How to host an image

[the100thmonkey]

ok, so i've seen a lot of people having problems with image hosting recently - particularly since filelabs went down - so i thought i'd write a brief tutorial explaining how to host an image off-site and link to it so it displays in the forum.

to do this, you will need:

• an image (derrr...)
• an internet connection (again, derrr...)
• an image hosting site. since filelabs went down, i use http://pix.nofrag.com, as imageshack is too slooooooow...

1. now you have your image, save it somewhere you'll be able to find it. i use the desktop, because it's the default location for me, and it's easy.
2. go to your image hosting site, and click the "browse" button, which is usually next to a text-input field:
   
   
   
3. a dialog box will pop up, asking you for a location to upload from:
   
   
   
4. navigate to the image, click the "OK" button, and then click the "upload" button on the site. once the picture has uploaded, you will be taken to a new screen:
   
   
   
   note that depending on the speed of your internet connection, the upload can take a surprisingly long time, particularly with uncompressed image files.
   
5. ignore the section marked "no!" - that's adirect link to the image, suitable for Instant Messaging programs and posting a direct link. most image hosting sites (nofrag included) will not allow hotlinks in [img]http://pix.nofrag.com/e9/b3/13de8f11aa6ec844424509f17ac9.html[/img] tags. they want traffic to their site. that's why the only permissible hotlinks are ones with a referrer url in there too. think about it - why should a free hosting site host your images if they're not going to get traffic? give some respect to them, link back.
   
6. you're interested in the section marked "yes!" in the red box. these are links with BBcode in them - they do all the hard work for you and allow you to just copy-and-paste the links directly into your posts. the top link is intended for small pictures (both size in KB and dimensions). basically, we don't want you to be posting full-screen pictures - there are dial-up users on this board (i often access the board using GPRS on my mobile phone too), so please keep image size to a minimum by using thumbnails wherever possible.
7. choose the "display the picture in a thumbnail in a forum" or "display a big thumbnail picture in a forum" link, right click, and select "copy".
8. go to forums.torrentspy.com, and paste the link into your post:
   
   
9. hit "submit", and your post should contain a thumbnail of your image, like in this post.

if you have any questyions, or want to request clarification, please post below