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EuroGoldLS -> Image Posting. PLEASE READ!! (11/19/2007 3:02:12 PM)
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I had a request for a tutorial on how to post images on the forums. If you have multiple images to post, please do not use the upload photo option as it will lead to increased server load and diskspace.
So to start... I would get yourself a free account over at PhotoBucket.com. There are other free photo hosting services as well, but I have used photobucket for awhile now and haven't been let down.
Once you get a hosting site, now you're ready to get your photos on the web. I would suggest that when you upload your photos to your host site, that you create different sections for photos depending on what they are. So for your latest truck meet, you can create a section labelled "Bad Azz Truck Meet" and upload your photos to that section. This will make it much easier to find your pictures later on once you get quite a few of them in there.
Now about the resizing. Really the best application that I have found is the Microsoft Image Resizer Powertoy (from Microsoft Windows XP PowerToy only for Windows XP users). It is so simple and easy to use. I would recommend resizing to around 640x480 before uploading to your online host. You'll also want to resize the picture before say rotating it because the resizer assumes a width wise photo. So if you resize a height wise photo (taller than it is wide) to 640x480, the resultant photo will be 360x480 because it kept the aspect ratio, but limited the height to 480. So if you wanted a 480x640 picture, you'd either have to do a custom resize or rotate it after you resize.
I also do not recommend posting images above 640x480 (or 480x640) on our forums due to the size limitations of some of our members computer screens and resolutions of said screens.
If you have other operations (crop, rotate, etc), then there are tools like Photoshop that you can use. A good free alternative to Photoshop is Paint .NET. If you have all of the updates from microsoft for Windows XP, you should be all set to install Paint .NET without issue. I find myself using Paint .NET more than my PaintShop Pro program that I paid for!
Ok, so now you have pictures that you are ready to upload to your new online photo host. Login to your account, create the section for your new photos, and select the number of photos to upload (may be limited so you may have to do it a few times). Now browse to each one of the photos you want to upload. After all of the photo locations are entered, click upload and wait. When it completes, you should see the photos.
Now that you have the photos hosted on the web, it's time to post them!!! At Photobucket, there will be some fields below each photo. One should be 'url'. You will need to copy all of the text in this field and paste it into your posts using an *image* tag. So you'll end up with something like this:
[image]http://PATH_TO_YOUR_IMAGE[/image]
You're done!!!
Now the reason why I say to resize the pictures prior to uploading them is #1, it makes them load faster for everyone and #2, every free photo hosting site has a disk space limit and a monthly bandwidth limit, meaning that you can only have so much space for your pictures (size matters - smaller the better) and you can only access your stored images so much in a month (I have never went over my bandwidth allotment yet).
If you would like to give everyone access to the full res photos, then atleast create thumbnails for the casual viewers and link to the full res shots for the interested viewers. So basically, you would have a full res photo on your host site as well as a thumbnail. Most people will only view the thumbnail not using much of your bandwidth, and those interested enough can click on the picture to view the full res image. Once both the thumbnail and the full res shots are uploaded to your image host, here's how you would post the image:
[image]http://PATH_TO_YOUR_THUMBNAIL_IMAGE[/image]
This will display the thumbnail and when clicked, open a new window showing the full resolution image.
Another little tip is to name your thumbnailed images the same as the full res image with just adding a 't' to the end. So if your full res image is 'Blazer_01.jpg', then the thumb would be named 'Blazer_01t.jpg'. This just makes it easier for sorting your images and keeping things tidy.
Another option would be to use your 'Member Gallery' for your photo storage, but you are much more limited in the disk space for photos in the Member Gallery than you are in the free online photo hosts.
For AVATAR's, the images must be 145x145 or smaller to work. The filesize limit really does not apply. You will need to use one of the resizing methods above to create an image small enough for use as an AVATAR.
Good luck and if you have any more questions, please feel free to post here or PM me!
I'd also like to add that Photobucket has automatic thumbnails. Just add a 'th_' prefix to the actual photo filename in your link.
If you have anything to add about other Photo hosting sites, PM me and I'll unlock the thread and allow you to amend it.
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