Create a Thumbnail with Fading Caption Using jQuery

Written by Kevin Liew on 20 Oct 2009
259,777 Views • Tutorials

Introduction

Hi all, today we are going to learn to create another thumbnail effect with fading and transparent caption. It's simple and obviously I have running out of ideas in jQuery tutorial because this is similar to jQuery Thumbnail with Zooming Image and Fading caption. If you have any suggestion about tutorial, please contact me

Before we begin, I have already made different effect for thumbnail, you can check it out:

1. HTML

First of all, HTML. it's easy to understand, all your caption/description of the thumbnail should put inside the caption class.

<div class="item">
	<a href="#"><img data-src="image.gif" alt="title" title="" width="125" height="125"/></a>
	<div class="caption">
		<a href="">Title</a>
		<p>Description</p>
	</div>
</div>

2. CSS

I have put comment on each important CSS. However, if you want to learn more about CSS, you can visit my following posts:

body {
	font-family:arial;	
}

.item {
	width:125px;
	height:125px;	
	border:4px solid #222;	
	margin:5px 5px 5px 0;
	
	/* required to hide the image after resized */
	overflow:hidden;
	
	/* for child absolute position */
	position:relative;
	
	/* display div in line */
	float:left;
}

.item .caption {
	width:125px;
	height:125px;
	background:#000;
	color:#fff;
	font-weight:bold;
		
	/* fix it at the bottom */
	position:absolute;
	left:0;

	/* hide it by default */
	display:none;

	/* opacity setting */
	filter:alpha(opacity=80);    /* ie  */
	-moz-opacity:0.8;    /* old mozilla browser like netscape  */
	-khtml-opacity: 0.8;    /* for really really old safari */  
	opacity: 0.8;    /* css standard, currently it works in most modern browsers like firefox,  */

}

.item .caption a {
	text-decoration:none;
	color:#0cc7dd;
	font-size:16px;	
	
	/* add spacing and make the whole row clickable*/
	padding:5px;
	display:block;
}

.item .caption p {
	padding:5px;	
	margin:0;
	font-size:10px;
}

img {
	border:0;
	
	/* allow javascript moves the img position*/
	position:absolute;
}

.clear {
	clear:both;	
}

3. Javascript

I have declared two variables called move and zoom. Move variable is for the top and left value of the thumbnail, if you mouse over the image, the image will move according to the value you have set (i make it move to left, so after the zooming, it'll always display in center). And for the second variable - zoom, it's the value you need to set if you want to enable the zooming effect. Currently, it's set to 1.2 which will enlarge the image to 120%. Simple, and for the rest of the code I have added comments above it. If you have any question, please drop me a comment.

$(document).ready(function() {

	//move the image in pixel
	var move = -15;
	
	//zoom percentage, 1.2 =120%
	var zoom = 1.2;

	//On mouse over those thumbnail
	$('.item').hover(function() {
		
		//Set the width and height according to the zoom percentage
		width = $('.item').width() * zoom;
		height = $('.item').height() * zoom;
		
		//Move and zoom the image
		$(this).find('img').stop(false,true).animate({'width':width, 'height':height, 'top':move, 'left':move}, {duration:200});
		
		//Display the caption
		$(this).find('div.caption').stop(false,true).fadeIn(200);
	},
	function() {
		//Reset the image
		$(this).find('img').stop(false,true).animate({'width':$('.item').width(), 'height':$('.item').height(), 'top':'0', 'left':'0'}, {duration:100});	

		//Hide the caption
		$(this).find('div.caption').stop(false,true).fadeOut(200);
	});

});

Conclusion

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68 comments
Thiago 11 years ago
How can I make the code work in onclick event?
Reply
Paul 10 years ago
It seems that there's a line of code missing in the .css file, ".item .caption" section. After the .left: 0 add .top: 0 to prevent the error in Chrome rendering (firefox works well even without it:))
Reply
rakesh 10 years ago
Thanks Man ...Its Wonderfull for small banners i wld say
Reply
Sandra 9 years ago
It does not work for me ... ( by doing exactly the same code )
There would be no missing code ?

(sorry, my English is not good).
Reply
Justine 9 years ago
Hi !
I don't know if i'll have an answer as this article seems "old" ^^ but still i'll try : I've used your code for one of my projects but I only wanted the 'caption appearing' thing and not the rest with the image zooming so I didn't use all your code. It works fine but the caption in my case does not want to take the width and height that I gave it. Do you have any idea what I'm missing ? I've tried to add some stuff in the css code in the ".item .caption" part or in the js file but it still doesn't work and I don't see where the problem comes from ...
Thanks
Reply