This is covered in the help section of the website, and a search of the forum will turn up the same question. Upload your pictures to a photo hosting website like photobucket or whatever. then follow the instructions there for adding them to other sites. You can put the url in the box under your message when you preview your post, or use the "tag" to insert it directly into your post. Try not to insert really big pictures, as they cause the window here to get really wide and you have to scroll from side to side to read all subsequent posts. Also, one or maybe two is enough. We don't need to see eight pictures of the area from every possible angle to get the idea. Try to include the whole front, if possible, so we can see how it relates to the rest of the front yard. A closeup is no help. There is a test forum for experimenting until you get it down, and a help section and tech support section too.

There are any number of "dwarf"/smaller evergreen shrubs that can fill your needs. While 'Sky Pencil' hollies are tall and narrow - they are very narrow, and don't really spread out as they grow. If you look for the height and width you want - bear in mind that the plants you chose will stay smaller, being in pots - and for plants that can take mostly full sun, you should have a wide selection to chose from - Junipers, False Cypress, Euonymus, Curly leaf privet, Cypress, Pittosporum (not narrow, so may need too much pruning), Podocarpus, Yew, etc. Get hold of a copy of the Sunset Garden Book and look at their listing of hedge/screening plants, as well as at their evergreen shrubs list, as that will give you a lot more. Gardengal's points about container growing are very applicable to your situation. I would only suggest that if you want these shrubs to last for more than 3-4 years, that you do plant in individual pots, subsequently removing them as a single plant, or 2 together, since root pruning on one mass of roots is MUCH easier than trying to take out a longer row of shrubs from an oblong planter - 'been there, done that! On that note as well - ease of future removal - I very strongly advise you to stay away from any pot that has a top opening that is narrower than the belly of the pot - the only way to remove a plant from that configuration is to hack the roots to pieces and yank the thing out, which rather defeats the purpose of removing it to root prune and put it back, since you really do have to hack and wrench at the plant, massively disturbing roots and trunk.

Jmac, We were talking about soil amendment because you said, "The native soil here is hard clay and alkaline, and I have to amend it like crazy." Unless there is more to what you were trying to say or something I missed in your post, your statement seemed to contradict soil science. The physics involved doesn't change from one part of the country to the other. Variables (soil particle size, compaction, etc) may change, but the principles remain the same everywhere. Unless you are planting above ground (in a raised bed or berm), planting into the side of a hill (similar situation to planting above ground), are able to amend the soil to a depth where satisfactory drainage can occur (like down to a layer of soil with different drainage properties), or have some other way to address drainage, soil amendment is not a proper way to improve drainage. I particularly thought it might be important to address your comment because I was afraid that maybe you misunderstood what I had done. When you wrote, "...I have to amend (my soil) like crazy (or) replace native soil with an import, as you did", I was afraid that maybe you had misunderstood what I had done. I didn't replace my soil; I only added a new layer (raised bed) above grade. If you understand the principles of drainage, that's great, but I feel my comments are important because I don't want my mention of raised beds leading to misunderstandings.

Are the hard leafed ones getting a lot of wind and more of the low angle spring sun? If they are sheltering the other ones on the right, you have the answer. You could put up stakes and burlap between the ones on the left and the sun/wind every fall, and remove it when the new growth starts. Wind will dehydrate the leaves, then the low angle winter or early spring sun will bake them hard. A wind break solves that. I have that happen to blue boy and blue girl hollies, plus a seedling, but only if I don't put up a wind break each fall. If lots of snow comes early, that shelters them too. I don't know how much snow you get, as I am in Canada, and lots of snow differs with what you are used to getting.