Help with Php smooth Gallery script

[gigi]

Hi  I'm new here and have no idea about coding whatsoever.  I  have a wordpress theme that has the smoothgallery script included in it.  Currently, the script calls the title and photos from featured post on my blog.  ( custom field name set to featured and image url) I want to be able to create my own titles and not have them called from my blog post titles. As a workaround I attempted to create a blog post and date it from a year or two ago (as I want my readers to see the photo and photo titles in my gallery but I don't want them to be able to view the post itself.  needless to say, it didn't work because I think the script only uses recent posts.  anyway, I need some help editing the script so that:

1.  I can create my own photo titles and not have the titles automatically come from my blog post title or

2. be able to have photos come from a  hidden back dated post.

 

Here is the script:

<!--INITIALIZE SMOOTH GALLERY-->
<script type="text/javascript">
function startGallery()
{
var myGallery = new gallery($('myGallery'),
{
	timed: true,
	showCarousel: false 

});
}
window.addEvent('domready', startGallery);
</script> 

<?
global $options;
foreach ($options as $value) {
    if (get_settings( $value['id'] ) === FALSE) { $$value['id'] = $value['std']; } else { $$value['id'] = get_settings( $value['id'] ); }
}
?>

<div id="myGallery">
<?php
#RETRIEVE THE SMOOTH GALLERY POSTS
$smoothgallery_posts =  new WP_Query("category_name=$theme_featured&posts_per_page=5");

#DISPLAY SMOOTH GALLERY ELEMENTS
while($smoothgallery_posts->have_posts())
{
$smoothgallery_posts->the_post();

#RETRIEVE THE SMOOTH GALLERY IMAGE URL
$picture = get_post_meta($post->ID, 'featured', true);

#RETRIEVE THE SMOOTH GALLERY URL
$url = get_post_meta($post->ID, 'url', true);

#SMOOTH GALLERY IMAGE URL EXISTS
if(!empty($picture))
{
?>
	<!-- SMOOTH GALLERY ELEMENT - START -->
	<div class="imageElement">
		<h3></h3>
		<?php the_excerpt(); ?>
		<?php
		#SMOOTH GALLERY URL EXISTS
		if(!empty($url))
		{
		?>
		<a href="<?php echo $url; ?>" title="Read more" class="open"></a>
		<?php
		}
		#SMOOTH GALLERY URL DOES NOT EXIST - USE POST URL
		else
		{
		?>
		<a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>" title="Read more" class="open"></a>
		<?php
		}
		?>						
		<img src="<?php bloginfo('stylesheet_directory'); ?>/timthumb.php?src=<?php echo get_post_meta($post->ID, "featured", true); ?>&h=280&w=490&zc=0&q=85" class="full" alt="<?php ; ?>"/>
		<img src="<?php echo $picture; ?>" class="thumbnail" alt="<?php ; ?>"/>
	</div>
	<!-- SMOOTH GALLERY ELEMENT - END -->					
<?php
}
}
?>
</div>

 

Here is a demo of the theme http://54800.com/

 

 

Thanks everyone!