Wikipedia

User:Pengo/ownimg

< User:Pengo

Contributing your own images to Wikipedia or the WikiMedia Commons


This is a brief guide to uploading images you have created yourself. It favours broad brushstrokes to comprehensive detail, but tries to stay accurate. It also includes tips to help you along.

See also:

What image to upload?

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You may wish to contribute a photograph you have taken, a drawing you sketched and scanned, or an SVG diagram you have created. Images on Wikipedia usually go with articles, but they may also be for your user page or a help page.

Wikipedia accepts the following file formats: JPEG, SVG, GIF and PNG. Use the JPEG format for photographs, SVG for diagrams, GIF for animations, PNG for other images. If you would like to know about the differences between these file formats, see Preparing images for upload.

Featured examples of images contributed by Wikipedians, and the licenses chosen.

Can Wikipedia use your image?

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Have a look at articles related to your image.

  • If there is no article, maybe you'd like to write one, or write a short stub so there is an article for your image.
  • If you do find an article, and it has no images, then you'll be able to add one!
  • If it's crowded with images already, ask what your image will add to the article. Maybe it will show a different angle. Maybe it's better than the other images. Maybe your image could replace a copyrighted "fair use" image. Maybe your image could add to a gallery. Might someone else build on my image? Maybe you should look at more specific or general terms.

Adding your image to Wikimedia Commons will add it to a pool of images for others to draw from for any purpose, including articles on other language Wikipedias.

Image size

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Larger sizes are always preferred. Wikipedia can dynamically scales images as they're needed. You do not need to upload smaller versions of files, just the largest size available. Note: this (like the rest of the guide) applies only to your own images. Fair use images follow different rules.

Optional preparation of your image

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If you are experienced with computer images and image formats, there is nothing special you need to do to your image, except to keep in mind that larger images are generally preferred.

Captions, labels and watermarks should not be part of your image, unless you are creating an SVG (vector graphic). Captions can be added later. Labels may need to be changed for other languages. Watermarks are not necessary, and may be removed.

Compression: There is no need to highly compress JPEG images. Use the "high quality" setting when saving JPEGs: around 95% if it has a slider.

Cropping: Unlike scaling, Wikipedia will not crop images or alter the colours or brightness. You'll have to crop your image before uploading it. If you want to use multiple crops, you can upload multiple files each cropped differently.

Brightness and colours: Wikipedia does not have commands for adjusting colour or brightness of an image. If you wish to adjust colour and brightness on your image, you will need to do it before uploading it. If you want to upload now and leave it for later to adjust, that's not a problem as you can replace the old original image easily. You may like to upload the original first, and then upload over it (with the same filename) with an adjusted version. This will cause a history of changes to the image to be kept, and the original will still be available within the history. You may even find others will tweak your image for you, but you may have to ask first.

GIF animations sometimes are not scaled correctly by MediaWiki. So you may have to be more careful about what size to use.

Commons or Wikipedia?

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Wikipedia
When you upload to the English-language Wikipedia, your image will be accessible to all pages that wish to include your image that reside on the English-language Wikipedia. It is perhaps initially easier just to upload to it. You don't have to think about inter-wiki links and relations or multiple accounts. However, please make your image more widely accessible by uploading it to Commons instead...
Wikimedia Commons
When you upload to Wikimedia Commons you're making your image easily accessible to all of Wikimedia's sister sites. That includes the English-language Wikipedia as well as all the other language Wikipedias, Wikibooks, Wikispecies, Wiktionary, and others. It's the preferred that you do this. But there are some extra things you'll need to do, like create an account on Wikimedia Commons; and some things to understand, like how to link between Wikipedia sister projects.
 

Creating an account

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Wikipedia
You need a user account to upload. While most changes to Wikipedia can be done without an account, uploading files cannot. If you're not already logged in, there's a Sign in / create account link at the top-right of every page.

Creating an account is easy. The good news is that the quickest sign-up procedures anywhere on the web are probably for accounts on Wikimedia sites. All you need is to pick a username and password, and copy the text from the captcha. You should enter your email address too, but it is not strictly required. That's it.

Wikimedia Commons
To upload to Commons you'll need an account there as well.

Why another account? Currently different Wikimedia projects (Wikipedia-EN and Commons) each maintain accounts separately. This may change in the future, but for now you're stuck with having to sign up twice. You need an account on the commons so you can upload to the commons and make your images easily available to all Mediawiki projects.

It's a good idea to sign up with Wikipedia-EN first so you're more likely to end up with the same user name on both sites.

The signup process for commons is the same as Wikipedia. Click Sign in / create account on the Commons site.

 

Choosing a license

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Full article: Wikipedia:Image copyright tags

You automatically hold the copyright of the image you've created. You will have to license your work so that Commons and Wikipedia (and others) can use your image. Licensing your work simply involves choosing an "own work" option from the "Licensing" drop down box.

Which of these licenses you choose is up to you, depending on what degree of freedom you wish to give others to use your image.

Two popular options are:

Own work, attribution required (Multi-license with GFDL and CC-BY 2.5)

Use this option when you would like to require credit when your image is used. It grants permission for your image to be used by either the GFDL or the Creative Commons "attribution" license.

Own work, all rights released (Public domain)

Use this when you created this image yourself and release it to the public domain. Releasing all rights to your image will allow anyone to use it for any purpose, including commercially and without credit. This is the most generous license you can give. Note that credit will still be given by Wikipedia, Commons and sister sites when someone clicks on your image.

Other options

Additionally, you may require anyone using your image to license the entire work in which it appears to be have a copyleft license also (Own work, copyleft); or you may choose a specific open license (e.g. GFDL, CC-BY or CC-SA-BY license)

If you do not agree with any of the available licenses, you will have to reconsider contributing your images to Wikipedia. You cannot license an image only for use by Wikipedia. All user-contributed images must be licensed not only for use by Wikipedia and its sister sites, but for use by third parties (without fee) also. Freedom to re-use the content of Wikipedia is an important part of its founding ethos.

Screenshots

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If it is a screenshot of computer software you created, then licensing may be different.

Uploading the file

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Every page on Wikipedia has a link to "Upload file" in the toolbox. This link takes you to Special:Upload. Open the link in a new window or tab to keep reading this document while you prepare to upload.

Welcome to the friendly upload page.

 
Wikipedia
Every page on Wikipedia has a link to "Upload file" in the toolbox. This link takes you to a page called Special:Upload where you'll be presented with a bunch of warnings telling you not to upload copyrighted material unless you have a really good reason (if you own the copyright, then that's a good reason), and then there's a white box saying you're uploading to the wrong place, and that you should be uploading to Wikimedia Commons instead. And you should be.

To get to the Commons upload page, find the link to it on Wikipedia's upload page and click.

This guide gives procedures for both Wikipedia and Commons, so if you're certain you want to upload just to the English Wikipedia, sign up for an account on en.wikipedia.org and skip ahead.
Wikimedia Commons
The Commons upload page is not on Wikipedia's web site. Instead it's at <http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:Upload>. It requires you to sign up for a new account (you can use the same username and password as you do for your Wikipedia account)
 

The default filename for your file may be fine as it is, but it is best to use a descriptive name. You don't have to rename the file on your computer, as you can choose a different name in the upload box.

Advanced tips

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Test uploads on Wikipedia

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There's no sandbox to upload your images to, and you can't delete images you've uploaded without an administrator's help, so there's some handy tags to know.

use this tag to request your image be deleted:

{{?}}

Oops! Uploaded it twice

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Oops! Wrong name

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{{redundant|[[:Image:Wikisource-logo.jpg]]}}

Oops! Wrong file format

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Building on others work

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If your work is based on another persons work, or includes another person's work:

  • If that work is copyrighted and not licensed under a free license, you're stuffed.
  • If that work is Cc-by-sa-2.5 OR GFDL licensed, you are required to license your work with the same license. (sa is short for share-alike)
  • If the original work was dual licensed with BOTH CC-by-sa-2.5 and GFDL, it's recommended you also license your work under both licenses.
  • If the original work was public domain or all rights were released, you can choose a new license for your work, or keep the same one (recommended).

People may make derived works of your work too, and the above rules apply to them too.

Be catalogued in the commons

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You may also wish to catalog your image in the Wikimedia commons

Geting noticed

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Featured image

Getting feedback

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Helping out

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Requested images

Finding places for your image

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Many images

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If you have a very large number of images to upload, you may want to use a bot (an automated script) to upload them for you.

Licensing fear

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  • have a look what's already been contributed
  • upload only select images
  • places to contribute NC works
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Learning about licensing

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Animated GIFs

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Uploading over a file

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after adjusting brightness

Placing your image on a page, and the clear tag

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Is anyone monitoring uploads

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Yes.

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