Creating a post thumbnail image for your site using custom fields only adds about ten seconds to the time it takes to make a simple blog post. Shifter’s post thumbnail image system is easy to use and adding post thumbnail images to your site will help improve the overall professionalism of your site and improve your visitor experience.
Follow these simple steps to create a post thumbnail image using custom fields:
Upload Your Image
Upload an image to your site using the image upload feature on the post edit screen in your WordPress admin panel. The image upload interface can be found just below the post edit section of your post edit screen.
Choose “Show: Full size” and “Link to: None” and then click “Send to editor” to insert your image in the post edit screen.
Once the image has been inserted into the post edit screen, copy the URL of the image that was inserted.
Add A Post Thumbnail Custom Field
After uploading your image to your post edit screen, scroll to the very bottom of the post edit page and look for the “Custom Field” bar. Click the “+” on the custom field bar to open the custom field dialog.
Type the word “thumbnail” into the “Key” input field in your custom fields dialog box. Paste the URL to your image in the “Value” textarea input field of your custom fields dialog box and click the “Add custom field” button just under the “Value” textarea input field.
Save your post.
That’s it! You have now successfully added a post thumbnail image using custom fields.
Shifter Does The Rest
Shifter’s intelligent thumbnail system takes care of the rest. Shifter will automatically resize your post thumbnail and place the post thumbnail in functional places on your site. Shifter will place post thumbnail images on your category and archive pages to make those pages more interesting. Shifter’s Featured Tabs will also show a post thumbnail image on your home page when the tabs are active. If you are using the “Blog-Portal-Excerpt” Shifter Plate for your home page, Shifter will place thumbnails next to your post excerpts for a fantastic eye catching front page.
Tags: custom fields, images, wordpress
