Tips for Publishing Images on Gather

How to Publish Images on Gather

(updated on August 20 to reflect changes from out lates upgrade)

You can find the Publish Images feature on Gather from a variety of locations on the site. The main source is the Publish Tab at the top of every page. You can also publish directly from your My Gather page and most Groupspace pages.

First you simply select your image file using the "browse" button. after you select a file (jpg format only) your image will automatically begin to upload and process.

While your image is uploading you can add your caption. This is a great opportunity to get a conversation around your image started so even though this is optional I recommend you always write a caption.

You'll also need to add tags. Tags are descriptive words or phrases that help others find your work and can help categorize images on different topics. Make sure that your tags are related to the image you are publishing. Adding politics tags to the image of your dog is only useful if your puppy is a senator.

Decide who you want to see your image on Gather. If you leave the setting at "everyone" your image can be enjoyed by all Gather members and others who visit the site. It will also be searchable across the entire internet.

You also need to decide if you wish to share your image with Gather Groups you belong to. Be sure to be selective. It's not nice to send your images to just any old groups. Most groups have specific topics of interest. If you aren't sure if your image is appropriate to your group you should visit the group and chsck their description.

There are a lot of photo groups on Gather that woudl probably welcome your images. These are easy to find using the Group Search page.  here's an example.

Getting the best quality image

We have a saying in photography that goes "Garbage In, Garbage Out", also known as GIGO. Keep this in mind as you read this article and when you post your images to Gather and you will achieve the best results possible.

Posting photos on Gather has become a very popular activity. Many people have asked me how to get the best quality for the images they post on Gather. Here is a simple trick that will help to achieve the best quality for your Gather images and also make your images post faster saving time in the process.

Many of the images posted to Gather start as digital camera images and others are made using a scanner from your original work. To get these images to load faster and achieve great quality the best thing to do is to resize your images for Gather before you upload the pictures.

The large image view on Gather is set at 550 pixels wide at a resolution of 72 DPI (dots per inch). When you load an image the technology Gather uses to load the image automatically reprocesses the image to this 550 pixel width and 72 DPI resolution. This means that if your image is bigger or smaller than these settings Gather is dramatically changing the specifications of your original image during the process.

If your images are larger than 550 pixels wide and 72 DPI the upload process has to work longer to load all that extra data and process the file to the correct size and resolution.  If your original image is smaller than these dimensions you image quality will be impacted when the file is enlarged to fit the specifications.  

Try this. Use any image processing software such as Adobe PhotoShop, which is professional software and sort of expensive, or any other image editing software you have available. Most computers come with any number of a variety of simple image tools that will also work. They are too numerous to name.

If you want to crop your image it is recommended that you do this first while your image file is still in its original quality.

Using the image editing software of your choice open your original image and first make the image resolution 72 DPI if it isn't already. Most digital cameras default to 72 DPI so chances are that the image may already match this resolution.

Next edit the size of the image to be 550 pixels wide. 

Make sure you save the file as a Jpeg or .JPG format as Gather can only load Jpeg format files.

These steps will also work for images smaller than 550 pixels wide and 72 DPI to raise the image specifications but only the more expensive software will have the extra tools needed to compensate for the effects of enlarging a digital image file. Some software will automatically perform a process called "interpolation" where the software guesses as it adds more pixels to the image around the original pixels as it makes the image larger. Using other software options such as "sharpen Image" filters will help if your software has this feature.

If anyone else has other image tips I'm sure our Gather friends want to know. Now go load your favorite photograph.