Fixing upside down images

This article addresses why some photos appear upside down on the forum yet right-side up in other applications on your device, and the steps to fix this when it occurs.  This same information applies to other forums you may visit and is not unique to USA7s.net or our particular forum software.

Why it happens

Short answer is because your phone was upside down when you took the picture. Your phone logs meta data in the photo indicating which direction you intended as up.  Unfortunately, this information isn't always transferred correctly when a photo is uploaded or emailed, and further, some source systems simply don't know how to read the orientation data. 

How to fix a photo after uploading to the forum

Open your photo in your editing software of choice and rotate the photo at least one full revolution, stopping when the orientation appears correctly, then save and upload it to the forum.  (e.g. if it looks right-side up on your device, rotate at least 1 full revolution before resaving. if it's upside down rotate it 1.5 times, so it is correctly oriented.) This works most of the time.  If, however, your photo is an exception, first try a different a different editing program if you have it (for Windows users, Paint seems to work best).  If you don't have another option or that still doesn't work, then a quick hack is to use the Snipping tool in Windows to take a capture of the photo while it is right side up or take a screenshot in Android or iOS and crop down to the image, then save and upload this new image to the forum.  

How do I avoid this from happening? 

Take your photos with the phone in it’s right-side up position.  In portrait mode, the lens should be at the top of the phone.  In landscape mode, the lens should be at the upper left corner.