Slight change to how attachments/thumbnails work

So, this might only be temporary, but I've tweaked thumbnails so that attached images are just automatically displayed inline at the end of the post. I figure this is better, but let me know if it gives anyone trouble or seems counterintuitive.

Yes, it's causing trouble. I'm seeing pictures I've attached TWICE in every post I've made. And I've attached a lot of pictures to my posts. I'm not correcting every single post -- an impossible task -- to make them look normal.

Ugh, that looks like crap. Sorry, but it really looks bad to me. It's a visual overload and looks redundant, as the thumbnail attachments are now really huge and make the reviews look cluttered with duplicate pictures. Why the change?

This is a copy of my latest review, see what I mean?


Director: Steven Spielberg
Writer: Steven Spielberg
Cast: Richard Dreyfuss, François Truffaut, Teri Garr
Genre: Drama, Sci-Fi

About: A series of unexplained encounters with U.F.O.s sets in motion a global search for answers...While a family man, Richard Dreyfuss seeks answers to his own close encounter with an unknown object.

Review: I first watched Steven Spielberg's opus to extraterrestrial first contact back in the early 80s. I was blown away by what I saw. After all these years, I rewatched this classic sci fi...and was still blown away! Thanks to Spielberg's mastery of film making.

You know, usually the director gets all the credit for the movie, but it's the intelligently written, multi story layering of the script that impressed me most. And guess what? Steven Spielberg wrote the movie! That's probably why his movie comes close to perfection as it's his unified vision...and according to him based on a childhood experience.


But of course Spielberg is also skilled as a director. I love how he imparts us with the emotion of the scene, by cutting to a reaction shot as he does in the above photo. It's the tears welling up in the son's eyes that tells us how deeply affected the father is by the UFO encounter.

Nothing makes us feel the pain or joy of the moment more than by seeing the emotions in the other character's eyes. Spielberg works magic here with his reaction shots.


I love how the movie interweaves the different stories of those who had extraterrestrial encounters of the 1st kind. Especially powerful was the story line of the international team investigating the re-appearance of long missing planes and ships in the deserts. It gives an all important and serious feel to the context of the movie. Very cool that the renowned French director François Truffaut, leads the investigation team.

Another secondary story that's hauntingly effective, is due to the mother's fear of losing her son. Both mom (Melinda Dillion) and the little kid are instrumental in building the story arc of what the aliens real intentions are?...And her little son (Cary Guffy) was so good an actor that Stanley Kubrick decided to us him in The Shining.

I think of Richard Dreyfus as a comic actor but he's so good here. I instantly believed he was an average family guy with kids and the lovely Teri Garr for a wife. The way he descends into his obsession after his close encounter is powerful. The scene where he's in the shower having a mental break down and the son is screaming at the top of his lungs, while slamming the bathroom door in anger!...is some of the most realistic, family crisis drama I've seen on film. All thanks to Dreyfus and Spielberg.


And Teri Garr was great as the loving suburbia wife, who's pushed to the edge by her troubled husband. She was great in this...and I realize she looks a lot like Blake Lively, or is that the other way around?

Gosh, there's so many well done scenes that each moment in this movie is a real treat. I loved the setting at Devil's Tower, which in itself is more amazing than any modern CG effect. And the alien ships!...with all of those beautiful lights and the way they moved and rolled over before landing, so very cool.

+

Last edited by Citizen Rules; 14 Hours Ago at 11:40 PM.

Ah, so the problem isn't the tweak itself, so much as the fact that you guys had already worked around it by inlining the attachments manually? Does that make sense?

Regardless, I'll change it back for now. But if I could make it so it excluded those ones automatically, or else only did it if there was one attachment or something, do you think that would work without messing up older posts?

I don't know.

I thought everyone who attached photos, clicked the attachments to copy the URLs, then inserted them manually, where they wanted them to go, by using the photo tool insert icon in the tool bar.

I write my reviews and place the photos to give clarification or a visual aid to the paragraph that I place them by. At the bottom of the review is useless IMO.

Yeah, while that might make it easier for some people, it's not what Citizen and I do. We place our pictures in spots we want them to be in.

I agree re: reviews, though I was thinking more for posts where the attachment is the whole point. There are lots of those, IE: here's a picture of me/my dog/whatever, where it really makes more sense to have it just display at nearly full size.

That said, I think the best solution here is either:

1) Detect what you've put inline and not display it at the end, which seems to have no downside for reviewers, or
2) Just make it much easier for people to inline their own attachments.

Back to the drawing board, then. Thanks for the feedback.

I wouldn't mind clicking a button that says "don't immediately post the attachments as images at the bottom of the post" (something like that) if you want to have images at the bottom of the post be an automatic thing for people who don't know what to do about attachments. If that can be done. I am willing to sacrifice a little extra step in my post making process to get things right. A valve for people who want to do something differently with their post.

Nah, it's cool, don't need you guys jumping through any unnecessary hoops. Wanna do this right, since it's such a common thing. Thank you, though, for being willing.

Okay, update! I've added an "Insert" button when you upload attachments that'll automatically add the ATTACHFULL tag a handful of you already use. Should ease the learning curve, since it works the same way it always has, but doesn't require people to be grabbing IDs and writing the tag themselves.

The attachments button thing does not work anymore for me.

Okay, looking into it now.

Okay, try it now.

I just tried the Insert attachment, it didn't work for me either. It didn't do anything after I clicked Insert

Works for me. Thanks.

Am I missing a step? Am I suppose to do something else after clicking Insert?

Edit: I tried inserting an attachment on this post and all I can do is save the attachment.


BTW...when I use bold, I mean that to say it's a name of a MoFo link/icon.

Attachments

 

When you click Insert it automatically adds the ATTACHFULL code to your message area. Or should, at least. Did it not? It's not in your post.

It looks like this (sans the usual asterisks)

[*attachfull]ID#[/attachfull*]

I'll try again on this post. Give me a few seconds to find a pic.

It didn't work, I will turn off my adblocking to see if that helps. Give me another few seconds

You'll know without posting it. It'll either add the bbCode to the text box or not.