Wikipedia:Uploading images

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Before uploading images at Special:Upload, make sure you read and follow the image use policy. Please note that most images you might find on the Internet are copyrighted and not appropriate for uploading to Wikipedia. If you did not create the image yourself, or are unable or unwilling to verify its copyright status, do not upload the image. Also, in the cases of images where their owners have stipulated they be used for non-commercial purposes only, under new guidelines such images may no longer be uploaded into Wikipedia except by the express permission of those owners. [1] For hints on how to find images appropriate for uploading, see the finding images tutorial. It might also be helpful to read Wikipedia:Preparing images for upload.

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[edit] How to upload a new image

[edit] Determine image copyright status

  1. Determine which Image copyright tag is applicable for your image file.

[edit] Free license images

If, after looking over the Wikipedia:Copyright and Image copyright tags pages, you determine that the image is public domain or other free license (e.g. GFDL, Creative Commons), then you may upload it to Wikimedia Commons. This is a shared repository for images and other media files. Images uploaded to Wikimedia Commons can easily be used here on English Wikipedia as well as by other language Wikipedias and Sister projects (the [[Image:]] tag will find Wikimedia Commons images as if they were stored on Wikipedia). Another advantage of Wikimedia Commons is its category system that helps to organize and make images easy to find. An important caveat to Wikimedia Commons is that they do not accept fair use images.

See Wikimedia Commons Help for further instructions on uploading to Commons

[edit] Fair use images

If the image you wish to upload is not under a free license, but meets fair use criteria, then you are permitted to upload it directly into English Wikipedia. Keep in mind that it is not permitted to upload fair use images into Wikimedia Commons, but it is permitted to do so into English Wikipedia. In addition to fair use images, it is possible to upload any image directly to Wikipedia; though, doing so lacks some advantages of Commons.

[edit] How to upload

Only Logged in users with autoconfirmed accounts (meaning at least four days old) can upload images. You can upload an image by using the Upload file link in the toolbox, which is a link to Special:Upload. On most browsers, you will see a "Browse..." button, which will bring up your operating system's standard file open dialog. Choosing a file will fill the name of that file into the text field next to the button. You must also check the box affirming that you are not violating any copyrights by uploading the file. Press the "Upload" button to finish the upload. This may take some time if you have a slow Internet connection.

Note that some licenses, such as the Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike License v. 2.5, require that licensees attribute the work as specified by the copyright holder. After uploading, you may need to manually edit the "Licensing" section. For this example, you would add the correct attribution as a parameter to the {{Cc-by-sa-2.5}} template, which would then appear as {{Cc-by-sa-2.5|Attribution}}.

[edit] Find previously uploaded images

Please note that as with wiki pages, others may edit or delete your uploads if they think it serves the encyclopedia, and you may be blocked from uploading if you abuse the system.

[edit] Adding images to articles

The procedure for adding images to articles is the same, regardless if the image was uploaded to Commons or directly to English Wikipedia. To make your uploaded file appear in an article, you need to insert it: edit the article and add the syntax

[[Image:Image name|thumb|Caption]]

where you want the file to appear.

Important: Image names are case-sensitive. For example, if an image is called Picture.jpg then neither picture.jpg nor Picture.JPG will find it.

See Wikipedia:Images or Wikipedia:Extended image syntax for further instructions.

[edit] Technical aspects

Main article: Wikipedia:Image use policy#Format

The preferred formats are JPEG for photographic images, SVG for drawings and line-art illustration, PNG for non-vector graphic iconic images, Ogg Vorbis for sound and Ogg Theora for video. Please name your files descriptively to avoid confusion. To include the image in an article, use a link in the form [[Image:File.jpg]] or [[Image:File.png|alt text]] or [[Media:File.ogg]] for sounds. To include an image as a thumbnail, use [[Image:Apublicaffaircover.gif?|thumb|Caption]].

When overwriting an image with one of a different size, you must refresh your browser's cache to see the new image in the correct size, but sometimes this does not work.

[edit] Mini HowTo

The Upload file screen has three fields.

The Source filename field with the browse button allows you to choose a file on your local system. The Destination filename is the name used to link to the image from articles. If JavaScript is enabled, it will be set automatically to the same name as the one you have specified in the Source filename field, but may be changed to any valid name you wish. For the convenience of non-JavaScript users, if the destination field is left blank, source filename will be used.

The Summary field appears below the image on an image page, and allows Wiki markup. Here you should include a brief description of what the image is, its source, and what license you are uploading it under. This can be done with Template:Information. Here's an example that you may copy and paste:

{{Information
|Description = What can you see/hear?
|Source = self-made or URL, if existent name of institution and such things as catalog numbers or similar
|Date = date image was created and/or released; to avoid misunderstandings with different date formats, spell out the month (e.g. created 2. Oct. 2099), use ISO 8601 notation (e.g. 2099-10-02), or for new self-made works, use ~~~~~ (5 tildes) to insert the current date
|Author = pre name and last name of the author (in case of self-made works additionally ~~~ ) and/or the name of the institution
|Permission = Short quote of the permission of the copyright owner (if too long shortened with link to long version).
|other_versions = Wiki link to other versions if they exist within the Wikimedia Commons (e.g. a black and white version of a color image)
}}

As for the description of the content, if it’s an artwork, please provide brief historical background; in case of scientific data, a brief scientific abstract of the file. If you have detailed information about the image, for example the name of the species or the size of the object, please add it. Especially with mineral images, including the size is helpful.

Submitting this information will upload the image and save the summary. There is no preview, as there is for editing pages. Nevertheless, after the image is uploaded, you can still click the edit button and make changes to the summary and license, should you make a mistake you did not catch beforehand. If there is already a file uploaded with the Destination filename that you chose, you are given the option to save anyway and overwrite the old file (although it remains in the image history), or returning to the upload form and specifying a new filename.


[edit] Licenses

If you are uploading non-free material, please place the text "{{fairusein|Article name}}" (or a more specific fair-use template, such as {{Non-free album cover}}) in the summary and provide the reason for the claim of fair use. Always state the source of the image. If the image is licensed under the GFDL, please include "{{GFDL}}" in the description.

If the image is under any other license please indicate this by using the appropriate message from Image copyright tags.

[edit] Multiproject upload

Main article: Wikipedia:Moving images to the Commons

Although it is possible to use one image within several Wikipedia articles, it is not possible to use an image uploaded to one Wikimedia project (both sister projects like Wikisource and other language Wikipedias) in another one without re-uploading it. For this reason, all free images should be uploaded to Wikimedia Commons, where they will immediately be accessible from all Wikimedia projects. Note that Commons only accepts free images (public domain or licensed under a free license). If the image is fair use, you can't upload it to Commons, so it will have to be uploaded separately to every project that uses it. To upload the image existing on Wikipedia to another project you will need to download the image to your own computer (often right clicking on it will give you this option), and then re-upload that to the place you want the image to be copied to. Interlanguage links can be added between the two.

If this is too confusing, just tag it with {{Copy to Wikimedia Commons}}. This adds a notice saying "This is a candidate to be copied to the Wikimedia Commons" to the page; then someone will move it for you and remove the tag. This category has a significant backlog though, so it may be better just to move it yourself.

[edit] See also