Commons talk:Featured picture candidates/Archive 3

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Digital manipulation of FP candidate photographs

I propose that we should add something along the following lines to the Guidelines for evaluating FPs. I'm posting here first, to see if we can get a consensus, before moving to the project page.

  • Digital manipulation for the purpose of correcting flaws in a photographic image is generally acceptable provide it is limited, well-done, and not intended to deceive. Typical acceptable manipulations include cropping, perspective correction, sharpening/blurring, colour/exposure correction, and removal of distracting background elements. More extensive manipulations should be clearly described in the image text, for example by means of the RetouchedPicture template. Undescribed or mis-described manipulations which cause the main subject to be seriously misrepresented are never acceptable. More generally, any deceitful manipulation disqualifies the photograph from Featured Picture status. Deleted as suggested by Trialsanderrors, below. --MichaelMaggs 07:49, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

--MichaelMaggs 16:26, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

 Support I like the wording, except the last sentence sees redundant. Also, we should account for the possibility that uploader and nominator are not the same person, and the nominator is unaware of the manipulations. ~ trialsanderrors 19:48, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
The thinking behind the last sentence was to support de-featuring if anything untoward comes to light later. But maybe it's not needed. --MichaelMaggs 20:47, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
It kind of implies that the delisting is automatic (without consensus vote), and I don't think that's the purpose of this proposal. ~ trialsanderrors 00:21, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
  • My first thought was that the way the text is written some artistic photographs, which do not intend necessarily to depict reality faithfully, would be banned from this forum. Some of those pictures may be the result of extensive manipulations, including the misrepresentation of their subjects. The truth is those pictures should not be taken as “true” photos, since photography is used only as a technique to achieve certain results. However, and after reading the proposal more carefully, I don’t think that it really applies to those cases. In short,  Support the proposal. - Alvesgaspar 22:57, 19 March 2007 (UTC)
    • Well the POTY aurora borealis can only be seen as an "artistic" manipulation of the original, but I don't see anyine wanting to delist it on those grounds. The extent of the manipulation can easily be seen by comparing it to the original. ~ trialsanderrors 00:21, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Something I was thinking about a few days ago that is partially relevant - you always need to be careful with any manipulation not made by the original photographer as the original photographer is often the only person who actually knows what he/she was looking at when taking the picture. Any form of straightening/contrast/color manipulation needs be examined in that light if it could detract from the realism of the capture and thus its encyclopedic value. Mfield 00:55, 20 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Some questions is this policy looking for a problem or is it a problem needing a policy? While enhancements are wonderful where is the line between enhancement and manipulation, then where does manipulation become deceptive. Providing it hasn't infringed on the copyright of the photographer why cant it still be promoted, maybe we just need a FP subsection for Digitally manipulated image just like theres a subsection for non photographic media. Thius also encourage the editors to indicate what they have done. Gnangarra 02:03, 20 March 2007 (UTC)

OK, there seems to be a consensus. I'll add the text to the project page. --MichaelMaggs 16:16, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

  • I belatedly ask why limit these comments to digital manipulation? If I do the same things with an air-brush etc or in a dark room is it ok :-) --Tony Wills 10:53, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

People keep on saying "Another XYZ..."

I've experienced this twice personally. This isn't fair to people if voters oppose purely on the basis that it is another [place term here]. We have many photographs and based on this logic, we shouldn't accept any more to FP because they are photographs. Also, "Another XYZ" isn't a very good description of why you want to oppose if you aren't opposing just because it is a photo/fractal/raytraced image. --wj32 talk | contribs 07:35, 19 April 2007 (UTC)

Why exactly this isn't fair? Photographs and fractals are two fairly different kinds of pictures, especially in terms of what it could portrait. If you tell 100 people to make a photo you'll end up with 100 different photos. If you tell 100 people to render a fractal, most of the results will probably be Mandelbrot set renderings quite similar to the one you've nominated. What makes yours stand out from these? --che 10:26, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
Is the quality of the candidate reduced because there is another that is very similar? This isn't a "1,000 best images" contest after all, where you can't add one without getting rid of another. What if the new candidate was significantly better than the existing FP? Is the newer and better one permanently ineligible? Stan Shebs 17:33, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
I'm not specifically talking about my nomination. Just the "Another ..." phrase. Not only what Stan Shebs said, but the reason for opposing should be made more clear. --wj32 talk | contribs 00:30, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
Oh yes, and fractal != mandelbrot set fractal --wj32 talk | contribs 00:31, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
You can word it as "not above its category". I agree that opposing with "just another..." isn't one of the nicest reactions, but I still think that there are cases when this reasoning has a point. Take for example sunsets, which are more or less nice by default. There are featured pictures among them, but they really have to be somehow special. --che 01:55, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

I think the same goes in the opposite direction as well where a photo with a subject in high demand gets rejected. I get irritated when a photo gets rejected because the subject is camouflaged, for example. In other words, tough to see in the photo, but that is, in my opinion, what makes it so great, because it shows the subject in its natural environment. But that’s what this ultimately is all about, as this is open to all registered users, it all comes down to opinion. For anyone submitting a nomination, they need to be able to accept critique and accept that an image may get rejected. In an open voting forum like this, it is impossible to set guidelines on how voters should vote. I tend to consider Wikipedia usage value. Others consider only the photo, regardless of the value it would lend to any Wiki project. Whatever your criteria may be, in an open voting forum, if someone opposes because it’s “another XYZ” then that is the voters opinion and needs to be accepted whether you agree or not. --Jnpet 08:32, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Category Change

Food or animal?

When browsing the featured pictures I keep feeling uncomfortable with this image being under the animals category. This image belongs here as much as a picture of ground beef would. At this point it’s no longer an animal, but food. Anyone object to moving this image to the food category? --Jnpet 09:12, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

  • Its dead, its beef, so its food. Go ahead and move it to the food category --Digon3 17:32, 20 April 2007 (UTC)
    • Was just about to do so. I now see there is no "food and drink" category. If this category is created, should it be a separate new category? Or should it go under objects? Jnpet 02:35, 23 April 2007 (UTC)
I think it should go under objects sub category as food and drink. When we get more featured picture of food there should be a seperate category, but I think this is the only one. --Digon3 22:47, 23 April 2007 (UTC)

Problem with picture

Do you know why my picture Image:Lac de Roselend.jpg doesn't want to appear? It exists here, I really don't understand. I'm sure I've done all the necesary... Can you help me please... Thank you, --Floflo 20:34, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Well, I finally found the mistake. My apologies...! --Floflo 20:45, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Desktop Wallpaper

  • I propose that we make a gallery of Featured Pictures suitable for desktop wallpaper, like Wikipedia featured desktop backgrounds. The wikipedia desktop gallery is what first got me to go to the commons, and I think a desktop gallery would be a good addition to the commons. Tell me what you think. --Digon3 19:59, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Could you please elaborate a little more on the idea? Are the size and aspect ratio the only requirements for a FP to enter in that gallery? - Alvesgaspar 22:33, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
A desktop background should be be atheistically pleasing, so it would probably be limited to Natural phenomena, Places, Astronomy, and maybe some in the Plants and Objects category. Do you have any other ideas? --Digon3 23:48, 7 May 2007 (UTC)
I had an idea similar to this. You will be able to find some suitable images among the pages at User:Pfctdayelise/Commons:Packs. pfctdayelise (说什么?) 07:57, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
Might as well just have a category rather than gallery unless you're going to perhaps have sub-gallery pages by subject.
The Wikipedia wallpaper criteria seems to be size and proportion, and there is a featured picture and non-featured picture version. Just running a bot through FP and QI that checks their ratios and tags them might be a start. But I would suggest that for desktop background 'wallpaper' you want to be more selective so that icons aren't easily lost against the background. There are of course a few people that use multiple screens and have desktop backgrounds that stretch across both screens so the ratio requirements are rather different :-)
One could use CatScan to provide lists by subject of FP or QI images (except that certain projects suggest removing categories from images after they're added to galleries, thereby ensuring they are no longer found by CatScan). --Tony Wills 09:24, 8 May 2007 (UTC)
Could you run a bot through the Featured Pictures Natural phenomena, Places, Astronomy, and Plants and Objects categories to check for aspect ratios of 4:3 or 5:4 and 16:10 for widescreens with a tolerance of ±6%? We can then manually check them and see what comes up. --Digon3 13:03, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Please don't! This can be handled efficiently using a dump or SQL query. --Dschwen 13:14, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Then can you run a SQL query? --Digon3 13:20, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Working on it :-) --Dschwen 13:23, 9 May 2007 (UTC)


Results

with 1% tolerance. --Dschwen 14:25, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

Did you run it through the Commons:Featured pictures/Places/Natural? There are quite a few pictures there that are a perfect match. Also Commons:Featured pictures/Places/Architecture has a few matches for widescreen within 6% tolerance. --Digon3 14:33, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
By the way, thank-you. --Digon3 14:35, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Completely forgot the sub-galleries. 6% tolerance seems a bit high to me. It should look good when squeezed to fill the screen. IMO anything more than 1% is too much of a stretch (pun intended). If you don't care about ratio then you can go directly to the FP galleries. --Dschwen 15:25, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Could you run a SQL query with 5% tolerance for the widescreens only? Thanks. --Digon3 15:32, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
Yeah, done. --Dschwen 15:42, 9 May 2007 (UTC)

5:4

4:3

16:10

16:9

  • Here are my opinions on what should be in the gallery. I choose pictures that would be used desktop background 'wallpaper' so that icons aren't easily lost against the background and taste. I think a minimum of 1024 pixels wide should be the limit. I am very interested to see other peoples opinions. --Digon3 17:32, 9 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Should we vote which ones should go in the gallery, or just put them all in (excluding the ones which have too small resolution)? --Digon3 16:42, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

Speedup Proposal

The promotion rate for FP seem to be stuck at around 15%-20%. Many nominations are not appropriate or have no chance of success far before 7 days has elapsed, yet they remain to clutter up the process. Even worse, if an image gets a support vote other than the author/nominator, then it stays around for the full two weeks even if it has no chance of success. I suggest that we change this to match some sort of snowball clause. Here are some ideas:

  1. If a nominated image reaches 5 oppose votes and no support votes (other than the nominator/author), then it may be closed immediately.
  2. If a nominated image reaches +4 oppose votes (a 8 support vote deficit), then it may be closed after 24 hours.
  3. When, after 7 days of evaluation, there is a minimum of 6 total votes and the ratio support/oppose is 1:2 or less (e.g. 2-4, 3-6, 4-8, ...), then the picture can be closed early.
  4. When, after 7 days of evaluation, there is a minimum of 5 total votes and the ratio support/oppose is 3:1 or more (e.g. 4-1, 5-1, 6-2, ...), then the picture can be promoted early.

Just some ideas. -- Ram-Man 19:33, 11 May 2007 (UTC)

Idea 1 seems good, and would allow much of the junk to be cleared away quite quickly. The others I'd prefer to avoid as I think it's best to keep the rules as simple as possible. Also, I would suggest not promoting early, however many votes an image gets: it does sometimes happen that several unknown users (unknown to me at least) express support shortly after an image has been posted, suggesting possible canvassing on a local wiki. --MichaelMaggs 21:46, 11 May 2007 (UTC)
I agree. Idea 1 seems good, Idea 2 seems redundant to number 1, and ideas 3 and 4 seem complicated and ack MichaelMaggs. --Digon3 16:46, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I don't see the volume of nominations being a real problem, it doesn't affect the speed images can be accepted. The list length shouldn't affect the rate people vote on images unless they feel compelled to vote on every obvious poor image. A shorter evaluation period would be acceptable though. --Tony Wills 00:14, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Speedup Proposal 2 - how to avoid frightening away new nominators, many of whom don't read the rules the first time

Another idea: what about a series of templates such as {{TooSmall}}, {{Blurred}} etc which generate some (not too unkind) wording such as "This image is unlikely to reach FP status, as it is too small. Please read the guidelines to see the type of image we are looking for here". These templates should be used only for hopeless cases that will obviously fail. When such a template is used on an image which has no support, other than the nominator, it may be closed after 24 hours unless anyone else votes to support it within that period. If they do, voting then continues as usual. This would clear the decks quickly, and would avoid newbies finding that their first nomination crashes out in flames with large numbers of oppose votes/comments, some of which the nominator may consider pretty rude. I can put together some suggested wordings for discussion if this approach is of interest. --MichaelMaggs 17:06, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

I really like this idea, more than my proposal. It's a good way not to bite the newbies who may end up producing good pictures that become FPs. -- Ram-Man 17:22, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
I like it. It should clear out the useless nominations and give people more time to focus on the good ones. --Digon3 17:41, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I think the idea could be tried though I'm always afraid of these type of "administrative measures", because of the risk of bad use. The period of 24 hours is too short, specially during weekends and vacancy periods. Alvesgaspar 22:57, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
  • In general, and after some time closing and observing this forum, I'm quite convinced that 15 days is too much. Maybe it made sense when Commons:FPC was created and very few people participate, but not any more. For me, and also considering the case of the English FPC, 10 days would be enough to identify the best and reject the other. Alvesgaspar 23:14, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
  • A problem with these templates is that anyone will be able to apply these official looking tags, that may then dissuade others from bothering to look closely at the image. I think a lot of voting at the moment is influenced too much by others comments and this will just be an official looking comment which may have undue influence. --Tony Wills 00:03, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

I can see your concern, but don't think this would be a problem in practice. We'll make it plain that the templates are not for use in anything but clear cases of failure, and where the nomination really is hopeless there's actually very little chance that someone will come along and say that the image actually is of FP quality after all. The idea is just to get rid of the obvious no-hopers quickly while doing so in a way that encourages rather than drives away newbies who might not yet have a clear idea of what we are looking for in a FP. --MichaelMaggs 07:07, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

I totally agree with Alvesgaspar on this point. On the one hand, the period of 24 hours is far too short, on the other hand I think communication with new users should not be automated with such templates. I hold that it's always better to explain with some sentences, why his actual nomination doesn't match the guidelines. Maybe even on the user's talk page. --norro 19:43, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Ace photographers, heads up :)

Hello,

Likely people here will be interested in a new page I created (thanks to David Gerard's suggestion), Commons:Meet our photographers. We can use it to show off our ace photographers. But first we need to agree on what standard people should meet before they can be listed there. Please comment on the talk page about what you think. --pfctdayelise (说什么?) 14:54, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

  • Well, at least you will have a supporter, I like the idea. I think the best way to chose the people to be part of that list would be some kind of election in which self-nominations are not allowed. Would you like to elaborate a little more on the kind of information to include in that file? A short byographical note, an image portfolio? - Alvesgaspar 23:23, 14 May 2007 (UTC)
Her ;) --MichaelMaggs 05:31, 15 May 2007 (UTC)
er, um, yes, that's what I meant :) :-) --Tony Wills 22:29, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Idea to increase FPCs and pass rates - import all from en.wp

Another thought I've had for a while: we should make a concerted effort to transfer all of English Wikipedia's FPs to Commons [well, excluding fair use images and dodgy licenses etc - not sure if fair use can be FP there], and nominate most or all of them for FP here. For one thing, they should have a much higher pass rate here than our average nominations. And our POTDs need the boost. :)

Another reason is that if they really are such great images, which presumably they are, they really should be on Commons so that the other projects can use them too. --pfctdayelise (说什么?) 16:17, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't think thats a good idea transfer all of them. Voters on the English Wikipedia FPC don't care as much about technical quality or size and most of the good pictures are already featured in the Commons. There are some though... Someone would have to screen 764 featured pictures at Wikipedia for technical quality, size, and check to make sure they are not FP in the Commons. --Digon3 16:39, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
A very good idea, in principle, the only problem being the time this would take, especially since the the size requirements on en-W are less rigorous than here. It might work to nominate all en-W FPs of a suitable size, though, and to reject any that aren't up to Commons standards. Anyone care to automate it? --MichaelMaggs 16:44, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
Well, yeah, some machine help would be nice. :) We don't HAVE to nominate them all, but it seems like a good place to look. pfctdayelise (说什么?) 00:41, 13 May 2007 (UTC)
  • I'm not sure why we need a higher pass rate, and regarding POTD - we have 242 Featured Pictures which have apparently not yet been POTD. Though I agree any en-W FP of a suitable license should be nominated (I don't think you should automate filtering by size, as we don't have a size requirement, only a guideline :-) --Tony Wills 21:01, 12 May 2007 (UTC)
  • A little tool that a clever person introduced me too : Catscan, look in cat 'Featured pictures', but without Template 'Picture of the day' (NB it returns other pages as well as images pages) (I am of course making gross assumptions about the historical usage of these cat.s & templates) --Tony Wills 12:56, 13 May 2007 (UTC)

Nominating images by others as FPs

Many but by no means all FPs get started as self-nominations. That's fine of course, but means that there must be many times that number of great pictures by more retiring types that could do well here if only we knew about them. Trawling through all new files is a thankless task, and I wonder if there's any way of focussing the search down? For example, is there a way of browsing through images posted by Wikimedians who identify themselves on their user page as high-quality photographers (PH-3)? That would be a worthwhile search that I'd like to do regularly as I'm sure it would flush out quite a few new FP candidates. --MichaelMaggs 21:52, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Speedup proposal - decision time?

After reading all contributions, here is a "composite" proposal to speed up the FP promotion process:

  1. Shorten the revieweing period from 15 to 10 days.
  2. Shorten the period of the "7th day rule" to 5 days.
  3. Put MichaelMaggs' template solution to try, but with a 48 hour period, instead of 24.
  4. These measures are to be applied immediately after the decision is made.
Have a look at the way it appears in practice. I've added it as a test to some existing images that are going to fail. The template requires a parameter, so whoever uses it is forced to add some free text which can be as long as you like. It doesn't stop users posting onto a talk page as well, of course, but in practice few people do that and what a new user typically gets is a long list of Opposes with a variety of rude comments. This should prevent that, and if the free text is used properly will be much gentler on the uploader. --MichaelMaggs 12:30, 17 May 2007 (UTC)
  •  Comment - We have unanimous support for the new proposed periods. Shall we implement them? I'm changing the rules. As for the template, I think it is better to wait a couple of days more before puting it in the rules. - Alvesgaspar 23:02, 18 May 2007 (UTC)
    I agree. --norro 11:15, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
  •  Oppose The templates.  Support The shortened evaluation periods --Tony Wills 11:37, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
  •  Comment I think these proposals need to be better canvassed, only a small number of the FP candidate users have voted here. These proposals should have been notified and highlighted on the main FPC page and at least mentioned on the Village Pump page. It's a matter of proper process. --Tony Wills 11:37, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
  •  Comment I note that the new voting periods have been implemented and that entries nominated under the old rules were fast-tracked through under the new 10 day period, which was inappropriate (what's the hurry?) they should have been left to run for their full term. --Tony Wills 12:25, 20 May 2007 (UTC)

Speed-up warning template

I have created a draft template for this, as discussed above, called {{FPX}}. It takes one parameter, allowing variable text to be included.

As an example, typing {{FPX|too small - [[User:SomeUser|SomeUser]]}} generates:


Thank you for nominating this image. Unfortunately, it does not fall within the Guidelines and is unlikely to succeed for the following reason: too small - SomeUser Anyone other than the nominator who disagrees may override this template by changing {{FPX}} to {{FPX contested}} and adding a vote in support. Voting will then continue in the usual way. If not contested within 24 hours, this nomination may be closed.


--MichaelMaggs 21:44, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

  • Great. I made a little edit to remove your signature from inside the template and adjust the logo size. I think the user should put the signature as part of the variable text. Alvesgaspar 08:30, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I didn't realise I had embedded my own sig inside it. The template always worked perfectly when I tested it ;) --MichaelMaggs 09:28, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

Clearer lead

We seem to be getting quite a few nominations which don't meet the basic criteria, and i'm thinking that it probably mostly because it isn't all too clear where the guidelines etc are. The text at the top doesn't seem all too clear, and there is quite a lot of it, would it be worthwhile to restructure the top bit, probably starting with moving the TOC below the lead text so that it is directly above the listings. The guidelines could be before the Add nomination box, so that people wont just skip straight to adding. So an overall structure could be more like:

  • Formal things
    • Nominating
      • Guidelines for nominators
      • Adding a new nomination
    • Voting
      • Guidelines for Evaluating Photographs
    • Delisting
    • Digital manipulation of FP candidate photographs
    • Featured picture candidate policy
    • Above all, Be polite
  • Featured Picture Candidates
  • Delisting candidates
  • Timetable (day 5 after nomination)
  • Timetable (day 10 after nomination)

and they should all be under a level two heading, so that Guidelines for nominators, Guidelines for Evaluating Photographs, Digital manipulation of FP candidate photographs and Above all, Be polite are all under Formal things. That would just make the layout a bit neater i think. Plus those few lines at the very top seem a bit stale the way they are, so incorporating them elsewhere or something could be an idea.

How about that... Chris huh 06:27, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

As long as you don't change the basic content (the rules and process) and only change the arrangement, this is a wiki: you can just make some changes and see if people like them. It takes only a few seconds to revert and we can always see the example in the history and comment on it there. -- Ram-Man 12:24, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I've done it, but because of the new layout the guidelines. In the end this could just be made into several more specific guidlines, but i don't even know if we need a separate guidlines page. Chris huh 13:47, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I only have two problems with the change. 1. Could you get rid of the background and 2. change the create new delisting candidates box back to what it was (like the create new FP nomination box)? Thanks --Digon3 13:55, 23 May 2007 (UTC)
I have removed those for you, i put them in to separate it from the candidates, and to have the input boxes stand out a bit more. But it still looks ok now. Chris huh 08:45, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
Thanks.--Digon3 13:03, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

Discussion for Guidelines

I have added a discussion for guidelines here: http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons_talk:Featured_picture_guidelines And I have added a few topics. —the preceding unsigned comment is by Charlessauer (talk • contribs)

Image:Amur Tiger Panthera tigris altaica Eye 2112px.jpg removed

Image:Amur Tiger Panthera tigris altaica Eye 2112px.jpg was taken off the list but only the top image had been finalised. I have readded it but i think its time it finishes. I'm not too sure what to do to finish it so if someone could do the necessary stuff that would be helpful. Cheers Chris huh 10:32, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

  • Thank you for your edit, that was my mistake (I'm replacing Simonizer as the closer for some time). Don't worry, I'll take care of it from now :) - Alvesgaspar 14:28, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Image:2004-tsunami.jpg

A tsunami?

I don't think this image can be what it claims to be. If it was, I would expect the photographer to be slightly dead. "According to a lot of witnesses the tsunamis, 5-10 meters in height, came in 10 minute periods." [1]. I suspect it's just a large wave coming over a sea wall. Thoughts? Ben Aveling 12:26, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

I don't have any reason to doubt it is a real pic of the tsunami. Look at the colour of that water, it's carrying a large load of mud etc, it is not just the foam and spray from a wave splashing up --Tony Wills 10:42, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
You're right about the mud, there's something happening there. But you can see through it. It's mainly spray, not solid water. And it's clear that the people in the picture don't look afraid, most of them aren't moving quickly, one is heading toward the water. There's water in the gutter, suggesting that this isn't the first wave, or whatever. But the plants are intact, so there hasn't been enough water to destroy, or even damage them. I can't remember how fast a tsunami moves once it hits land, but it's pretty fast. At sea, it's hundreds of miles per hour. And the wave is 15 to 30, even 45 foot high - so you see it, but you don't have time to do much. It's a lot of water, moving very fast. Apart from the obvious lack of panic, I just don't see how someone could have been this close, and survived. Regards, Ben Aveling 00:11, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
Yes it looks like this is mainly water spashing up, rather than a wall of water. And yes the water and a small amount of debri (stones) on the road seem to suggest that this is a later wave. The height and speed of the waves varied a lot depending on exactly where you were, the angle of your local coastline to the wave front, and distance from the epicentre. And of course we don't know how far inland this is or how high the road and whether there's a sea wall etc, etc. Also despite the huge devastation a lot of people did survive. --Tony Wills 02:45, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
Do you access to the original upload? I'd be curious to know the date and time on it, not that it necessarily proves much either way. Regards, Ben Aveling 02:52, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
Not me. Get the original version undeleted and see if there's exif data, or ask the uploader who scaled it down, they may have kept a copy of the original. Or email the photographer (details on pic page) - maybe best to not suggest you doubt it's authenticity, but you could ask about the sequence of events and whether he got wet :-) --Tony Wills 07:08, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Moving old nomination pages

It appears that some old nomination pages are located as a sub page Commons:Featured pictures candidates. As it is clear that the version without s is the standard page, I will soon move all of them to the correct location (leaving redirects intact, of course) in order to have the link on {{Featured picture}} work. -- Bryan (talk to me) 17:29, 24 May 2007 (UTC)

It's a problem we should fix, but I suggest we instead create redirects from the new names to the original locations. Older FPs don't actually have their own nomination page, eg Commons:Featured picture candidates/Log/February 2005#Image:Alpamayo.jpg featured. And the nomination page isn't always the same as the Image page, eg Commons:Featured pictures candidates/Image:Roman aqueduct in Segovia (side view).jpg. Regards, Ben Aveling 22:19, 24 May 2007 (UTC)
I noticed that User:Fir0002 was creating new nominations under that old page, probably due to using an old template. I left a note on his talk page. It doesn't really cause any great problem apart from having to make two mouse clicks to get back from the nomination page to the FPC page. It would perhaps be simpler to make Commons:Featured_pictures_candidates into a proper redirect page. --Tony Wills 10:58, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
Done. I can make a list of 'broken' pages, where the link points to nowhere, if that's useful? Regards, Ben Aveling 00:16, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
I don't care which name is standardised upon, as long as redirects are made and edit histories are preserved (where possible). And the "auto link" in the FP template that appears on image pages should always be blue. Whether it's a redirect or not doesn't really matter. pfctdayelise (说什么?) 10:19, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

FPC record !!

The month of May will close with almost 200 nominations for COM:FPC and more than 50 promoted pictures. Also, the percentage of sucess will grow from about 21% to a stunning 26% (shall we make the review more strict?...). This is an absolute record! The fact is partially explained by the excellent contributions of talented newcomers, like Ram-Man and Makro Freak (congratulations) as well as by the extra effort of some regulars. - Alvesgaspar 14:38, 26 May 2007 (UTC)

we have 242 Featured Pictures which have apparently not yet been POTD. --Tony Wills

I suggest we suspend the use of Quality Pictures for POTD for at least 8 months. Regards, Ben Aveling 03:31, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Well if I'm right, then we could suspend use of QI altogether as during most months enough images have been promoted anyway, and that number of unused FP is a more than adequate buffer. Of course there may be reasons those images haven't been used for POTD, but if they're not good enough then maybe they should be de-listed as FP too. --Tony Wills 07:15, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
I haven't done an exact count, but there's 4 and a bit pages of Category:Featured Pictures. Not all of that is images, but most of it is. That's about 800 images. Given that we've been using a fair percentage of QI, I can easily believe that we've got a backlog in the order of 1 or 2 hundred. I think we might as well leave the June POTD as is, but from July onwards, no more QI. Regards, Ben Aveling 07:47, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
 Info 810 --Tony Wills 12:00, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
For the moment, I'll create a list of pictures that appear to be unused. In the long run, I think a new category might be more useful, maybe Category:Picture of the day candidates? Regards, Ben Aveling 08:57, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
I think this is an excellent idea. Also approve the idea of suspending the use of QI's as POTD - Alvesgaspar 09:04, 27 May 2007 (UTC)
I've updated Commons:Picture of the day, and I've created a rough snapshot of the backlog at Commons talk:Picture of the day/Unused featured pictures. I don't promise it's all right, and we'll have to work out how to keep it up to date, but it's a start. Regards, Ben Aveling 10:05, 27 May 2007 (UTC)

Flower pictures

I know we supposidly have too many flower pictures, but seriously, are we totally ignoring them? Three pictures, one of mine, this flower, and this picture from Alvesgaspar have better than 66% support, but are failing because of lack of votes where 1 or 2 votes would likely decide its outcome. Other pictures like this and this barely have enough to pass. This recent FP barely received any votes either. Besides that issue, I have to wonder what the policy is for resubmitting a picture later that failed to reach a decisive result (5 support or 3 oppose) or perhaps extending it longer to allow more time for comments. Since we just shrunk the evaulation period from 15 to 10 days, this surely doesn't help at all. Each picture, regardless of the subject, deserves a decisive result. It seems to me that we have more insect pictures than we do flower pictures. I have a lot (dozens) of flower pictures that I could submit to the FP process, but if no one is going to vote, I'm just going to stop nominating pictures. What's the point? -- Ram-Man 03:51, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

  • Nothing serious is happening, really. People are just fed up with flower pics, as they are of insects for that matter. It is not a question of having too many of them (how many species are there of phanerogamic plants, hundreds of thousand?). People want to be surprised, it is no longer enough to give them good quality pictures of beautiful flowers (or insects, or NASA nebulosae). I believe that many pictures are not even seen in full size by most users, unless something unusual calls their attention. That is ok, people are not obliged to vote on every picture, it is our job as nominators to convince them (in a few seconds) that our images are unique and valuable. There is no stated policy on the re-submission of pictures, but experience shows that people get irritated when a picture shows up again after a couple of months (visual memory really works, even with images which we didn't pay much attention to). My suggestion is that we reduce the submission of flower pictures unless we have something truly different to show. Alvesgaspar 08:36, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • That's one of the reasons QI was created. FP is a popularity contest, and the public are fickle ;-). And FP is the primary source for POTD, I don't think POTD is going to want lots of the same type of image either. QI is to recognise quality images, regardless of whether it's the 1000th sunset or not. (that 10 FP quota looking more elusive now ?) --Tony Wills 10:38, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • It does make this difficult for someone like me who specializes in plant and flower pictures. Nevertheless, this problem doesn't just affect flowers either (although its a big part). This image has not received enough votes either and is nearing the deadline. The nominator is getting anxious for the same frustrating reason. My point is that people are going to stop nominating pictures if people don't have the decency to at least vote it up or down. What I don't understand is that we currently have a number of insect pictures garnering lots of votes and even some more NASA images getting votes (up and down), but these flower pictures do not, so I don't buy that people are bored with those types of pictures. -- Ram-Man 14:26, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Although I've been submitting pictures now for a while, the new Commons:Meet our photographers is based on Featured Pictures, not quality images. Plus, to remain on the page one may have to keep submitting so many featured pictures to stay on the list. Now, my success rate has been pretty high with FPs (note the record acceptance above) overall, but since I mostly do flowers, it's going to be very hard to determine which flowers will wow people and which won't and the success rate is surely going to decline. The other option is to just stop submitting. Just looking at some of Alvegaspar's FP nominated work, I never would have guessed which would have been successful and which not. Reaching 10 FPs is proving extraordinarily difficult. 9 was oddly very easy. -- Ram-Man 14:39, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Looks as if SVG images attract even less interest. :-( Lycaon 16:00, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • That's true. Still, I'd vote on SVG images if there was more guidance. The guidelines are tailored towards normal photographs. I have no idea how to properly judge an SVG image. Many SVGs are the epitome of boring, even though they are often much more useful than photographs. I'd vote if I had some idea what criterion to judge them by. -- Ram-Man 16:23, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
  • Animations are pretty hard to judge, and it doesn't help that there are no guidelines for them. --Digon3 16:36, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Is there a category for this page? Featured picture candidates/removal/Image:Urocyon littoralis full figure.jpg? Any category that I put on it is taken back off it. It can't be without a category, cause that would mean we might as well delete it as it's not used for anything. Should I put a delete template on it? Deadstar 07:57, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

:-)
What exactly is it that you think you're putting these category tags on? :-) --Tony Wills 10:22, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
Hmm, well, it's a "gallery page" not a "category", and it looks to be something to do with "featured pictures" and "candidates"... that's all I know :) I just don't want it to show up in Special:Uncategorizedpages again! Deadstar 12:37, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
It is one of these. All I know is that we need to archive them, so don't delete it. --Digon3 16:42, 28 May 2007 (UTC)
All very confusing really, but I've finally caught on to what the problem is :-). This is a discussion page that should have been under Commons:, instead of moving it, it appears someone created a duplicate of it in the right place.
.../Featured_picture_candidates/removal/Image:Urocyon_littoralis_full_figure.jpg
.../Commons:Featured_picture_candidates/removal/Image:Urocyon_littoralis_full_figure.jpg

The two pages basically have identical content, and I'm sure that this version can be nominated for speedy deletion. --Tony Wills 20:49, 28 May 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for the detection work! I will put a speedy delete template on it now & hopefully that'll get it sorted :) Kind regards, Deadstar 07:44, 29 May 2007 (UTC)

Commons_talk:Featured_pictures#1000FP

What should we do to celebrate 1000 FPs? If we keep up this blistering pace, it could arrive in as little as three months :) Please suggest ideas on that page. --pfctdayelise (说什么?) 06:47, 31 May 2007 (UTC)

Thoughts on newbie submissions and such

One thing I realise is that Featured pictures are highly visibly linked on commons but links to both Commons:Quality Images and Commons:Photography critiques need some effort to track down. This may be the cause of this surge of inferiour quality image submissions.

Are there any requirements that photographer and uploader and nominator ought be different persons?

Also currently FP and QI seem to be independent categories, with most of the criteria somewhat lower for QI. Sometimes I thought that some FP nominations would blatantly fail as QI, so QI status before a possible FP nomination would be a logical sequence but then the QI process usually is based on a one-person assessment.

I do not want to advocate QI as requirement for FP nomination at this point, but I think that newcomers should be gently pointed towards QI to try their luck there first. --Klaus with K 14:42, 9 June 2007 (UTC)

June FP Stats

We're on pace for another record FP month, and we're not even half way through the month. I'm sure I miscalculated a picture or two, but so far there have been 115 finalized nominations and 37 have been featured. That's a 32% promotion rate, which blows apart the previous record. I was curious if my impression of "bias" was correct, so I created a breakdown by subject matter. Photos with insects account for just over a third of the FPs, with animals making up a large percentage as well. Looking over the current candidates, it looks like the number of insect FPs (and other animal FPs) is going to grow even more.

Type Total Comments
Landscapes 6
Illustrations 2
Animals 9
Plants 6 2 were just straight flowers. Only 3 did not have an integrated insect
Insects 10 13 if you count the insects in the flower pictures
Portrait 1
Other 3

My personal bias is that I take a lot of plant pictures and have had difficulty getting any through. I've had a handful or two of plant and flower pictures turned down in the past few weeks, many of very high technical quality (the overall FP success rate would probably be an even higher record if I'd stop submitting pictures). It seems that unless a flower has an insect, it has very little chance of success, especially since getting 5 support or 3 oppose votes is sometimes very difficult. I did a more detailed check: 13 out of 17 insect nominations have been successful. 2 out of 16 flowers without insects have been featured. That's astounding. -- Ram-Man 20:24, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

I checked the stats for May. Flowers without insects were 9 of 23 (39%) and insects were 11 of 25 (44%). The flower FPs were divided among myself, Alvesgaspar and Makro Freak. I didn't check other types of plant pictures. -- Ram-Man 20:38, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
  • These are good news for me, meaning that we were able to draw the attention of new and talented creators and the overall quality of submissions is raising. I wouldn’t put much meaning in the distribution of subjects, since two of those newcomers have a remarkable production and are macro enthusiasts. You complain about the lack of success of flower and plant images, I complain about the insensibility of the reviewers towards ocean pictures… I would suggest two conclusions from these results: first, that we need more pictures of people in Commons, and second, that maybe we should raise our lath (is this the word?) a little bit… - Alvesgaspar 20:44, 12 June 2007 (UTC)
    • I agree about portraits, although by their very nature they are difficult because of issues with getting access to a subject and permission to publish the photos, not to mention the technical expertise to produce good pictures. I'd certainly like to see more portrait nominations. But I do disagree about the meaning of the stats. An insect photo is given considerable latitude. The backgrounds and foregrounds are often somewhat distracting and DoF issues are ignored. A flower picture with perfect DoF must still have a perfect background. Even if it has all of that, it must have additional "wow". An insect gets a wow factor automatically. All it needs is technical quality, which is why the success rate has gone up and is now over 75%. The "wow factor" of the insect photos has not changed, but the technical quality has. In fact, the technical quality of flowers has also increased, but it's success rate has vastly declined. Some of your own flower pictures that failed to become FPs were better ones from May. I am still scratching my head as to why the lotus nomination failed. Of course there are exceptions to all of this because not enough people vote, creating anomolies. I don't know what you mean by "lath". -- Ram-Man 20:56, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Had the same feelings about underwater shots. So many rejections, yet used in so many articles in a several languages. I came to realize this has become an photo art forum rather than a extremely useful image for article page. Seriously, I have photos rejected here which are used in quite a number of articles on various wiki sites. That's why I gave up. I mean the main page says start searching here for your image, but what good is that when the image is a picture of useless but artful image. I really think value should be a major consideration for FP. But, that's not the case. Bring on the sunsets! --18:32, 8 August 2007 (UTC) —the preceding unsigned comment was added by Jnpet (talk • contribs)

I should point out that as FP is a vote system, I have less problem with this here, but QI, where it really depends on one person is incredibly biased. --Jnpet 18:44, 8 August 2007 (UTC)

Merge of QI and FP Guidelines

Currently, we have two sets of guidelines for images, Commons:Featured picture guidelines and Commons:Quality images guidelines. They both used to say pretty much the same thing in somewhat different ways. I've merged the FP Guidelines into the QI guidelines, with some help from a few other people. If no-one objects, I'll move the merged page to Commons:Images guidelines and update the Guidelines link to point to it. Regards, Ben Aveling 11:52, 19 June 2007 (UTC)

Pixel size text - less colour might be more

I want to suggest less colour use on the text below. Being all bold it reads awfully and one can no longer emphasize the importent parts. I'd prefer:

Please read the guidelines before nominating. In particular photographs of less than 2 million pixels (for instance 1600x1200 = 1.92 million) are usually not accepted unless there are strong mitigating reasons.

-- Klaus with K 08:23, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Agreed. In fact, I've gone further and removed the color altogether - it distracts from the fact that a link is present. Bold is strong enough to attract the attention. Regards, Ben Aveling 12:48, 15 July 2007 (UTC)
I have also been bold. Barely any camera does the borderline 1600x1250, lots of them do 1600x1200. This is below our agreed threshold, but as we still see quite a few submissions of this format, I have given this as an example of size too small. -- Klaus with K 17:04, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

Renomination of failed nominees, possible or not?

Hi there,

I wanted to nominate Image:Karen Padaung Girl Portrait.jpg as a feature picture, but then noticed that it was already nominated in in April 2006. It failed the nomination with 12 support, 7 oppose and 1 neutral. In light of the recent succes of other portraits, I would like to resubmit this nomination. Is this at all allowed? Anrie 14:01, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

Please do. (yes, it is allowed) Lycaon 14:18, 16 July 2007 (UTC)
I also think it is allowed. I thought there is something written in the rules/guidelines that a renomination is allowed after one year - but currently I can't find anything about renomination.--AngMoKio 14:31, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

FP wallpaper

Be aware that we now have Category:Commons featured desktop backgrounds and Category:Commons featured widescreen desktop backgrounds for those who are interested. Please help change it to give it a Commons feel so it doesn't look exactly like Wikipedia featured desktop backgrounds :). --Digon3 talk 19:02, 16 July 2007 (UTC)

What to do after voting is finished

The closing instructions have until now been hidden away in a section of a talk page. I've promoted them to a page of their own, imaginatively called Commons:Featured picture candidates/What to do after voting is finished. --MichaelMaggs 19:40, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Delisting rules

I don't think we should allow proposers for delisting to hide behind an anonymous IP address. I've changed the rules to read "The delisting rules are generally the same as those for FPs, with voting taking place over the same time period, except that anonymous proposals are not permitted". If anyone objects, please revert and we can discuss. --MichaelMaggs 20:23, 21 July 2007 (UTC)

  • This makes perfect sense. Anyone should be allowed to nominate a picture, but delisting is a much more "serious" issue and could easily be abused. -- Ram-Man 21:02, 21 July 2007 (UTC)
    • I don't think the rules should be different for list and delist. Bad-faith nominations get shot down pretty quickly, with no damage done. Regards, Ben Aveling 06:37, 22 July 2007 (UTC)

OK, suggestion withdrawn. I don't like instruction creep either! --MichaelMaggs 17:12, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Panoramas and projections - guidance available?

I presume the following quote from the guidelines also holds for panoramic images, where the display on a flat screen is often inferior in quality to either the projection onto a curved surface or the use of dedicated viewing software. 

Remember, the goal of the Wikimedia Commons project is
to provide a central repository for free images to be used
by all Wikimedia projects, including possible future projects.
This is not simply a depository for Wikipedia images, so images
should not be judged here on their suitability for that project.

As I am contemplating to submit more "best of my panoramic images" to FPC but notice quite some criticism on the projection of a current candidate image, a projection I deem the best choice for the image viewing position, I would like some guidance on whether it is worth submitting panoramic images in cylindrical or equirectangular projection? When a such projection choice is warranted it usually means that both a rectangular projection looks very distorted or is no longer possible and that the image looks funny and is not an honest representation of reality if displayed on a flat screen without the use of an appropriate viewer.

From the above quote I learn that such panoramic images are welcome on commons. What about FP? -- Klaus with K 14:12, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Please fix my pics

More and more contributors throw (by want of a better word) pictures into FPC, and expect some 'expert' to fix it and bring it up to FP standards. That's not what FPC is for, isn't it? This is not the place for such requests. Could we put a sentence in the Guidelines for nominators to discourage this from happening? It is frustrating for both parties: the ones at the receiving end and the ones that have to vote opposition. Can we direct them at sites like en:Wikipedia:Graphic Lab/Images to improve and fr:Wikipédia:Atelier graphique/Images à améliorer who willingly would do that for them? Lycaon 21:49, 10 August 2007 (UTC)

Or de:Wikipedia:Bilderwerkstatt. Yes, we should inform uploaders of the possibilities to have their pics improved. Among those photos with quality problems there are lots of important and relevant shots. Many of them can be retouched easily. The point ist to bring both sides together. --AM 11:17, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
As a guilty party (I swear, I never noticed the swan was blue; even when it was pointed out that there might be "some colour-improvements possible" I was still scratching my head) I have to say that I often don't realise that improvements are needed until someone is kind enough to point it out, and I'm know I'm not the only one who has a blind spot for their own work. So yes, I think a suggestion might help, but unless you want to find a way to discourage the keen but less clueful contributors, I think you're going to have to live with some good faith but bad judgement nominations. Sorry, Ben Aveling 12:06, 11 August 2007 (UTC)
You'd never expect to filter out all the good faith but bad judgement nominations. That's not necessary. If only half of them go to a workshop or review first, it will already be a significant improvement. Maybe also tell contributors that if things go wrong in spite of their high hopes, how to withdraw a nomination gracefully (I know I've used that escape a couple of times). Lycaon 14:09, 11 August 2007 (UTC)

Frantic delistings

From time to time we assist to a flood of delisting nominations, in a frantic attempt to keep FP permanently updated to the newest technical standards or, in fewer cases, just because the nominator dislikes the pictures or has little knowledge of FPC ways. This reminds me (I have said it before) of the Ministry of Truth, in George Orwell's novel “1984”, where a group of employees permanently kept the written History in accordance with present politics. In my opinion and with the possible exception of those obvious errors of judgement in terms of basic photographic quality, delisting a featured picture is useless and prejudicial to the memory of FPC. FP status is a recognition of excellence given, at a particular time, to a picture and its creator. It makes little sense to take that award away just because technology has evolved or the overall quality of pictures uploaded to Commons has risen. FP archive is much more like a “gallery of fame” than a warehouse of good photos for common use. That should be the role of QI (however, delisting a QI is not possible). Thoughts? - Alvesgaspar 12:50, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

featured pictures are supposed to be "some of the finest pictures on Commons". Since we maybe have ten times the amount of pictures on commons than a few years ago, obviously some pictures that previously were some of the best images on commons might not anymore. -- Gorgo 13:22, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
Exactly. FP is not a chronicle of achievements, at lest that's not what it says on the page. This whole fame crap is completely overrated anyways. It takes away some of the respectability of the voluntary work IMO by shifting the focus from the good of the project to a gratification system for individuals. The former should always come first. --Dschwen 13:44, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
You are wildly exagerating my own words. Just like you, I put the main emphasis on the pictures not on the individuals (though the awards are a strong motivation for excellent contributions, as we all know). But forgive me to repeat myself, this delisting mania looks like an ugly (and useless) operation of censorship. The remote possibility of someone chosing a sub-standard 2005 FP for POTD doesn't justify the effort. What about re-nominating all FP with say more than 6 months, in order to garantee that the standards are accurately kept? Sounds ridiculous? It is. Alvesgaspar 23:30, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

FP peer review?

I think we should make self-nominators go through COM:QI. There is also Commons:Photography critiques and maybe there was another page somewhere. pfctdayelise (说什么?) 14:21, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
The problem with going COM:QI is that not all FP's have great technical quality. They can make it through FPC with no problem because of their "wow" factor but might never be able to pass QIC because their technical quality is low. IMO, Commons:Photography critiques is just a place you can get comments to improve your pictures, and would not be good as a staging ground for FPC. I think we need something that is optional but highly recommended for new nominators as a staging ground for FPC. --Digon3 talk 15:59, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
To let go self-nominations through COM:QI is in my opinion no good idea. In general pictures that have a good compostions but are of a lower quality have problems to get a FP while pictures with a high quality and no real composition get FP easily. It would only be fair if there would be another voting besides COM:QI where mainly the composition counts. People could nominate pictures there with explanations of why they think the composition is good. If their pictures gets promoted there they can nominate on FPC. --AngMoKio 21:11, 15 August 2007 (UTC)
  • I share AngMoKio's concerns about the importance of composition but I don't think the problem could be solved with administrative measures. Unlike the purely technical aspects, evaluating composition is a higly subjective matter and requires sensibility and experience. The rule of the thirds and other similar rules-of-thumb are obviously poor tools to deal with such a complex subject. Yes, it is a question of taste though taste can be educated. A new forum like the one you are suggesting could indeed be quite useful in educating all of us in those matters. But would that forum be compatible with a normal voting system? - Alvesgaspar 23:55, 16 August 2007 (UTC)
  • I don't know what you mean by normal voting system. What I had in mind was an optional but highly recommended peer review with a nominator, a seconder, and space for comments. --Digon3 talk 15:12, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
  • I don't see the need to cut down FP nominations. Overall quality has improved a lot over the last months and that was reflected in more exigent evaluations by our reviewers. Also, sub-standard nominations are much less frequent now and the new tools of speedy closing help us controlling them with effectiveness and little effort. On the other hand, the results of QIC have a great deal of randomness. There are just too many pictures to evaluate and the mistakes made by unexperienced or less knowledgeable reviewers often prevail for lack of attention or interest. Alvesgaspar 22:53, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

Nature and animal pics

Take up, I'd say, over 2/3 of the featured Image nominations and actual winners. They have gotten on my nerves now and they all seem to get over 90% of the vote from what I can see on the project page. People don't want to see an insect on a blade of grass day in day out. Where are the archaeological and artistic masterworks? You people are too cynical. --81.104.190.115 14:33, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

  • Are you complaining because people do not nominate good archaeological and artistic masterworks or because people nominate too many good nature photos? The forum is open to everyone to participate both as creators and reviewers (including yourself). - Alvesgaspar 16:53, 30 August 2007 (UTC)
I suppose that I am being a bit too critical, but many days I just see insects and flowers when I've seen it all before. Sure, they are good pictures and well done to the photographers, but there are more worthwhile things to see out there. I'll be more active on this project page in the future. --81.104.190.115 22:14, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Change to FPX template

Do others like the recent change to split the text over two lines? Personally, I find it makes things harder rather than easier to read. --MichaelMaggs 17:56, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

I do prefer the previous version. Lycaon 18:40, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
The reason I changed it is because I don't care about reading the explanatory introductory text every time, and I think others wouldn't either unless it was there first time reading it. I just want to pick out the reason and skip the rest. If there is a better way of doing that, please change it. Dori | Talk 18:59, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
I understand you don't care (neither do I) but the template is especially useful for first time offenders who need to read that intro. Lycaon 19:09, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
I have put it back to how it was but bolded the parameter text to make it stand out more. The only problem is that it bolds the user and time too. I think either this or back to original as i think the extra line just makes it look a bit odd, but i do understand wanting to have it easier to find the reason. Chris_huhtalk 21:37, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
The signature can be put outside the template, or alternatively, you could automatically build in the signature (not bold) of the FPXer. Lycaon 22:14, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

I like the new bold-text version. That's much better --MichaelMaggs 21:38, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

I support the bold one too. Lycaon 22:14, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

A related issue: I suggest mentioning the proper use and meaning of the template in the voting section of COM:FPC. This is where the applicable voting templates are listed. Recently, some nominators has expressed frustrations and/or confusion about the meaning and use of the template. Hithertoe, the template has only been mentioned on this talk page and thus appears unofficial. It is unlikely that newcomers see it here. -- Slaunger 19:52, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Done. --MichaelMaggs 17:22, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

That works...I have another complaint with the template. It says: "Anyone other than the nominator who disagrees may remove this template and replace with a vote in support." I think others should be able to remove it even if they don't support the nomination for FP. The reasoning is that I may not agree with the small resolution objection for example, but I still don't like the picture enough to support it. I don't like the short-circuiting as this just replaces the "The rule of the 5th day" with the "Rule of the 48 hours. Dori | Talk 22:14, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

FPX serves a different purpose than the "The rule of the 5th day". I is a necessary tool to quickly weed out the nominations that clearly do not fulfil the requirements of the guidelines. The 5th day rule removes nominations that do not gather any support due to a variety of reasons (lack of wow, unfortunate composition, etc), but that fulfil basic FP requirements. If you want to comment on a picture that has been FPX'ed, that is always possible, without removing the template. But removal should only be done when casting a serious support vote. Lycaon 04:29, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
The question is what do you do when you disagree on whether the basic requirements are fulfilled but do not think that the image is FP worthy. I believe it should still get a fair chance. Not everyone who might support it would show up during 48 hours, but they might in 5 days. Dori | Talk 05:36, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
You've got a point there, but those are borderline cases, and I think we cannot make a special rule for every flavour. Now we have three more or less delineated scenarios. If once in a blue moon a picture is judged by a less appropriate procedure, then that's bad luck. For the vast majority these three scenarios are applicable. Lycaon 05:50, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
I agree with Lycaon on this. If a picture is judged as having no realistic chance and is tagged with the template, removing it without supporting does no more than leave a hopeless picture on the list for 5 days, and negates the purpose of the template altogether. But then why not say that 'the voters might not show up in 5 days, but they could in 10'? Everything is a compromise between allowing enough time for users to vote and the need not to have hopeless pictures cluttering up the list for two weeks. Bear in mind that even though one of the reasons given may be 'too small', its unlikely that a 1600x1200 picture thus tagged will have no other problems. The template is supposed to be used - and in fact always is - for obvious cases. Those who use it don't always write a long essay on a picture's numerous flaws, though, partly to avoid giving offence and putting off a potential new contributor who generally is nominating in perfectly good faith. --MichaelMaggs 06:36, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
I'm with Dori on this. FPX shouldn't be used in borderline cases. We could replace the requirement to add "a vote in support" with a requirement to add "an explaination of why FPX is inapropriate in this case". Remember that seeing failed nominations is part of the education process for would be nominators. If we remove dead noms too quickly they don't get seen. Regards, Ben Aveling 07:40, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Antelope Canyon

Dear Team, i was diving deep into the amazing history of FP, where I found 3 pictures displaying the same locality. So i would ask for your helpful suggestions of maybe delist 1 of them? What i found out was that feb.2006 is not very sharp and jan.2005 is very noisy. feb.2006 is very simmilar to aug.2007 but showing a different spot. --Richard Bartz 23:53, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

  • jan.2005
    jan.2005
  • feb.2006
    feb.2006
  • aug.2007
    aug.2007
I don't think we should try to only have one single picture of a certain locality/subject. If it's an amazing picture it should get featured, another existing picture doesn't make it any less great. But I do agree that all three pictures are quite noisy (especially jan.2005), you can always nominate them for delisting though. -- Gorgo 01:09, 21 September 2007 (UTC)
I like the Jan05 most (noise blends with the texture IMO), and Feb06 the least. Dori | Talk 02:17, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Lost thumbnails

I think the only way to have back the lost image thumbnails is to re-upload the pictures. I have just done that with the  Info template and it worked. - Alvesgaspar 10:23, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Image:Iwami_squid_drying_DSC01868.jpg

This won't display in high-resolution for some reason - I get an error message. Is this true for anyone else? Adam Cuerden 17:13, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

I would say try emptying your browser cache and then log out and log back in. Dori - Talk 23:02, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

FP of the year 2007

Do we let this be decided and imposed upon the FP community by the two people (all credits, good job!!) who are doing all the work right now (e.g.)? Lycaon 16:19, 14 October 2007 (UTC)

  • It happened last year, remember? Alvesgaspar 19:42, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
    • Sorry for the negative comment ( but I still remeber quite well last year's contest). Well, there is only one way to influence the process positively, which is to participate in the discussion (in a organized way, if possible). If the FPC community does nothing we will have to accept a truncated FP year and other odities. Remember that we may now count with a new generation of authors (Benh, Benjamint, Dori, MJJR, Ram Man, Richard Bartz, Slaunger and many others...) who are just waiting for a sign to join the vets and start working hard... We should really applaud the enthusiasm and thank the effort of those two people, but I agree with Lycaon that the participation of some FP regulars is necessary - Alvesgaspar 23:22, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
  • If they're dedicated enough to do all the work, and they did a good job, why not? I know I can't dedicate the time so I won't be complaining. Dori - Talk 19:54, 14 October 2007 (UTC)
  • Please do take part, even if only looking over the preparation notes and commenting "looks fine", "what's the reasoning behind this?", "I would prefer X", etc. To date only five other people besides myself and Bryan have left any comments at all. POTY is a celebration of the entire FP process, it is indeed silly if FPC regulars don't participate in helping form it. But I would rather have a silly POTY than none at all, so...
    Also, this year should be relatively less work for committee-type people due to Bryan's software. Please test it out and give some feedback. --pfctdayelise (说什么?) 12:25, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

Owl pictures by benjamin

Where are the owl pictures? Was they withdrawn ? Cant find them in the archives. Vandalism?--Richard Bartz 07:36, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism by the author himself :-o. Lycaon 08:16, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

What is going on there?

I smell a election fraud. My edit is overwritten and all votes are merged together. Have a look at the history please. Is this legal ? --09:12, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

Volunteers needed

I need a little help with the FPC closing process, cause it is pretty much work to close FPCs and I dont have the time anymore to make that every day. Does anyone like to? --Simonizer 15:23, 19 October 2007 (UTC) --Simonizer 15:23, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

It is indeed quite a lot of work, and really needs to be done daily or things get stale. What we need - of course - is a bot. --MichaelMaggs 16:02, 19 October 2007 (UTC
I have asked Bryan. --MichaelMaggs 16:23, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
Maybe if we are seven of us we can take a day of the week each? Lycaon 16:05, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
A bot would be nice, but as long as we dont have one i find Lycaons proposal very good --Simonizer 16:30, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
I won't have time the next week or so, but maybe after that. I am also not entirely sure whether a bot is a good idea. A bot can not smell sock puppets, deletion of votes, etc. -- Bryan (talk to me) 20:59, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
It wouldn't need to - just do the rather tedious administrative closing actions on a case by case basis, to be run manually by the human closer. It would save a lot of time, especially for images that are promoted. --MichaelMaggs 21:15, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
  1. Count me in for a day (or more if needed) Lycaon 16:03, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
  2. One day is ok for me too --Simonizer 16:30, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
  3. I can also do one day. --Digon3 talk 20:12, 19 October 2007 (UTC)
  4. I'm not an admin and also new here but will sure help. Acarpentier 02:49, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Personal picture contests

Please help choosing my best fly (here) and bee/wasp (here) pictures. I've shoot so many that am no longer sure about their quality... The winners will be nominated to COM:FP. - Alvesgaspar 21:53, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

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