Photo Rating Suggestions

[vuk_vuksanovic]

John G.

 

One does not necessarily have a proper e-mail address of raters in this system. You can type in whatever you like when registering--there is no verification (not to mention how ridiculously easy it is to circumvent any problems by setting up a hotmail account).

[charles_dillon]

I agree with many of the comments already offered. While I agree that rating art on a 1-10 scale for aesthetics and originality seems a bit arbitrary, I feel that it has helped me get a better idea of what aspects of my work are preferred by the masses. I am not saying that pleasing the publics should be the goal of any artist. However, I think that knowing what aspects of my style are preferred may help me in the future should I decide to pursue a career in photography.

But having said this, I would like to add that as a result of rating the work of others on this site I have received �nasty� emails, been subjected to �attacks�(1,1 ratings on all my photos) by members who signed up for a photo.net membership on the same day that I received the nasty emails, and been falsely accused of rating my own photos.

So what is it that I see as the most logical course of action? I think that the rating system is worth having as a part of photo.net. I feel that it helps those of us just starting out to get a general idea of how we are doing, as well as serves as a useful way of filtering photos for critiquing (an activity that I usually partake in just to see what else is out there) But I think that the system could be improved by only allowing members with at least five photos in their portfolio to rate the work of others. I think that this would make it more of a pain to set up a false account. Hopefully this would make it enough of a hassle that fewer individuals would create a false profile, whether they are attempting to rate their own photos or �attack� someone else�s work. In addition, I agree that people should have to write in a comment in addition to their numeric rating of a photo, as I love when someone actually takes the time to write a comment, but I fear that this will only lead to fewer people receiving any feedback at all. I think most people are more inclined to give someone a numeric rating because it is quick and easy to do, But if they have to think of a specific comment in addition to the numeric rating they may be inclined to say �well, I�m not going to bother on this one� Perhaps we could change the categories on the numeric system to something like: COMPOSITION, TECHNICAL, ORIGINALITY, and ASTHETICS. This would allow people to get more of an idea of what was liked or disliked about their photo, while still making it easy to rate a photo.

To sum it up, whenever you allow someone to critique your work you will sometimes be delighted by the opinion and other times be disappointed. And by allowing the free exchange of email addresses on this site it will always be possible for an individual to receive nasty comments. I look at it like this, the few bad experiences I have had are the price I pay for being able to freely communicate with other photographers, view their work, and receive feedback from them. In my opinion, the price paid is well worth the goods received.

[tom_menegatos]

I disagree with the whole notion that it's only a few people abusing the system. It's obvious that a lot of the best photos and photographers aren't perkolating to the top of the list. The concept of seeing the best photographers is a good one but the methods employed now don't work.

 

At one point I bet you couldn't throw a rock at the top 50 list and not hit someone that had some sort of ratings abuse. Whether it's them rating other peoples photos much lower, creating phoney aliases and rating themselves, getting friends to rate them higher and others lower, "I've gotten 4 really good ratings on this photo after posting this 3 times to the critique forum. If I create a fake account and rate this It'll make the top photos list. Well while I'm at it might as well give it a high rating just in case." Same goes for the 11'th position that gets it applied to the top member rated page rating. It seems that some of it has been cleaned up recently now that everyone can see a photo's ratings. But that also hurt the system too. I've been in the same position Vuk's been in. Being asked to critique or at least rate someone's photos and to know they can see my ratings is tough. "Yeah I think it's a 4 but maybe we'll make it a 6 since they've been giving me a lot of 8's"

[nige_buddy]

Can we have a 'WORST 1000 Photographers' page.. I might make that one!<P>To Tony, some of us do generally ignore ratings and the Top Photographers list but can see that overall, the value of the ratings system is minimal. I would add this is probably a recent thing, brought on by a few bad eggs.<P>I've viewed a few of the portfolios in the 'good' list and once you get out of the top few, things get very average (not average and in poor, just as in nothing should be better or worse than the next one) This is all personal taste anyway, some of the folders look very ordinary to me, cause they have stuff they I don't care for.<P>As far as my own pictures go that I've uploaded, most have been loaded for a specific reason and I 'unclick' the 'rate this' option (even if it does no good). I even delete them on occasion! For stuff I want a critique on, I post elsewhere, for stuff I'm happy with, goes on my wall and then into a box.<P>P.S. I'm so far off topic that it's funny!

[mark_jacobs1]

I'd vote to drop the numbered ratings all together. If nothing else, maybe it might promote the writing of comments instead, which I find much more useful.

 

Something that I've wondered about for quite while though is this: how do you guys pick out the photos of the week out of the hundreds of photos that come in per week. Is it by the top rated and then filter from there? Or top viewed and start from there? Or how about how the photos are chosen to be displayed on the opening page... which numbers determine that? Just something to consider in case it was by ratings... maybe it's time to rethink how that is done.

[gauthier]

I'm very new in this community, but I've used the rating system quite a bit and find it useful overall. First, it's great way to look at all kind of different pictures, with different styles, etc, in a few simple clicks. Second, I like my work being rated - it gives me an idea of what works and what doesn't. True, comments are better. But they are more time-consuming so you can't expect to receive so many. And many of us don't speak English as a first language and have a hard time expressing complicated ideas.

 

In my opinion, current problems stem from competition (top-rated photographers and the like). Remove that a much of the incentive to cheat is lost.

 

Many suggestions are excellent. I'm not sure about reduced scales, but limiting ratings to one picture a week per photographer insures that only the best stuff will be shown. Also, photographers who don't post anything should not rate. I often check the picture of those who gave me very high or very low ratings. If I get a good one from a guy who posted great pictures, I'm very happy. If I get a bad rating from a guy with awful photos, I don't take it very seriously. But when I get a bad or even a good rating from someone who posted nothing, I don't know what to think.

 

The idea of an "interesting" or "worthy of notice" rating to make up lists of pictures worth seing seems nice and it should be tried.

 

Some people here think that only our very best pictures should be posted, that 5 pictures per photographer, for instance, should be a limit. I don't agree. First I don't necessarily KNOW what are my best pictures. Some that I didn't like so much got me very positive comments here. Maybe they were better than I thought, after all. Also, if the object of comments is to provide a tool for amateurs to improve, then it's obvious that even not-so-good photos should be posted. Finally, when I like a picture very much, I often check the portfolio of the guy who made it. When there are a lot of pictures, you find variations on the same theme, other ideas, etc, that are often a good source of inspiration. Please don't ban the pictures from the photo site!

[vuk_vuksanovic]

<i>"I've viewed a few of the portfolios in the 'good' list and once you get out of the top few, things get very average (not average and in poor, just as in nothing should be better or worse than the next one)" --Nige Buddy</i>

<br><br>

You either have no taste or (as I suspect) have made far too little effort. Have a look at: <br>

<a href="/photodb/top-rated-photographer-photos?user_id=259813">this,</a><br>

<a href="/photodb/top-rated-photographer-photos?user_id=292183">this</a><br>

<a href="/photodb/top-rated-photographer-photos?user_id=335793">and this</a><br><br>

All below the 200 mark.<br><br>

While compiling the URLs, I noticed Jo Voets climbed 20 spots--perhaps due to references in this thread.

<br><br>

On another note, I think the elves have cleaned up a considerable amount of "false account" rating damage tonight, at least as far as my portfolio is concerned (and Tom's to some extent). This is the sort of thing we need to make it fair. For those who don't understand why photographers would be extremely upset about (or find it difficult to ignore) nasty, vindictive and fabricated ratings of their work, I suggest you consider an extended trip to a Mediterranean country to (re)learn what it means to be human and passionate.

[dennisdixson]

It's always interesting to hear all the different points of view. I am disapointed with the rating system mainly because it does not give me the kind of feedback I want. After reading the posts I have concluded that people must have very different motivations in life than I do. I take photographs mostly for my own pleasure as I had imagined many other people here do. It's not that critical to me what others think of my work (or play). Sometimes it is nice to connect with people who have some of the same interests as me and even those who have different ones. I am mostly here for enjoyment and inspiration. Too bad some people see this forum as a competition.

[harry]

I found photo.net early this year, when I was searching for

information on cheap digital cameras. A few cameras and lots

of money later, I read photo.net now about every day. Photo.net

has been my primary instructor for learning photography. I have

posted a few photos, and appreciate the little bit of feedback I've

received. I've gotten ratings I don't agree with, and some I do.

Maybe my perspective would be different if I was a pro, but to me,

if you're offended by a crappy rating, then you're into photography

for the wrong reasons. I've gotten photos back from a lab, that

made the people there honestly say "wow", and then had them

rated pretty poorly on photo.net. Guess what, both are valid

ratings. I have put a lot of time, effort, and money into my

photography, and some of it is good, and some of it really sucks,

and not everyone is going to agree on which category each piece

is going to belong to. I do think the ratings system could be

improved. The category of "originality" doesn't do much for me.

For me the challenge of good photography is maintaining both a

high level of, and a balance of, technical skill and artistic

expression. I think the ratings system should be geared more

towards those two things. Making comments mandatory with a

rating, I think would just reduce the number of ratings, and I don't

think that's productive. I do think that making a comment

mandatory for an extreme rating would be good. Rating a photo

1-3 and 8-10 should require an explanation of the rating from the

critic. This would hopefully cut down on the number of casual

1's and 10's. I don't think any system will completely eliminate

ratings noise like self-rating or revenge raters. Anyway, that's my

opinion. Many thanks to the photo.net community, and to Phil, for

making such a great resource for me.

[andy_graham]

i simply meant in averaging....the low ratings would be there just not used in the average.....i do not comunicate very well sometimes..well ok almost never......

[hassel weems]

I think that making a comment a requirement for any numerical rating would help, then let the owner of the photo remove any comments/ratings he desires. Hopefully, most Photo.netters will be mature enough not to just delete a rating because it hurts their feelings, but only because the content of the post is somthing like "your feet stink and so does your camera."<p>

Do away with the top rated photographers page, but have a page where I can filter for highly rated individual pictures - for that day where I just want to find a few good shots to help better my photographic vision.<p>

[nige_buddy]

Vuk, a few is a few.. ie. not many. But since you've decided to bring up specifics here's my summary on your examples<P>

<a href=http://www.photo.net/photodb/top-rated-photographer-photos?user_id=259813>1</a> - Nice B&W's... otherwise garlish manipulated colours, including that Red Ball POW!<P>

<a href=http://www.photo.net/photodb/top-rated-photographer-photos?user_id=292183>2</a> - Excellent!<P>

<a href=http://www.photo.net/photodb/top-rated-photographer-photos?user_id=335793>3</a> - couple of interesting ones...<P>

As far a 'no taste' I have my tastes, you have your's and I don't pretend to tell the world what your tastes should be.<P>

Now, how about you look at...<P>

<a href=http://www.photo.net/photodb/top-rated-photographer-photos?user_id=284075>a</a><P>

<a href=http://www.photo.net/photodb/top-rated-photographer-photos?user_id=150495>b</a><P>

<a href=http://www.photo.net/photodb/top-rated-photographer-photos?user_id=290224>c</a><P>

 

All above your listed ones...

 

P.S. <I>c</I> was humour!

[howard_anderson1]

In addition to aesthetics and originality, add a third catagory to be rated - CONTENT.

[lyndon]

I'm in favour of the ratings system, despite the increasing abuse (which I think could be greatly lessened by implementing some of the ideas already posted; disabling the ability to rate your own photos, having some sort of 'Slashdot-esque' logic involved, etc).

 

As someone already said, the "top rated photos" from the previous week/month etc is, for me, the best thing about the site because you do get some great photos in there that would otherwise be hard to find. The volume of images on this site necessitates some sort of numerical ratings system to find good images.

 

While the Top-Rated Photographers" page does promote a negative competitive aspect, the ratings system that drives it does at least give you quick access to some undeniably good portfolios - e.g. with a comments-only system, it would be much harder to come across the likes of Tony Dummett, Dan Heller, David Julian - all 3 are regulars in the Top 10 or Top 20 and this is a fair reflection of their ability as photographers, IMHO. That's not a defence of the Top-Rated Photographers' page, but a vote for the ratings system.

 

When I first came to Photo.net 6 months ago, I spent hours refreshing the home page to view the randomly-generated photos that came up because you knew that they had either been hand-picked by the elves or were there because they were consistently highly rated. Again, another vote for ratings because, overall, the standard of these shots is high.

 

Restricting the number of photos that a user can upload per day / week is a good idea and might prompt people to only post their best images.

 

Restricting rating / commenting rights to new users should be based o

on length of membership as opposed to portfolio content because there are some, like me, who haven't got their portfolios scanned yet but enjoy commenting and rating photos.

 

I'm rambling now, but you get the drift. I think the ratings abuse should be the number one target, not the system itself, because that is plainly against the spirit of Photo.net as a whole. But if you are going to change the system, we do need more criteria to rate by than just Aesthetics and Originality. Personally, I'd take Originality way completely; how many truly original photos are there left?

[GerrySiegel]

Rajeev,you ask "what to do with the photo ratings systems?" One arguable option is scrap it. And that is still on the table I see. They do it with laws once in a while in a democracy. Die after a time unless someone reestablishes value and reenact. Back to zero, make it justify against objective and operating cost.(So,lets see if I got a few opinions clearly. Tony and Tom, both experienced and vocal gents- and venerable and prolific photographers,-like or favor the system and use to their benefit). Stirred their confidence even. Some others just LIKE it and its now part of the family and not to be flushed down the drain. Voted to tweak it. (Rajeev wants to know what parts to tweak, but that is coming out) Tony says the comments he sees are pretty blase throwaways. Hmm.Are they insufficient perhaps to the majority of critiqueniks. Another issue Rajeev? And,- hope I paraphrase riht,Tony,-heck-we may meet in a taverna one day over a Fosters :-)- You wouldn't hire a job applicant based on a blabby reference without looking at numerical grades. OTOH Dave sees numerical grades have been prostituted in academia. Another poster: even pianists are rated numerically. The credibility there is I believe is that the judges are qualified,selected, confer and their results are not usually all over the scoreboard. I think this is not a poo poo item Michael and hope a few more users come in with some persuasive reasons on what they get out of numericals. I have no doubt les elves can manage-away some of the more egregius abuses.Aside to Michael: Personally, Mike I set up a portfolio for some examples of my work. I haven't posted in the critique for own good reasons. But I critique regularly when I find a shot interesting. You may want to use your workspace page to put up things you aren't submitting for competition. And competition and the "high" it entails is not to be dismissed. Just kind of feel that broad participation from an anonymous lot is not the best way to enter a competition for excellence.I could be wrong on that. Popularity maybe which has its own logic. Even Bush's pollmeisters use a random sampling process tho.)Thanks photonetskys for listening to us all. GS

[fabgo]

The rating system that is currently here on Photo.net might be simple and flawed, but it is also easy and fast. People are lazy, and the vast majority of uploaded pictures never get even a simple rating.

 

Removing the rating system or forcing people to leave comments will drastically reduce the number of photographs that get an expressed opinion from the already low rate.

 

I believe that in order to keep the level of feedback level high, a very simple rating system is needed. I would even suggest removing the originality/cleverness rating and only retain an overall rating for the photograph. Especially since members often confuse what exactly they are voting for. I believe this rating needs to be numeric, if for no other reason than to make it easy to compute an average.

 

In addition, I would suggest that a list of check boxes be added below the numeric rating, allowing members to leave quick feedback on a photograph. These check boxes might contain entries like "No foreground", "Weak composition", "Lack of depth", or any list of maybe ten items that capture the most basic problems with a photograph (I'm no expert, so don't put too much weight on my choice of examples). And at the bottom, a comment field would allow members to add further comments.

 

Most photographs on this site are by definition average, and often suffer from at least one, if not several, basic flaws. A simple suggestion, by checking off one or comment entries, might go a long way for the learning photographer. And for the well executed photograph free from obvious flaws, the comment field at the bottom leaves room for more subtle suggestions.

 

The checklist also serves as a reminder to the viewer to evaluate the photograph with a critical eye, and might inspire the viewer to write further comments, achieving the goal so often mentioned in this thread: more comments on posted photographs.

[werner_van_der_cruyssen]

Don't have time to read the entire thread so perhaps this was said before, but here's my opinion:

 

1. Introduce some form of ID check (such as entering a valid credit card number and checking the name). This will slow down bogus user registrations. While you're at it, make it possible do donate money via those credit cards (don't want to use PayPal in Europe).

 

2. If it were up to me, drop the rating system because the figures don't really mean a thing. If you want to keep the ratings, make it possible for people to turn them off. And thirdly, if someone submits a rating, it should at least be commented.

[vadim_makarov]

I can'r say for the whole thing, but here are two suggestions.

 

<ul>

<li>

With critique or rating system, it is important to maintain high ratio of people wanted to comment or rate to the number of works submitted. You should set limits necessary to maintain this ratio, the harsher the better.

 

<p>

 

For instance, one image <strong>per month</strong> for critique sounds like the right number to me. Then the works submitted will get a decent review, and it will be more interesting to go through them. Also, there should be a limit of, say, 15 images per three months where you can uncheck the box "not to be submitted for critique".

 

<p>

 

<li>

There should be checks hindering creation of multiple accounts. One thing that comes to mind is IP check. If somebody wants to create a new account from IP already actively used by two or more accounts (show him these accounts), let him explain the reason (e.g. "this is the proxy server for our 10,000 employees corporation") and wait for manual review of his answer by elves. No 100% reliable check is possible, but I believe simply having basic checks in place will clean things up radically. Hopefully this won't be much burden if the checks are sufficiently lax.

 

</ul>

 

I think it would be a bad idea to completely <em>remove</em> a service, e.g. ratings, top list, critique. You should only modify them, preserving if possible already accumulated information.

[nigel_nagarajan]

Get rid of the numerical rating system, keep the comments. In addition to Photo of the Week, introduce a Portfolio of the Week. That way, it will be easier to spot the aspiring Tony Dummetts and Daniel Bayers who haven't made it to the top of the Member Rated page.

[martin_fahey]

Keep the ratings system - currrently the only filter for those like me who can only make very short visits to the forum, and don't have time to wade through all that's submitted. Perhaps clarify the ratings system - eg: 1: absolutely no merit; 2: barely adequate beginner's effort; 3: promising amateur effort; 4: hey, this is starting to be interesting; 5: worth submitting to local photo contest; 6: etc

 

Vadim Makarov had some good suggestions. Particularly that regarding checking IP addresses to prevent bogus flooding. However, hotmail-type email addresses would not be amenable to checking using this? Also his suggestion for limiting the number submitted has merit.

 

Earlier poster mentioned everyone having a "photos I like" section. I think this would be fantastic if it included reasons for liking them. Then we beginners could really start to understand.

 

Perhaps also, if egos permitted, a section on "photos that are good but get no cigar" for some simple technical or other reason - photos with a flaw that has ruined an otherwise good shot.

[tom_menegatos]

IP addresses aren't worth the trouble. The majority of service providers use dynamic addressing for their clients. Most major networks only have a small number of shared external ip addresses for thousands of users. On my home dsl line there have been plenty of times I've had for computers and users online at the same time. Not to mention this other stupid thing I did for a couple of friends that somehow got public and people were using my proxy for god knows what :(

[mealha]

I think that the more complete information of the member contributions, the better. We would spot manipulation/orientation easily.

Suggestion: Lower the number of ratings per day on the same member?

[mark_crame1]

Comments. At least you know how your image is perceived.

 

Possibly rating as poor, reasonable, average, good, very good. (but more relevant photographic terms) on SPECIFIC things - perhaps technical competence, aesthetic qualities, and one more.

 

Possibility of applying to have certain ratings/raters removed/blocked from your images if you feel they are abusing the system (not just because they think your work is not very good - its easy to see how they generally score people)

 

Remove the element of competition - this is not about winning prizes as far as I am aware (or perhaps I missed something?)

 

Thats my 2 pence worth (Sterling) for now. But, a question, what does everyone have against hotmail addresses? I am a Hotmail user, I have (too many!) pics uploaded, have been here a little while (and visiting a LOT longer)

[vadim_makarov]

I don't know how bad the situation with dynamic IPs is, but a photo.net can collect IP profile of the member, i.e. the set of IP addresses he's accessing from, with number of visits from each address. To reduce server load, IP can be recorded only when the member contributes something (a vote, posting, etc.).

<p>

Then it would be possible to publish a statement like this:

<blockquote>

<em>This account shares IP profile with these members who also voted on the same photos (and had no other contribution than voting, had skewed/discrete distribution of votes, etc.)...</em>

</blockquote>

<p>

Checking distribution of votes is another way to spot possible abuse, i.e. if low and high votes prevail in the distribution.

<p>

Of course, it would be more fun to devise a system that wouldn't require such police-style enforcements (not very efficient anyway), but self-regulate. Hopefully we can find the system that is perceived as fair by the majority and that nobody feels urge to abuse.

[tmjacobs]

I have read many times that the comments are considered of (much) more use than the ratings, but the fact is it takes a lot of time to write a good comment. Therefore the number of ratings is much, much higher. I have a few photos with 25 or more ratings and only 1 or 2 comments. Doing away with the rating system will therefore give a lot of photographers very little or no feedback - I don't expect the number of comments will increase after the rating system stops. Of course what you learn from these ratings is very much a personal thing, but for myself I have definitely learned from it and I certainly wouldn't want to miss it - despite the few problems it is experiencing.

 

A few alterations I would suggest: increase the number of photos needed for a listing from 3 to 10 (that has been suggested earlier). Also I would suggest that only the 10 best photos (with >10 ratings)in someone's portfolio are used to calculate the average. (but still all the photos with >10 ratings are shown)

The reason for this is: there are quite a few photographers with very good photos in their portfolio but their average is lowered by their 'lesser' photos. Some choose to delete the photos that get lower ratings, others don't and that seriously influences one's ranking. For instance: if I was to delete all but my best 3 photos my rating would go from 11.78 to (app.) 12.7 getting me to no. 20 - a place where I definitely don't belong :(