Inserting images

[Neil Fitzgerald]

One of the great things about BirdingNZ.net is that it allows you to insert images into the body of your posts. A photo of a hard to ID bird, an unusual behaviour, or a map showing where to find something interesting for example could save a lot of words.
It is quick and easy, and here comes the brief tutorial on how to do it...

[Neil Fitzgerald]

First, some rules
I shouldn't need to say it, but I will: You must own the copyright to any images you post or have the owners permission to post them.
Images should be jpeg format, no more than 200 KB in size, and should not exceed 800 pixels on the longest side. There is a maximum of three images allowed per post.
Images can take up a lot of bandwidth. Please think about this, and the forum members who may be on slow dial-up connections before you go crazy posting images.

[Neil Fitzgerald]

Linking to images
If you have an image hosted on another website, you can link to it using the "[Img]" BB tags. Type the full path to the image, select it and click the "Img" button:

linkimage1.jpg (27.34 KiB) Viewed 30525 times

If your image fails to display when linked like this it is probably because the server on which it is hosted does not allow hotlinking in this way.

[Neil Fitzgerald]

Uploading images
If you don't have your images hosted elsewhere, registered members can upload images to BirdingNZ.net. To do this,

1. click on the "Upload attachment" tab under the new post form

2. browse to the file on your computer

3. click on "Add the file"

Uploading images to BirdingNZ.net

imageupload1.jpg (22.7 KiB) Viewed 30526 times

Text entered in the "File comment" box is not visible in posts, so no real need to bother with it.

Now, to make your image appear in the body of your message (rather than as a link attached at the end), click on the "Place inline" button in the Posted Attachments section:

imageinline1.jpg (13.67 KiB) Viewed 30523 times

The code for the inserted image will be placed where the cursor is. You can cut and past it somewhere else in the message if you like.

That's it. Hit the Preview button to make sure it all looks right, then click on Submit and it is done.

[Graham Saunders]

Thanks Neil.
I'll give those instructions a go.

[Clinton9]

Hi Neil,
I'm trying to put my photo of a red feral pigeon for my profile.

Cheers

Clinton.

[Neil Fitzgerald]

Clinton, sorry for the delay in getting back to you on this (I was away, then forget to follow it up when I got home).

The profile picture is also known as an avatar. To set or change it you need to:

1. go to your User Control Panel
2. click on the Profile tab
3. click on Edit avatar on the left of the tab
then choose your file and submit it.

avatar-how-to.jpg (64.16 KiB) Viewed 29620 times

[Neil Fitzgerald]

I tend to give little thought to things like resizing and cropping images, but if you are not doing it every day things like this can be a bit tricky. You might not even have software to do it (that bundled with cameras is often pretty average). IrfanView is a great little free but powerful program that is surprisingly good at things like this. I should have posted this years ago. You can download it here: http://www.irfanview.com/

[Steps]

I have had issues like this come up every now and then on my web sites.
It pays to keep uploaded pics below 50k , not 200K
Get a couple pics on 1 page and page loading /server loading can get great causing delays, and even locking up, or timing out
Servers have a time out limit built in, most servers are off shore ...regardless what your download speed is, your max upload speed IF one has a full on isp a/c AND a adsl2 router...is between 200k and tops 1.1 meg.
The server will use a automatic editing program like NetPBM...so if your pic(s) are large..the time to upload, the time for the server editing program to read the pic, edit, loadit....it has timed out... The time out period is built into the server at higher levels only accesable to the host, and VERY unlikely to be changed on request...Its a security issue.
Get your pic editor...NOT MS paint...infran recommended above is good.
1/Crop the pic so remove all background, and bring the subject to the forground.
2/Resize, change the longest side to between 500 and 600 pixels
3/Save As....use this so as not to over right the orginal pic.....rename the pic (eg pic name_ed1) choose .jpg in the drop down list.
A new tab appears with .jpg "options" choose 20 to 25%
4/Save
Now upload
Withthe smaller file size one can upload more pics at once

I suggest make this thread a 'sticky'.
Cheers
Steps

PS the same process is used for making an avatar.. crop, resize... change the dimesions to requirements , then change the options to suit.

Do the editing in the above order to prevent tearing, as much distortion in the pic as possible.

[Neil Fitzgerald]

Yep, it's a sticky already.
Cheers,