If you've had the opportunity to take a vacation this summer, you more than likely have a few photos of the event, and some stories to tell. It's easier than ever to send your photos and memories to your friends via Internet. We've got a few tips on how to make your photo-sharing experience easier.

Edit Your Photos

When you take a photo, you may find that there may be some things you wish you could change. Perhaps the photo is too dark. Or maybe the back of someone's head showed up in the corner of the photo. Perhaps your friend's eyes look a little too red. Many of these things can be fixed with image editing programs such as Corel Paint Shop Pro or Adobe PhotoShop. Be sure to save a copy of the photo, then close the original file and work on the saved copy so that you do not loose the original, in case you make a mistake. Once you're done, you're ready to take the next step - preparing it for internet distribution.

Preparing Your Photo For E-Mail or Web

Whenever you scan in or take a picture using a digital camera, your image will more than likely be a large size. These sizes are ideal for printing photos, as a lot of information is needed in order to produce a clear, sharp image. However, E-Mail and Web images do not need to be this large. In fact, viewing very large images in E-Mail or on a web page can often be cumbersome. In addition, the image file's size itself can be rather large, and can take quite a long time to retrieve just one photo inside an E-Mail message. Often some E-Mail programs or mail servers will reject files that are too large. Please see Why is my attachment file size reported as too big?

There are a few ways you can reduce the size. By reducing the size of the image, you also will reduce how much space the image takes up. The less space an image takes up, the faster it can be transmitted in E-Mail or displayed on a web page. The best size for a photo is 640 x 480 pixels. This will allow the viewer to see the entire photo usually without scrolling, and the photo will appear faster. To reduce an image's size, you'll need an image editing program as mentioned before. In fact, while editing your images, you may want to also reduce the size while you still have the image loaded. Save the corrected, reduced final image when done. Another way to reduce the size of an image if you have Windows XP is to right click on the image in Windows Explorer and choose Resize Pictures. This will give you a pop-up dialog which you can choose how to resize the image for internet use.

Sending A Photo In E-Mail

The easiest way to share a photo is to send it as a file attachment in an E-Mail message to your friends and family. It's much easier than sending copies of print photos to everyone, and far less costly. Simply use your E-Mail program's File Attachment feature and browse to the photo you want to attach, click on it (or double-click) to add it to the message. Then you can tell a little bit about the photo in the message area of the E-Mail.

Put Up A Photo Album

You can share your photos on your web page. There are many ways you can do this, including using software you can install on your Active Web Hosting CGI server. We'll take a look at one of these, Coppermine, in this month's Webmaster's Workshop.

Another way is to build a web page yourself, if you know a little bit about HTML. We have a tutorial on building a web page to help you get started.

If you're a bit uneasy about building the web page from scratch, and not sure how to install or use a photo gallery on your CGI server, there are some programs that can take your photos and build a web page for you. One of these programs is Corel's Photo Album Deluxe. This program not only helps you organize your photos, but lets you create projects with them, such as greeting cards, calendars, photo CDs, magazine covers, and even full web pages to share your photos online! Once the web page is created, simply use your FTP program to upload the photo album web page files and direcories to your Active Web Hosting Web Server, and give your friends the address to the new photo album!

Add The Photo To Your Blog

If you have installed Blog software on your Active Web Hosting CGI server, you may even be able to add a photo or two to your posts. This is nice when you want to share a little story about your vacation, as well as a few photos. Take a look at our Featured Article Blogs: Share Your Vacation!

It's easy and fun to share your photos online with friends and family. And it's great for them as well. Adding a little caption or telling a story with your photo often can make one feel like they were there on vacation with you! Have fun snapping those vacation pictures and putting together your own online scrapbook!

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