Embedding annotated images in journal posts

Someone asked me recently how I embed annotated images in my journal posts, so I thought I'd make this quick post to explain how.

Finding photos

My general approach is to read papers to get a sense for important characters and then find examples in iNat photos that show those characters. When finding iNat images, I always choose once that have licenses so I just have to attribute the observer rather than contacting them for permission. Generally, look for the 'cc' rather than the 'c' on photos you want to use


From the brows photos section of a taxon page you can also search for only photos with certain licenses

Once you find a photo you like, just right click to save locally or just do a screen grab (shift-command-4 on a Mac).

Annotating images

I have a copy of Adobe Illustrator I usually use, but because Illustrator isn't free, for the examples in this post I used Inkscape which is essentially a free version thats perfectly fine. I pretty much just drag photos I've downloaded in and then layer on text and little arrows (just 3 cornered polygons) to point at things. You can save the image in vector format which will keep all the elements separate, but export a png version to use in your journal post.

Uploading images to the web

iNaturalist doesn't let you upload images to journal posts directly so I upload them to Flickr which is free for a certain number of photos that is way higher than I will probably ever use.

Embedding images in journal post

To embed the photos in your journal post, click on the curved arrow on Flickr and choose 'embed' and grab the little bit of text it shows

You can past this whole thing into your journal post

But I make 2 changes. First, I get rid of the anchor tab wrapper to and just keep the img tag bit in the middle so it doesn't link back to Flickr. Second, I replace the width with a percentage and just remove the height and alt tag. This leaves me with this:

When you save and preview or publish your journal post that will render like an image.

I'd love to see more people making journal posts with tips on how to distinguish tricky species - so if you're trying to do that, I hope this helps!

Posted on January 13, 2023 09:18 AM by loarie loarie

Comments

Magazine images are the real attention grabbers, especially if they are creative. Whether it's athletes foot images or any other, it's the artistic presentation that lures you into reading the articles. Respect to the creative minds behind these captivating visuals!

Posted by etnostyled 4 months ago

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