Your starting point is a multilingual website in TYPO3. You create a content element of type text with an image and translate this element into several languages. If you want to change the image of the default language afterwards, you also have to change the picture in every translation. But we only want to change the image once in the default language and have it changed automatically in every translated version as well. Just follow these steps:
Step 1: Change the setup
In the setup of TYPO3, the following settings must be made:
config.sys_language_overlay = 1
config.sys_language_softMergeIfNotBlank = tt_content:image, tt_content:imagewidth, tt_content:imageheight, tt_content:imageorient, tt_content:imageborder, tt_content:image_link
Step 2: Adapt the extTables.php file
Add the following lines in the file typo3conf/extTables.php:
// field is not displayed in the back-end
// $TCA['tt_content']['columns']['image']['l10n_mode'] = 'exclude';
// image field is displayed in the back-end and in the default language
// existing image overrides the image from the default language
$TCA['tt_content']['columns']['image']['l10n_mode'] = 'mergeIfNotBlank';
Clear the cache and try it out :-)
Note: This solution has been tested with TYPO3 4.X.
Category: TYPO3, localization