NextGen Gallery and Featured Image

I’m using themes from Elegant Themes in conjunction with NextGen Gallery, and want to be able to use an image from NextGen Gallery as my featured image, rather than have to upload it again separately. But, this does not work.

I have found a number of threads on the topic, including:
https://www.ads-software.com/support/topic/featured-image-not-working-with-nextgen-gallery?replies=10
https://www.ads-software.com/support/topic/plugin-nextgen-gallery-featured-image-problems?replies=10

– but the explanations all seem long and convoluted, and the themes I am using don’t contain anything remotely resembling the code that those threads instruct to change. They are also from quite a while ago, so I’m hoping something has happened in the meantime to make this not so hard ??

If it helps, this is the code that pulls the post thumbnail for one of the themes I am trying to use:

<?php if (get_option('magnificent_blog_thumbnails') == 'on') { ?>

						<?php $thumb = '';
						$width = 218;
						$height = 218;
						$classtext = '';
						$titletext = get_the_title();

						$thumbnail = get_thumbnail($width,$height,$classtext,$titletext,$titletext);
						$thumb = $thumbnail["thumb"]; ?>

						<?php if($thumb <> '') { ?>
							<div class="thumbnail">
								<?php print_thumbnail($thumb, $thumbnail["use_timthumb"], $titletext, $width, $height, $classtext); ?>
								<span class="overlay"></span>

https://www.ads-software.com/extend/plugins/nextgen-gallery/