Using default WP Image Upload

Introduction:
I’m trying to make a custom featured content plug-in, which will have an admin panel allowing the end-user to manage the featured box content via the Admin > Settings panel.

The Problem:
In the Settings area of the plugin (admin panel), I want to use the default “Add Media” button/option of WP to manage image uploading, and save the uploaded images, along with all other info, to the database for easy retrieval later. I’m not sure how the default image upload mechanism works in WP (whether a reference to the location of image is saved in Database or the whole image as BLOB) but I would prefer the image location reference to be saved in the Database.

Extra Bits:
It’s my first time writing a plug-in, I’m fairly good with javascript and PHP/MySQL development. I’ve tried searching through forums and google but have had no luck. Any sort of help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!