How to upload pictures to Brickshelf

[Hinckley]

Since our last tutorial on this topic mysteriously disappeared here is a new one.

The best way to display pics in posts, in your signature and as your avatar is to host them on Brickshelf. If you don't know how to use Brickshelf to upload pics, here is a quick tutorial:

1. Open a Brickshelf account and login
   
2. Click the "Add a folder" link in the upper right hand corner of the screen
   
3. Enter the requested information for your new folder and click the "create" button
   
4. Click the "Upload" link in the upper right hand corner of the screen
   
   
5. Click the "browse" button and locate the picture you wish to upload on your computer (Note: Brickshelf won't except long filenames and certain characters. Thanks to Ralph_S for the reminder...)
   
   
6. Double click the picture you want to upload or click it once and click the "Open" button in the lower right hand corner
   
7. Once the picture is selected and the path appears in the upload box, click the "upload" button
   
   
8. Repeat for additional pictures, or...
   
9. Upload a .zip file to post multiple photos to your BS account. (Thanks to Ralph S for the tip. See instructions and discussion below...)
   

[Ralph_S]

Something useful many people don't seem to know is that brickshelf accepts zipped files. Uploading anything more than a few pictures manually gets very tedious.

If you have a whole series of files that you want to upload to the same folder and you're a user of Windows XP (presumably it works in Vista as well) you can select the image files (by left clicking them with your mouse whilst keeping either the shift or control key on your keyboard pressed). If you then right-click one of the files that you have selected, you'll see the option "copy files to compressed folder". That'll make a single zip file containing all the images you selected. In step 5 of Hinckley's scheme, you can now select the zip file rather than a single image file. Brickshelf will unpack it for you.

Another important thing to know is that brickshelf doesn't accept filenames that are very long or that contain spaces -unlike windows, for instance.

Cheers,

Ralph

[Hinckley]

Something useful many people don't seem to know is that brickshelf accepts zipped files. Uploading anything more than a few pictures manually gets very tedious.

If you have a whole series of files that you want to upload to the same folder and you're a user of Windows XP (presumably it works in Vista as well) you can select the image files (by left clicking them with your mouse whilst keeping either the shift or control key on your keyboard pressed). If you then right-click one of the files that you have selected, you'll see the option "copy files to compressed folder". That'll make a single zip file containing all the images you selected. In step 5 of Hinckley's scheme, you can now select the zip file rather than a single image file. Brickshelf will unpack it for you.

Another important thing to know is that brickshelf doesn't accept filenames that are very long or that contain spaces -unlike windows, for instance.

Cheers,

Ralph

Thank you. I wondered about that. I've never been able to get that to work. What browser do you use?

And thanks for the extra tips, I'll add them to the tutorial. As a web designer, I already never use spaces or long filenames or certain characters, so I always leave those rules out. You are very helpful and my favorite person of the day!

[Ralph_S]

Thank you. I wondered about that. I've never been able to get that to work. What browser do you use?

And thanks for the extra tips, I'll add them to the tutorial. As a web designer, I already never use spaces or long filenames or certain characters, so I always leave those rules out. You are very helpful and my favorite person of the day!

Well, gee thanks. I'm an old fashioned kind of guy who still prefers to do certain things command-line, so long file names are a big no-no. However, we live in a windows-oriented world and if you use windows to rename multiple files the filenames do end up with a space in them.

I currently use firefox as a browser, but in the past have used both netscape and internet explorer. It works in all of them.

Cheers,

Ralph

[Starwars4J]

Thank you. I wondered about that. I've never been able to get that to work. What browser do you use?

.zip files are accepted regardless of what browser is used. You may have troubles if you're trying to upload too many at once, in which case it might time out, not to mention Brickshelf has the occasional hiccup, for which you'll just need to try again a bit later. I've uploaded zip files with both IE and firefox though with no problems. It's really the only way you can upload a large amount of pictures without going insane.

[Hinckley]

.zip files are accepted regardless of what browser is used. You may have troubles if you're trying to upload too many at once, in which case it might time out, not to mention Brickshelf has the occasional hiccup, for which you'll just need to try again a bit later. I've uploaded zip files with both IE and firefox though with no problems. It's really the only way you can upload a large amount of pictures without going insane.

You know, I'm uploading .zip files from my MAC and I think the archive utility makes uploading zip files to Brickshelf impractical. It creates an additional file for each pic that is a read-only file and I have to delete each one, one by one and I may as well just upload each pic one by one. I wonder if the BS team automatically finds these files and deletes them on their own or if it's something PC users deal with too... Have you ever experienced this when uploading a .zip file?

[Ralph_S]

You know, I'm uploading .zip files from my MAC and I think the archive utility makes uploading zip files to Brickshelf impractical. It creates an additional file for each pic that is a read-only file and I have to delete each one, one by one and I may as well just upload each pic one by one. I wonder if the BS team automatically finds these files and deletes them on their own or if it's something PC users deal with too... Have you ever experienced this when uploading a .zip file?

I don't know how the archive utility on a MAC works, but with the standard 'copy to compressed folder' utility on a PC or with a program such as winzip all you get is a .zip file and that's all you have to delete afterwards. When I am uploading more than two images to the same folder, I always go via the zip option.

Cheers,

Ralph

[Starwars4J]

You know, I'm uploading .zip files from my MAC and I think the archive utility makes uploading zip files to Brickshelf impractical. It creates an additional file for each pic that is a read-only file and I have to delete each one, one by one and I may as well just upload each pic one by one. I wonder if the BS team automatically finds these files and deletes them on their own or if it's something PC users deal with too... Have you ever experienced this when uploading a .zip file?

No, that must be unique to the Mac. It sounds like you're using the .zip archiving utility that came with the computer though, have you tried downloading a separate one? As mentioned above, when I create a .zip file...that's all that's created, a simple single .zip that I can upload to BS.

[Hinckley]

Thanks for the help, gentlemen...

[Dark Sword Ragnarok]

Hey, guys.

I'm having a bit of trouble uploading .zip folders onto brickshelf.

I highlighted all the pictures I want to upload, right-click on a picture, click on the "Send To" option, then .zip folder.

It takes awhile for it to compress the files ( a few minutes or so.) When I hit upload on Brickshelf, I browse to the .zip folder I created just fine. I click on it, and hit upload. The next page takes about a minute or so to come up.

Now here's where I have my problem: Nothing happens!

The folder just says "folder empty" when I'm done, like it did before.

Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks in advance,

DSR

[Admiral Blockbeard]

From what has been said maybe you are trying to upload to many pics in one hit... try making the zip file smaller by not adding so many pics to it. The problem might be that the page has timed out...

regards Cpt. PB

[Dark Sword Ragnarok]

I was only uploading around 20 pics, but I'll try it, thanks!

DSR

EDIT: Dang, tried it with only 6 and it still won't work...

Is there any way I can get someone else to upload my pics to a brickshelf?

Edited July 10, 2008 by Dark Sword Ragnarok

[Admiral Blockbeard]

okay this is the last of my knowledge on the subject, on the site it has these warnings/requirements

Make sure your image files have the right extension. (.jpg, .bmp etc). <li>After uploading multiple files, you may need to use the "Rescan" link to fix thumbnails.

i am not sure what the rescan is, i have never had trouble with brickshelf...

as for if someone else can upload for you, it is probably easier for you to try and upload them individually, it will not take that long to do, i have individually uploaded 20 or so pics in one sitting, you get into a trance eventually!

Regards Cpt PB

[Dark Sword Ragnarok]

okay this is the last of my knowledge on the subject, on the site it has these warnings/requirements

Make sure your image files have the right extension. (.jpg, .bmp etc). <li>After uploading multiple files, you may need to use the "Rescan" link to fix thumbnails.

i am not sure what the rescan is, i have never had trouble with brickshelf...

as for if someone else can upload for you, it is probably easier for you to try and upload them individually, it will not take that long to do, i have individually uploaded 20 or so pics in one sitting, you get into a trance eventually!

Regards Cpt PB

Well, I would do that, but I have over 150 pictures to upload, so I would most likely go crazy after around 50 or so...

Guess I'll stick with Flickr.

[LandShark]

Sorry to bump a very old topic.

But I'm having a problem with my Brickshelf. I've just created an account, but whenever I try to upload a picture, it comes up with this:

There was an error with your input. Permissible characters are [A-Z][a-z][0-9][-][_][@][.][ ]. Please go back and try agian

Any advice? It probably something really obvious, but I've never had an account on any kind of photo site, so it's all new to me.

[Brickdoctor]

You had one of the unacceptable characters in the name of the file you were uploading.

[LandShark]

You had one of the unacceptable characters in the name of the file you were uploading.

I can't enter the file name without using the backslash key ( / )

It even shows them in the first post:

There's no weird symbols in the words of the file name, I can't think what else it could be.

EDIT: I've just realized, there's an apostrophe, that's probably it. Sorry for wasting your time

EDIT 2: Yep, I changed the file name and it works now, apologies once again

Edited July 25, 2011 by LandShark

[Brickdoctor]

EDIT: I've just realized, there's an apostrophe, that's probably it. Sorry for wasting your time

It's not wasting my time. Glad it worked for you.

[LandShark]

It's not wasting my time. Glad it worked for you.

Thanks a lot!

I hope to be sharing pictures soon.

[Strikeman]

I'm going out on a limb here and post a question because there seems to be no-one at the other end of the support@brickshelf.com email address (I've sent a mail about 3 weeks ago I think):

1. I can't upload anything but images. No MLCAD files (.ldr, .mpd), no PDF documents. I know that it's possible as I see many other people with these files on their accounts, yet I can't. I tried changing the filenames to very short filenames, does not work either. After the site finishes the upload, I come back in my folder and nothing new appears when I try to upload one of these files.

2. I can't upload zipfiles (probably same reason ?). I have to manually upload everything at the moment, not cool

If anyone could shed any light on these issues it'd be appreciated.

ps: I tried with Firefox & Internet Explorer, haven't used another browser yet but I'm 99% certain it's a problem on the receiving side

[Palathadric]

Hey, guys.

I'm having a bit of trouble uploading .zip folders onto brickshelf.

I highlighted all the pictures I want to upload, right-click on a picture, click on the "Send To" option, then .zip folder.

It takes awhile for it to compress the files ( a few minutes or so.) When I hit upload on Brickshelf, I browse to the .zip folder I created just fine. I click on it, and hit upload. The next page takes about a minute or so to come up.

Now here's where I have my problem: Nothing happens!

The folder just says "folder empty" when I'm done, like it did before.

Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks in advance,

DSR

Sorry to bump an old topic, but I have a similar problem to this. I wanted to try uploading a .zip file, instead of uploading each picture and .l3b file manually. When I upload the .zip it doesn't do anything. It says the folder is empty. When I try to look at the folder without being logged in, it says "This Folder in Not Yet Public."

Does anyone know what the problem may be?

[ahughes]

Thank you! This tutorial saved me. I just joined the forum yesterday, and I had made a Tactical Vest decal for another member which I wanted to post in the Decal Wishlist, but I couldn't for the life of me figure out what to do.

It took me a moment to figure out what the next logical steps beyond this tutorial were. In case this is helpful to anyone else who's new here, I did the following:

1) Once my photo was uploaded to Brickshelf, I clicked on the thumbnail to embiggen it.

2) I right-clicked on the large photo and opened it in a new tab

3) Copied the URL from the address bar

4) Selected the 'Image' icon from the editor in the new post I was creating on Eurobricks Forum.

5) Pasted the URL.

[TheNextLegoDesinger]

i want to put a pic on a topic but i couldn't work. I got an error witch said: You are not allowed to use that image extension on this community. BTW it is a foto from Flickr

[Peppermint_M]

Try using the Flickr tutorial we have. It is easy to follow and in the FAQ.

[TheNextLegoDesinger]

ok