Friday, August 19, 2011

Google Blogger picture PSA

With all the buzz about picture blogs lately among my friends and family (not to mention the Top Ten Reasons to Start a Picture Blog), I thought it would be good to share my #1 Google Blogger tip.

Blogger is a great (free) tool but it's a little touchy sometimes.

A couple of months ago, I noticed that the pictures I posted to my blogs seemed to be just a tiny bit blurry and not clear, even though they looked perfectly fine on my computer.

After convincing myself that I wasn't in fact losing my mind and that there was actually a problem, I found this fix by Googling my issue.

I don't completely understand the technical terms for all of this, but it has to do with how Blogger shrinks your pictures to fit the blog templates - the scale is somehow off so the pictures end up looking distorted.

To fix this, when you are working on the New Post or Edit Posts pages, after you add your image(s) to your post, click on the Edit HTML tab (next to the Compose tab) which can be found on the upper right corner of your main editing box.

The HTML will look like a big mess of stuff. It's basically the "guts" of your post. Look for the /s400 within the HTML and simply delete those characters. Switch back to the Compose tab and carry on.

Before the fix:


After the fix:


The difference is subtle (and might be more or less obvious depending on the individual photo) but if the main point of your blog is to showcase your pictures, you might was well make sure they look as crisp as possible.

If you run into other minor issues with Blogger here are my suggestions:
  • Try the Blogger help forum. Chances are someone else has had the same problem as you.
  • Try editing in another browser. For example, I have trouble with Blogger when I use Internet Explorer and Google Chrome but things usually go smoothly in Mozilla Firefox.
  • Ask someone else who has experience with Blogger (oh, oh, pick me! pick me!)

4 comments:

  1. We're changing the world one PSA at time....Jalapenos, Angry Black Birds and HTML's be gone!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Blogger sucks! WordPress forever!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Okay -- am I driving you nuts? You are my go-to blogging expert. Just read this important PSA (via Top Ten Reasons to Start a Picture Blog). I don't see a /s400 in my html code, but I did find and delete /s1600, which seemed to make a difference as well. Does this make sense to you?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I think the number after the 's' will change depending on the size of your picture...for example if you select the small size when you add your picture in, it will say s320...if you don't see the s400, you might have to select "Large" when you insert your picture (after you insert, you can hover over the picture and you will have some options down along the bottom). I think the s1600 might be something different but if it seems to make a difference, then go for it.

      And no, you're not driving me nuts! Happy to help, although I am by no means an expert!

      Delete

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