Image generation

RankYak may illustrate your articles with generated images: a header image at the top, and supporting images and infographics throughout the body. Every image is created specifically for its article, drawn in a style you choose, and colored to your brand, so your articles carry a consistent visual identity. This page explains how to enable image generation and what each setting controls.

Enabling image generation

Image generation is configured per site.

1. Go to Settings, then Articles.
2. In the Images section, click Enable.

Once enabled, the style and color settings appear, and each image type may be toggled individually. Articles written from that point on include images as part of article generation. To stop generating them, return to the same section and click Disable.

Image types

Three types of images may be generated, and each one has its own toggle, so you may run any combination.

Header and article images are generated in a wide landscape format that works as a header or featured image on any platform. Infographics are generated in that same format, so every image in an article shares one shape.

Image styles

Each site has a single image style, so your articles look like they belong together. You may choose from Photography, Illustration, Line art, Watercolor, and Cartoon. A site still on the previous image system keeps its original styles until you upgrade from the article settings. Most styles show a preview in the settings, and you may zoom in on one before deciding.

Sometimes you may wish to describe a look of your own instead. Choose Custom and write a short description of the style you want, such as the medium, the linework, the fill, and the colors. You should describe the look rather than the subject, because RankYak decides what each image shows and applies your description to all of them.

Text style

Your images carry a little text: the title on a header image, and the headline on an infographic. Text style decides how that text is written, so it reads the same across every article. You may choose Modern, Classic, Bold, or Technical.

The labels inside an infographic always stay plain, whichever style you pick, because they are small and have to be read.

Header image settings

Header images follow your article style until you give them one of their own. If you would like your headers to stand apart from the images inside the article, choose a different Header image style.

You may also decide whether the article title appears on the header image. Turn Put the article title on the image on, and RankYak sets the title into the image itself. Turn it off, and the header is artwork alone.

Brand colors

Two colors tie the generated images to your site.

• Background color sets the ground each image is drawn on. You may choose a dark ground, and the linework and type turn light so the drawing still reads. Photographs ignore the background, because they carry a real scene behind the subject.
• Accent color highlights elements within the visuals, and is typically your primary brand color. During setup, RankYak reads a suggested color from your site's favicon, so the picker opens on a color you already use.

You may leave the accent color on automatic, and RankYak picks colors that suit each image instead. That often reads better when your articles cover subjects your brand color has nothing to do with.

The image library

Your site keeps one image library, shared by every article. RankYak adds to it while an article is written, and the rest is yours to add. An image made for one article may illustrate any other, so a picture you like is never stranded on the article it came from.

Open an article in the editor and click the image button in the toolbar above the content. You may upload a file, generate a new image, or open the library to reuse one you already have. Typing /image where you are writing offers the same three, and puts the result at your cursor. You may also drag an image file straight onto the article, or paste one, and RankYak uploads it and places it for you.

Inside the library, clicking an image puts it into the article you have open. If you opened the library from the header image, clicking one makes it the header instead.

Search the library by name, by alternative text, or by what an image shows, and narrow it by type and by whether RankYak generated it or you uploaded it.

The pencil beside an image's name opens its details, where you may rename it, write its alternative text, and delete it. An uploaded file arrives without alternative text, because only you can say what your own picture shows, and you should write it so that search engines and screen readers can read the image.

Removing an image from an article does not delete it. The image stays in the library, so you may put it back later, in that article or another one.

An image that an article still shows, or still uses as its header, cannot be deleted. The library is shared, so the file would go from every article at once, including ones you have already published. Take the image out of those articles first, and the delete becomes available.

Image generations

Each article may generate up to five images, including the ones RankYak places for you while the article is written. The Generate image menu shows how many are left on the article you have open.

Uploading a file costs nothing against that number, so you may add as many of your own images as you like. Replacing the header image with one already in the library costs nothing either.

Changing the style later

The settings on this page apply to articles written from then on, so changing a style or a color leaves existing articles as they are. If you would like a different image on an article you already published, generate or upload one in the editor and publish the article again.