Too Big Pictures!

The very first thing on the "Add Photos" page, after the title

itself, is a link to <http://www.photo.net/photo-posting-guidelines>,

outlining the requested maximum dimensions of a picture submission.

 

It's understandable that a newcomer might overlook these guidelines.

For this reason, and because critique requests are in a semi-blind

format where previous ratings and technical details are concealed, my

until-now silent protest has been to pass over that photo thus

withholding a potentially good rating. These big pictures are

frequently good and otherwise deserving of high scores, and the

ratings I see when the next page loads are often quite high.

 

But really, it's cheating isn't it? Bigger picture files look

better, there's no denying it. I've seen shots that simply can't

deliver the goods at 600 x 800 pixels and 100kb, but at 200% to 300%

larger look stunning.

 

It takes skill to squeeze some shots into the guideline size. If I

was pursuing ratings (I'm not) I'd be disgruntled about the unfair

quality comparisons. Perhaps the next time I see an oversize shot

collecting high ratings I'll give it a 1/1 and point the author to

the "Guidelines on Allowed Number and Size of Photos" link.

 

regards, Anthony

The first thing I will say is, don't rate any photos 1/1 because of something like that. Leave a comment, but don't do any abusive ratings. You won't like the results.

 

As for your suggestion (allowing larger images)... it's not bad, but I'm almost positive a feature like that would be relegated to paying member accounts, simply because of the bandwidth/disk space issues it poses. Either way, I wouldn't care, because all of my photos are in 650px-700px wide range.

 

However, I don't see this as that much of an issue, so much that it actually effects the ratings of a photo. Except for maybe panos, or maybe the opposite (someone submits a tiny little photo and people rate it low because they can't make anything out.)

To fix something in my first reply... I said "the opposite"... but what I meant is, if a photo is at least 800x600, it's not likely to be rated significantly lower than if it were 1600x1200 (or some other, larger, size). The same is not true for photos that are 320x240 or some really small size; they MAY be rated lower than if they had been submitted at a larger size.

<I>I see an oversize shot collecting high ratings I'll give it a 1/1 and point the author to the "Guidelines on Allowed Number and Size of Photos" link.</I><P>I really dislike that comment. What does size of photo have to do with ratings. How about a comment? I could see nocking down the aesthetic rating by one simply on the careless presentation just like I would a bad scan or a bad frame. But to give some one 1/1 is simply vindictive. It appears you are on a crusade to punish those who post outside the limits. I have found that a courteous comment usually does the trick and in most cases, oversized photos are usually from new posters that are not familiar with resizing for web use. The last thing I would want to do is deter them by giving them a rating of 1/1. But, do your thing man.

"In most cases, oversized photos are usually from new posters that are not familiar with resizing for web use".

 

Well, A.J. you're not not new and you're certainly not unfamiliar with resizing for the web, so how do you justify the dimensions of the very first picture on your bio page (caption: 2160568). I reckon that you'd be wiser to leave this topic alone. But you didn't, so.... did you ever read the guidelines I referenced? Do you believe you're entitled to a bigger share of server space per photo than anyone else. I'd be more interested to know why you think your submissions should exceed photo.net's requested dimensions, than how much you dislike my comments (based as they were upon the real, actual, published PN guidelines). But if you're worried that I'll give you 1/1 ratings, don't fret I was only thinking "aloud". Still, rules are for one and all, and knowingly ignoring them has a name..... That said, I really do admire the photos of yours that I've seen, however I won't be rating them while they retain an unfair advantage.

 

Bob, I'm certain I made no suggestion that paying members should be permitted larger image file submissions. AFAIK photo.net patrons are expected to conform to the same submission guidelines as free members, but are allowed a bigger portfolio and more frequent critique requests. You argue that smaller photos won't be rated "significantly lower" than oversized ones, but that just reinforces my case. A few tenths here and there is a big issue in the top photos list, and that means a lot to the competitive natured photographers here.

 

To both Bob and A.J., no I won't spend my time commenting to photographers about oversized submissions. I'm not PN's policeman, or anyone's mother to nag them for their errors. I opened this thread to air my feelings in one place, instead of in fits and starts all over photo.net.

 

I would like to think that we are 'grown-ups' who can read the rules of a contest and follow them in a spirit of fair and equal competition.

 

regards, Anthony

Actually I've felt the urge to do the same. But really you need to leave a comment to the effect, "I've rated this 1/1 because it breaks the posting guidelines, please re-upload - do let me know when you have and I will post an objective rating".

 

However I can live without the argument that would follow, so I've never bothered.

I started a post once pondering whether there would be any way, on the server side, to

refuse an incoming upload beyond a certain set of dimensions. I don't know database

management. However, if it were possible, I think it would be a good idea. In the

meantime, I simply don't rate the picture (because I literally can't if I can't see the entire

thing), and I jot a quick comment asking for a smaller upload. It happens constantly.

James there are no such thing as an onjective ratings on PN. They are all subjective -

Originality and Asthetics are personal and not quantifiable by any Standard Measures as

you would use a measuring instruement to gather objective information or data.

 

The polite thing to do if you come across a too large photo that someone asks for a

comment/ rating, is to comment re the size. I was a recent victim of a person who felt that

they should be rude and indicate that they couldn't "honestly" rate the too large photo and

yet left a 1/1 rating. The comment would have been sufficient to correct the error on my

part. The rating from this person was clearly irrelevant.

I'm not saying that some photos aren't rated lower because they're too small even though they're at the upper width limit. But you reach the point of diminshing returns, especially when you start exceeding the width of the browser window (and if pictures were significantly larger than 800, they would, on most browsers). I know a lot of people browse at 1600x1200, but a lot more browse at 1024x768 and 800x600.

 

As for patrons-only comment, I feel that this is not enough of a problem for it to be worth it for photo.net. If they let you upload higher-resolution photos, they would have to increase the 100kb size limit (as you pointed out), and someone is going to have to pay for this. Depending on how this is implemented, current patrons or future ones might not want to pay for your ability to upload higher-resolution photos.

 

I'm not against this idea, though. It's not a bad idea and for panoramas, it would be useful.

 

And... ok... don't comment on photos regarding the guidelines. But if you leave a 1/1 for this reason, you probably won't last very long on photo.net.

Bob, I almost fully agree with your first paragraph except that, if a picture is at the upper width limit it is definitely not too small! It is, in fact, the right size even if its length exceeds the guidelines. This point is discussed in the guidelines with panoramas in mind, with the warning that the excess length would force scrolling and may annoy some viewers.

 

And I still have not suggested any change to the guidelines that would allow patrons to upload bigger pictures at any price, this idea started with you and I wish you would stop presenting it as my concept. I would be happy if the rules stayed the same and if members and patrons alike bothered to honour the rules.

 

You might notice that I already reliquished the thought of giving 1/1 ratings to any OS shot I encounter, and you shouldn't worry as I've seen nothing at all of your's that deserves low ratings in any department.

 

regards, Anthony

Ok, I see now what you're getting at, but it's because I wasn't sure where you stood on the issue from your original post. I didn't intend to pass my suggestion as your concept and hopefully no one else interpreted it that way.

 

You make a very good argument for allowing larger photos (because "at 200% to 300% larger look stunning") and I was at the understanding that you wanted the guidelines to be changed so that there are no limits on photo resolution. Thus, the reason for my comments.

 

So, basically, you want the guidelines to be enforced as rules? Or... ?

There are enough rules in the world already, so I think it would be a shame if people had to be forced to comply with the site-owners requests.

 

Something I enjoy about photo.net is the passion with which some photographers strive for ratings. The competition definitely does improve their skills, and I'm certain they value the time in the spotlight that success brings. It must be tough for them to resist pushing, even breaking through, the envelope with regard to size limits on submissions, especially when their perceived rivals have submissions in the critique system that are oversized and could be getting a few tenths of points better ratings than they would get at the 'legal' size.

 

What to do? I don't know except for what I've already done, which is to raise the matter here and appeal to members to not dishonour photo.net's generosity in giving us this venue, by ignoring their very reasonable request/requirement to limit our submission sizes.

 

regards, Anthony

It used to be that we were pretty tight on space for photos, and that was one of the reasons for the limits. But we now have loads of disk space for photos -- enough, easily, to accomodate double the number of photos as we have. So, that is no longer really a factor.

 

What is still a factor, and was the main factor even when space was an issue, was the bandwidth consumed to download large images. This is not only something which photo.net has to pay for, but very large images are also a drag to download for viewers. Furthermore, once they have arrived, large images usually don't fit in the typical browser window, and people have to scroll around, or mess about, to see the whole image.

 

If you get your image down to a size that will fit on the typical screen (which according to surveys is 800x600 pixels), then you will be treating viewers respectfully (not to mention saving photo.net on bandwidth costs.)

 

I can't believe that oversized images are treated well by raters if they have to wait a long time for them to download and then have to scroll around to see them -- even if they are a bit higher in quality. I doubt very much that people are making their images bigger to gain some rating advantage. It is just ignorance, or maybe lack of consideration for viewers with slower lines and smaller screens.

It may be too late for my question here, and perhaps I will have to start a post of my own but I will try anyway. I have 4 photos in my folder that are oversized. I have resized the originals in photoshop. I go into photo.net and when I update the image info to the downsized file, photo.net insists on using the original oversized file it already has. What am I doing wrong? I do not want the size police coming after me and I do not want to tick off any users.

 

Unfortunately the size of the jpeg files we create on our computers is not even close to the jpeg file size once it is loaded into photo.net so it is very difficult to judge exactly what the size of the file on photo.net is going to be.

John, you did not specify which version of Photoshop you use or the method you use to save the files, but if you are using any relatively recent version, you should take a look at the File > Save for Web option. This should allow you to resize your files and save them in a way that works on photo.net.

 

If you're still having problems, you may want to upload one of the offending images to your private webspace and post a text link to it from here. Then someone could check it out and figure out what the problem is.

If you don't have "Save for Web" capabilites on your editing software Brian's size suggestion is good

It is Photoshop 6 and I know it has save for web but I have not tried that yet. I was simply estimating the file size I needed when saving as a jpeg ready for uploading. Usually when I am between 300-400 K it comes out as somewhere between 50-100 k on photo.net.

 

Thank-you very much, I will see what I can do!