Using Flickr

Flickr is a web-site for displaying and sharing photos. It is free to view, and if you wish to post photos and participate in groups, it is free to join at a basic level, and not very expensive for a fully-featured Pro account. Flickr was taken over by Yahoo! a few years ago - if you already have a Yahoo! account you can access the site through that.

Viewing other people's photos

This is easy and free - just click on a link you have been given, or search the site for photos on a particular topic:

- go to the Search box at the top right of any Flickr page

- enter any search term(s) you are interested in, just like in Google or any other search engine

- use the drop-down menu (triangle beside the Search box) to limit the search as you think fit

Joining Flickr

Go to http://www.flickr.com/, and:

- click on Create Your Account

- you will be asked for a Yahoo! username and password; you will need to set one up if you haven't already got one - all you need is an email address

Joining Flickr will give you a page of your own; you upload your own photos there, and can access all the other features of the site.

Uploading photos

For some strange reason they've hidden the Upload command away where it's not obvious.

To put photos onto your own Flickr page (Photostream):

- go to your Photostream page (something like http://www.flickr.com/photos/abc789etc/)

- click on the little triangle beside You (below the Flickr logo)

- from the drop-down menu, select Upload Photos

- click on Choose Photos

- navigate your hard-drive/memory stick and select the pictures you want to upload

- once uploaded, you can add titles, descriptions and tags, create sets, and lots more

- and you can add to a Group, which is outlined below

Using your Photostream

When you upload your first photos Flickr creates a home page for you, which it calls your Photostream, with a url something like:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/123abc789etc/

This is the essential first step - any photos you upload will be added to this page. Once you've got some photos into your Photostream, play about with it for a bit, click around and see what you can do with and for your photos.

For instance, click on a picture in your Photostream, and it will take you to a page showing a larger version of just that photo, and there are more options there to be explored [later]. Amongst the options, you can add any of your photos to a Flickr Group.

Posting photos to a Group

To share your photos with a Flickr Group:

- up to 6 at a time

1) on any of your own pages, click on Groups in the line of menus below the Flickr logo

2) click on the Group you wish to post to

3) alongside Group Pool, click on Add photos

4) select the ones you want to add (max 6 at a time) - you can drag them across individually, or double click on each one

5) click on the Add to group button

or

- individually

1) on your photostream page, click on a photo you want to send to the group

2) on that photo's page, click on Send to Group above the photo

3) click on the Group's name

- go to the Group page and your photos will be there . . .

Downloading other people's photos

Depending on the copyright license applied by the author, you may be able to download other people's photos.

1) click on the thumbnail of the picture you would like to download - this takes you to that photo's main page

2) if the author of the picture allows downloading, you should see a button labelled All Sizes (above the picture) - click this

3) click on the size you want (square, thumbnail, small, medium, large, original)

4) click on the link Download the xxxxx size

If you wish to embed a photo directly into a blog or web page, see our page on Using online images .