio (e.g. 1280x720px). For help in calculating the aspect ratio of group images use this handy calculator.

Here's an example of how a fund image is rendered on a fund page...

To upload a fund image, head into the Funds section of the Giving module. From a fund's "View" page, click on the image avatar and select Edit.

On the Edit image pop up, drag and drop a suitably-prepared image onto the drop zone or click to browse and choose the image file.

The image is uploaded and immediately applied to the fund - job done! Clicking the image avatar again, note the additional image actions to View and Delete an image.

FAQs

• What about safeguarding issues around child images?

Images uploaded to the Children module are only visible to ChurchSuite Users who have permission to access that module, and within My ChurchSuite only linked parents/carers can see their child's photos. Children are not included in the "Search for others" functionality; however, for children in small groups and serving on rotas, their name and an avatar of their profile photo will appear in group and rota member lists in My ChurchSuite. A child's avatar profile image is also shown within the Child Check-in system - shown next to their name when checking in. Child profile photos are not displayed on child name badges, parent pick-up badges or room badges.

• What about Data Protection?

There are many pastoral and practical benefits to having profile images for your members. However, as with any manual or computerised system that an organisation uses to store or process personal information about individuals, this should be done in compliance with your Data Protection Policy. Data Controllers are responsible for clearly communicating to members and users how personal information is to be processed and the lawful basis for processing each type of data - typically 'consent'. In respect of storing images, we recommend that your organisation's policies be extended to explicitly cover how images will be used. In the Children Module, we have provided functionality for primary parents/carers to manage the Photo/Video consent of their children - child profile images should therefore only be processed in accordance with those parental settings. Similar functionality can also be achieved in the Address Book for adult Photo/Video consent using custom fields. It is always best practice for members to upload and manage their profile images in My ChurchSuite (rather than 'cribbing' images from people's social media profiles!)

• Can I bulk-upload Photos?

No, it is not possible to upload or import batches of photos to either the Address Book or Children module. Photos must be uploaded on a contact-by-contact basis, either by a user or, preferably, by individuals adding their photos.