Image Tips

Image Sizing
One of the most important parts of image sizing is the actual dimensions of the image. This may be expressed in pixels or inches. You should try to keep your images at a maximum height or width of 8", or 576 pixels. This ensures that visitors with 640x480 resolutions can fit the full size images on their screen. Eight  inches is also a good size for printing.

DPI, "dots per inch", should be set to 72. 72 DPI is the Internet standard for images, though some higher-resolution monitors are set to 96 DPI. The higher the setting, the bigger the final file size. Stick with 72 DPI and you won't have any problems.

If your program has a Quality setting, in general you can use the default 'medium quality' setting in most any program. If you use Photoshop, the medium setting is perfect.  High quality files will take a lot of time to download - it could take several minutes to download a picture file for people using a dial-up connection.

Skipping the first image slot
Occasionally, due of the size and/or content of the paragraph, you may not want to place an image in the opening paragraph.  However, to skip the first image, you still must upload an image in the #1 spot.  Once the images have been uploaded, proceed to the Article Editor page and scroll down to the bottom of the page. Then:

Correspondents need to enter a note telling their Editor to "un-check" the Image 1 box when they approve the article.

Editors need to "un-check" the Image 1 box. This turns off the first image, but the other image/s will display normally.


More than three images in an article
If you need to place more than three images in the same article, you should simply create a slideshow. You can upload the first image in the image 1 position so you have a photo displaying in the article.  Then put all the images into one slideshow, and embed in the article.

You can also add more pictures by insertinga local image. To insert an image, position your cursor where you want the image to appear. Click Insert on the tool bar and then select Local Image from the list. From the dialogue box, select the directory where the image is located, select the image, and then click insert. SOCS will not size your picture using this method. Any re-sizing should be done in a photo program before placing the image into SOCS.

Picture Pages
Picture pages are created by inserting local images from the tool bar.  These images will not automatically be sized as they are with the “upload images” feature.  Make sure the photos are a compatible size before inserting them (see sizing tips on page 1).

There are two ways to create picture pages:

1. You can simply insert local image from the tool bar and tab to the next insert point to insert the next picture.
2. You can insert a table and insert a local image into each cell of the table.  (see related article on Tables for more detail).