Hi – NextGEN basic does include a number of different lightbox. Just go to Gallery > Other Options > Lightbox Effects and select your desired lightbox effect.
If you try selecting some different lightbox effects and are still seeing images open in their own page rather than a lightbox, there’s probably a plugin or theme conflict.
*If your theme has an option for it’s own lightbox, that would be the source.
*If you have caching plugin installed, try momentarily deactivating it.
*Consider trying to deactivate your other plugins just long enough to see if the lightbox effects start working.
If you’ve done all that an you can’t get lightbox effects to work, please let us know.
Thanks. (Erick)