Today I thought I’d post a tip on how to get one of those cute little square pictures of yourself that show up with your comment in any blog or forum. Here’s mine!
“Why?” you’re asking. Because it’s FREE, really easy to do, and it’s so much nicer to see a face, or an image representing your personality, instead of a computer-generated icon or a blank spot alongside your comment.
What is a gravatar?
A gravatar, or globally recognized avatar, is quite simply an image that follows you from site to site appearing beside your name when you do things. Avatars help identify your posts on blogs and web forums, or on any site.
Here’s all you do:
- Visit http://en.gravatar.com and sign up – it’s free. All you need is your email address.
- Once you’ve signed up, you upload your avatar image by following the instructions to browse your hard drive and locate the image you want to use.
- Then use the little resize doo-hickey (that’s a technical term) to drag the arrows to select the area of the image you want to use for your gravatar. I used the entire image I uploaded because I’d already cropped and trimmed it in Photoshop. But you don’t have to do that, you can select any part of an image you upload.
- Soon after you’ll start seeing it on gravatar-enabled sites (like this one)!
- You can associate the image with multiple email addresses if you want to.
- You can also go back to your account and change your image any time you feel like it. Like if you get a better hairdo, for instance. Or a facelift.
Twitter Gravatar Tip
Note that this gravatar service does not apply to Twitter.
In Twitter, you simply go to your account Settings link, then click on the Picture tab. Then use the “Browse” button to search your hard drive and locate the image you want to use for your Twitter account. Best to use a 72 dpi image or Twitter seems to get confused.
Hope this tip helps!
[Note: this is a re-post of an article I wrote here some time ago on my woefully-neglected personal site lindafarmer.com.]
Thank you so much for sharing this!
)
I just signed up & uploaded a pic.
Now I can’t wait to see it work, lol.
Hugs and blessings,
Anita
The nectar of life is sweet only when shared with others. –Adam Mickiewicz
http://aseknc.blogspot.com/
http://asesaj.blogspot.com/
aseknc(at)gmail(dot)com
Yayyyyy!!! Hi Anita!
That’s the site I used to make my gravatar. It was so easy! I used a quilt I made that I thought looked a lot like me when I had longer hair (and younger-looking skin and less weight!). I use it for everything now. Many times I can tell who is posting just from their gravatar. They become very recognized over time.
Thanks for that link. I’ve been wondering for a while how people were doing it.
Well this is a great tip!!! I really appreciate it…considering I just got a new hair do and facelift…now I can post a foto of myself:)
cool…thanks.
Glad you’re all finding this helpful, and it’s great to see your faces popping up around the site even if you haven’t commented here.
Hi, just want to say thanks for your great tips….. they seem endless.
ok I did my avatar, thanks for the info.
Thanks for that Linda! It’s so nice to be able to see people’s faces next to their comments… and I didn’t know how this was done until I read your post. Fantastic!! I’ve just set up my Gravatar account. So much wonderful info here! tanglepatterns.com – my number two fave website (zentangle.com is number one, but I’m sure you don’t mind that [grin]). Kit in Australia
Thanks Kit, great to see you too! Cheers, Linda
All the way around the globe in Australia – how about that?!! =)
Wow…I am new to Zentangles and Tangling….I am not sure I do it right but I certainly give it a go when I can..thanks for hte helpful in and allthe fun designs..my head is spinning with creations right now…lol..
hope to have a gravatar soon
ok have to see if I have one now
Welcome deedee, great to see you!
trying to figure this out re your instructions to add picture. will see if it worked????
Hi Barbara, it worked and it was easy too, right? Good to see you!
This was so helpful! Very nice to have something that will work for all those blogs (who can upload info to everything with an avatar). I like the way it does make us more familiar with one another… Especially ones that have actual photos – I like putting faces to names!