We gardeners tend to be a visual bunch, so it’s not surprising that images are a big part of our blogs. We use them in the tops and sidebars of our templates, if we can, and we include them in our posts. Sometimes the images are there just to add a bit of color; sometimes they’re there to enhance what we’re writing about; and sometimes the pictures are the whole point of the post, hardly needing text at all.

When you’re first starting your garden blog, simply figuring out how to transfer your pictures from your camera to your computer, upload them, resize them, and place them roughly where you want them in a post can be a pretty steep learning curve. Eventually, you may experiment with whatever more advanced options your blogging platform allows, such as aligning photos to the left or right margin and wrapping text around them, centering them, or adding captions or borders.

As you visit other garden blogs, you’ll start noticing all kinds of interesting ways that other bloggers are using to present their images and enhance their posts, and you may decide you want to try them yourself. Fortunately, garden bloggers are as happy to share their blogging tips as they are plants and seeds, either by direct e-mails or with how-to posts on their blogs. These gems can quickly get lost as posts slide back into archives, though, so I hope to keep a running list here of ideas, tips, and examples relating to fun ways to jazz up your images. I know there are many out there that I’ve missed, so please add comments or links below to any photo-related posts you’ve seen or written or great ideas you’ve come across.

Pictures Imperfect?

Garden bloggers vary in their feelings about using software to make changes to images before posting them. Some take their images directly from camera to computer to blog with no changes whatsoever; others spend hours on a single image, experimenting with color correction and more advanced techniques. Many of us fall somewhere in between: we’ll use software to resize our images and maybe do a bit of cropping or add a watermark but otherwise not make changes. A while back, Pam at Digging wrote a post on this topic – Photoshopping photographs: Is it “honest”? – which led to a spirited discussion of the ethical issues involved in manipulating blog photos.

The approach you decide to take with your own images is up to you. I think we’re all irritated when commercial catalogs and web sites obviously enhance images of plants they’re trying to sell by pumping up the color or pasting in more leaves or blooms. But for the most part, we bloggers aren’t here to sell anything; we just want to have fun and create pretty posts for others to enjoy. If you enjoy the challenge of using photo software to improve your images before you post them, then go for it.

Finding free photo-editing software. There’s no need to spend a bundle on high-powered photo-editing programs to have fun with your photos. Picasa and GIMP seem to be top favorites with garden bloggers, but they’re not your only options.

• For an overview of more free software options, check out this article: The Best Free Photo Editing Software Applications.
• You can also find some interesting insights here: Better Blog Photos Part 2: Picasa 3.5 vs. Photoshop 7 by VW at VW Garden.
• Anna at Flowergardengirl mentions GIMP in Learning to Use Gimp to Enhance Blogging.

Improving your photography skills. Learning how to take better photos in the first place is something many of us find fascinating.

• Here at Gardening Gone Wild,  Saxon Holt contributes a regular column called The Camera Always Lies, in which he covers concepts such as creating pleasing compositions, finding focal points, shooting silhouettes, and more.
• Opportunities abound for great macro (close-up) shots in the garden, but results can be disappointing if you don’t have a tripod to keep your camera steady. Photographer/blogger David Perry posted about his experiments with an ultra-low-tech but amazingly cool idea - using a canning jar to support the camera – in Macro in a Mason Jar and More from the Bottom of the Jar. These posts are must-reads. I’ll bet you come away wanting to try this technique yourself!
• Photography after Dark at Gardening in a Sandbox covers some other unique ideas.
• Robin at Robin’s Nesting Place covers a variety of photo tips and shows examples of different camera settings in A Little Change That Makes a Big Difference, Photography and F/stops, and Photographing Flowers.

Mixing It Up

The most straightforward approach to posting photos is to paste single images, like this:

It’s simple and quick, and it serves the purpose for many kinds of posts.

If you’re feeling more adventurous, or if a single image doesn’t readily convey the point you’re writing about, consider trying one of these more advanced ways to present images in your posts.

Collages/montages. Placing two or more photos side by side or in a grid pattern makes it possible to fit more images into one space (to show off multiple images for Bloom Day, for example). It’s also handy for before-and-after comparisons or through-the-seasons sequences. They can be “just for nice,” like the collage that Robin at Robin’s Nesting Place created for her blog header, or serve a dual purpose for both beauty and site navigation, like the one Shirl at Shirls Gardenwatch uses on the home page for her site.

Below is an example of a simple montage I created a few years ago with Microsoft Word, following Shirl’s instructions: Photo Montages – How To.

If you’re more technically oriented, check out this post by Cameron of Defining Your Home Garden about a way to create a basic grid placement: How to Post Blog Photos Side-by-Side.

WordPress users can try out the “gallery” feature for placing multiple photos in their posts. Kathy Purdy of Cold Climate Gardening shared some tips in How to Use WordPress’ Gallery Feature.

As I visit garden blogs, I often jot down ideas and features that I think are especially interesting, such as the simple but elegant grids created by Lene at Willows (European Beech – Lasting Colour and Salix koriyangi ‘Rubykins’) and the  eye-catching creations by Brenda at the BGgarden blog (like these in Bren’s Greenhouse, for example). When I asked how they made them, both bloggers gave me the same answer: Picasa. Wait until you see what you can do with this free software!

Slideshows. Presenting a linear sequence of photos in a slide show allows your readers to view a number of images with a single click.

• In Oudolf Nursery & Garden - Hummelo, The Netherlands, Adam at Gardening Gone Wild included a link to a slideshow from an album in his Flickr account.
• Picasa allows you to easily create slide shows from your images, with all kinds of interesting transitions.
• At the end of this post, Mr. McGregor’s Daughter used Slide.com to present a multiple images from a garden she visited.
• Anna at Greentapestries used Smilebox.com to make a slideshow with musical accompaniment to share her garden in this post: Garden Bloggers Bloom Day – August 2009.

Videos. Oh yes, now we have vlogging: blog entries done on video, rather than in writing. Actually, it’s not new; several years ago, MSS of Zanthan Garden gave us Vlogging the Drought of 2006. YouTube is bigger than ever, and garden bloggers are still having fun using it and other video-hosting sites such as Vimeo to add short clips and entire entries to their blogs. Anna at Flowergardengirl is one blogger who’s been incorporating lots of video into her site: for example,  Rudbeckia h. ‘Chim Chiminee’ and Vlogging Up the Christmas Tree. I also really enjoy watching Shirl’s hedgehog videos; there are a bunch of links at Hedgehog Visits and Links.

Time-lapse sequences. Traditional videos are great for showing a range of plants or garden scenes at one point in time. Time-lapse sequences, on the other hand, show one plant or scene over a period of time. They’re a fantastic tool for observing the germination process, seeing seasonal changes, or watching how a part of your garden has changed from year to year.

I first saw this technique in this post by Craig of Ellis Hollow; he used it to show the changes in two parts of his garden over the course of 5 months, following instructions he found at eirikso.com. Wait until you see these videos! I can’t wait to find the time to try this technique myself.

Scans (a.k.a. digital photo collages). Craig’s blog was also the first place I ever saw the use of a scanner for creating images. He uses it for his Bloom Day posts; check them out here. He posted detailed instructions in Create a Digital Photo “Collage” at The Bulb Project, along with links to some other bloggers who have tried the technique. You can also find an interesting discussion of this technique in Flower Scans – Creepy and/or Art at The Human Flower Project.

Protecting Your Pictures

It’s so frustrating when you put a lot of time and effort into posting great pictures, only to find that someone else has taken one or more of them to enhance their own web site or online auction listing. As far as I know, there aren’t any ways to make sure that this never happens, but there are a few strategies you could try to discourage casual copiers.

First, consider adding a “plagarism warning banner” to your site, such as those available for free from Copyscape: Defend Your Site with a Banner.

Adding a “watermark” to each of your images before you post them clearly indicates that they below to you and may possibly discourage others from using them. Problem is, you don’t want the watermark to detract from your image, but if you do it too subtly or put it along the edge where it could easily be cropped out, it may not protect your pictures as much as you’d like.

• In this post, Frances of Fairegarden experimented with watermarks on her photos and asked for opinions, and it led to a very interesting discussion down in the comments section.
• Here’s a set of instructions for adding a watermark with MS Paint: How to Add a Watermark on Pictures Using MS Windows Paint
• Here’s a different technique from Blog for a Not-So-Angry Redhead: Watermarking Your Images Using Gimp 2.6.
• If you use Photoshop, try these instructions from Bright Hub: How to Add a Watermark to Your Images Using Photoshop CS4 (the second half is here).
• Instructions for watermarking multiple photos in Photoshop: How to Watermark Several Images at a Time Using Photoshop at Chris Hutto’s Blog.
• You can easily watermark groups of photos in Picasa following these instructions. On individual images, use the Text tool on the Basic Fixes tab.
• There are also free online watermarking applications: Watermark Tool and PicMarkr are just two.

More Photo Tips

Adding captions. WordPress users can add captions to their photos (some tips here), but it’s not easy to change the font, color, or alignment. Cameron of Defining Your Home, Garden and Travel wrote a helpful post on a way to add captions that works with any blogging platform: How to Add Captions to Blog Photos.

Preparing images for uploading. Sometimes you want to reduce the size of your photos for easier uploading and blog viewing, but you don’t want to sacrifice the quality of the images. For tips, check out:

• Getting Higher Quality Blog Pictures and Better Blog Photos Part 2: Picasa 3.5 vs. Photoshop 7 by VW at VW Garden
• Enlarging Photos on Blogger by Robin at Robin’s Nesting Place.

Making room for bigger photos. Large photos are great, but your blog template may limit the sizes you post. If you’re feeling adventurous, try these tips from www.gardenbloggers.com: How to Widen the “Main” Blog Area.

Exploring legal issues. Pam at Digging wrote a thought-provoking post  on Permission Required? Using Photos of People & Property on Blogs.