Image Source: when life gives you lemons, make the best lemonade ever
I have been reading some professional blogs such as Dosh Dosh’s Internet Marketing and Social Media for sometime. One of the blogging tips is to add images to your blog post and makes the post more interesting. It gives the post fresh look and space to breath. It also give the readers a first impression on what this post may be talking about.
I don’t always have interesting topics to blog about. If you know me, you probably know that I am more of story teller blogger. My post images always have some degree of connection to the topic that I am writing about.
To make my post a little big interesting, I find pictures from Flicks.com. There are so many great photos that you can search for and use it on your web site. All the images on my blog are chopped into 600×140 in order to fit into my blog template. They are also under the creative common license, which allows me to modify, post on my blog and give the photographer some credit. I add all those photos to my favorite photos under my flickr profile.
In most of the cases, I will just chop the image into the size I need. In some case, I have to modify the image to make it look more clear or interesting. I do auto Color, auto level, flip the image, blur the background, burn the image, remove unwanted spot, change colors and add objects. This allows me to make the photo perfectly fit into my story.
Here is one of the photos that I took myself. I use this photo in one of my popular post build close relationship with your visitors.
If you look at the original photo on flick.com, it will look like this one.
You can clearly see that the image is chopped and the handbag on the rock is removed. Also the water is also blurred to make the image softer.
Here is another example. You can read the post at It’s a small world! Your bitchy web site visitors are your best friends. I modify the image and make it a suitable header image for my post.
Here is the original one here. As you can see I turn a color photo into a black and white photo. I also blur the news paper on the wall. Burn the white wall on the right side. I chop the image to get rid of the fan. It makes the post more attractive with high contrast.
I know everyone have different taste of photography. The choice of mind may not be good to others, but it gives my reader a sense of my taste. What’s your choice of photos?
What do you think about the photos that I choose?
Here are more photos that I have used on my blog.
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Impeccable taste. That is what I wish to say about the choice of your photographs. Another thought that comes to mind. You keep talking about fashion jewelry. Why not some photographs to make us more knowledgeable?
@Dining Tables:
Thank you! Hmmm. The fashion jewelry related post will be on my Fashion Jewelry Blog. I am hoping to make this blog a place for people to avoid the same mistake I made and learn the great tips and tricks I learn.
Pictures look simply awesome. And I liked your idea of keeping your blog colorful with nice and fresh pictures.
@Dandruff Cure:
Thanks! I actually spent great amount of time to find the images and modify them. I did like the way it turns out.
Personally I’m all about that photo with you and your wife taken from above…you’ve got to use that one somewhere, Terence, it’s got so many elements. It’s got the deep love you share for her, it’s got the spiritual element from the viewpoint it was taken. It says you are firmly planted (the rock) yet at the same time, you don’t mind venturing off into the vast uknown (the ocean) while keeping your wife in your heart. I like it, can you tell? xo
I always try to include photos or other graphic images. I put them at the top if it’s applicable, but generally I use graphics to break up a long post to keep a reader’s attention. I think if a reader opens up a blog to read and just sees miles of endless text they will often just skip it.
Hi—-Terence:
Long time no see. Hope all is good, and nice to see your new blog title. I see your still posting over at Bryan’s blog, and thats how i found you again.
I like very much your new title, and the blog theme looks really good as well. The photos remind me of Mark of DotSauce, a domain blog. He always uses photos to accompany his blog posts, some are down right funny or wacky.
Keep in touch.
Missy.
@Stacey:
OH .. No .. Not to upset you. It’s not me and my wife in the photo. Those two are someone I have no idea. I just thought that will be a good composition. I love how they get so close to each other.
Do you have to make my day every time?
I have my wife in my heart all the time.
@Marie:
You are right. People usually don’t have time to read the text. The picture will speak for itself. I specially like Stacey’s big smile and your queen picture.
@Missy:
Yeah. It’s been a long time. Thank you for coming back! Yeah. I remembered Mark. I have not been to his site for sometime. I will go back to visit him.
U R right.. pictures can make ur blog looks more interesting..
Nice blog you have!
@Chronicles of Trisna:
Ha .. I did not fully read your current latest post, because my eyes stop at the photo. I, then, scroll down and look for more pretty photos.
Thank you for stopping by!
I just visited your jewelry site and have left my comment.
Terence – I love the way you use these chopped photos. It’s looks very creative. One of my goals for this month is to learn to add pictures to my blog, and I’ll definitely be using this tip.
@Dining Tables:
Thank you! Got your comments. Hope you like it.
@Catherinel:
Thank you! I sometime spent too much time finding a great photos for my post, but I was very enjoying the photos on Flickr. It give me some idea what in the world people are seeing.
I agree that it is a good idea to add pretinent images to a post, they are eyecatching and tend to say a lot without actual words being said. besides i love looking at good photos.
@Recliners:
I like to put up image for my posts. It’s like in the old time when we were son young. Teach asked us to tell a story from a picture. I like to put up image that can basically give my read something to think about.
Terence,
Your use of images is fantastic! In fact, I was trying to work out how you did it – I thought maybe you were using a plugin. This post explains it all – it’s a pity it takes so much time, but wow, it’s worth it…
@Stephen:
I wish there were plugins to do so. Maybe you can write a wordpress plugin for that.
Believe it or not. I had a master degree in interactive computer graphic. Photoshop image retouching was one of my greatest skills. So it was not hard for me at all. However, it’s time consuming to find the pictures in full size and get the portion that I need out and make them look meaningful.
I am glad that you like it. Thanks!
Terence,
There’s the Yahoo Shortcuts plugin, which I tried out, but it does other stuff beyond flickr and I don’t like it much… The problem is it gets the whole photo. I guess it would be possible to modify the plugin (if the license allows!) so you could see the photos it finds, choose one, then crop it and insert it. But it would be a hard plugin to write (for me)..
Anyway, lets face it, a plugin can’t match what you’re doing – what you’re doing is really art. When I saw some of the original pictures, they weren’t that special, but the way you’d altered them turned them to magic.
@Stephen:
You are right. No plugin can take over what I have done in the image. Well. I try to be a magician in the photography world.
Image headers like this are sure a wise implementation. They’re attractive, attention-grabbing and make the text easier to read.