Some Google uploading tips

[radiostationx]

Firstly, Google do not want you to embed photos on external websites any longer ..it seems like that anyway.
They took away Picasa Web Albums and along with it much of the "tooling" to make things very easy.
Now it is much much harder.

But there are some advantages,
1. Google give you 15gb of storage at cost of zero if you open an account, quite good for free.
2. Lots of people will already have google accounts for phones, tablets and the like so you can use these accounts to post photos on the NWAN website.
3. You can play around with Googles code to do things that you are unable to do with Flickr.
4. The security on Google is quite good unlike some other free hosting sites.

Assuming you have completed all your editing and resized your photo to a manageable size you can embed the photo/s on NWAN using googles services.

Method 1 : Google Drive.

For this Have your photo ready @ 1024 pix wide before proceeding.
Open up the google search website.
Click on "sign in" and enter your details.
Click on the 9 square matrix of dots in the top right of the page (google apps) when the apps window opens.
Select "Drive"
There is a folder created by default called "Public"
Click on the Public folder to open it.
Now look at the top left hand side of the page, click on "New".
Click on "File Upload", this will open a navigation window where you can navigate to your photo for uploading to NWAN.
Upload your resized 1024 pix wide photo which you want to dispaly on the NWAN site.

TIPS/INFO You must have it a reasonable size of less than 1600pix working with any photo in any google app or google will play tricks with you and do your Head in.
Using this method, there is no way to resize later so make the photo the right size for display on the web (1024) before proceeding with the next bit.
Normally Google track how many views your photo gets, they do not like you embedding photos to websites as then they cannot track hits properly.
Google will apply alternative coding to automatically and without warning switch the link to your photo off.
Especially if :
1. Your photo gets a lot of attention.
2. If the file is too big (as they cannot scan it effectively for viruses)

When the upload is done, double click on the photo icon in your public folder to expand the frame to a larger size.
With your photo opened up to larger size, Click on the 3 dots at the top right of the page.
Click on "share".
Make sure the "anyone with link can view" option is active (green paperclip icon), it should be if you are working in your public folder.
Copy the while address in the box using the "copy link" button .
Open up Wordpad or Notepad and paste it in a blank doc
You should end up with an address that has an ending like this..

/view?usp=sharing

Now go to this website

gdurl.com/

Paste the address in full into the long rectangular box at the top of the page and press enter key on your keyboard or click "Create Permalink"
This website will create a simple shortened link to your photo which is much more reliable than a google hosting address as Google cannot track it easy or mess things up on you.
You will see a copy of your photo with a shortened address link below it
Copy the short address in the first section box.
Now use the formula I explained in my flickr tricks post to put your photo on the NWAN site.

[url=shortened-address][img]shortened-address[/img][/url]

Paste this code string into your NWAN post as you would a flickr link or photobucket link.
You should now see your photo if you use the preview option when editing your post for nwan.

A few things you should remember, use the pubic folder only in google drive, only put things in that folder you want to go out to a wide audience never personal stuff.
Leave all that stuff safe in other google drive folders which are not shared and you will be fine.

If members wish I can throw up a few screenshots of the steps above, let me know .

Method 2. (Clickable Thumbnails)
Will come here next..

[radiostationx]

Method 2 (Clickable Thumbnails)

With your google account apps you get "Google +"
You can cheat the coding in Google + to do things you cannot do with Flickr or Google Drive.
Here is how to make a clickable thumbnail using Google + as the hosting.
Open Google +
Click on the red /white pen icon to write a post to Google + social network.
Click on the camera icon at the bottom of the new post blank page.
Click on "Add Photo".
Navigate to your photo and click "open" to upload it to your Google + post.
Add some text or a title if you like at the header.
Click "Save" to save your post containing the photo.
Close Google + and wait 5 mins. (Google will scan it for viruses and make it public in this time)
Open Google + again and in the left menu click "profile", scroll down and find your post.
Click on the photo in your post to expand it to a full page display.
Right Click anywhere in photo and "Copy image address"
Paste the address into a text editor like Wordpad/Notepad.
It will look like this,



Example 1 : 200 pix wide thumb clickable to 1280 full size.

Now we need to change the default google coding in the last part of the address after the = sign.
to this for full size 1280 pix image,

=w1280-no?.png

Meaning : Set width detail to 1280pix,break,no change,do not question, file type extension (in this case .png).

After the small change it should look like this




and for a thumbnail of 200 pix wide,we change the end if the address like this

=w200-no?.png

The result is this




The formula we use for clickable thumbs is


[URL=addressoffullsize][img]addressofthumb[/img][/url]

So it the embed code string looks like this for a 1280w image shrunk to 200w thumb






Paste the whole code into your NWAN posting and it will look like this
200pix Thumb with click to 1280pix Full Size on plain white padding.



You can change the size the larger image and its thumbnail by playing about with the width perameter in the first and second address in the command string after the = sign.

Example 2: 400 pixel wide thumbnail clickable to 1024 pix wide full size.

I have used a different photo for this one but I changed the end of the address using the method in example 1

=w1024-no?.png (first address full size)
=w400-no?.png (second address thumb)
A 1024 wide photo with thumb width 400 code string looks like this .




and displays like this....



The image above is evidence that sometimes all things photography dont go according to plan ! Bloomin Clouds

It is handy to be able to have both flickr and other hosting methods.
Sometimes you may not wish to mess up your flickr account with non aviation content such as trip report cabin photos,mistakes & duffers but within a single post, armed with a little knowledge, you can use a mix of regular flickr embedding for the aircraft and another hosting service for cabin/meal/lounge shots or your out takes for a bit of fun.
Its takes a bit of messing around at first but you will become familiar with this very quickly.

It is important to understand that with Google + you are making your photos public.

Hope this helps.