uploading photos; how do I do it?
 

I've been trying to upload some photos from my computer's photo files into a thread and have been unsuccessful at every attempt I make.

HOW DO YOU DO IT? Very frustrating, to say the least.

If you have photoshop, the following should work:

In PS, go to file/save for web... At least in my Mac version, there will be a Preset: box in the upper right. Choose, say, JPEG medium. In lower left, look at the size of the file. For jpg, you need to get the file size to 97.7 kb or lower. Go back over towards the bottom right where it shows Image Size. If your file size is twice as big as it can be, try halving the file W:. H: will adjust automatically. Check the new file size and keep adjusting up or down as necessary and then hit save.

If you got the size right, you should be able to paste the image into your post.

Attached File method
When making your BF post, the easiest method is to click "Go Advanced", then click the paperclip icon to upload your photos. It lets you browse your PC folders and select photos to upload. There's no link to the photo in the body of the post. These just show at the bottom of the post, so this works okay for a couple of photos.

I resize before uploading, making the photos about 800 to 1000 pixels wide. (Full size photos usually fail to upload.)

For example, this sunset Cincinnati bridge photo at the bottom of the post was 1000 pixels wide. The thread often shrinks it even more--to get it under 100k bytes?

imgur.com
The free accounts at imgur.com are simple to set up, and easy to use.
I resize before uploading. (I think imgur can do a resize for you, but I'd rather use my own software to do it.) The imgur resizing is kind of confusing, and the upload is fast if the photo is smaller, so I like to resize before uploading.

Then you can view your uploaded photo on imgur. Click your login name at the top right, and go to Images to see the recent photos. Click it to view, and it has a "direct link" to the .jpg image that you can copy and paste into the yellow "insert image" icon here on BF's thread post editing. These photos show up in-line with your text, much better if there's many photos or if they need titles or descriptions.

This riverfront park photo hosted on imgur.com was resized to 900 pixels wide, and uses the "insert image" icon.

BF resizing!
If my browser window is too narrow, this gets resized to fit. Is it imgur or BF changing the size?
On a narrower browser, image info shows a temporary resize: 900px × 506px (scaled to 706px × 397px)
But it's back to it's full size if my browser is wide enough.

http://i.imgur.com/zI2yPM2.jpg

It's embedded within the post text.

This night photo was resized to 250 pixels wide:
http://i.imgur.com/tuMstwH.jpg


The "attached file" bridge photo just shows up at the bottom of the post. Even though it was uploaded as 1000 pixels wide, it's been auto resized. This was 288k, so it appears the old upload limit of 100k no longer applies -- but it's been resized by BF to 96k and 734 pixels wide. It failed to upload at it's original 4400 pixels width!
End of my post text.

I did the first part of what you said, but how do you resize before uploading? When I hit the Browse button and try to upload what I've selected I just get the "Fail to upload" message

Do you edit your photos? For instance, straightening or cropping? That software should have an easy resizing method.

Or on Windows, try right clicking a photo file and select Edit. That brings up the windows Paint on my PC. It has a resize option. I usually resize to a specific width in pixels, and it needs to "maintain aspect ratio" so that the horizontal and vertical scales at the same time (otherwise it'll be stretched or squashed).

I save the changes with a new file name if I want to keep the original too. For posting a set of photos, make a new folder, then copy the photos to be posted there, and edit/resize within that folder. You still have the originals, and these copies are easy to find when you want to upload them.

I normally don't use Paint, I have other photo editing software, FastStone, free to use. It's got tons of features for viewing and for editing, but there's a bit of a learning curve.

I used Paint (it was easy!) to resize this original 4400 pixels to be 500 pixels wide, then used the Attach paperclip method:

I would use photobucket or something. I don't like pics people upload from a computer on this site, they're too small.

Testing the paperclip method...sweet!