I wrote this for the SANParks forums, but you might find it useful as well. Especially read the last bit, making thumbnails is easy but it works a little differently.
Posting photos became easier, cheaper, and with more options.
Dropbox is not quite the same as sites like Tinypic or Flickr. It can do a whole lot more:
dropbox manual wrote:
What is Dropbox?
Dropbox is a free service that lets you bring all your photos, docs, and videos anywhere. Any file
you save to your Dropbox will also automatically save to all your computers, phones, and even
the Dropbox website. This means that you can start working on your computer at school or the
office, and finish on your home computer. Never email yourself a file again!
Well, that sounds fine, and it is. I personally have scans of our passports, our reservations and other stuff in the personal space. That means that if we lose the real documents (trouble) we can still show it if there is Internet available, even from the phone.
But that is not what I am typing about, it is about sharing the photos. (Video might work too, but haven't tried that yet. Anyway using Youtube works fine.)
Almost everyones problem is uploading photos to a site so you can share them here, or with friends & family. Many steps, little webspace unless you pay and confusing interfaces. And then I am not even talking about the terms of service, like hotlinking (the photo showing in full here) not being allowed.
With Dropbox you can save many steps, so lets see what you have to do.
You need to register at Dropbox (http://www.dropbox.com), and then you will get 2 Gigabyte of storage. That will take a ton of photos. However, they use an invite system. If someone registers due to your invite you will get 0.5 GB extra storage, with a maximum of 25 GB at this moment. The moderators will happily send out invites. If we are at our maximum we can start an invite topic in Chit-chat. :whistle:
After registration you need to install the program. just follow the easy installation steps. Let Dropbox create new directories for private and shared directories.
Make sure you use a strong password! You do not want your passport scans or other private stuff to be stolen! http://strongpasswordgenerator.com/ will take care of that, just make sure you store the password where you can not loose it as Dropbox has no recovery.
An easier to remember way is to use a simple sum like 25/5=4+1. You can add to that with Q for question, and A for answer, your name somewhere or similar things, but it will be a strong password which is easy to remember.
You are go!
Yep! You really are.
In both Linux and Windows you will see a Dropbox folder when you try to save a file, just like the Desktop folder.
There is a Getting Started pdf in it, a Public folder, and a Photos. The last one is the one we need, and this is where the real work starts.
Create a folder in Photos with a descriptive name like Kruger 2012.
Open your photo editing program, like Photoshop, Lightroom, Paint.net or ... Too many choices, and start editing your photos. Just save them to that folder you created. If you intend to use them on these forums make sure the longest side of the photos does not exceed 800 pixels!
If you have a permanent internet connection the photos will be uploaded in the background to the server. And better yet, if your partner has access to your Dropbox, or your computer at work, they will automagically download them. You have 1 or more backups instantly. If you use dial-up it will take a little longer, but Dropbox has a very good system of sending the changed bits only, very much cutting down on bandwidth.
Your photos are online now.
You can share the photos with friends and family by just sending them the link. Now what do I mean with that?
Your Dropbox on the web looks more or less like this now:
Inside the Photos folder is the folder you created. Walk to it and open it. You should see something like this:
As you can see I circled the little triangle at the top. It is an important one, and the one you need now. Hit it and it shows "Gallery" and "Show deleted files". The first option is what you need, it will give you a link to a gallery of the photos you uploaded. And that you can share with people, no matter if they have Dropbox installed or not.
This link goes to the photos I share. It's all of them as you can see by the choices you can make in albums. If you do not want that, but want just a link to that album just navigate to it, and grab the link from the little triangle.
Do NOT edit that link or people will not be able to see anything!
Insert the link into an email, post it on Facebook, and the people who want to see your photos will be able to.
Now an important bit pops into memory here, you have uploaded the files by saving them there, so you can delete the files. Right?
Wrong!
We have seen that a bit too often. If you delete it, it is gone. People will not be able to see it. So please, if you use the photos online keep them on your PC! Or you tripreports and such will have nasty empty holes in them.
It is only a few gigabyte at most, with current harddisks that is nothing.
So we now have a very easy system to create galleries, even with a slideshow included. But you want to post the photos inside your tripreport, in Bird ID, and so on. And for that you need to hotlink.
Here is how:
Navigate to the photo you want to show in your Dropbox by going to the folder (see the second screenshot) and clicking it. (And check if it is 800 pixels at its longest side or it will not work here!)
In the bottomright corner you will see these icons:
Hit the anchorcable to get the link. A new page will open. In the top of that you will see a button:
Rightclick that. Your browser will pop out a menu, and one of the options will be "Copy Link Location" or tems of a similar nature, depending on your browser.
That is the link you want for your post. So pop over to that, and paste it where it should go.
You need to do two little things now. The link looks like this:
Remove the ?dl=1 bit so the link ends at .jpg.
Then select the link, and hit the button [Img] you have while writing a post, above the typing area.
Finish your chat around the photo, and hit Preview to see if it worked. If it worked hit Submit. Done!
For when you have done this a few times:
If you are going to post a great many photos you can export two sizes of your photos, one small preview, and a large(r) one. Post the small one as above, and a text link to the large one. That will keep your tripreport fast and people with slow connections very happy. 
Last edited by DuQues (22-05-2012 10:55:47)
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