If you take a high quality image with a digital camera the dots per inch (dpi) can be high making the file size very large. If you change the dpi to 72 the file size will be much smaller but the picture will have the same dimensions. 72 dpi is all most computer monitors can see. I resize pictures with Irfanview and always change the dpi to 72.

To illustrate what I mean here's a picture of a Downy Woodpecker resized to 640 x 480 pixels but the dpi at 180 just as it came out of my camera. The file size is 156 KB.
{{gwi:1487924}}

And here it is with the same dimensions but saved at a lower quality at 72 dpi. The file size is 47 KB.
{{gwi:1487925}}

By the way you can bypass the file size restriction by going to a site like photobucket.com and opening a free account. Upload your pictures to that account and copy the html code from under the picture and paste it in your gardenweb post. The picture will show up when you preview the post. Normally I would never post the first picture because the file size is larger than it needs to be. For the sake of dial up users keep the file size to under 100 KB.
You can check the file size by right clicking on the picture and choosing 'properties' or 'view image info' which I get in Win 7.

Great illustration, but it's kinda over my head. I've used the photobucket route before, but it was a battle for me, so I decided to use the GW method. I had to use "Paint" on my computer to re-size. My picture to be within the 6lk was small on the screen, but as I mentioned another posting was smaller k but the dimensions were larger. When I use the "paint" I could only use pixels or size dimensions, which I didn't know which dimensions size to use. I do have Win 7.

I was incorrect. When using "Paint" my choices are percentage and pixels. I got my final picture by cutting them 50% each time in percentage and keeping the "maintain aspect ration" checked.

There are many ways to resize pictures. I use Irfanview but I'm sure there are other ways just as good. Irfanview is useful for dealing with graphics in other ways and I like it for resizing because I feel it gives me more control over the end result. Here's how to use Irfanview:
Resizing pictures for posting
There are two 'sizes' involved, the dimensions and the file size.
If the dimensions are too large the viewer has to scroll to see the entire picture and it also means scrolling to read other posts in the thread. I don't think any picture needs to be more than 800 pixels wide and probably no one will have to scroll to see the entire picture.
If the file size is larger than 100 KB it will be very slow for viewers using a dial up network (DUN) and almost half of internet users are on a DUN.
One way to have a picture big enough for easy viewing with a file size under 100 KB is to use the free program Irfanview. It can be downloaded from the author's home page at Irfanview.com. Download the plugins also and you will have a very useful photo editing program. There are many tutorials for using the program. Just do a search for "Irfanview tutorials' and you will find many.
To resize a picture for posting you need to do so before uploading it to photobucket or your other online host. Here's how I go about resizing a picture after installing Irfanview:
Right click on the picture, pick 'Open with' on the drop down menu and select Irfanview. When the picture opens in Irfanview click on 'Image' > 'Resize/Resample' and the following screen opens:
{{gwi:1465210}}
I've typed 800 in the width box and the height is filled in automatically. Make sure 'pixels' is chosen and that 'Preserve aspect ratio' is checked and type 72 in the 'DPI' box. Click 'OK' and you will see the resized picture.
Now click 'File' > 'Save As' and you get a screen like this:
{{gwi:1465212}}
Notice that I've made a folder called 'Resized Pictures' and I'm saving it there. If you save it in the same folder it was in originally make sure you give a different name so your original picture is not changed. I've given the picture a name and am saving it as a .jpg file. This brings up the 'JPEG/GIF save options' that you see on the right of the image. Set the 'Save quality' slider at around 30 and click 'Save'. Now go to the saved picture and check it to make sure it is what you want. It should be, but if not experiment a little with the 'Save quality' slider.
This may sound like a lengthy process when you read this but after you do it a time or two it only takes a few seconds.

Let's make it simple:
1. Login to your Photobucket account.
2. Click on big green button to upload a picture from your computer. (If you don't re-size before uploading to under 1 MB, Photobucket automatically deals with it.)
3. After it's uploaded, go to its location in Photobucket and hover your mouse over it; right-click on the "HTML Code" link that appears and copy it.
4. Paste link into body of your GardenWeb post.
5. You're done.

lets make it even simpler use the image resize tool you can download to your pc and then just right click on any picture and select the size you want it, it will then create a duplicate in that smaller size.
Image Resizer

this was a powertoy for xp but has been cloned to now work with Vista and 7 including 64bit.

It does not get any easier.

Thanks for all the great suggestions! I'm definitely for SIMPLE!!! hee hee

I will check them all out!