The best article gets boring without illustration and color. That is why we always add pictures and illustrations to our how-to articles, and that is why you need to do the same in your WordPress blog. But, how can you add a pictures to your blog?
The best is if you open your WordPress admin site in another browser windows and do the steps immediately as you read aout them in this guide.
Add the first picture to your WordPress article
If you have an article written that is the best, because when the article is written it is easier to try the different ways in which you can add image and other media to your WordPress installation. In your WordPress admin tool either create a new page or create a new post (or edit an article you have written earlier). Once in the editor window you will see the area where you can write the title of the article and beneath it you will find the box where you can type in the content of your post. To add a picture to your post or to your page you need to find the “Add Media” button located on the left side beneath the topic area and above the content area (see illustration beneath this text).
Click the Add Media button in WordPress
Once you press the Add Media button a new window will show up where you can choose between uploading a file or selecting a file from your media library. If the picture you want to add to the page or post is located on your computer, choose upload files. You will then see a screen telling you to “Drop files anywhere to upload” and it also has a button saying: “Upload files.” If you have a folder open with the picture in it, simply click on the file with the left mouse button pressed. Keep the button pressed down and drag the picture file to the area where you can drag files to upload. Once there, let go of the mouse button, and the picture will be uploaded. The other version is to select “Upload files” and find the folder in which the picture is located and double click on the image.
If you want to upload multiple images at the same time you can select more images in the folder (holding down the control (CTRL) button and clicking on the images you want to upload.
What to do after the picture is uploaded?
Once the picture is uploaded it will be added to your media library. If you uploaded one single image you will be able to see a thumbnail on the right side. You will then be able to add an image title, a caption (you will see this text under the image when it is presented in your blog), an ALT text (since Google doesn’t actually see the image, you can explain to Google what the picture is about using the ALT tag) and a description (a bit more about the picture description later). I forgot to write that the ALT text is what turns visible to visitors who do not download the image on your site, so it can be worth making it good.
After adding an image title, caption, ALT-tag and a description you get to add an alignment to the picture. If you set the alignment to none the picture will normally be added to the left side of your blog, with no text on any side of it. If you choose left or right the picture will allow text next to it, which can be very useful if the picture has a small size. If you choose the center alignment the picture will be centered, with no text on either side of it.
After setting the alignment you get to choose what the image should link to. At the moment there are four options.
- Custom URL – you can add an URL to which you want the image to refer
- Media file – when people click the image they will get to see the image file itself on a new page
- Attachment page – when someone click the image they will be referred to another page with the same design as your entire blog where the picture can be seen, together with the image description you added earlier.
- None – the image will turn un-clickable and not refer to anything
The last option before finishing is to choose the size of the image. You will normally be able to choose between Full Size, Large, Medium and Small. Next to the names you will see what that means when it comes to size, so you just select the version that suits your blog the best. Be careful to add full image if it has a large size, because a blog often has a width of 600 or 800 pixels, which means adding a picture larger than this will often make everything look strange.
When you have done this press “Insert Into Post” and your picture will be added to the post. If you want to do changes to the image concerning alignment, caption, ALT-text, title or size you can press the image in the editor of the post/page and press the “edit image” icon. If you do not like the image press the delete button instead. Even if you delete the picture from the article, it will still be found in the media library, so if you delete it and press the Add Media button again, you will find the picture in the library and be able to add it again to the article.
Good luck and keep your articles colorful and with lots of great images. Looking for illustrations and pictures you can use on your site? Read our how to find good pictures and illustrations for my blog post.
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