Changing my annoying avatar?

[shoelessone]

Hello! I would love to change my animated avatar to something else. I don't see a way to do this through the account setting options, but I imagine it must be possible somehow so I'm surely just missing something.

 

I imagine one way to do this would be to update my image in my Google account, then wait for some job to sync the changes, but I'd prefer not to touch my Google account (as annoying as the animated gif is, I've had it this way for years and I don't think Google lets you have an animated profile image any longer... for good reason :)).

 

Perhaps because I'm a new member some of these options (e.g. to change profile picture) are disabled to prevent abuse, which I completely understand, but I'm annoying people I think with my picture :).

 

Thanks for your support!

[David Mack]

On my phone I click on Account, then Profile, and clicking on the image icon gives the option to upload a photo.

[shoelessone]

11 minutes ago, David Mack said:

On my phone I click on Account, then Profile, and clicking on the image icon gives the option to upload a photo.

...snip snip snip...

 

Thanks for the reply - yeah in my case I don't have these options. I suspect it's either

 

1. I'm a new account, they don't want me being some spammer / bot and posting some sort of cryptocurrency scam ad on my image or something

2. Because i used Google to sign in, they use Google as the "source of truth" for the avatar - i.e. you can't change it without changing it via Google (I'm really hoping it's not this one :))

3. Perhaps as a Patron (I am new to the forum so am assuming you donated or somehow contribute to the forum?) you have this option, but it's a "perk"? I'm guessing it's not this because plenty of members seem to have custom avatars

4. I'm doing something wrong (very very possible :)) - that said I'm attaching a screenshot and you can see there is no option to change my image like you have - clicking the gear icon brings me to the sign in options but I didn't see any image options there either.

 

All of this said, thanks for taking the time to look / help!

[Tony Brooks]

On my screen (computer) I open my profile and can see a little picture icon in the bottom left of my profile photo. I click that and get asked to select a photo, but be aware there seems to be a 0.1Mb size limit, so you may have to resize or use a thumbnail. I sign in directly to the forum, no Google/Microsoft sign in.

[shoelessone]

Thanks @Tony Brooks, I appreciate it. Unfortunately I don't believe I see any such icon as you describe. Perhaps once my account is out of probation it'll appear!

 

 

[IanD]

9 minutes ago, shoelessone said:

Thanks @Tony Brooks, I appreciate it. Unfortunately I don't believe I see any such icon as you describe. Perhaps once my account is out of probation it'll appear!

 

 

IIRC you only need to make 10 posts for that, so keep going... 😉 

Edited February 28 by IanD

[Rob-M]

Is there any option to change under the account settings you see on the screenshot you posted...?

[Arthur Marshall]

If I go into account settings, it gives me three tabs, one if which is upload cover photo. Dunno if that's it. That's on an android tablet. On the phone it's just an house icon

[Tony Brooks]

20 minutes ago, Arthur Marshall said:

If I go into account settings, it gives me three tabs, one if which is upload cover photo. Dunno if that's it. That's on an android tablet. On the phone it's just an house icon

 

I tried that and it seemed to do nothing.

[Ian_C]

I'll be interested in the solution to the original posters question too

[Alan de Enfield]

27 minutes ago, Ian_C said:

I'll be interested in the solution to the original posters question too

 

 

On a windows lap-top its very easy.

 

 

Click on your name/avatar picture ( circled top left) and this opens

 

 

 

 

Click on the little box in the bottom left picture and its takes to another page saying 'choose you picture' and follow instructions

 

 

Edited Saturday at 23:01 by Alan de Enfield

[Rob-M]

I think the OP may not be seeing the same account options as he is using his Google account to sign in rather than a dedicated CWDF account.  I know on other sites where I use my Google account for access it shows the profile picture from the Google account.

[Alan de Enfield]

1 hour ago, Rob-M said:

I think the OP may not be seeing the same account options as he is using his Google account to sign in rather than a dedicated CWDF account.  I know on other sites where I use my Google account for access it shows the profile picture from the Google account.

 

So, if he signs out, and back in again (directly using the forum 'sign in') he should be OK ?

[Rob-M]

55 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

 

So, if he signs out, and back in again (directly using the forum 'sign in') he should be OK ?

He would have to create a new account rather than use the Google account sign in option.

[Arthur Marshall]

12 hours ago, Tony Brooks said:

 

I tried that and it seemed to do nothing.

I've not tried it because my photo was taken about thirty years ago and I'm sticking to it.

[shoelessone]

On 01/03/2026 at 02:20, Rob-M said:

I think the OP may not be seeing the same account options as he is using his Google account to sign in rather than a dedicated CWDF account.  I know on other sites where I use my Google account for access it shows the profile picture from the Google account.

 

This was one of my suspicions, and I'm still thinking this _could_ be it, but I'm a bit less certain now because I've now gone through and unlinked my Google profile for sign in / SSO, and am now signing in with a username and password directly through the forum... I signed out, cleared cookies/all browser storage, signed back in with the canalboat.net account, and I' seeing the same thing... of course this isn't "proof", there could still be a flag somewhere e.g. "account_created_with_google" (or whatever), but I'm now leaning more towards my other theory, which is that I'm a new account and (understandably!) the forum moderators / owners / whatever don't want me changing my profile picture and spamming an ad or something with it (maybe?)

Update: I just made a new account to test, signed in directly with a username / password (no SSO) and am not seeing the option to change my profile picture.

 

So perhaps I just need to get out of this probationary period!

 

On 01/03/2026 at 03:41, Alan de Enfield said:

 

So, if he signs out, and back in again (directly using the forum 'sign in') he should be OK ?

 

I wrote more above, but unfortunately this doesn't seem to be the case - there is an option to disable the Google sign in and sign in directly with email / password, which I did, but no luck. I think I'm just a new account and (understandably!) have reduced privileges? 

[Ange]

Maybe you just need to chat for a while to increase your post count. I must confess I found your avatar funny but understand it could get irritating.

[shoelessone]

6 minutes ago, Ange said:

Maybe you just need to chat for a while to increase your post count. I must confess I found your avatar funny but understand it could get irritating.

It doesn't bug me too much myself, but I'm here begging for advice and I think it was annoying a few other people (which I understand as well!) so trying to get it fixed :).

For now I'm hoping that I'll be active enough asking questions and things I'll be out of probation before too long!

[Ange]

6 minutes ago, shoelessone said:

It doesn't bug me too much myself, but I'm here begging for advice and I think it was annoying a few other people (which I understand as well!) so trying to get it fixed :).

For now I'm hoping that I'll be active enough asking questions and things I'll be out of probation before too long!

Hey you're doing good. Ten posts now hopefully you get to change your avatar..

If not just chat with us some more 

There's people that find your avatar annoying won't be the people that help you.

There's lots of folk that will help you 

[Mac of Cygnet]

5 hours ago, Ange said:

 

There's people that find your avatar annoying won't be the people that help you.

 

Just to prove Ange wrong 🙂 it was me who originally commented on the avatar. It's no big deal - sorry for all the hassle.  But one rather radical solution would be to create a completely new account (a new name would be needed, but only subtly different) which then gives the opportunity to create a new avatar and leave this one in the mists of time.  Strictly speaking this is against forum rules but I've done it (I was Torquemada for a while and presumably still am) and I wasn't struck down or off.

[haggis]

I was another who said I wasn't keen on the moving avatar but like Mac I can live with it and I am sorry it is causing such a problem. Just leave it and enjoy the forum ! 

[IanD]

1 hour ago, haggis said:

I was another who said I wasn't keen on the moving avatar but like Mac I can live with it and I am sorry it is causing such a problem. Just leave it and enjoy the forum ! 

It seems pretty unlikely that the avatar can't be changed, no matter how you signed up to the forum you should have the option to upload a different image.

 

If this isn't possible then that's a software bug which should be reported to the mods... 😉 

 

(and if all else fails, I suspect they can change it for the OP anyway)

[carlt]

I like your avatar.

 

I hit 60 at the end of this month and it always cheers me up to see pictures of folk obviously much younger than me but with much less hair.

[David Mack]

1 hour ago, carlt said:

I hit 60 at the end of this month and it always cheers me up to see pictures of folk obviously much younger than me but with much less hair.

My son, fearing nothing but the wisps on top of his father and paternal grandfather, and polished pate of his maternal grandfather, decided to accept the inevitable, and shave completely what remained of his once luxuriant hair, at about age 30!

[carlt]

1 hour ago, David Mack said:

My son, fearing nothing but the wisps on top of his father and paternal grandfather, and polished pate of his maternal grandfather, decided to accept the inevitable, and shave completely what remained of his once luxuriant hair, at about age 30!

My brother started losing his hair young and obsessively gels his remaining tufts into slightly thicker spikes and bitterly suggests that my hair is wasted on me (I'm not the "male grooming type")

 

His typically blunt Norwegian partner asked me across a crowded room, recently "Carl, how come your brother's bald and you're not?"

 

I could only respond with "By some quirk of fate I got the looks as well as the brains."