Commons:Photography critiques/November 2009

November

Young Muslim woman in the Thar desert, India

does this picture have any chance of being featured on commons, or quality images? any issues?--Paulrudd (talk) 00:02, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Good shot! I would support both nominations. As for the issues, I think there's slight chromatic aberation at the top of the wall behind her (especially on the left), you might want to fix it before nominating. You should also geocode. --Yerpo (talk) 07:52, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Done--Paulrudd (talk) 10:31, 11 November 2009 (UTC)

Boro Hall

I have never put my pix for comment or praise, but am pleased with this one and wonder if it might qualify as a "quality image". Jim.henderson (talk) 19:10, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Yes, a nice photograph. Before I start with a critique, I should say that what Commons considers a good photo is not quite the same as whether it is a good photo artistically. By which I mean we have a preference for illustrative photos, rather than aesthetic photos. So to illustrate a building the preference is for good lighting, little shadow. Also as it is an architectural work there is generally a push to have distortion inherient in using a camera lens on an angle, corrected. So people will ask that not only are horizontal and vertical lines actually exactly horizontal and vertical, but also barrel distortion and perspective effects be 'corrected' - so that straight edges are not curved and so the building doesn't get smaller towards the top. These changes can be readily achieved in many photo editing programs. Some also like to avoid the 'snapshot' look of having people in the shot, although sometimes they are good for scale, and sometimes un-avoidable.

Also the image has a reasonable resolution of 3,732 × 2,626 but is only about 1Mbyte in size which suggested that it has been compressed too far - generally best to use the highest quality setting available (so not just highest resolution, but least compression (usually termed highest 'quality')). I think the compression shows up in blotchyness of the sky and a slight halo around sharp transitions (eg the edges of the clock tower) when viewed at full resolution.

So a lot of small changes you could make to impress QI or FP reviewers, have a look at some of the other reviews and changes made to similar architectural nominations :-) --Tony Wills (talk) 21:25, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks; this is exactly what I need. Well, it is bad news in the sense of discouraging a notion I had, but better to understand what's happening than to suffer mysterious failure. For the lighting, I was delighted at the way the Sun was giving the en:Portico all the glory while the rest of the building hid in shade, but yes, I see that this seriously impares its power to illustrate the building. I'll put the pic into Category:Porticus (how come Commons spells it differently?) in case true architectural technical mavens might think it useful to illustrate their work.

I have little experience in correcting geometry, and the failures of my small efforts make me suspect I lack the knack. My picture of the en:Islamic Center of New York was greatly improved when someone who understands that art adjusted it properly.

Yes, I originally intended this, like all my pictures, for an article, a purpose which is not impaired by compressing away two thirds of the Megabytes to speed the upload through my slow DSL connection. Only after it was sent did I start thinking, y'know, this has some of the qualities of a picture that goes in a picture book. Were I serious about entering the "quality image" league, I would dig up the orginal, apply all that you've told me, and enter it for judgement. However, inexperience would make it a slow and uncertain process, using scarce brainpower that would better be applied to making pix good enough to illustrate a dozen currently unillustrated local geography articles. As it is, it hasn't been developed into a proper picture book picture, while the sun angle that pleased me keeps it from becoming a precisely informative illustration of the building.

Thanks again; if other activities eventually lead me painlessly to the required skills I might make a serious run at it, but now I understand that a different direction will lead to more fun for me and more useful pictures for the Wikiworld. Jim.henderson (talk) 22:05, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

The people are actually nice. The pictures worst flaw IMO is the cropping at the bottom. --Dschwen (talk) 22:14, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks; I too thought a bit of humanity was a good feature. I visit this area once or twice most months and took many pix, with and without people. Anyway I've been doing urban and suburban exploring and geography for half a century, and it seems most Wikiphotographers aren't as good at it as I am. On the other hand I've only been doing photography and photo editing for two years, and it seems Wiki is flush with people who are better at those things than I am. So, my main intended direction is to build on my strength, to go where others don't go, and get pix they don't get. Back home on the computer, I'll loosen up on compression, and pay more attention to geometry in editing. Most important, or at least most relevant to the kinds of questions that surround "quality images", when a future picture strikes me as having potential in this direction I shall also upload the camera-produced original, so more skillful picture editors can work on fresh material if they think it worthy of their efforts. Jim.henderson (talk) 00:05, 7 November 2009 (UTC)