They say a picture is a worth a thousand words, and in our visual society, using visual images is a good way to catch the eye of the reader, whether for your story, your account, or your profile page.
There are many opportunities to use images on our sites:
-- Banner: A wide, short image at the head of your story; think of it as the "cover" to your book
-- Chapter Image: A picture used in a chapter that acts as an illustration of that chapter
-- Bio Image: A picture on your account page in the Archive
-- Signature: A picture that appears at the bottom of every post you make on the forums.
-- Avatar: A small square picture that appears directly below your name and on your profile page on the forums.
-- Personal Pic: an image in your profile page on the forums (forbidden in HPFF forums)
Whatever image is being used, there are some common things that exist with all of them. Below are some instructions and guidelines for creating, requesting and hosting an image. At the bottom of this article, you will find some links that give further instructions on how to insert the images into portions of our sites. For the purposes of this article and any others of this topic, the terms 'image', 'graphic', 'picture' are interchangeable.
Putting up a graphic on our sites is a 3-step process:
- 1. Create a graphic
- 2. Host a graphic at an offsite location
- 3. Insert the graphic into our site
1. Create a Graphic
If
you are savvy with a computer graphics program, you can create a graphic
yourself, or you can go to a service that makes images/graphics for you.
Creating your own graphic
If you create your own graphic, remember our rules for sizes and content:
Banners
-- banners at HPFF may be no larger than 700x110 pixels (width x height)
-- banners at HPFF may not include links
-- banners must be rated 12+
-- banners are only permitted in your story summary and may not appear in any chapter summary (more on this in a moment)
Chapter Images
-- chapter images at HPFF may be no larger than 380x300 pixels (width x height)
-- chapter images at HPFF may not include links
-- chapter images must be rated 12+
-- only ONE chapter image per chapter
-- chapter images are only permitted in your chapter body text and may not appear in any chapter summary
Bio Images
-- bio images may be no larger than 700x110 pixels (width x height) OR 380x300 pixels (width x height)
-- bio images may not include links
-- bio images must be rated 12+
Signatures
-- signatures may be no larger than 500x200 pixels (width x height)
-- signatures can contain links, but you must have an accompanying rating (example: 15+) with the signature
-- signatures must be rated 12+
Avatars/Personal Pictures
-- avatars/personal pictures may be no larger than 100x100 pixels (width x height)
-- avatars/personal pictures cannot contain links
-- avatars/personal pictures must be rated 12+
-- avatars/personal pictures CANNOT contain any personal pictures of yourself or your friends/family
-- please note, some of our sites do not allow personal pics to be loaded at all.
Personal Pic
-- personal pics may be no larger than 150x100 pixels (width x height)
-- personal pics CANNOT contain any personal pictures of yourself or your friends
-- personal pics must be rated 12+
-- bear in mind, some of our sites do not allow personal pics to be loaded at all.
Having someone else create your graphic
The best place (in our opinion) to request a graphic is a sister site to HPFF called The Dark Arts (TDA).
TDA is a forum specifically set up to allow people to submit requests
for graphics, and there a fleet of talented volunteer computer artists
can provide you with one. You can request certain celebrity faces,
poses, subject matter, backgrounds, or leave these up to the artist to
decide. TDA has a specific set of instructions to follow to request a graphic. Please read all rules before posting on the site.
However,
should someone else make a graphic for you, it is very important that
you double-check the size. The graphic MUST meet all of our rules
requirements; this is YOUR responsibility to make sure it does, not the
artist's.
File types for graphics/pictures can be .jpg, .gif, or .png.
2. Host a Graphic
Once
you have your graphic file, you will need to "host" it at a separate
site. HPFF does not host images/graphics. A host site for images/graphics/pictures is a separate site that you can maintain an
account on, and upload your banner to. Think of this site as a
"storage" area for your pictures.
When you upload your picture
file to the host site, it will in turn provide you with a URL (a web
address) for your picture. It is this URL that will be used in your
story account. Some of these sites can provide an assortment of different URLs for you to use. You will only want to use the URL that provides the most "direct link" to the image. It may look something like this -- http: //www .sitenamehere.com/filenamehere.gif. Anything with the HTML arrows (< >) in it is not to be used.
Some suggestions of host sites:
TinyPic
-- a free hosting site. You need not maintain an account at TinyPic.
HOWEVER -- images hosted with them will 'expire' (be removed from their
servers) after a period of inactivity or high bandwidth usage. File
size limitations: 250K.
Photobucket
-- a free hosting site. You WILL need to register an account, but this
is extremely easy and takes only a few moments. Photobucket offers you
the ability to organise your pictures into different "albums". File
size limitations: 250K.
Pix8 -- a free hosting site, You WILL need to register an account. Pix8 also has the ability to host very large file sizes.
Others -- just google "free picture web hosters"
3. Insert the graphic into our site
Follow the links below for more detailed instructions on how to insert your graphic into our sites.
Problems?..... read Problems with Images/Graphics/Pictures
