Flickr is one of the best-known photo sharing sites on the Web. While it's fairly easy to use, you can do a lot more with Flickr than just post and share photos. This TechTip looks at a number of things that you can do to make your use of Flickr easier, faster, and more enjoyable.
Use an uploader
 Like other photo sharing sites, Flickr has a Web-based uploader. And it's really slow -- especially if you're uploading larger images -- and you can only upload six photos at a time. An uploader is software that sits on your computer. You can upload multiple photos with one and even add tags. There are a number of uploading tools available for Flickr. The service itself offers a pretty good uploader for Windows and MacOS.
I prefer an Open Source application called JUploadr. It's written in Java, and can run on Linux, Mac OS, and Windows. It's easy to use -- you just drag and drop the photos that you want to upload on to JUploadr and then click the Upload button. And it's much faster than Flickr's Web upload interface. If you have multiple sets (the Flickr equivalent of an album), you can right click on a photo and select which album to put it into. Or, you can create a new album. You can also have JUploadr automatically resize you photos before their uploaded. This is useful if you have really large images, and only need a smaller one online.
Editing your photos with Picnik
Sure, you can edit your photos with a piece of software on your desktop. But what happens if you upload a nice image using your cheap digital camera, of the special someone in your life, and notice the red eye? You can download the photo, get rid of the red eye (assuming, of course, you have the right software), and then upload it to Flickr once more. That's a lot of work. Why not use a service like Picnik instead?
Picnik is a basic image editor that can open photos on Flickr (as well as Picasa Web Albums and Facebook). Picnik's functions are very limited -- they include removing red eye, adjusting color, fixing brightness and contrast, and cropping images -- but for most purposes those are enough. Everything is easy to use and well explained in the Picnik interface. On top of that, the results aren't too bad, either.
I was surprised at how well Picnik plays with Flickr. You just click an icon on the Picnik Web site, log into your Flickr account, and tell Flickr that you want to give Picnik access to your account. From there, your photos load pretty quickly -- just a couple of seconds for over 100 photos, in my case. From there, you select the photo that you want to edit and get to work.
Use a browser
You're probably saying "Hold on ... you need to use a Web browser to access Flickr! Just what the heck do you mean?" With the right browser, you can do quite a bit with Flickr. Two of those browsers are Firefox and Flock.
If you're familiar with Firefox, you know that it has a lot of extensions which enable you to add more features to the browser. A number of those extensions are for working with Flickr. Flickrfox allows you to browse and search images on the service, while Fotofox is an upload tool which enables you to tag your photos before posting them to Flickr.
Flock, a popular social Web browser, has some support for Flickr built in thanks to its Media Bar. The Media Bar is a little strip that appears at the top of the browser window when you select Tools > Media Bar. With it, you can search and view photos on Flickr that are available to the public (including your own, if you want). You can have the Media Bar appear even when you're browsing another site. And when you click on a photo, it opens on a Flickr page.
Flock also has a Photo Uploader, which works a lot like Fotofox or JUploadr. You just drag one or more photos into the Uploader and tag them, put them in a specific photo stream, or even do some basic editing. When I say basic, I mean basic -- you can crop or rotate the image and that's about it. Still, the Photo Uploader is easy to use and quick -- far faster than using the Flickr Web-based uploader.
Sprucing up your Web page or blog
Flickr offers you a few ways to share your photos with the rest of the world. However, most of these photo-sharing tools require people to go to the Flickr site. But why give Flickr all of your traffic? Why not embed your photo stream into your Web page or blog? Doing it is easier than you think.
One tool available online is SlideFlickr. If you have public photos on Flickr, all you have to do is point the SlideFlickr service to them and within a few seconds the service will create a Flash slideshow of your photos. It also gives you the necessary code to embed on a Web page or in your blog.
If you prefer a set of static photos on your site, then it's easy to add a Flickr photo stream to your Web site or blog. Detailed instructions are here. On top of that, you can include any photo in your photostream in your blog. Well, as long as Flickr recognizes it. This help topic at the Flickr site explains how to do it.
What else is there to do?
Plenty…In fact, several books can be written about all of the things that you can do with Flickr. Some of the other things you can do include getting your digital photos printed as stickers or cards, viewing and uploading images using your mobile phone, use your Flickr photos as your desktop wallpaper, or use a seriously cool Web app called Smartsetr to create and manage your Flickr sets.
There are literally hundreds of tips and tricks for Flickr out there. Just do a search using your favorite search engine, or visit the Flickr user forum where you can find a lot of great ways of getting more out of Flickr.
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