I think this is just such a superb way to commemorate a sculptor. Plus, the engraving is based on a photo, but has survived far better than the photo has, so we get the best of both worlds.
Proposed caption
Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux was a 19th-century French sculptor and painter who sought to inject movement and spontaneity into his works. This engraving, done to commemorate him after his death, shows his sculpture Flore below him, and others of his works above. In his time, some of his works, particularly La Danse, were criticised as indecent, but today his sculptures are exhibited in major museums of art worldwide.
Support as a beautiful print that encyclopedically illustrates the sculptor. On the issue of caption, do you happen to know what works this print depicts, specifically? If so, it would be good to have that on the image description page and in the proposed caption. Enuja(talk)06:43, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I can find images of the works online, so I do know they're his. The bottom set was used on a French postage stamp commemorating him, for instance. But I can't find anywhere that gives the names. Vanished usertalk09:56, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If it helps, I THINK the two recumbant figures are his figures of Science (left) and agriculture (right), but I can't find any good reproductions of them, only what appear to be early studies for them, or works based on them. Vanished usertalk23:05, 28 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. I don't find the tribute composition to be encyclopedic (and it looks terribly messy in the article). I would prefer just a photo or even a crop of this engraving showing the sculptor alone. Mangostar (talk) 18:46, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Conditional Support either upon removal of some of the more obvious fuzzy black spots around the scan (looking at the peripherals), or a good explanation, bringing up something like artist's intent, as to why they should stay.D-rew20:40, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That revision fix it? I'm actually somewhat surprised I hadn't done that already - I generally edit out the paper texture unless it's direct from the original, and most of what I find that's PD can't be scanned directly - it's in a library reference section, etc. Vanished usertalk20:54, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No other such detailed picture of the flower available on wikipedia.
Proposed caption
Ocimum tenuifolium (known as Holy basil in English, and Tulasi in Sanskrit), is a well known aromatic plant in the family Lamiaceae. Apart from its culinary uses, for which it is known across the world, it is also used as a medicinal plant, and has an important role within many traditions of Hinduism, wherein devotees perform worship involving Tulasi plants or leaves
Neutral. I find the spiderweb distracting and I think it could safely be photoshopped out without affecting the encyclopedic nature (except perhaps positively) of the shot. Good composition though. --Dante Alighieri | Talk20:15, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose both Very hash and distracting flash lighting. Composition really is meh at best; the crop is very tight, and given the size of the flowers relative to the entire frame, I want to see the entire plant, not just this part. thegreen J Are you green?21:36, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If I take the entire plant, the flower itself will not be in much detail. The plant is after all, about a meter tall. I think the crop is fine. The whole of the flower is perfectly showing. Muhammad Mahdi Karim (talk) 10:14, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose edit 1. The web hasn't been edited out well, and there's no reason to do so. I'd oppose original too, due to harsh lighting. Sorry. —Pengo11:33, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose both: Edit 1 is very poorly retouched, both are very poorly lit. As ever, fine encyclopedic photographs of above-average quality, just not FP quality due to issues already mentioned above. Have you ever considered using bounce flash? This and other hot tips are always available at WP:PPR.. --mikaultalk15:29, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support edit 2 I disagree with Pengo - the lighting doesn't appear to bother me, it helps show the detail. I also disagree with thegreen. The crop is just fine shows the detail. If you need to see the entire plant, look up the entire plant. Good picture. job —Preceding comment was added at 16:38, 28 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose bothSorry. While "No other such detailed picture of the flower available on wikipedia" is a reason that this is a valuable contribution to the encyclopedia (it undoubtedly is, I agree), it alone is not reason enough for this picture to be FP. Technically, the biggest problem I have with this picture is that a large portion of the subject is overexposed; the affected flowers contain no detail. Yes, there are good examples of the flower at the top, but the overall quality of the picture is compromised b/c of the blown highlights in the lower half. Moreover, the picture is compositionally weak: too tight in the upper right and bottom left corners, with awkward empty space in the other two corners. Finally, a minor issue, but is the entire stalk considered one flower, or is each small flower on the stalk in the picture considered an individual flower? If the latter is the case, zooming in on one flower, or maybe a macro, would've been the better choice IMO. --Malachirality (talk) 21:49, 28 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your informative comments. It is indeed true that some parts are blown out. However, I disagree with you about the crop. I think the picture gives some kind of a feeling, the way it is with the two corners tight and the other two blank. The entire stalk contains many flowers, inflorescence. Muhammad Mahdi Karim (talk) 18:28, 29 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Composition is interesting and very good (just a slight quibble with the leaves cut at the bottom); the diagonal framing is something different and eyecatching. Good details in the flowers despite the brightness; I'd like to see what you could do with a camera where you had more control of the flash. --jjron08:16, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original. Triple H ring entrance sequence at 2s intervals.
Reason
Following the recent (failed) nominations of a couple of wrestling photos I thought a highly active topic on Wikipedia with well over 3,000 articles should have an FP, so picked up a ticket for a rare WWE house show in Melbourne to see what I could get. Well it’s certainly not easy, trying to capture fast action in low light from a considerable distance, through the crowd, and with no option of moving around, getting closer, using a tripod, etc.
I think I did pretty well with these pics. They're something quite unique, and would make a great addition to our sadly lacking sports (and sports entertainment) FPs.
It has high encyclopaedic value as Triple H has been one of the biggest names in wrestling for over a decade (an 11 time World Champion), and is captured here performing his iconic ring entrance pose. Even amongst the hundreds of professional Triple H photos on the official WWE site, IMO there's nothing on his entrance that comes near this.
I’m nominating a multishot sequence taken at 2s intervals which gives a real feel for the darkened arena, strobing coloured lights, and action as my favourite for overall encyclopaedic value. Another option would be to extract just one of these images from the sequence, such as this classic pose, or to go for this closely related image now serving on request in the Triple H infobox.
Personally I think these images have already staked a strong claim for FP status, having elicited compliments, further image requests, and even a barnstar from regular wrestling editors within a couple of days of going into the article – surely this type of reaction is the definition of what an FP should be? And please remember that this is sports action photography, not a portrait.
Support Great work, it definitely shows something important to the subject. The shots are all quality as well. But don't say "the WWE" in the caption. It's not "the World Wrestling Entertainment." Just "WWE." Tromboneguy0186 (talk) 14:45, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Wow, that does look like a tough situation to get a featured picture out of. I think the combination of photos, however, is just too difficult to look at because of the different lighting situation in each. Also, to get the combo image featured, I think each image should be high resolution, and they aren't. I was hoping to be able to support the "classic pose" individual shot, but it's simply too grainy at full resolution. I wish I could support it, but, despite the real difficulty in creating a good image in that situation and despite how really useful those images are to the articles, I can't support any of them. Enuja(talk)23:30, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose because different light is distracting. Would think about supporting a crop of third frame, because of the images power.D-rew (talk) 03:34, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support There is no way that such pictures of Triple H's ring entrance be taken in perfect lighting. Per the reasons mentioned in the nomination I support this nomination. H92110 (talk) 11:05, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
File:Triple-H-Spritz-Temp.jpgSpritz. The part of entrance spraying water referred to by Spedukmak (thanks for clarifying Mshake3) - now that's bad lighting. These are the conditions I'm working with, but I'm sure others would do better. jjron
Hold on a minute, I don't think this is his "iconic ring entrance". As far as I know, his iconic ring entrance is he gets up in the middle of the ring apron -- equidistant from two turnbucles and directly facing the main TV camera (for televised shows) -- and does a similar move but with a water bottle in his hand and sprays water in the air. That, I would love to see a photo sequance of. This pose up on the turnbuckle is a bit later and I don't know if he always does this. Am I right about this or is my memory just bad? Spebudmak (talk) 04:32, 28 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yep, that's correct, although I would say that this part of the entrance is always done as well, so it is part of the "iconic ring entrance." Of course, him standing on the stage with the varying light, such as this, is also part of it. Basically, it's one heck of an entrance. Although I would say this four-image set would work better with the waterbottle part you described above. Mshake3 (talk) 17:12, 28 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Given the circumstances I doubt you could ever get much better lighting (per H92110); and there are no other major flaws. The reasons given by the nominator are sufficient for me. CillaИ ♦ XC04:04, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, to get to the point, opposes based on poor lighting are just daft. This is the lighting, and for me to bring a spotlight along to change that would be unencyclopaedic, as well as obviously impossible. To complain of varied exposures (just plain wrong, these were full manual with identical exposures), or of the changing lighting, both probably indicate the nom hasn't been read or comprehended. Images meet resolution requirements and the sequence as a whole is miles above; I have higher res, but that's pretty irrelevant. Of course I suppose some people will just automatically oppose anything wrestling related, regardless, which is rather what I expected. --jjron (talk) 11:10, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You could be right; I had an earlier darker, blurrier one where I think he was actually spraying it, but I was waiting for the lighting to get better. I think he may have just finished here going on the angle of his head. --jjron08:19, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose I agree that the subject needs an FP, this is not it, (yet.) Focusing on a single picture would probably have better effect. I like the Infobox picture, but the shadow across the chest might exclude it. --RoninBKTC03:02, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A Green Grass-Dart Skipper Butterfly, Ocybadistes walkeri, perched on a succulentAlternative 1
This image works well on a number of levels IMO, it is of high technical quality and enc value but also has strong aesthetic elements too. The DOF off the leaf edge creates a pleasing effect as it merges into the background as it moves out of focus. That coupled with a nice off centre composition and pleasing colours makes quite a nice photograph IMO
I respect your votes regarding the DOF, but keep in mind the technical limitations of macro photography due to the effects of diffraction. I also think that the relatively limited DOF works well in the first as I mentioned before, but at any rate significantly better DOF is not really possible. --Fir000200:29, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original – marginally, as the focussed detail seems to be less well defined than the alt. Unlike the alt, which doesn't work due to the huge upfront OOF area, the original has a lot of appeal, drawing the eye in and along the body towards the eye. I'd love to see a bigger version to quash my doubts, but understand the constraints. A good, honest macro shot, I like it :o) --mikaultalk14:17, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment May I please suggest to add to the description page of each image the link to another image in the "Other Versions" tab. IMO every image adds value to another image and it would be nice to link them together.--Mbz1 (talk) 16:20, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Original, oppose alt. Although optimally more of the wing and thorax would be in focus, the detail and sharpness on the head is enough for me to support. But per Mick, the large OOF wing near the center of the alt is really distracting. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Malachirality (talk • contribs) 00:38, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually no, my image shows how the skippers eyes looked perfectly (based on what I saw with my eyes of the butterfly). I hate to say it but yours are blurry and lack detail. --Fir000221:05, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A fine cartoon by a famous Victorian artist. And it's not from the Entr'acte, so I bypass THAT hassle. By the way, the person on the left is Mr. Punch, the Punch mascot.
Proposed caption
When William Henry Smith, was promoted to First Lord of the Admiralty by Britain's Queen Victoria, there was some surprise: He was the owner of the WH Smith chain of newsagents and booksellers, and had served ten years as a politician. Of naval experience, he had none. Gilbert and Sullivan would satirise him mercilessly in H.M.S. Pinafore, with a character given a lengthy song satirising Smith's life that ended: "Stick close to your desks, and never go to sea / And you all may be rulers of the Queen's Navee!" and which gave him the nickname "Pinafore Smith". However, the satire began before thin: This Punch cartoon dates from soon after his promotion.
Comment. Good scan of a helpful illustration, but it's basically a cartoon. The William Henry Smith also includes a (poorly scanned) etching or photograph which I assume is a more accurate depiction. If the purpose of the illustration is to illustrate, for encyclopedia purposes, what the guy looked like, then is a caricature the best possible representation (especially when we know that better representations of this guy exist? This is more of a policy question than a critique of this specific image. Spikebrennan (talk) 14:16, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As with the Entr'acte nom currently down the page somewhere, these illustrations are much more enc for the magazine they come from than the characters they represent, IMO. Many of these old caricatures are eerily accurate-looking while the photography of the day was a little staid and posed, but the skill of the artist is what they illustrate best, and there were few publications as good as Punch in it's day. I'd say this was probably mis-nominated, as perhaps was the Entr'acte one.--mikaultalk14:32, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
However, I think this is a fine example of public perception of Smith at the time, which was distilled into W. S. Gilbert's satire of him in H.M.S. Pinafore. Even if not the most accurate portrayal of Smith, it's certainly useful for H.M.S. Pinafore - it even echoes the line "But when the breezes blow / I generally go below / And seek the seclusion which a cabin grants..." Adam Cuerdentalk15:29, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
AT&T's lines and metallic circuit connections. March 1, 1891. Note: The map shows the communication lines in orange. On the folded cover is the statement "500 miles and return in 5 minutes. The mail is quick; telegraph is quicker; but Long Distance Telephone is Instantaneous and you don't have to wait for an answer." On the back of the map is a list of public pay stations.
Weak oppose and your compression comment is what make me think about this... I think this information would be better presented on a vector map made from this source. While this map is interesting, I don't think an old map scan is the best way to present this information. grenグレン09:12, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't really see the importance of the map--more the information on it... but, maybe I'm wrong... so, I'll just leave mine as a comment, not an oppose. Also, don't lose quality--for that I would oppose. grenグレン08:01, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Conditional supportIt needs squaring up, ie a small clockwise rotation and crop. Please don't compress it. If anything, make a downsampled version (2000x1500 or something) to provide a viewable copy for those with slow connections and short tempers and link to it from the image page. Great scan of v interesting historical doc in good condition, which I'll support if it gets the crop. --mikaultalk13:40, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support if it gets the crop and rotate MlckStephenson suggests. It's an encyclopedic image of a real document that adds to the section of the article its in, plus it's cool! No compression needed, no SVG; promote the pretty picture of the document! Enuja(talk)00:02, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose per gren, who should have stuck to her guns. I see little value in having the old map, when it is extremely hard to read, especially in thumbnail. I would much prefer a new svg version for clarity. Mangostar (talk) 18:41, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Sure I guess it's kind of interesting enough (as most old maps are), especially if you're into the history of the US telephone services, but there's nothing there that screams FP, i.e., no 'wow'. Colours are drab, quality isn't great, and the info thereon is both limited and rather specialised. --jjron08:11, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Good encyclopaedic value, but the the (surpisingly) rough manner in which the orange/red lines were drafted onto the base map kills it for me as an FPC. --Melburnian03:47, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It couldn't get much more encyclopedic. You have the before and after, and the image is high quality, sharp, and high resolution.
Proposed caption
This reproduction of a 1900 minstrel show poster, originally published by the Strobridge Litho Co., shows the blackface transformation from white to "black".
Support (edit 1)Really nice, iconic image. On the plus side, the colors are fresh and vibrant, the object is in near-mint condition. However the fact that there's a legend in the lower right corner that is illegible is a let-down. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 02:40, 28 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I actually was about to get rid of it, but didn't want to mess up the coloring on the guy's cheek. If I remember, I'll work on it later. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-11-29 13:56Z
Yep. I support either. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-11-30 16:01Z
You can't do that in two separate votes - you either need to change the original vote to 'Support either' and cross out this one, or cross out the original vote and make this one 'Support either'. What if everyone just kept re-voting willy-nilly every time a new edit went up? Not very fair on other users or the closer, and as I've said, not the way it's done. --jjron08:04, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
High resolution, eye-catching, very well-made and encyclopaedic.
Proposed caption
Drawing of a massive star collapsing to form a black hole. Energy released as jets along the axis of rotation forms a gamma ray burst. It had be theorised that such an event would disrupt the biosphere on Earth by wiping out half of the ozone layer, creating nitrogen dioxide and potentially cause a mass extinction.
Proposed caption (B)
Drawing of a massive star collapsing to form a black hole. Energy released as jets along the axis of rotation forms a gamma ray burst that lasts from a few milliseconds to minutes. Such an event within several thousand light years of Earth could disrupt the biosphere by wiping out half of the ozone layer, creating nitrogen dioxide and potentially cause a mass extinction.
Support, but... It's a lovely image, but I really would like to have the year it was made put on its information page. Any image of this sort is going to eventually be out of date, from better understanding arising. Knowing how old it is is thus an important part of the information it provides, even if the core ideas are unlikely to change. Adam Cuerdentalk23:42, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The image was attached to an article and a press release dated September 12, 2005. [1] It was created before that, but at least it was considered accurate as of that date. - JehochmanTalk02:07, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I added the information template to the image description page, but I'm not sure that it is a public domain image. According to the NSF Copyright and Reuse of Graphics and Text policy: With the exception of NSF logos, permission to use NSF graphics is granted on a case by case basis. Some are public domain, some are created by NSF contractors, and some are used by NSF with specific permission granted by the owner. Therefore, with the exception of the NSF logos provided, photos and illustrations found on the NSF web site should not be reused without permission.Cacophony00:46, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hang on. This is in fact a public domain image. I have added details to Image talk:Gamma ray burst.jpg showing the email I sent to request permission, and a summary of the response I received. If there is a better place to put the information, please let me know. I was the one who uploaded the image. - JehochmanTalk02:03, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - Pretty, but.. what is it? I see a sphere with increasing numbers of layers, which are apparently described at the end of the chain; and then it explodes and becomes a black hole. I assume there are gamma rays being expelled in one of the frames here. Based on the image and what I already know about the solar cycle, I'm guessing this is showing the life cycle of a star; however, the image is worthless unless someone knows that. Even with the current description, it doesn't explain the lifecycle of the star before it collapses; that part is unexplained and will likely confuse the average viewer. I know I was confused at first. Also, do black holes usually have bright lines perpendicular to them? This might be featured material with a better description, but as it is, it's just confusing. --Golbez02:09, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Proposed description, version B': "Drawing of a massive star collapsing to form a black hole. Energy released as jets along the axis of rotation forms a gamma ray burst that lasts from a few milliseconds to minutes. It had be theorised that such an event within several thousand light years of Earch could disrupt the biosphere by wiping out half of the ozone layer, creating nitrogen dioxide and potentially cause a mass extinction." This has been added to the image on commons. - JehochmanTalk02:19, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
B still lacks an explanation that it's showing the entire life cycle; I'm guessing it's showing the stellar life cycle by showing the elements at play, and then it finally hits the iron roadblock and begins its rapid demise? --Golbez19:54, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose, poor color choice (makes it look scifi), poor flow through series of event, poor background (its very flat and undynamic).D-rew21:52, 1 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
What's wrong with looking like sci-fi? And what would be a dynamic, appropriate background for this picture? AFAIK starry nights are very flat by itself, so you want to put it on a background of something dynamic like mating insects flying in mid air? Please DO be more constructive with your criticisms. --antilivedT | C | G03:26, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Lord, some people. The problem with the colors is that they are grating and far too neon. I'm all for cool and bright coloring, but these pop but in all the wrong ways and end up being irritating. The background is not only undynamic it is unappealing. And for the record I think mating flies in the background would make this picture much more interesting. Here are non-flat starry nights [2][3][4][5][6]D-rew04:16, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You do know that those pictures are taken with extremely high magnifications don't you? And would youput a SEM image as a background to say an ant? Having backgrounds like that is hugely inappropriate as it is simply not something you would see at this scale. This is an encyclopaedia, not a sci-fi book (which is ironic as you complained about the sci-fi aspect of this image). --antilivedT | C | G05:19, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I am not one for too much bickering on these boards since it won't really add anything, so I won't respond again unless semi-necessary. Anyways, not that it matters but after searching for almost an hour I can find no astronomy picture (that is not a computer diagram) that has a background as boring as this one. Almost all give a sense of depth and richness to the stars that this one is missing. Upon looking at so many pictures I realized that the reason that the background looks so bad is that it is missing the little things. Its the dynamism of the dim stars vs. the bright stars that sells a starfield like the one this background to be. For that reason I'd prefer it to be black over this (obviously I would prefer a real-looking starfield most).D-rew06:03, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes that's something I agree on, that the stars are unrealistic and could be better with a plain black background or something. You see, that is a much, much, much more helpful criticism than what you've said in your first comment, and even though I'm not the creator of this picture and thus I cannot fix anything more than trivial, constructive criticism is nonetheless helpful in these situations to point out where the actual shortcoming is, instead of vague statements "poor xxx, undynamic background". --antilivedT | C | G07:47, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This isn't a board and whoever had the flash of insight to call forums of internet interaction "e- bulletin boards" was a blithering idiot. --ffroth01:39, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Insane hippie colors.. you do realize that this is in false color and that it can be colored any way right? And that the entire content of this image is 6 copies of the same circle, with different coloring, and an unshown mysterous trasformation to a tiny black dot? And then whimsical, totally photoshop-drawn spirals of LSD-inspired colors? Come on, this picture is a joke- the starfield background made me guffaw out loud irl because it's so preposterous to try to place the happenings of this diagram in real space- as if 9 stars in various advanced stages of collapse would be right next to each other in a nice aesthetic arc. And the cutaway effect on the first 6 stars looks like some giant sheet of glass is in the middle of cutting the stars in half, not providing a friendly window into their inner workings, especially since the other face seems willing to ignore the laws of gravitation and stay behind its arbitrary little boundary. My final beef is the two-motion-blurred-overexposures-superimposed-in-photoshop look of the final stage, and the cel-shaded tongues of plasmatic flamage licking out from the top in bottom, with their outragous sharp outline against the stars behind. --ffroth01:51, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
An beautiful image that is eye catching, pleasing to the eye, and encyclopedic. Although not quite a 1,000px I feel that this image has outstanding wow power, and have decided to place it here to see about making it featured. This image originates from the Commons, and is already featured there.
Proposed caption
A cut away fo a 16in gun turret, Identifying the important machinary parts within the turret.
Tom: for .svg files the px dimensions given are nominal and the image can be rescaled without loss. This means that the 1000px threshold doesn't apply, though it is nice to have them at a reasonable size like this one so the detail can be examined without rescaling. Agree words preferred over numbers; I'll make a new version with words. Is everyone happy with the color scheme and aesthetic details? It seems like the image is kind of dark and the colors scheme could be improved. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 00:41, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The color scheme and asthetic details are excelent the way the currently are, I believe that alot of the colors were chosen to match as best as possible the equipment that was actually used (the shells, for example, were green in color). Thanks for the FYI about .svg formatted files, I didn;t know that they could be rescaled without loss; it great to hear it though. Also, the uncolored jpg version of this image does have names instead of words; my suspicion is that the image was numbered to make it easier for those on the commons to translate the numerical values into their own respective languages. Its not a major hang up to substitute words for the numbers, it just seems like that would narrow the image's audience somewhat (although if it increase the chance of this image clearing FPC I'm all for it). TomStar81 (Talk) 01:04, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Commons will of course keep the numbered version (with a link to the en-version) for the reasons you give; for English readers here on wikipedia, it's so much easier when the image has words so you don't have to memorize the number code. I'll leave the color scheme alone, but I'm going to fix up the pointer lines. Too-thick pointer lines make an image look like Wound Man. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 01:14, 30 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weakly support edit 1. Slightly outdated choice of colours and gradients (linear gradients on curved surfaces?), but it still works as an illustration. Samsara (talk • contribs) 09:47, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support, please remember to put the sources from the original photo too in your description. If Image:16in Gun Turret.jpg was deleted then there would have been no link back to the US mil website which is the original source of this. grenグレン10:43, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Support I have looked into him and he does deserve it but, I am not too sure... BUT anyway you HAVE to change the caption thing.--Doodler45 (talk) 12:12, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oh dear god, why did I have to check this page before breakfast?! Apart from this nomination being the least bit funny, the quality of the image is actually quite good. Nonetheless of course this gets a You-gotta-be-freaking-kidding-me-oppose. P.S. no comment from the subject yet. Are you still clinging on to the fantasy of being featured? ;-) --Dschwen16:50, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I feel like I'm on the outside of a very exclusive inside joke. But seriously, how has this nom survived for so long? And where did all these supports--and, coincidentally, new voters--come from? ...sockpuppets? maybe? --Malachirality (talk) 18:26, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Very high resolution, illustrative, well composed and very encyclopedic, what more do you want off a featured picture?
Proposed caption
Not sure what it could be but something from the article along the lines of
"The British currency was decimalised on February 15, 1971. The basic unit of currency – the pound (or pound sterling) – was unaffected. Before decimalisation there were 240 (old) pence in a pound, now there are 100 (new) pence. The new coins were marked with the wording NEW PENNY (singular) or NEW PENCE (plural) to distinguish them from the old. The word "new" was dropped effective with the 1982 coinage. The symbol p was also adopted to distinguish the new pennies from the old, which used the symbol d, which came from the Latin denarius, a coin used in the Roman Empire."
The greens in the foreground contrasting with the blues in the back make for a very beautiful composition of colour. The image is also very well balanced with the trees nearest in the left, but the mountains highest at the right. A beautiful photograph.
Proposed caption
Clouds breaking up after a rainy morning in the Blue Ridge Mountains. This photograph was taken from Deep Gap overlook in western North Carolina, one of the many scenic lookouts along the Blue Ridge Parkway. The road's construction began in 1935, with some of the work being carried out by New Deal public work agencies after the project's authorisation by congress the following year. Not completed until 52 years later in 1987, the 755 kilometer-long protected landscape runs from the Shenandoah National Park in northwest Virginia to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in southwestern North Carolina.
Oppose. It's a very beautiful shot, but the whole thing is very artifacted (is that a word?). Ken, the camera you used is 10.1 megapixel... did you try to reduce the file size in Photoshop or something? tiZom(2¢)19:50, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No, I did crop it and scale it down a bit with The GIMP, but that's not what's responsible for the 'artifacts'. The camera I use is kind of notorious for high noise levels to begin with, and this shot was taken on a dark and overcast day so I had to crank the ISO up a few notches, which only made the noise worse. As much as I'm fond of the image, and as much as I appreciate Djlayton's nomination of it, this is not one I would normally support for Featured picture designation simply because of the lack of quality - especially when viewed at full resolution. 'Card23:11, 2 December 2007 (UTC) (BTW, I'm the guy who took the image and uploaded it to Commons - I just got stuck with a different username on Commons than I have on Wikipedia.)[reply]
But you should never (ok, rarely) have to up the ISO in the middle of the day, even if it is overcast. Far better to hold the camera extra still than to take the 'lazy' option and up the ISO, inevitably lowering the image quality unnecessarily (particularly with a camera like this, DSLRs are more forgiving). Diliff | (Talk)(Contribs)07:10, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hugely Oppose The whole image is interlaced with errors. Looks like it was scaled up using some kind of algorithm. Definitly not wiki material. Teque5 (talk) 02:59, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Horehound bug, Agonoscelis rutila, on a horehound bushEdit 1 Removed the nasty glare spotAlternative 1
Taken on a horehound bush, this image has high enc value as it not only illustrates the insect well it also provides a natural setting for the bug. High technical quality compliments this making it a worthy FPC IMO
Neutral Natural setting and good detail in places, but DOF is an issue (it always is) and there's flash reflection causing slightly blown highlights. In an artificial setting, these problems would be inexcusable; the question is whether the natural setting makes up for the loss of detail. Personally, I'm not really sure.--HereToHelp13:11, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Strong points are composition, color, and the natural setting. I much prefer images of flora and fauna in the wild rather than against a piece of white cardstock. Depth of field could be better (what was your aperture setting on this?) and especially on this one I'd be willing to sacrifice a little sharpness for it. The blown area is unfortunate, but acceptable. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 06:28, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If it's truly blown out, nothing can be done to fix that. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-12-03 14:19Z
Yeah it's unrecoverable - but really is an area of about 30px such a detracting feature? It's not like those kind of reflections do not exist in real life... --Fir000201:53, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well that implies that if it were on the rear end of the insect it'd be OK which doesn't make sense but you're welcome to your opinion. --Fir000210:19, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually Fir - that makes a great deal of sense. That blown highlight is smack dead in the middle of the image, which, given the composition, is where your eyes jump to - the highlight ends up getting more attention then the bug itself, and that's why such a central and strong (it contrasts heavily with the bug's colour...) is so big a detractor. Also, Oppose. --Mad TinmanTC14:10, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral Great composition, nice catch in general, just a bit oversharpened for me, and that highlight is right in your face. Probably deserves to be an FP, just not an obvious candidate IMO.--mikaultalk11:25, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original, neutral edit 1 - Beautiful picture, I love the composition with the background colours. But it is too easy to tell that edit 1 is photoshopped. I might support the edit if someone can do it slightly better. TheOtherSiguy (talk) 00:53, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
good image, illustrates anti-Semitism and the event itself. I like it, but perhaps if somebody could edit out the text
Proposed caption
The International Holocaust Cartoon Competition was a cartoon contest sponsored by the Iranian newspaper Hamshahri, to denounce what it called 'Western hypocrisy on freedom of speech'.
An Israeli group announced an anti-semitic cartoon contest open to Jews only. One of the two founders of this group was quoted as saying "We’ll show the world we can do the best, sharpest, most offensive Jew hating cartoons ever published! No Iranian will beat us on our home turf!".
This image has no source info with which we can verify the license (what we'd like is a URL to a page where you'd find the image). MER-C02:18, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment What is this supposed to be? This image lacks encyclopedic context, without which this appears to be some kind of inflammatory attack. Simply saying that it illustrates a cartoon competition is not good enough; why would that be notable or encyclopedic? Even with proper source information, it would be totally unsuitable for the main page because the main page (in contrast to the rest of the encyclopedia) is not the place for offensive things. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 02:59, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The cartoon competition created a great deal of controversy worldwide and is therefore noteable and encyclopedic, just because it illustrates an unpleasant concept does not make it unsuitable for the main page --Hadseys (talk • contribs) 15:00, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment The cartoon may well be encyclopedic, but the image caption needs to demonstrate why. The proposed caption does not even use the word "controversy" let alone explain why the cartoon is representative of wikipedia's best work! The image and caption should not leave the reader wondering "what is this?" Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 17:09, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. No reason has been given why this exemplifies Wikipedia's best work. The fact that an image illustrates a notable event has never been sufficient grounds in itself for featured status. Chick Bowen18:14, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Just in case that appropriate licensing info does appear, I think this is a very poor shot at what it's trying to illustrate. It's like someone pasted a bunch of cartoons at various magnifications randomly into an image, and then put a tiny caption somewhere near the top (not readable unless viewed full size) saying who it's from. That caption should not be in the image in the first place. It should be in the image description in the Image namespace, and selectively in the below-image caption in various articles. And it doesn't meet the size requirements. Samsara (talk • contribs) 13:29, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose and move to speedy close due to licensing issues (although there are plenty of other reasons to oppose per the comments above. Spikebrennan17:53, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose, need more proof that this artist was a very important part of that competition.... this is the first time I've seen these cartoon and I have read about and seen others from the competition... also let's clean up licensing issues... grenグレン10:55, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It show the majestic pose usually recognized by small münsterländer, it gives question: What is he looking on? What is he waiting for? etc...
Proposed caption
The Small Munsterlander (SM) is a hunting-pointing-retrievingdog breed that reached its current form in the area around Münster, Germany. Small Munsterlanders are very intelligent, trainable, and attentive but require gentle and patient training, which provides excellent results.
Oppose. Ineligible - not in an article. This is the version in the article. I like the dog, but besides the ineligibility, the washed out colours don't do it for me. --jjron08:09, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - colour noise in the dog's fur, JPG artifacts everywhere, not used in any articles (although that can easily be changed, the first two can't). —Vanderdecken∴ ∫ξφ10:54, 2 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It's strange that a previous commenter complained of "jpeg artefacts". It does have a few visual distractions in its fur; it's difficult retrospectively to say conclusively whether they are present in the subject, but I'd prefer them not to be there. I believe we used to have a guideline that said that jpeg was most appropriate for photos. Has the guideline been changed? Samsara (talk • contribs) 09:34, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It's not a great photo for a few reasons, but opposing because it's a PNG is not valid. Please provide constructive criticism --Fir000210:28, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Probably isn't a strong reason to oppose, but image use policy is pretty clear on preferred formats. PNG is a good replacement for GIF but no better than TIFFs for file size, lossless compression, etc. This one has clearly been a jpeg and later pointlessly converted to PNG. A net disadvantage, all things considered. --mikaultalk12:02, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
@Samsara: Not strange at all - it was probably saved as a JPG then converted (re-saved) to PNG. Artifacts aren't suddenly lost by saving in a different format - once the information is gone, it's gone forever. At the time of my vote, I didn't even realise it was PNG - another reason to oppose as per pschemp's reason below. It's not against the FP criteria, but it's against general image guidelines, which are a prerequisite for even considering the FP criteria anyway. —Vanderdecken∴ ∫ξφ15:41, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - Guidelines clearly states "Photos and scanned images should be in JPEG format." I think this combined with the artifacts and the dullness of the composition. pschemp | talk14:27, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OriginalEdit 1, colour and contrast tweaksStitching ErrorNo stitching error
Reason
Great picture of the Cathedral. It is in my opinion the best picture we got of Notre Dame .
Proposed caption
Notre Dame de Paris, known simply as Notre Dame in English, is a Gothiccathedral on the eastern half of the Île de la Cité in Paris, France, with its main entrance to the west. It is still used as a Roman Catholic cathedral and is the seat of the Archbishop of Paris. Notre Dame de Paris is widely considered one of the finest examples of French Gothic architecture. It was restored and saved from destruction by Viollet-le-Duc, one of France's most famous architects. Notre Dame translates as "Our Lady" from French.
Comment Great pic, but the ghost in the bottom-left corner is distracting. There's also some kind of bright bluish thing there, too; do you know what that is?--HereToHelp00:08, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Conditional Support I didn't notice that blue thing until H said something, and now it's all I can look at. The image is great, but that spot's got to go. SingCal (talk) 03:54, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak oppose. Could do with a bit of colour correction I think. I know its a very sodium-light-tinted scene, but its a still a bit warm. The areas of shadow seem a bit peculiar and posterised. Also, its significantly tilted, particularly at the top where the perspective is exaggerated. Could relatively easily be corrected, so I can't see why not. Would support it with the correction of the tilt at the least. The other issues are more minor and optional. Diliff | (Talk)(Contribs)18:27, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The building is not 100% straight, so it should not be straightened in the image for maxiumum encylopaedic value. Please read the successful nomination on Commons, where many issues were brought up. [7] --Aqwis (talk) 19:01, 25 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose until the horizontals line up. This is especially noticeable at the top where the right tower is shorter than the left by 28 pixels, and is nearly 2 degrees off horizontal. I really doubt it's engineering fault since this is quite a large discrepancy, and that it gets worse as you go up, which correlates well with perspective errors. --antilivedT | C | G09:08, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
We were very carefull to check that this picture doesn't have perspective problem. The rightmost tower is actually much lower than the left one, and does show this leaning to the right. Please have a look a discussion on this picture's commons' nomination on this issue. -- Blieusong (talk) 12:00, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Conditonal support edit 1 It really is a very good photograph, the sort of detail you'd see on an old plate negative of the place. Unfortunately, the colour balance looks Victorian too. Most tellingly, there are no blacks where there should be: silhouetted foreground figures should be black, not red-brown. The same applies to detail in the hedgerows and buildings to the sides, I'd rather see no detail at all than colour-aliased "false" detail. HDR mapping problem is my guess, so it may be fixable. I'll try to upload a corrected version myself if I get time later on. FWIW I've heard of the leaning towers of Notre Dam before, so no objections there. <edit> Edit 1 now uploaded --mikaultalk14:05, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose When looked at with full resolution the detail is impressive, but overall the image is flat and uninteresting with an unattractive Brown Windsor soup background. The blurred people are also unappealing, even on the thumbnail. SilkTork *SilkyTalk21:43, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak oppose - colors not appealing (why is the sky brown?). Heavy jpeg artifacts at full resolution. Would look better without the ghosts. Kaldari (talk) 22:00, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support edit 1 pending photographer's agreement that the colors still look realistic after the edit. The only jpeg artifact I see is around the antenna at the top of the tower; where are the artifacts you are talking about, Kaldari? Enuja(talk) 00:07, 27 November 2007 (UTC) Changed vote to Neutral because of lack of agreement about color balance. Enuja(talk)04:47, 29 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Original and Oppose Edit 1. I find the Original very good, and I don't believe the Edit's colours are true to what we saw (I was there with author when he took the picture). Some fine details of the edit look weird on my monitor as well (like blueish edges or something) and this is noticeable on the lower part of the façade. Also, should we take into account negatives votes whom reason is the leaning of the right tower when we have (kind of) proven it is how the building actually does look like ? Blieusong (talk) 12:32, 27 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Stitching error (as per crop). Seems like it's a product of the shadow from the neighbouring tower. I dislike the strong sharpening - it should be toned down a bit as it's giving everything a halo hence despite the nice scene weak support. Do you think you could upload a less sharpened version? Looking at the original it's pretty clear that I'm not just imagining that pretty heavey sharpening has been applied. --Fir000205:35, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
What ghosts? ;o) Apart from the extreme lhs, it's not a simple clone job. The bottom of one of the doors is totally obscured and, like much of the detail behind many of the FG figures, is basically irretrievable, at least without alternative frames to clone from. For me, this is a minor issue anyway, compared to the awful tone and colour balance, especially in the shadows. I hear the comments of the nominator and accept that the general shift in colour balance I uploaded isn't based on anything objective, but neutral, dense blacks is something any subject in this lighting should definitely have. I still have the PSD file of the edit & could clone out the figure on the left, retaining much of the original's colour balance but beefing up the shadows, if that's likely to help things along. --mikaultalk12:18, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Original - beautifully detailed image, which makes me want to read more about the cathedral. Some of the beautiful detail is lost in the edit - look, for example, at the iron tracery on the doors. TSP (talk) 12:08, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
China was under dynastic rule from the Xia Dynasty (2070 - 1600 BCE) until the collapse the Qing Dynasty and the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1912.
Oppose Need actual Chinese labels along with English labels, remove the banding gradident/shadow in the sea to save quite a few kb and the topography overlay is not consistent: some have topography while others don't. --antilivedT | C | G09:27, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment My suggestions for the animation would be to label the regions directly, instead of using a legend; the animation moves too quickly to decode the image. The animation could pause longer on the more complicated maps, for example, and the image description page might list individual frames so readers can study each more closely, instead of having to wait for the next cycle. Then, you might choose a more informative/less confusing color scheme. Make sure colors aren't re-used in a conflicting way and try to keep them consistent (eg in 350 BC Qin is green but in 210 BC it is pink, and later the Shu dynasty re-uses the green color). Direct labels rather than colors should be used to distinguish areas (for the colorblind), but you can still use color in a meaningful, sophisticated way. Careful thought should go into the color scheme to make it coherent, rather than a bunch of randomly chosen colors. I don't think the Chinese labels are really necessary, but the gradient areas and topo problems should be fixed. The animation could also be smoother. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 20:29, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Fairly high res picture of a spectacularly colored caterpillar with confirmed taxonomy.
Proposed caption
Caterpillar of the Spurge Hawk-moth (Hyles euphorbiae) on its primary food source the Spurge Cypress (Euphorbia cyparissias), seen in Kriegtal near Binn, Valais, Switzerland at approx. 2000m altitude.
Support original. Cool colors, they really sell it. Little to no TOF problems, and I only have the slightest qualm with some flash reflection especially on posterior portion. Can anything be done about that?D-rew01:52, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
No flash was used in the production of this picture. Hm, that reminds me to put a SpeedLite on my X-Mas whishlist :-) --Dschwen02:14, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original. It looks like it needs sharpening, but then the other issue – chromatic noise – is exacerbated. Neither that nor slight softness are fatal flaws. In effect, corrections in these circumstances just seem to work against each other. We ran into a similar issue with that Locust image. In this case as in that one, once the dust settles, the original comes out looking favourite. --mikaultalk11:06, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Good clear shot of the flower panicle, individual flowers, and sample leaves for added encyclopaedic value. Nice colours, and sharpness and DOF seem right.
Proposed caption
A common lilac bush (Syringa vulgaris) showing a panicle with multiple flowers in bloom, and typical leaf structure.
Neutral A good clear capture with nice lighting,. Odd-looking bokeh and dull composition kill my outright support, unfortunately. --mikaultalk11:14, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Can I ask what you mean by "Odd-looking bokeh"? I actually thought it was nice myself; it's a result of the dappled sunlight through the leaves on the far side of the plant, but (IMO) cleverly avoiding the overexposure that often results from those sort of conditions. But if you think that's all dull, you're welcome to your opinion. --jjron (talk) 12:40, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"Nice" bokeh is generally taken to mean smooth, uniform gradations of tone in OOF areas; this has odd, hard-edged areas in the background, thanks to the lens design, rather than anything you did yourself. I'm not sure I referred to it as "dull" though. --mikaultalk14:53, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Fair enough, but how the bokeh looks will also depend on what is actually in the background and how far it is from the object in focus; given the background here is relatively close and made of the hard edges of leaves and twigs against the bright light, that will be a significant factor. This lens does produce the bokeh you describe in other situations. --jjron (talk) 23:58, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It probably does, at other focal lengths, just not at this one. It's a function of lens design rather than distance, and ultimately choosing the most appropriate lens/focal length for the situation. --mikaultalk00:51, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Shrug. Maybe you're right. I took a number of basically identical shots a couple of months ago of this other image with this lens at 210mm, partly to experiment with the bokeh using a simple subject and fairly consistent background. I just varied the aperture from f/5.6 through to f/32 (and altered shutter speed to match). The bokeh altered significantly, starting supersmooth at f/5.6, so to me there's more to it than just the lens/focal length. In this nominated image for example I could have reduced the DOF to get a smoother bokeh, but then there's consistent complaints at FPC about DOF being too shallow in these type of photos (I actually intentionally increased the DOF in this shot for that reason). Oh well, it's hard to please everybody. --jjron (talk) 07:30, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Edit1 uploaded. An enhanced sharpness version for those who like extra sharpness (if I remember correctly I didn't sharpen the original at all before uploading). --jjron (talk) 12:40, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately, artificial "sharpening" does not add detail to a picture. Software sharpening can improve pictures significiantly, but only ones that are already relatively detailed, which this is not. --Aqwis (talk – contributions) 13:11, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Determining how sharp (detailed) a picture needs to be to be sharp enough can be very difficult - I feel a subject with a lack of "wow", such as this one, needs to be almost perfect technically to achieve FP status. However, we all have different requirements for featured pictures, and I am aware that my personal technical quality/sharpness requirements may appear somewhat extreme. --Aqwis (talk – contributions) 23:18, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Very nice and encyclopedic shot. The colours may seem a bit dull to some but jjron is not to blame if the actual flower is that way. Did you want him to paint it another brighter colour before taking the picture? :) H92110 (talk) 16:32, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The image speaks for itself. I did replace the original washed out sky with a blue gradient. I'm not sure if this is too much editing or not.
Proposed caption
Belfast Castle provides great views of the city of Belfast . A castle has existed on the site since the 12th Century. The current castle was built in 1870 by the 3rd Marquess of Donegall. His son, the 9th Earl of Shaftesbury, who presented it to the City of Belfast in 1934, and it is now open to the public.
A 24-bit PNG is higher-quality than a maximum-quality JPEG, as it's a lossless format. (Perhaps you're thinking of GIFs, which are limited to 256 colours so intrinsically bad at displaying photos?) However, a photo-quality PNG will have a much larger file size than a JPEG of similar quality. TSP (talk) 00:12, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I'm just not convinced by that sky - particularly for Belfast (for Tahiti, maybe). It's a shame the original is so blown; this is quite a nice shot otherwise (though perhaps a little lacking in 'Wow' factor). Perhaps you could try pulling in the sky from another photo (preferably a Belfast sky) rather than just doing a blue gradient? People might still have concerns about encyclopedicity, but at least it would look more convincing. TSP (talk) 00:12, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Strong oppose both versions. The castle looks like it's been cut out and pasted on top of a fake background...take a look at the tree-line. CillaИ ♦ XC03:06, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Any fake sky is, in my opinion, too much manipulation. At the most, a sky could have filters applied to it. However, if the sky is blown completely, the image is not, in my mind, of a quality good enough to be a featured picture, no matter the manipulation. In this case, the quality of the cutting out of the castle & treeline makes it much worse. Even if this image had a decent sky, the out of focus back corners and leaning walls (right especially) are not characteristic of a featured picture. Enuja(talk)04:10, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original. Current FP up for delist based on photographer's commentsEdit1. This is actually the one the photographer said he thought was most accurate, and should be the version up for nomination here
Reason
While we are delisting the first edit and having a lengthy discussion, let's renominate the edit the photographer recommended.
Proposed caption
A terrestrial subadult Eastern newt or red eft, Notophthalmus viridescens. Salamanders of the family Salamandridae with aquatic adult stages are called newts. Some newts, including the Eastern newt, have a juvenile terrestrial stage called the eft. The red eft has aposematic coloring to warn predators of its highly toxic skin.
Sorry Cynops3, you've renominated Fir0002's edit, which is the same one up for delisting. This wasn't the one the photographer recommended, it was the one I've put up, which I think was a mikaul edit. --jjron (talk) 16:49, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment There's some sort of strange "scan line" effect going on in the new version. It's most apparent on the newt's neck and foreleg. CillaИ ♦ XC03:12, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Original The original is lacking contrast but I like the shot. The edit gives it the extra contrast but the whole image ends up looking like it was run through an orange filter which makes it look strange and unreal. Cat-five - talk05:57, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment for above voters. Please take a look here and familiarize yourselves with the history of this nom. Technically, you cannot support the original b/c it is not a real candidate (it is already featured). More importantly, you shouldn't support the original b/c it is inaccurate (not enough red) and therefore not enc (which is why it is being nominated for delisting). Admittedly, the edit looks a bit too warm, but is more or less accurate according to the photographer, who was there and says that the leaves and such were in fact a reddish orange color. Therefore whether or not the edit looks strange (and it doesn't seem totally implausible to me), it is, in fact, the more true and enc of the two. --Malachirality (talk) 07:34, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Speedy close This is a complete mess. Can we please close this early, delist the original first, as I suggested, and renominate based on the photographer's viewpoint? The whole point of this review was to get back on a more objective basis, not highlight the errors of original nomination. --mikaultalk11:39, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OriginalOriginal 2Edit1 of Original 2 by jjronOriginal 3
Reason
Educational and interesting image
Proposed caption
Monarch butterflies cluster in Santa Cruz, California. Monarch butterflies migrate to Santa Cruz to spend the northern winter. During migration Monarch butterflies travel up to three thousand miles. No other butterflies migrate like the Monarchs of North America. Even more amazingly, the butterflies that make the journey are the great-great-grandchildren of the butterflies that left the migration place the previous spring, yet somehow they find their way to the same roosting spots, sometimes even the same trees.
Oppose. Interesting phenomenon but both images are just too soft and blurred. What happened? Looks like it didn't lock the focus properly or something. The first one also looks slightly motion blurred in addition to being out of focus.. Diliff | (Talk)(Contribs)19:08, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Thank you for your votes and comments,Diliff and Aqwis. I know some of you believe that 3 original images in a nomination are two too many. I would have deleted the first two, but they have been voted against and commented already and I do not think I could remove them now. May I still ask you to take a look at the third image? Maybe it is still not FP image, but do you find it any better? This subject was kind of difficult. The lighting was not very good (lots of shadows), the butterflies were very high up at the trees (just overhead) and in constant move. Thank you.--Mbz1 (talk) 05:16, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Even on the third image, I'm straining to discover any part of the image that is in focus. I'm puzzled because it seems there was enough light to pick a short shutter speed (eliminating motion blur) and get reasonable depth of field. Could be the film speed? Samsara (talk • contribs) 05:29, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I kind of believed that, if one could count the lines and spots at the butterflies wings, that means that they (butterflies) are in focus. I guess I was wrong. I'll try to take a better image, if I go to the place again. Thank you for your vote and commnt,Samsara.--Mbz1 (talk) 05:52, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Edit1. OK, I'll go against the grain here. Edit1 has been slightly downsized and sharpened. I like the interest of the topic and encyclopaedic value, and the colouring etc in Original 2 is the best for mine. I don't find the pics, especially number 2, as soft/blurred/unsharp/unfocused/whatever as others are saying. There is variation on different butterflies, but I believe that's more an issue to do with the fairly large DOF being dealt with, with some butterflies in good focus. I also take a step back whenever I see eucalyptus trees (unless I'm very much mistaken) in a setting like this. Do you know Mbz1 whether it is common for these butterflies to roost in eucalypts, because going on the article it doesn't sound like they feed on them, and I wouldn't really expect them to given eucalypts are only relatively recently introduced to California? --jjron (talk) 12:55, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Question. What aperture did you use on these shots? After having another look, it seems like you've used an extremely narrow aperture (circa f/22, see the FPC talk page for the debate over this), considering there is blur on the butterfly wings and it was shot in daylight on a sunny day (although the dark sky suggests a polarizer may have been used?). Diliff | (Talk)(Contribs)14:06, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The exif data for the one I edited says f/5.6. As Mila says, they were in constant motion, and that may account for some blur on the wings of various individuals. --jjron (talk) 14:51, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, Jjron and Diliff. Jiron, you are absolutely right and the trees you see at the image are eucalypts. Ever sinse I first discovered those butterflies for myself (like 10 years ago) they always were roosting at the very same trees. It is a very interesting question what they eat during winter months. I just found here that they gain some fat and weight before migration and during their long flights to California to survive winter months and to be able to fly back. It is also interesting to know that they not just roost there, they are flying around too, which means that they could find some flowering plants to get nectar. There are always something blooming in California. Thank you very much for the working on the image, Jiron. I really like the result you've got. Thank you,Diliff, for taking your time to improve my photography skills. I've used different settings for all shots. I have not used any filter at all. It could look as a polarizer was used because in some shots I did use an extremely narrow aperture. The blur in the wings is partly due to the butterflies motion, to the wind and most of all to mine own inability to take really sharp images. I have not used a tripod. I know that a better image could have been taking. I'm not sure I'm able to take it. I tried really, really hard with those butterflies and you still do not like the result I've got. I've nominated the image because I believed that it is interesting to show so many butterflies together.--Mbz1 (talk) 16:03, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks for the update. I do find it hard to believe, though, that at f/5.6, on a bright sunny day, you could have that much motion blur. What was the ISO and shutter speed then? According to Sunny 16, f/5.6 should correspond to around 1/1000th sec at ISO 100. ISO 400 would make it 1/4000th sec. Even at 1/1000th, I would expect it to stop the movement of butterfly wings. I mean, I recently visited the Shell Wildlife Photography of the Year 2007 exhibition at the National History Museum in London (you should all be jealous - some amazing photography there! ;-) ), and there was a photo that this shot reminded me of (although lets be honest, it isn't in the same league). It was taken with a shutter speed of 1/45. Obviously more blurred, but that was the intention. Anyway, just some food for thought. Without knowing the shutter speed, I can't really comment further, but given the sunlight, it does seem there was evidently plenty of scope for increasing the shutter speed. Diliff | (Talk)(Contribs)17:22, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you, Diliff. Your link did not work for me and I really wish I could see the image you're talking about. I've used ISO 400 only for the Original 1 because these butterflies were in a shadow. For other 2 images I've used ISO 100 because I was afraid that the images would be noisy. I believe that in some shots the shutter speed was 1/1000 or maybe even higher. Maybe I should have used a tripod. Would it help, if I say that I blured the wings in purpose too :) --Mbz1 (talk) 18:19, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, I should have double checked the link. Try this. Thanks for the info on the shot. Maybe a tripod would have helped but you don't normally walk around during the day with one, expecting to need it. Nevermind. I do like the photo, but as with many photos submitted to FPC, I just don't think it belongs as a FP, but it is certainly useful for articles. Oh and while we're looking at that site, I remember seeing this photo and being convinced it was also on Wikipedia. Well it turns out it wasn't the exact same image, but it was taken by the same author, presumbly at the same time. Still, one of our own made it to the Shell Wildlife Photographer Of The Year gallery. Not sure anyone else can lay claim to that. Diliff | (Talk)(Contribs)20:20, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you very much, Diliff. Your comments are much appreciated. I also like to thank you for all the links you've provided. I liked the butterflies image. It is really artistic. I've seen the monkey image you're talking about at Wikipedia too and it is a great image!--Mbz1 (talk) 21:59, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
add: They have a bad contrast, the colour balance is not good and the exposure ist not accurate. They seem to be blurred a bit, too. Overall impression: Much too unnatural. —αἰτίας•discussion•13:30, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A couple of Argentine tango dancers in close embrace. In Argentine tango, the dancers' chests are closer to each other than are their hips, and leader and follower may be dancing cheek to cheek or chin to forehead, depending on their heights. This very intimate embrace distinguishes Argentine tango from ballroom tango, where dancers arch their upper bodies away from each other.
Oppose - does not clearly illustrate subject - half of the proposed caption is irrelevant because the photo does not show anything lower than the shoulders. There's also blown highlights on the man's shirt and the woman's hair, the entire image is slightly out of focus and motion blurred, as well as colour fringing on some edges (e.g. the lady's brooch). E5T4A7 —Vanderdecken∴ ∫ξφ14:38, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. The image doesn't really add encyclopedic value to the subject of either article. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-12-04 14:56Z
"Comment on content, not on the contributor." There's no need to make it personal. (Also, that nom is independent from this one. Samsara can with no problem believe that a tight crop benefits one situation and not the other. Free opinion at work.). On the actual pic, I Oppose on the grounds of lack of encyclopedic content. --Mad TinmanTC16:06, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think that you're making a little too much out of that comment - I was just point out what in my mind was the fairly obvious irony of Samsara opposing an image below for a tight crop restricting enc value and directly after nominating a tightly croppped image. Surely you can see the irony there? --Fir000222:07, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I actually don't see any significant amount of irony, all I see is that Samsara thinks that the tight crop benefits this shot whereas it does not the other. Indeed, maybe I did make too much out of it - should just have pointed out I didn't see the irony. Cheers. --Mad TinmanTC22:18, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. I actually like this image a lot, it feels emotional and intimate. However, per many above, a picture demonstration must actually be demonstrating something. This picture is in no way encyclopedic.D-rew (talk) 16:20, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. Let me just interject there and check that people understand the significance of the picture. What is being shown here is the close embrace. It is a particular, well-recognisable embrace, and the dancers will be dancing like this essentially the entire time. That's to say, her nose may not leave his cheek for the entire dance. Just thought I'd clarify that. Samsara (talk • contribs) 16:48, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hmmm... I'm still not sure, it doesn't seem to representative of it, as they could be just embracing each other (as I see it). However, a full sized pic of this would probably get the featured status - maybe contact the photographer, see if he has a full body shot? --Mad TinmanTC18:37, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Without more context in the picture the embrace could just be that - a common or garden embrace. We need to see more of the dancers to be able to judge that they are in fact dancing and not just a couple embracing. We can't even see what their hands are doing --Fir000222:07, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Maybe it's time to invoke the martian scientist. It's probably really enc to Argentinians and fans of ballroom dancing, but I have to agree I don't "get" dancing, let alone tangoing, from the image. --mikaultalk00:27, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose, you can't tell without reading the caption that they're dancing. The caption mentions the position of heads, chests and hips; an ideal photograph of this subject would illustrate those three things well. --bainer (talk) 11:45, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support on the basis of Samsara's explanation above. Apparently, the specific position of the heads shown in the picture is an important aspect of this form of tango. I didn't know that, so this picture and the article have taught me something new. That's the point, right? -- Coneslayer (talk) 13:07, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The California Condor, Gymnogyps californianus, is a species of North American bird in the New World vulture family Cathartidae. It is a large, black vulture with patches of white on the underside of the wings and a largely bald head with skin color ranging from yellowish to a bright red, depending on the bird’s mood. It has the largest wingspan of any bird found in North America and is one of the heaviest. The condor is a scavenger and eats large amounts of carrion. It is one of the world’s longest-living birds, with a lifespan of up to 50 years.
Comment I tend to think exceptional close-up shots make up for lack of full-length descriptiveness, and this is is a really good example of that. Great colour and detail. OTOH I really don't like the crop, it's way too tight on the right, and there's something amiss with the shadows, possibly from high ISO or enthusiastic processing. I'm neutral for those reasons. --mikaultalk10:29, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
support Sometimes not a whole animal (bird) image provides more interesting details that are lost in the whole animal (bird) image. IMO both kind of images add value to the articles and are encyclopedic.--Mbz116:41, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Slight oppose. I consider headshots to be perfectly encyclopedic, especially when full-body shots are also provided in the article. For birds, the head is often a key to identification. This shot is a valuable contribution to Wikipedia, but I think it falls just shy of FP quality, because of the tight crop on the right. When the subject is looking to the side, I like a little room for it to look into. -- Coneslayer17:54, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Neutral, while I am not of the belief that a picture needs to describe the entire topic of an article to have enough encyclopaedic value for FP, I dislike the composition in this picture; the bird is looking to the right, where there is hardly any space, making the composition unbalanced. --Aqwis (talk – contributions) 23:48, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support - Maybe it's just me, but I like the composition - it and the other things it has going for it (detail, endangered subject, and so on) really make it for me. Also, on a less serious tone, that's a damn cool bird. --Mad TinmanTC16:19, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Oppose - I just don't think this is striking enough and I am also concerned that it does not show the body of the bird. Oscar (talk) 19:52, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OriginalWith improvements suggested by some reviewers.
Reason
This map is not only beautiful, it provides an thorough overview of the geography of the Olmec heartland, the locations and relative size of the major Olmec sites, and the locations of other important Olmec finds. I wish all my maps did such a fine job of combining elegance and utility.
Proposed caption
Map of the Olmec heartland showing the major cities and towns (in yellow), and archaeological finds unassociated with settlements (in red).
Support as self-nominatorMadman03:58, 4 December 2007 (UTC) (P.S. I seemed to have screwed up on the nominating procedure. If someone can straighten this out, I would much appreciate it.)[reply]
I think I've fixed up the problems (and have left a warning note and redirect link on the duplicate subpage). --jjron07:31, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose images must follow WP:RS and WP:V. If you can provide the sources to show how you made this map and that it is accurate then I definitely won't oppose--probably would support. grenグレン10:33, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Nice map, just not sure it's exceptionally nice. I'm struggling to see anything really outstanding beyond the clearly competent design. I'm finding that large white title box a little garish, although I realise it's part of a series. Wouldn't a key be better use of that space? --mikaultalk10:37, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The label for the mountains is in the sea so as not to overlay/overwrite the detail of the mountains themselves, particularly the twin peaks and the lake (Lake Catemaco) in between. Since the mountains border the featureless Gulf, I thought people would still understand what the "Tuxtla Mountains" label referred (which you did, Peta). The Tuxtla Mountains were important for the Olmecs and I didn't want to obscure that if I could help it. Hope this helps, Madman (talk) 00:44, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. I must say I find this map rather interesting and quite like it. However there is an error in the scale, and it's confusing. The 'k' on km should be lowercase, not uppercase in the abbreviated form - see SI prefix. When I say it's also confusing, I mean that the 25 at the end obviously relates to miles, but far less obviously to the km. I think I get that it's meant to indicate where the line at bottom comes out part way along means 25km, but it's far from clear. Unless I'm mistaken, scales using two measures would usually indicate the distance for each at the end of the scale or progressively along it (say 25 for the miles at the top, and 40 or whatever it is for the km at the bottom). The 'miles' and 'km' labels could then also be directly under each other. --jjron (talk) 08:53, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I see that the scale was understandable, but not intuitive. I have changed the formatting of the scale to that used by Google maps. Madman (talk) 14:47, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Another query. One river appears to be labelled (though not called a river, I assume it's what the Olmecs called it?), but no other bodies of water are. How come? Also if you're using the exact Olmec term for that river, and everywhere else, should you also do so for the Gulf of Mexico (i.e., why is this one place labelled with modern parlance, but nowhere else is)? Should you perhaps have this labelled as such on the larger scale map in the box below, perhaps along with modern countries, and then the main map would be just in Olmec terms? --jjron (talk) 09:00, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I originally only labeled one river because that was the only river named in the Olmec article and the map was designed to help the reader identify placenames. However, now that you mention it, it does look a bit off-kilter, so I labeled the two other rivers. In keeping with the style used by my source maps, I didn't add "river" or "rio" to the label. This convention was likely developed to reduce the map-space needed to write the name.
To respond to your other concern, all the names are modern names – we don't know the language that the Olmec spoke.
Ah, OK, I'm not very familiar with this area of the world; I guess what threw me is that all the names are Spanish, except for the Gulf (perhaps it could be labeled Bahia de Campeche, or at least subcaptioned with that, and maybe you should also use Sierra de los Tuxtlas rather than Tuxtla Mountains?). Unfortunately I can't find another map to verify all the names, but given there's been no complaints about accuracy after all this time I'll assume it's correct. I'm not sure about including the 'rios' (I'd be inclined to), and also wouldn't mind names on the lakes, and I think I actually preferred the title in the original. But for overall value, because I like it and find the Olmecs pretty fascinating, and compared to other featured maps, I'm giving it a... --jjron (talk) 16:17, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support (per above discussion). Preference for edit (but I like the title in the original - or at least the concept of it having a title). --jjron (talk) 16:17, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Since the question was raised by gren, I jotted down some criteria that could be used to judge a map:
Is the map successful at providing information on the subject?? Does it contain the right amount of information? If the map contains large amounts of data, the data should be hierarchically arranged (e.g. by color or by size)†
Is the information presented in a clear and intutive way??
Is it factually correct?? Is it complete?
Is it useful in the context of an encyclopedia??
Is it attractive? Does it entice the user to examine the map further? Does it add an extra zing to the article?? It should be neither garish nor somber.
Does it make good use of the space? Or is the subject matter squeezed off to one side?
† Please note that there are different types of maps. Some maps are designed independently of the article and would find themselves right at home in a geographic atlas. These maps generally need to be opened in a separate window to read. Sting's topographic maps are a great example of this type.
Other maps are designed to work within a specific article, that is to identify places, movements, changes etc. mentioned in the article. This is the more traditional encyclopedia map. The components of this map should be large enough to be read without opening a separate window. This was the goal of my map above - something that the reader could refer to while trying to understand the Olmec milieu.
OriginalEdit 1 - cropped out blown parts; slight sharpen
Reason
The Puget Sound article is well complimented by this panorama.
Proposed caption
A Panoramic Picture of Puget Sound taken from the Seattle Space Needle with the Olympic Mountains visible in the distance. A sound is a large sea or ocean inlet larger than a bay, deeper than a bight, wider than a fjord, or it may identify a narrow sea or ocean channel between two bodies of land. Puget Sound is an arm of the Pacific Ocean, connected to the rest of the Pacific by the Strait of Juan de Fuca, in the Pacific Northwest of the United States. The surrounding land partially overlaps the Seattle metropolitan area, home to about 4 million people.
Oppose The stitching and resuolution are fine, but I don't really find the composition compelling. The blown sunlight on the left bugs me a bit too. SingCal01:50, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I'm not sure this is a stitched pano so much as two shots combined... which makes me wonder if a better crop might be possible. A multi-part stitch often seriously reduces usable foreground & this might not have that restriction. More land/sea and less sky would have been a much better composition. If it is only a two-parter, it might explain the low definition, which we're unfortunately stuck with.--mikaultalk10:50, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment This is a stitching of 6 photos. I have only cropped out the black space. I have down sampled this image slightly to reduce noise. At 6300 x 1400 it is still rather large.Buphoff (talk) 08:02, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Heh, just shows how wrong you can be :) I missed that in the metadata. I'll have another (more informed) guess and say you're not shooting raw, which is probably why the definition isn't quite what it should be. It goes to show that even the "fine" jpeg setting uses enough compression to mess with fine detail; even in a downsampled six-part stitch. The crop from the left is a real improvement overall, but despite the lovely lighting and cloud formation, I still feel the foreground looks like it's "missing" & is a further dent in its FP potential. --mikaultalk00:00, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Could well be the stitching software that is messing with the detail - some of them do that in order to mask the blending. Do you mind if I ask which one you used (Photoshop CS Photomerge?)? I think the detail in the bottom right part of the city is pretty good, but it seems to become hazy over the sea and on the more distant land pretty quickly - I'm not sure if it is actual haze or something more like Mick is suggesting. I like it, and as Teque says below, pixel-wise res is fine, so overall I'm probably neutral. --jjron (talk) 08:44, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support I think you guys are being too picky. Wikipedia has very few images of this type and its definitly hi-res enough. btw: the original is better than that edit. Teque5 (talk) 03:44, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
One of the earliest depictions of the modern Santa Claus by Thomas Nast, which appeared on the cover of the January 31863 issue of Harper's Weekly. At this time, the image of Santa Claus had not yet merged with that of Father Christmas. This version was likely based on the Belsnickel ("Furry Nicholas"), a mythical being who visited naughty children in their sleep. The name originated from the fact that the person appeared to be a huge beast since he was covered from head to toe in fur. This image appeared as a small part of a larger illustration titled "A Christmas Furlough" in which Nast set aside his regular news and political coverage to do a Santa Claus drawing. This Santa was a man dressed up handing out gifts to Union Army soldiers.
If you read my userpage, you'll find I'm not from the US. The longest I've ever spent there was a week when I was 6 years old. The Library of Congress, regardless of where it's located, is a famous resource for knowledge, learning and media, and is mentioned on the image page. Anywho, we get the point. —Vanderdecken∴ ∫ξφ15:12, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support tattered edges don't detract IMO (although the crease in the middle is a little distracting); overall a good scan and an excellent find. --Malachirality (talk) 22:07, 4 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Have tried to refurnished the image a bit,Reshaped (saved as png mostly temporary to not introduce any aditional jpeg artifacts). →AzaToth11:34, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The Harper's masthead contributes a significant portion of the encyclopedicity of this image. Why would you want it taken out? It's part of the image, and also part of the significance of the image. --Malachirality (talk) 20:11, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, I believe that anything it does contribute to the drawing could be described (e.g. "This appeared on the front page of Harper's Weekly"), and it takes up space that could be better used by the drawing itself. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Oscar O Oscar (talk • contribs) 15:08, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hmmm. It would just be a crop - images are cropped all the time, and it's not as though this is being used to illustrate Harper's in any way. Just a thought. --jjron (talk) 06:20, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
(reset indent) Oh well. I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree (I see the banner as an essential, uncroppable element of the image, akin to the "Time" title on a Time Man of the Year picture or the newspaper title on famous front pages). This might all be a moot point anyway, as no one else seems willing to vote on this nom. --Malachirality (talk) 19:55, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
"Exploration is the sport of the scientist." (Auguste Piccard) May 27, 1931 Image courtesy of: Collection Musée du Léman, Nyon - Suisse
Support- this historic photo is smaller than recommended but it is the largest size available with a creative commons lisence. I find this image fun and fascinating. It drew me in to learn more about Dr. Piccard. The caption should read as it does on the Auguste Piccard page: ""Exploration is the sport of the scientist." (Auguste Piccard) May 27, 1931. Image courtesy of: Collection Musée du Léman, Nyon - Suisse. This quote was credited to Auguste Piccard on the website of Auguste's grandson, Bertrand Piccard. [10]Electricmic (talk) 01:32, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ask the uploader where it came from. Either the copyright owner needs to state on their website that they release it under an acceptable license or send a letter of permission to [email protected] stating that they release it under an acceptable license. Note that it is at least theoretically possible that it is public domain, though more information would be needed to make that determination. --B (talk) 04:23, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
There is a copy of an email granting permission in the page history, which should be forwarded to OTRS. I told the uploader that he should do this. MER-C04:59, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
But do we know that they actually own the image? Google "Auguste Piccard" and you can find several other uses of it. We need to know that they really own the copyright. --B (talk) 05:12, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The housefly, Musca domestica, is the most common fly occurring in homes, the most familiar of all flies and indeed one of the most widely distributed animals; it is a pest that can carry and transmit serious diseases.
reluctant oppose Nicely implemented, but I think the model that was used to generate the illustration must have been sickly or dessicated. The abdomen is collapsed and looks almost wasp-like. Compare the profile views of live flies. deBivort20:25, 5 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Adults have a black back and tail with a red head and neck. Their underparts are mainly white. The wings are black with white secondaries. Non-birders often mistakenly identify the Red-bellied Woodpecker as this species. Their breeding habitat is open country across southern Canada and the eastern-central United States. They nest in a cavity in a dead tree or a dead part of a tree. Northern birds migrate to the southern parts of the range; southern birds are often permanent residents. These birds fly to catch insects in the air or on the ground, forage on trees or gather and store nuts. They are omnivorous, eating insects, seeds, fruits, berries and nuts. And this photograph has enough quality which deserves FP as archetype of the species.
I'd say no. The bird will alter the centre of gravity (I'm assuming it's a free-hanging feeder) and mean that the feeder itself would not be hanging straight down; in other words, this looks pretty accurate to me. --jjron (talk) 05:24, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. High quality and encyclopedic. I will also add that the weight of the bird will push out the bottom of the bird feeder, so please don't try to parallel-ize the photo.
Yes, a tiny bit, exaggerated by slightly heavy sharpening. There's also a trace of noise in the wings and tail, but overall you have to admit these are very minor nits. --mikaultalk08:42, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
High quality encyclopaedic and attractive image, showing fine detail of the facial features of the Jaguar.
Proposed caption
The jaguar (Panthera onca), shown here at Edinburgh Zoo is a New World mammal of the Felidae family and one of four "big cats" in the Panthera genus, along with the tiger, lion, and leopard of the Old World. The jaguar is the third-largest feline after the tiger and the lion, and on average the largest and most powerful feline in the Western Hemisphere. The jaguar's present range extends from Mexico (with occasional sightings in the southwestern United States) across much of Central America and south to Paraguay and northern Argentina.
Where can I find that policy? (Note: I'm not this anonymous IP, just intrigued to see such a curt shut-down of any good faith editor, anonymous or otherwise). --Midnightdreary (talk) 01:47, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If you read the top of this page: "Note however that anonymous votes are generally disregarded, as are opinions of sockpuppets." --jjron (talk) 15:18, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I respect that you personally would prefer full-body shots, but I venture that this is definitely not a consensus opinion of FPC. Please take a look at the partial-body shots of otters, seals, tigers, giraffes, monkeys, and cows that are not in articles about their facial features. As the head is often (if not always) the most interesting part of the animal, I think most voters would agree that the head alone is perfectly encyclopedic and good enough to promote. IMPO, the difference b/t this nom and your example is that the crop in the latter weakened the original enc. claim, whereas the whole head is visible in this nom and the crop doesn't hurt the enc. value which, incidentally, the picture has, regardless of whether or not the caption says so --Malachirality (talk) 06:40, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, the example I cited is an FP. However, it was made an FP for inclusion in vibrissae, where it is illustrative of the subject. There is nothing wrong with having a close-up shot as supplementary material in an article; however, they are unsuitable as an FP. This has been repeatedly stated by others on FPCs for various birds and reptiles; we seem to have a bias when it comes to mammals - hardly a healthy situation! Samsara (talk • contribs) 07:23, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
While I respect your opinion, and in fact often agree with this stance, I'm not sure it's so much a mammalian bias as a matter of practicality. A bird 10 or 20cm long can be adequately captured in good detail in a full body shot, but a full body photo of say a 5m tall giraffe will obviously have far less detail of the whole animal. Thus a head shot of these larger animals are informative in a way that they are far less likely to be with small animals, because they provide detail you can't get in the full body shots. For example I'd be somewhat dubious about a head shot of a gecko, but perfectly happy with one of a crocodile - it's nothing to do with whether it's a mammal, it's how much detail you can capture in a single photo. --jjron (talk) 07:52, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
At present, there are only two things which define an image's suitability for FP: Featured Picture Criteria and individual opinion. Of these, only FP criteria definitively state what is and isn't "preferred", and there currently is no criterion relating to the enc value of head shots. I'm very tempted to agree with you on the whole head shot issue, within certain parameters, but I'd much rather any firm guidelines evolved from discussion on the FPC talk page than disruption of the FPC process by WP:POINT making. Sorry to be so blunt.. really, my only problem with this is that newcomers might be led to believe that you're referring to consensus-based criteria, when this isn't the case at all. --mikaultalk17:58, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Attractive and encyclopedic image. The people in the foreground help give a sense of a scale of the statue
Proposed caption
A colossal statue in Bangalore depicting Shiva (Hindi, शिव Shiv, Bengali শিব, Shib, Telugu: శివుడు), one of the principal deities of Hinduism. Shiva is depicted in a meditating posture.
The important part of the image is not, though. — BRIAN0918 • 2007-12-12 14:26Z
That's not what the criterion says though - besides, in this case, the rest of the image is needed for context. A >1000px crop of just the statue would not be good. deBivort21:16, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original per nom. Love the composition. Neutral alternate. Lacks the beautiful background of the original, and the composition is a bit too tight around the head. -- Coneslayer (talk) 02:48, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original, weak support alt Nice composition and colors. And, as I'm sure Fir0002 will readily tell you, the caption is not an integral part of the nom and is more up to howcheng when he puts up the main page/POTD. IMPO, it's not a big enough problem to justify withholding support from the picture, as it doesn't actually have anything to do with the picture. --Malachirality (talk) 18:14, 6 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose (original) Sorry, but the composition is fine for art, but not for information. Without reading the title, I wouldn't be able to even guess what kind of bird this is. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 06:06, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Why not? If you spotted me that it's a North American bird (because I don't know the birds of the rest of the world), I'd say it's a slam dunk. The bare head is diagnostic of vultures. That the head is black instead of red nails it as Black Vulture instead of Turkey Vulture or California Condor. The photo gives you the best possible field mark for this bird, IMHO. -- Coneslayer (talk) 12:45, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I would support the alternate; here we get the full bird with fairly good detail on the head. Not as much detail as the first and not quite as artistic, but with the full body shot we can see what this bird actually looks like. I don't care what its nose hairs look like if I can't see what its body looks like. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 02:16, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Sorry, I gotta oppose this one. The extremely bright (I suspect blown) areas on the head, and most particularly the beak, do it in for me. The tip section of the beak, being the central part of this shot and so important with vultures, should be a feature of the photo, not a flawed distraction. I may overlook this in a full body shot, but not when it's just the head. --jjron (talk) 08:38, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I would like to better understand this position that only full-body shots are encyclopedic. There are currently 5 images in the American Black Vulture article. Is it really your position that 5 full-body shots would be more encyclopedic than one or two full-body shots and a couple more showing details? For human subjects, would you insist on the full body, instead of a portrait? Would you say that a "detail" of architecture, like a close up of a Notre Dame gargoyle is necessarily unencyclopedic? For the two vultures in the USA (Turkey Vulture and American Black Vulture) a comparison of the heads is very instructive. Many field guides include head illustrations where relevant. I just don't understand this outright rejection of headshots. -- Coneslayer (talk) 12:13, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. I would say this, in regards to birds: As a general rule, the head is an important part of the bird to examine for identification. In the field, you never know how much time you have to ID a bird, so it's good to work methodically and quickly. I would generally start with the overall size and shape of the bird, with the hope of determining its type (sparrow, warbler, raptor, etc.). My next stop—the first part of the bird I would look at—would be the head. It very often has important field marks like eye stripes, eye color, beak color, and other diagnostic markings. I guess my point, then, is that in my opinion, good photographs of birds' heads quite frequently do provide useful information, in the context of bird identification. In this specific case, I would say that the bare head is a notable feature of vultures in general, because it helps keep them clean as they feed on carcasses. The black coloration of the vulture's head is diagnostic of the species, at least in North America. -- Coneslayer (talk) 13:39, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If that is your rationale, it should be reflected in the caption, and the articles that the photograph is included in. That's to say, if you believe it should be an FP because it is illustrative of the bald head of vultures, or more specifically of this family or genus of vultures, then you should include the image in vulture or the appropriate more specific article. You should then link to that article in the caption (which automatically forces the caption to be written in such a way as to emphasise the feature, to wit, (bald) head). Samsara (talk • contribs) 13:54, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
In the American Black Vulture article, this photograph appears in the "Description" section, where the appearance of the head is discussed at length. In context, the connection between the description and the image is obvious, and duplicating the information in the caption would be redundant. In terms of the POTD caption, I would agree that we should explain these features—but as noted at the top of this voting page, the POTD caption doesn't have to be fleshed out at this point. I have added the image to New World vulture#Diet, where the relationship between the bald head and the carrion diet is noted. -- Coneslayer (talk) 14:06, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, that's what I referred to as the "POTD caption". I was directing you to Malachirality's vote, and Fir0002's response, above, regarding that issue. -- Coneslayer (talk) 14:28, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support either with a slight preference to the alternate (whole body) shot. I would not oppose both pictures being passed. While the body shot obviously shows more of the bird and is more encyclopedic in that sense, I think the level of detail and composition in the head shot is significantly better. Very nice work. Matt Deres (talk) 15:24, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original, neutral on alternate I love the composition of the head-shot, and the blurred red background really makes it pop. I do think its encyclopedic to have an image of a vulture's head in addition to having images of the whole bird. While the whole bird image is technically good and encyclopedic, the background and composition and simply personally uninspiring to me. It's not bad, so I'm not opposing, but I'm staying neutral on that one. Enuja(talk)00:35, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original, weak support alternative I was actually planning on nomiating the original myself, but it looks like someone beat me to it:) The orginal shows almost insane details in the vulture's head and I really like the background in the image. It also seems to "pop" out of the picture, a quality which the alternative, though great for an encyclopedia article, is lacking. Rufous-crowned Sparrow (talk) 05:36, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm doing this as a group because commons:Category:Entr'acte - which I uploaded in a day - has many images of this quality, and it seemed better to do it in small, themed groups than to nominate 20-something images individually. These are lovely drawings, but very rare nowadays as the magazine they're from was pretty much just for London theatricals and those with a strong interest in them. I'm batch-nominating for convenience - I think the quality is similar, so...
With the exception of their first opera, Richard D'Oyly Carte produced every Gilbert and Sullivan opera, and had even built the Savoy Theatre, just for productions of their shows. However, in 1890, W. S. Gilbert discovered that maintenance expenses for the the theatre, including a new £500 carpet for the front lobby of the theatre, were being charged to the partnership instead of borne by Carte. Gilbert had trained and briefly practised as a lawyer, and, knowing this was not appropriate, stormed into D'Oyly Carte's office to put this right.
The confrontation did not go well. Gilbert was furious, and, as reported in a letter from Helen D'Oyly Carte (Richard's wife and business partner), addressed Richard "in a way that I should not have thought you would have used to an offending menial." Things soon degraded, a legal hearing was held, and Arthur Sullivan supported Carte in the hearing, testifying that: there were outstanding legal expenses from a battle Gilbert had with Lillian Russell; and while there were some outstanding expenses, they were small. Gilbert, however, thought Sullivan had been manipulated and asked him to say he was mistaken. Sullivan refused, and, despite both desiring to reconcile, Gilbert felt it was a moral issue, and could not look past it.
Sullivan felt Gilbert was questioning his good faith, and in any event, Sullivan had other reasons to stay in Carte's good graces. Carte had put into motion plans to build a new opera house, Carte's Royal English Opera House to produce Sullivan's Ivanhoe. This was Sullivan's only grand opera, and it had a consecutive run of 155 performances - unheard of for a grand opera - but did not recoup the production expenses, and Carte had no opera ready to replace it. The opera house closed until André Messager's La Basoche was eventually prepared, and this alternated with Ivanhoe, but two operas were not enough to make the company viable: it failed in early 1892.
While Sullivan was busy with grand opera, the Savoy Theatre put on a show by Edward Solomon called The Nautch Girl, which proved reasonably successful. However, in 1891, Jessie Bond and Rutland Barrington, two of the starts of the Savoy and creators of many roles for Gilbert and Sullivan, took a leave of absence from the show, and went on a tour of the provinces, presenting a series of sketches by Barrington which Solomon set to music. Both returned for the end of Nautch Girl's run, but left the company thereafter, and only Barrington would return for the final two Gilbert and Sullivan operas.
Gilbert and Sullivan were finally reunited through the efforts of Tom Chappell, who published the sheet music to their operas. In 1893, they produced their penultimate collaboration, Utopia, Limited. Its large cast and multiple costume changes prevented it from being as successful as their previous operas, but it had a reasonable run, and the public were very glad to finally have Gilbert and Sullivan back together, as Alfred Bryan's cartoon for the Entr'acte expressed. However, after Utopia, it would be some time before they collaborated again, on The Grand Duke, and when that show proved a failure, the two would never collaborate again.
(By the way, the main source I checked with for this is Jane Stedman's W. S. Gilbert: A Classic Victorian and his Theatre, roughly pages 270-280. A few things came from elsewhere, but all those are dealt with in detail in the various articles already on Wikipedia. I don't think we cover the Carpet Quarrel in as much detail as we might, though, so there's probably some new information here.)
Ssilvers trimmed it a bit - I'm not sure of the timing of his trims vs. you seeing it. But I always did figure that these captions should be educational, and, you must admit, the three images together provide a good justification for a short description =) Vanished usertalk20:32, 10 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Question can you clarify how we should consider these? Are they all separate noms? Is this a candidate for a featured image set of these three images? deBivort20:06, 10 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I thought it might work best as a small featured set. If we wanted to break it up, we could cut the paragraph on Bond and Barrington into its own caption (with the background), then keep the other two together? Vanished usertalk20:39, 10 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I guess I'd favor making the sets as large as is reasonable. In this case three images. But more broadly, I'd prefer to see all the Entr'acte image in a single FP set - if they had an article home. If we did it that way, the caption would be straightforward too. deBivort22:39, 10 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Don't know if I can find enough references on the Entr'acte. It seems to mostly get mined for reviews and images, not generally discussed for itself. If I come across something, though, we could combine a bit. Vanished usertalk00:35, 11 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support as a set - I would like to see the caption simplified though. Now it is a bit much and might reduce interest in the articles. deBivort19:48, 16 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Oppose Hate to say it but personally I don't see anything really special in these. I mean the technical quality is good but since there are 20 or so images which are very similar there is nothing in these examples which shine out to make them worthy of being FP. Sorry! --Fir000211:39, 17 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. As it seems likely this will be promoted even though it hasn't attracted a lot of votes, can I suggest that per the comments of a number of those that have supported that this is in someway promoted as a set. I don't object to one being promoted (or 'the set' promoted as one), in fact I'd probably support if I thought we had 'the best' one, but I can see little point in whacking twenty of these through FPC. (Also that caption is way too long!) --jjron (talk) 10:17, 18 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Witholding support for now. (see below) I've been holding off until I made my mind up about the "featured set" idea, and I do now think it has to be a set. I was keen on a gallery-based article to house them all and elect one image to represent them on WP:FP. However, it may be difficult to avoid an AfD in this format, as gallery pages are discouraged per WP:NOT. An alternative is to use a list format like this, which I quite like. It completely avoids the gallery page stigma and allows a short caption for each image. Something like The Entr'acte (illustrations) would do as a page title. I did, having said that, set up Alfred Bryan (Illustrator) for this purpose, but it may be that the single source of the images warrants something more specific. Furthermore, it could be that these Featured sets need a new category of FP, or at least the representative thumb on the FP page should just say something like "part of a featured set" and link to the gallery/list page. Maybe this needs discussing elsewhere first, and it's possible that a re-nomination might be required once it was all set up. Either way, it all seems a bit premature to promote this and then scurry off and find a home for them. Note that there's an upcoming FPC which could probably do with its own volcanic eruptions page, so this isn't quite the ad hoc proposal it might seem. --mikaultalk10:12, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't know: grouping them all as a set in that way seems to ignore that they have vastly different content - One's cricket, one's a political cartoon, others are on G&S, etc. in favour of lumping by artist. Is the artist really the most notable thing about these? I mean, if this was a complete set of the drawings from the Entr'acte annuals for years 18XX-18YY, sure, but this is, in fact, a selection. Vanished usertalk15:28, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The Entr'acte is the most notable connection between them. AFAIK there's little more than a stub's worth of info available on it, but we know enough about the context of each image to fill in the details. Why is "a selection" a bad thing, especially if it's a "best of"?--mikaultalk18:47, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Nothing wrong with a selection, but my entry criteria were very subjective: If I particularly liked it, or if I knew incidents or people were important to Victorian theatre, I chose it. Since this was one day's rifling through of the limited number of volumes available, it's quite possible that I missed things that should've been included due simply to lack of knowledge.
I wouldn't worry too much about that. NASA is regularly farmed for what are – in someones opinion – FP candidate images. Oddly enough I was just wondering about compiling a list, like the Oz books one, of Hubble images, the page being amended (entries promoted/delisted) as & when via the FPC page. Maybe I'm missing something; it might prove a little more complicated than people are prepared to tolerate, for example. In any event there's nothing wrong with being selective! FWIW you seem to me to have pretty good taste :) --mikaultalk23:00, 19 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This is really rather a tricky one. I'm not against it in principle, but sets are such a rare thing already that I don't even know how they work on the Main Page. Vanished usertalk07:13, 20 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Umm, what should I promote here? All three images? Or just one, in which case please specify the image to be promoted. MER-C12:20, 20 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, that depends.. can you think of a way of promoting a featured set? It seems a popular enough idea but I don't believe there's a precedent for it. Then there's those upcoming volcano images.. Personally, I favour the featured set idea but suggest we select a 'key' image to represent all howevermany others on some yet-to-be-created page. If you promote all three, there are a dozen more of similar quality which deserve the same recognition, is all. --mikaultalk14:02, 20 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think all three can be promoted separately (honestly, for a nom that's received the bare minimum of support to be promoted, could that possibly be justified?). In my opinion one gets promoted as representative of the set as Mick suggests; the caption on the image page can be changed to link to the others and point out it was promoted as representative of the featured set or something like that (perhaps Adam could do that as he probably knows most about it). Which one? I'd say Original 3 which shows Gilbert and Sullivan and looks to be the most interesting. --jjron (talk) 15:01, 20 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Keep on hold, or (better) withdraw and renominate once there's a proper home for them. As I said earlier, a list-formatted Entr'acte article would do, either for a featured set or to promote one or two of the very best examples from, or else they belong in disparate parts of the encyclopedia and the "set" idea is harder to gel. In any event, if a set is favoured, we'd better decide what a featured set is before that volcano nom comes along. --mikaultalk15:09, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You know, this is turning out to be such a headache, and all because I wanted to share some neat stuff I found. Tell you what. Settle what to do among yourselves, then let me know. Vanished usertalk15:42, 26 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm willing to vote oppose if it will help move this along pending a renomination once all the issues are sorted out. It should really have been sorted before the nomination. I hate these things that sit unresolved at the bottom of the page for weeks and months getting nowhere. --jjron08:39, 3 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I thought they had been. Then people started making new suggestions for how to divide them up, and, frankly, turned this into such a headache that I find it impossible to know how to move on. So, unless someone makes a specific proposal for what to do with them, there's not a chance I'm going through this pointlessness again with a renom. But I would still be rather annoyed to have my research work rejected because noone could be bothered to decide how to deal with it. Vanished usertalk07:33, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose -- I haven't seen any argument that these are of Featured Picture quality. Sure they're rare, and they are an interesting glimpse into a bygone era, but compared with other contemporaneous drawings, they are not top-drawer. Oscar (talk) 18:27, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. I guess I'm butting in here, as I didn't participate in the original discussion, but could we close this nom with no consensus and renominate on an individual basis, clearly detailing the enc. relevance? For example, there is one that I believe, although a caricature, applies excellently to G. and S. reconciliating. Several others could apply to different actors (caricatures, after all, have their enc. and importance too) and maybe certain plays (or is it operas?). I never warmed to the idea of a featured set, esp. one of 20 images, as it implies a certain specialness that I'm not sure is there. From the looks of it, it doesn't really seem feasible either (at least not in this case). And as it turns out, this inert languishing here on FPC is more hassle than necessary IMO.--Malachirality (talk) 05:55, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Original 3 I guess the best way out of this is to forget featured sets for now. As Adam pointed out, the only thing they have in common – the Entr'acte – is too obscure to base even a stub on, so they (technically) have no enc value as a set. They do have individual enc value and the third one here is a really good, slick illustration depicting a unique event (noticeably better than the first one, I think) and is representative of the quality of the others. Assuming earlier supporters agree (and waverers like me finally make their minds up ;o)) I think there may be consensus enough to promote this one. --mikaultalk09:14, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OriginalEdit 2 resized, sp fixed, text converted to paths
Reason
Moved from picture peer review. Nice detailed map showing important locations; pretty much a perfect vector map. Edits to the original moved labels from the legend to the map and removed the boxy frame, and added the Ibrahim al-Ibrahim Mosque.
Support per nom - very good. 13:04, 9 December 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Thelb4 (talk • contribs)
Oppose "Cemetery" is spelled wrong. I have a hard time checking the spelling of the rest of the captions due to the way my computer renders SVGs, but I oppose until these problems are fixed. Spikebrennan (talk) 03:58, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. Is the area that is labeled "Reclaimed Land" actually a geographic area with that name, or does the caption simply describe the fact that the land there is reclaimed? Perhaps an italicized caption might make it look less like the name of a neighborhood. Spikebrennan (talk) 14:40, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I've fixed the spelling on both versions. The edit has been resized, and the text has been converted to paths. This conversion should help rendering but at the expense of file size. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 17:14, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It seems to render a lot better but is still quite unwieldy, ie very slow to scroll and pan, which I can only put down to file size. I see it's quite a bit smaller, but (unless I'm mistaken) with this scalable vector stuff there's no reason to have a default viewing width of more than (say) 800px, which might work better. It'll all be immaterial anyway once we get FFox3.0 but for now it's not quite happening. --mikaultalk18:07, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not quite sure what your question is, but I'll try to explain. SVG files are really nothing more than text that uses a special markup (XML). The text is basically a list of coordinates, colors, and other attributes. Each browser has to "render" the file for itself, meaning it has to draw the picture based on the information in the (text) file. Some browsers are more reliable than others at rendering the file correctly, and especially older versions of most browsers have problems handling SVGs. The operating system is only important insofar as it determines which version of what browser you run. Some features that are allowed in the SVG format, such as certain blur filters and animation are not supported very well, if at all, in many browsers (yet!). Another option for folks whose browsers can't render vector images well is opening the file in a vector image editor, such as the free program Inkscape. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 23:45, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - I do believe that the locator map in the upper left is too small in proportion to the map itself. Other than that, this is a great map. Oscar (talk) 19:45, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support I can't believe I missed a map of my own home! I have been far too busy on commons, shame on me. It is really a great map, Sting told me it was one of his most accurate. Chris.B • talk15:33, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OriginalEdit 1: 1. Corrected stitching problems 2. Enhanced contrast of the whole image, and of the bridge in particular 3. Sharpened the whole image, and the bridge in particular 4. Resampled image to lower size to hide noise from sharpening and contrast enhancement, still big.Edit 2: 1. Fixed clouds/sky. 2. Changed perspective and skewed to fix verticals.Edit 3: by jjron (not for voting). Cropped distorted buildings and excess sky, slightly straightened verticals, minor adjustments for blown sky
Reason
It gives a very descriptive impression of one of the city's most famous landmarks and the prevailing architecture.
Oppose The sky is not very appealing with the clouds blown out so much. Plus the stitch should be redone to avoid the strong upward bent on the left side. In this pano the verticals should stay vertical. Plus the subject as per nomination title is almost lost in the wide pano. --Dschwen17:00, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Please hold on. Will try to fix these too later tonight. On the title issue, how about "Florence Architecture and the Ponte Vecchio". NikoSilver17:06, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I've uploaded a low res Edit3 for discussion only. I don't think you can fix those distorted buildings at the sides, so I've cropped them out and slightly straightened other verticals. This has the added advantage of making the Ponte Vecchio more clearly the subject, and allowing some of the blown sky to be removed. Unfortunately not much can be done about those blown clouds otherwise. What do people think? --jjron (talk) 01:26, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Pterois volitans, also known as red or common lionfish. Picture taken at Tasik Ria, Manado, Indonesia.
A really nice shot of a lionfish - the technical quality is quite impressive (considering it was taken underwater - an environment which I believe is quite challenging for sharpness, colour and lighting). It's actually one of only a half dozen images which I've taken from wiki to serve as a desktop :)
Support. Sure there may be some issues with DOF, transparency on the fins (a little hard to tell the cause with the focus), the tilt that I guess we assume is actual (though I wouldn't mind seeing a straightened edit), etc, but overall I'm happy with it as per the nom. I don't think we've had a fishy FP for a while. --jjron (talk) 08:14, 7 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original. Has that elusive "FP WOW". I like the tilt - makes you feel the fish is indeed floating in the water... --Janke | Talk10:40, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support edit Sometimes having things off-kilter can have an eye-catching effect, but other times, as in the original, it just seems like a mistake. A head-on shot doesn't always work as well as this one does, and it's a great way to see the fish's impressive fins. This pic could also find a home in one or more of the articles related to aquatic envenomation or animal defense mechanisms. Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 21:24, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original Disagree about the rotated edit; it looks inanimate, water-based life needs no horizon-reference, and the crop was uncomfortably tight to start with. Despite obvious noise and sharpening artefacts it's a striking, difficult-to-improve image with a large "enc value" cherry on top. --mikaultalk12:28, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think its an encyclopedic image and I do not see anything wrong with it.
Proposed caption
Annona squamosa is a semi-evergreen shrub or small tree reaching 6-8 m tall. The fruit is usually round or oval, slightly pine cone-like, 6-10 cm diameter and weighing 100-230 g, with a scaly or lumpy skin. The fruit flesh is edible and white to light yellow. The seeds are scattered through the fruit flesh; they are blackish-brown, 12-18 mm long, and hard and shiny.
Looks like MER-C already pointed this out above, but you really should provide reasons. FPC is not a blind up-or-down vote; oppositions especially should mention specific concerns that can be either addressed or evaluated for validity. And I just wanted to take this opportunity to point out that "No, definitely not. Bad quality" is pretty harsh, bordering on offensive, and not constructive criticism. FPC is a place to identify wikipedia's best pictures, but in many ways it is also a forum for peer review and discussion. --Malachirality (talk) 02:48, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Oppose Mainly because the solid black background looks unreal but also because of the limb behind it distracting from the main focus and being in the way, in terms of the main subject itself it's a good shot though. Cat-five - talk06:00, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Opppose Focus and exposure are just fine but lighting is awful, background provides no context and the specimen appears to be damaged. --mikaultalk11:44, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. As Cat-five points out, the composition could be better, but what really bothers me is that the absence of daylight makes the colours rather non-vivid. Is there a good reason this was shot in low lighting? Samsara (talk • contribs) 12:18, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The caption of Alternative 1 is the same as that of the original image. If you are referring to the "need" of an article rehash (aka the "proposed caption") refer to this page: FPC captions --Fir000201:32, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
That is simply not fair - you've got to understand the limitations of extreme macro photography. The only way (and no even shooting at f/22 wouldn't have got the antennae in focus) would be to use a focus stack which would be impossible on a live ant without killing it first. And killing it is likely to leave it in a crumpled heap which can't be photographed! --Fir000221:37, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure what the problem is - you managed it perfectly well in the second shot, which I would support if it weren't for the foreground object. It's clearly not a technical limitation. Furthermore, if you feel you absolutely need to immobilise the ant, there are ethically sound ways of doing that, which also don't affect the appearance of the ant. Samsara (talk • contribs) 12:27, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You don't understand. The first image is taken from a more or less to down perspective - the second from the side. As you can see from the second, the ant holds his antennae quite high and they extend a fair way away from his jaws. The technical limitations of macro photography limited how "deep" the focus is - there in lies the problem. And so in the first image the antennae fall outside the depth of the focus. In the second image - taken from a more side on perspective the antennae lies in the same focal plane as the jaws as it is roughly perpendicular to them. Could you suggest a ethically sound way? Putting ants in the freezer doesn't work - trust me I've tried (they crumple up) --Fir000221:32, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah I have - that's what I was referring to when I said I'd tried using a freezer, I didn't mean I'd killed it in the freezer (I'm not hugely fussed by I don't like the idea of killing insects just for photos - I prefer a catch and release :)) I meant I slowed it down. The fridge isn't cold enough (4 degrees?) to slow insects down quickly - you'd need to leave them in there for a few hours. So when I shoot in the studio (ie a white piece of photo paper on the kitchen table ;)) I usually give insects 15mins in the freezer before shooting. The problem with ants is that they curl up when they're cold and you can't get them in a semi-natural pose until they start becoming active again (at which point you can't do focus brackets etc). --Fir000203:04, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
There are many ways of doing it. One is to glue them to the substrate by the thorax. Depending on how you do this, it may slow the ant down rather than stop it. Make sure it's the thorax (chest) otherwise it can't breathe. You can also put CO2 in a container with the ant, which will slowly put it to sleep. They're hardy critters, but make sure you remove it when you're done; the ant should recover. (Point to note: CO2 is heavier than the mixture that is air, so you can pour it into a container and then put a lid on. The CO2 will only slowly diffuse when you open the container, and the ant will slowly wake up.) Alcohol vapour will do a similar job, but may be less easy to use. Alcohol does kill insects if they catch too high a dose (as does CO2 if you leave them for too long). My personal preference would be glue, but you'll need pincers to hold the ant, and small scissors or a scalpel to remove the glue and set the ant free. Depending on how the legs are attached, using permanent glue may impair the ant's ability to walk from that point on. For maximum ethics you'd use a water-soluble glue so you can just wash it off later, but these are generally slow to dry, so won't stick in a hurry. HTH.
As for the focal plane, I still don't find the argument compelling as the antennae seem to be as far off to the side as upwards. Part of the problem may stem from the fact that you refer to it as "head detail". It's a good enough depiction of the jaws, but for the head, it's incomplete. In fact, in one article, its caption reads "head and mandibles". If we can focus on the fact that it's a depiction of the jaws, I might be convinced (the image namespace caption also unfortunately has it as "head detail"). Samsara (talk • contribs) 21:38, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I'm not sure how your glue method works - what is the substrate? Putting them to sleep using CO2 will have the same result as the freezer - they'd simply curl up into an unphotographical ball. Ditto the alcohol treatment.
No, the antennae are roughly perpendicular to the head, and hence the fall within the same vertical plane as the head. But the antennae are just another part of the ant - like the jaws - so the head is the eyes and skull etc and the antennae are as seperate as the legs or thorax IMO. --Fir000206:05, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The caption is there, and perfectly sufficient in detail. Refer to this page: FPC captions to find out more. Opposing on the fact I didn't include the article it appears in is equally invalid - you can see that on the image's description page. I've added them for your reference anyway. FPC shouldn't be the place for bureaucratic nitpicking --Fir000205:02, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original Great detail shot; clear depictation of the head and jaws which would complement a full-body shot perfectly. Highlights are a bit harsh (need to practice with that new flash a bit more ;o)) but not distractingly so. I don't have any problem with the antennae and the caption is just fine. Nor, I have to say, do I see the point of the alt – the jaw is partially obscured and I'm left looking for the rest of the body. Just weakens your nomination, IMO. --mikaultalk11:57, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Great shot, perfect focus (how DID you do it?) and a pretty good angle. And Mick, I don't think he had his fancy flash when this one was taken. Could be wrong though. Diliff | (Talk)(Contribs)19:54, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Your intuition has not lead you astray Diliff - the was taken with a 580EX flash. It was manually focussed - it was fairly low light/shady area and the autofocus on macro's isn't that great... --Fir000221:37, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support You've recently added quite a few nice shots of this ant or its compatriots. While I like the full ant shot better for impact, it doesn't have the depth of field to make it here, and it is nice to have a featured image of scary insect threatening the camera, so I support the original image, despite the blown highlight on one tooth-thing. Enuja(talk)00:30, 11 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support It's a wonderful photo, encyclopedic, exceptionally clear, gives excellent visual information about the size and structure of a living ant in its natural habitat. I think what some opposing people desire is a Platonic Ideal when all we have to work with is Material Reality. Also, freezers and glue? Taxidermy is like the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle of nature photography! Saudade711:22, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Budding and opened flowers of the Hairy Toad Lily (Tricyrtis hirta)Alternative 1
This photo has great colours and sharpness - composition is also very good as it includes both the opened flower and a bud at the point of opening. Taken by Aka
Oh come on - shot at f/20 and still complaints on the DOF? Please have a bit of consideration of the technical limitations. It's not a case where a better image could be taken (beyond cutting lily and constructing a careful studio environment and using a focus bracket - which needless to say is rather extreme...) --Fir000210:07, 8 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Would you mind citing what points of the featured picture criteria you think this picture fails? Calling this picture (and many of the others you have voted on) "bad" is a rather vague and ineffective argument. What specific quality problems do you think these pictures have? thegreen J Are you green?02:32, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Incorrect - the focus is near perfect. The blurring of the image is simply because you can't have everything in focus - and this is exacerbated in macro, and again exacerbated in DSLR cameras with their larger sensors. The blurring of the background is a natural and unavoidable result of focusing on the flower. --Fir000222:39, 9 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose I find it hard to see what's what, and get the feeling the photographer was hunting for a point of interest too. Garish lighting fails to distinguish the form of the individual petals and the background seems to be working against rather than with the subject. Oversharpening, with serious haloes everywhere, was the final straw for me, I'm afraid. --mikaultalk12:44, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
beautiful hard to catch bird. The image adds value to the article.
Caption
A male Anna's Hummingbird,Calypte anna (4 inches in length) at a flower. Anna's Hummingbirds feed about 5-10 times per hour for 30-60 seconds each time. When Anna's Hummingbirds hover over flowers, their wings can beat from 22 to 72 times per second.
Oppose. Poor focus and - here it comes - motion blur. I know this is a difficult subject, but I've seen better. Good for the article, though! --Janke | Talk08:26, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
IMO it is a good high resolution (lots of room to be downsampled) image of a very difficult subject photographed in the wild (not next to a feeder) with the strong mitigating circumstances. In the full resolution one could see pollen flying around hummingbird bill. I sure agree that a better images were and could be taking. IMO it is correct statement about most of the subjects. That's why I withdraw the nomination. MER-C, I would appreciate it very much, if you could close it right away. Thank you all for the votes.--Mbz1 (talk) 17:37, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Clear, sharp, highly encyclopedic image. Note: this is a revised version of a recently delisted Featured Picture. During the course of the original candidacy, this edit was uploaded to address colour balance concerns and was subsequently promoted. Shortly aftewards, the photographer raised some issues with the colour balance of the promoted edit, leading to a lengthy discussion on the FPC talk page, which in turn resulted in the FP being delisted. Please note that the "original" image has since been overwritten by the photographer with this larger, colour-corrected version.
Proposed caption
A terrestrial subadult Eastern newt or red eft, Notophthalmus viridescens. Salamanders of the family Salamandridae with aquatic adult stages are called newts. Some newts, including the Eastern newt, have a juvenile terrestrial stage called the eft. The red eft has bright aposematic coloration to warn predators of its highly toxic skin.
I honestly have no idea what you mean. Your link points to a page section displaying two perfectly well-focussed images. If you would like to refer people to common errors involving focussing, exposure and so on, there is a long-established FPC criteria subpage here, which you might find a more effective reference. --mikaultalk22:19, 10 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Out of experience, it is best that you avoid linking to "personalised" criteria. People often view it as rude and expect to read an oppose rationale without having to link to someone's subpage. I have also seen personalised criteria used in discussions like RfA where they have again been fairly unpopular. Chris.B • talk16:22, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I used frosted (semitransparent ) acrylic plate (3mm plate). And I put the mirror finished white paper under the acrylic plate then some lights were spreading and reflected. Actually this picture was taken by sunlight but I wanted a kind of moonlight feeling. --Laitche (talk) 19:38, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose The technical quality isn't that great considering Wikipedia's standards. I don't like the composition and angle, against the sky it seems very bland. It's just an average shot of a statue. TheOtherSiguy (talk) 21:15, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose due to the perspective. Is there any chance you can retake it further away and/or more elevated so that it dosen't look like you are looking straight up at it? Cacophony (talk) 22:28, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Speaking of the perspective, it seems to highlight, well, perhaps this is just my (admittedly juvenile) imagination, but has the sculptor included a representation of, well, his, uh, little viscount? Chick Bowen04:28, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The Greater German Reich (German: Großdeutsches Reich), colloquially known as Nazi Germany refers to Germany during the period from 1933 to 1945, when it was governed by the Nazi Party.
The government of the Third Reich pursued apolicies based on the concept of expanding german Lebensraum(living space), which eventually resulted in the outbreak of World War II. Racial policy was also a key part of Nazi policy, the party was therefore virulently anti-Semitic, which resulted in the deaths of approximately 11 million people during the Holocaust.
Oppose to me this falls into the category of the multitude of moderately detailed SVG flags any one of which could become FP if a single one of them did. Therefore not among the best of WP. deBivort20:02, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose to me it looks off-model. In particular, it looks like an auto-generated bitmap trace that's lost its sharpness and definition, the corners look too rounded etc. Is there a reliable source to add to the image description page so we can compare the style? Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 23:24, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
This grand mosaic consists of 126 images acquired in a tile-like fashion, covering Saturn's rings from one end of to the other and the entire planet in between. The images were taken over the course of two hours on Oct. 6, 2004, while Cassini was approximately 6.3 million kilometers (3.9 million miles) from Saturn. Since the view seen by Cassini during this time changed very little, no re-projection or alteration of any of the images was necessary. For more on the creation of the image, see Nasa's summary.
"Three images (red, green and blue) were taken of each of 42 locations, or "footprints," across the planet. The full color footprints were put together to produce a mosaic [...]" --Malachirality (talk) 04:30, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - Does it seem unusual, weird, atypical or at the very least interesting that the name of this space probe is 'Cassini Huygens' and the software which is available to stitch panoramas together is called Hugin? -- carol07:10, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support It's a gorgeous shot. One thing I'd like is if we could possible identify the (two?) visible moons in the picture. That may not be possible (considering it's a mosaic, I suppose they could conceivably even be the same moon), but it would make the picture more encyclopedic to identify all the relevant parts. Matt Deres (talk) 01:53, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support It rocks, especially at full rez. However, I am curious what those blobs are in front of Mars near where the rings go behind again on the right. Are those moons? Vixwald (talk) 05:05, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Striking animation, once you catch on to what you're looking at. There are longer sets of images at Transit of Deimos from Mars (involving transits by Mars's smaller moon), but it doesn't look like anyone has composed an animation of them yet.
Proposed caption
This sequence of four images shows the Martian moon Phobos transiting the disc of the sun, as seen from the surface of Mars by the Opportunity rover in March of 2004. Because Phobos's apparent size is smaller than that of the solar disc, such events are called transits rather than eclipses. A transit of Phobos from Mars is observable from at least some point on Mars on most days of the Martian year-- the events usually last only 30 seconds or so due to Phobos's rapid orbital period of about 7.6 hours.
Comment. It is interesting, but gee it's very small, and the quality is frankly pretty terrible. I can't help but wonder whether a normal single photo part way through the transit, but with decent quality and resolution wouldn't be better (if such a thing exists). I also somewhat question its use in Eclipse. --jjron (talk) 08:37, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
CommentThe thing that makes this image is the inclusion of movement. It shows the "transit" of one object across another. If you take a single photo it will just look like a blurry image of a funky cresent moon or Cookie Monster's eyeball. I Support this image *if* this is the most in-focus sequence possible for these objects. Saudade712:09, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Of course a single image from here will just be some blurry blobs, because that's what this is. That was my point, if there was something that was clear and informative out there as a single image it would probably be better, despite lacking motion. --jjron (talk) 07:30, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose While it is interesting from an astronomy POV, I don't feel it is high-quality enough to be an FP. To most people, this is just a fuzzy black circle moving across a fuzzy white circle. Clegs (talk) 16:46, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Each frame has been upsampled by ~550% from original dimensions of 63x63. This is the maximum possible for shots of this type at the moment. The raw product IDs are (I think) 1P132176282ESF05A6P2670R8M1, 1P132176272ESF05A6P2670R8M1, 1P132176262ESF05A6P2670R8M1, 1P132176252ESF05A6P2670R8M1 and 1P132176242ESF05A6P2670R8M1 which you can obtain from here or here (PDS IMG file type warning). MER-C11:06, 13 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Sorry, having thought about it a bit more, this has too much lacking, despite the interest factor. Size, upsampled, black and white, blurriness, lack of detail... To anyone viewing this that doesn't look into it, it's just a fuzzy potato silhouette passing across a blurry white light. --jjron (talk) 07:38, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support - the otherworldlyness, the encness, and the inability to (at present) replace with a better version win out for me. --Golbez (talk) 04:50, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A true-color image of Ireland, captured on January 4, 2003 by a NASA satellite. The image uses Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) technology
I think it could take a downsample - but not more than to 60% of current size though, as I think data would start to be lost. deBivort21:15, 12 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Please log in or create an account to vote. To the best of my knowledge, the Featured Picture Cabal is not in possession of a weather controller. MER-C01:32, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I went looking for a picture of this control tower after seeing a program on the National Geographic Channel about the rebuild of the tower specifically and the track generally. I did not find much about the rebuild, but I did find this picture of the control tower, and figured it was unique enough to warrent a shot at FP status.
Caption
The Pagoda Control Tower at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The tower's current look came as the result of an extensive overhaul at the speedway, which included a rebuilding of the control tower and the addition of a Grand Prix track used by Formula One.
The DSM article does not have any FPs. This image, is of the few good images available of Tanzania and the only panorama. The image shows one of Dar es Salaams most expensive residential apartments, Elia Complex and the Muslim graveyard.
Caption
Dar es Salaam is the largest city in Tanzania. With a population estimated around 2,500,000, it is also the country's richest city and a regionally important economic centre. It has undergone much recent development with demolition of two storey buildings and replacement of taller ones. Much of the greenery, is however preserved.
Oppose Is there something particularly significant about what is illustrated in this picture? From what I can tell, this could be anywhere—the subject is a very small portion of the city, and the rest is largely out of view, so unless there's something about the Elia Complex or the graveyard that is unique to Dar es Salaam, I'm not seeing the encyclopedic value of this picture. thegreen J Are you green? 21:16, 14 December 2007
True but merely illustrating an article is the absolute minimum to be used at all, the FP criteria are a bit more demanding. --Dschwen14:05, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Clear, colorful, and nicely illustrates a supramolecular complex of cucurbiturilmacrocycles in three dimensions, which is crucial to understand their chemical properties. It was generated from the actual X-ray crystal structure data and is used to illustrate the difficulty faced in isolating the pure form of cucurbit[10]uril. The complex particularly interesting since it resembles a gyroscope, but is only about 2 nanometers wide. To my knowledge it would be the first featured picture of real molecules.
Oppose - E6T7A4. The edges of the model are heavily aliased (jaggy) at full size. There is also no information in the image itself as to what we are looking at. If the reader is a student of molecular chemistry they would probably know exactly what the image means without much of a caption (or at least only a caption that says it's a picture of cucurbiturilmacrocycles), but anyone else would be quite confused by what it's supposed to portray. There's no scale in the image (would be helpful) and nothing to tell people why the atoms are modelled as tubes and nodes. There's also nothing in the image that 'illustrate[s] the difficulty faced in isolating the pure form of cucurbit[10]uril' whatsoever - what's the difficulty, and how can this be seen from the image? Is it just that it's small? Is it hard to get the atoms in three layers like that? I dunno. —Vanderdecken∴ ∫ξφ15:40, 14 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I was only planning to nominate this image. I thought it might be interesting since I had not seen featured pictures like this before. M stone (talk) 18:00, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
And if that's the reason for opposing, it's invalid. You can't oppose an image just because the nominator may be going to nominate other pictures in the future. --jjron (talk) 07:13, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
My reason for opposing was that there is nothing about this picture that makes it better, more interesting or more informative than the rest of the molecule illustrations on Wikipedia. If this picture is FP'ed, the rest should be too! --Aqwis (talk – contributions) 10:20, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I was initially shooting this spider simply as an illustration of a fishing spider - the example of autotomy coming as a unexpected bonus. I wasn't sure if this was an example of autotomy or of a less voluntary "ripping off" amputation, but I had this confirmed by Martyn Robinson a naturalist at the Australian Museum. The picture is of high technically quality (sharp, nice lighting, nice composition showing the spider's ability to walk on water) and is of an interesting subject.
Caption
A fishing spider in the family Pisauridae and genus Dolomedes which has jettisoned two of its legs - most likely as a response to being attacked by a predator
Support It is a really interesting shot. The places, where his legs used to be look as eyes, which IMO could prevent him from feature attacks.--Mbz1 (talk) 02:02, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. I like the picture, really nice composition and light, and if it is a confirmed illustration of autotomy, then all the better. I wonder if it couldn't go in some other articles as well. PS. Nice nomination :-). --jjron (talk) 06:58, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Actually, perhaps you should disregard this. I'm not sure what's going on with this article, but you can see that it says (C)1926 even though the publishing date is 2005. In web of science this article is cited to 1926. The author published most of her other work in the 20s and 30s and according to the site of some B&B in her old house, she is now (predictably) dead. Other recent articles say this is in fact a real phenomenon, e.g. Brueseke MA, Rypstra AL, Walker SE, et al. Leg autotomy in the wolf spider Pardosa milvina: A common phenomenon with few apparent costs . AMERICAN MIDLAND NATURALIST 146 (1): 153-160 JUL 2001; Guffey C. Costs associated with leg autotomy in the harvestmen Leiobunum nigripes and Leiobunum vittatum (Arachnida : Opiliones), CANADIAN JOURNAL OF ZOOLOGY-REVUE CANADIENNE DE ZOOLOGIE 77 (5): 824-830 MAY 1999; Guffey C. Leg autotomy and its potential fitness costs for two species of harvestmen (Arachnida, Opiliones) . JOURNAL OF ARACHNOLOGY 26 (3): 296-302 1998. Mangostar (talk) 15:44, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Long story short: it looked like there was a 2005 article saying this phenomenon didn't occur in spiders. But somehow that article is actually from 1926, not 2005, and autotomy has been documented in at least several other species of spiders in recent journal articles. Mangostar (talk) 17:32, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Obvious historical value and nice size/quality. Incredibly whimsical, but also demonstrates the ability and determination of aviators in the early 20th century, a time when the industry was just getting off the ground.
Weak Support. OK, this is pretty good; but, I wonder if the image description couldn't be improved because at the moment it's high on interest but low on information. Unlike the caption here, it doesn't even mention the pilots, much less what the planes are, why they're doing this, where it's happening, what the outcome was, etc. Full support if those encyclopaedic considerations can be improved. --jjron (talk) 07:06, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
High quality, public domain illustration. Contributes a lot to the article content.
Caption
In a typical jet engine, air is drawn in and compressed, which feeds the combustion chambers. As fuel is burned in the compressed air, the heated gas expands and is expelled out throught the exhaust, which drives the turbines. The turbines are responsible for driving the vanes in the compressor section.
Support vector version I'm way ahead of you on this one. At the risk of turning FPC into the graphics lab, I drew a vector version of this image. Big machines are awesome! Jeff Dahl (Talk • contribs) 07:22, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Question. Is it just me, but would this make more sense with the intake at the right and the exhaust at the left? I know ultimately it's the same information, but it just seems to be the way images are normally shown. --jjron (talk) 07:30, 16 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Star formation in the Orion constellation. This high quality image has scientific value and esthetic merit.
Caption
This image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope shows infant stars "hatching" in the head of the hunter constellation, Orion. Astronomers suspect that shockwaves from a supernova explosion in Orion's head, nearly three million years ago, may have initiated this newfound birth.
The region featured in this Spitzer image is called Barnard 30. It is located approximately 1,300 light-years away and sits on the right side of Orion's head, just north of the massive star Lambda Orionis.
Wisps of red in the cloud are organic molecules called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). PAHs are formed anytime carbon-based materials are burned incompletely. On Earth, they can be found in the sooty exhaust from automobile and airplane engines. They also coat the grills where charcoal-broiled meats are cooked.
This image shows infrared light captured by Spitzer's infrared array camera. Light with wavelengths of 8 and 5.8 microns (red and orange) comes mainly from dust that has been heated by starlight. Light of 4.5 microns (green) shows hot gas and dust; and light of 3.6 microns (blue) is from starlight.
When I first saw this image it was very disturbed by it, and it moved my very much. If it can move me then I am sure it will move others to, so that why it is here. I will state right of the bat that this image falls short of the required size standards, but I will ask that in this case some historical consideration be given to the vote — oops, I mean the the "consensus" :)
Caption
This terrified baby was almost the only human being left alive in Shanghai's South Station after brutal Japanese bombing.
Oppose A shocking image for sure, but the quality (even for a historic photo) is way too low. There sure is a better scan somewhere... --Janke | Talk13:53, 15 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support for its historical illustration of the war's atrocities, and its rarity. I'm willing to excuse the size. There are smaller FP's on Wikipedia.-DMCer (talk) 13:16, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
All the criteria must be met for an image to be promoted. It also fails WP:WIAFP 1c - good composition - as this is a seemingly random corner of the much larger building which is the subject of the article. deBivort20:26, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Excellent architectural detail photo. The kinds of stone and the orientation are visible. Shows a lot that an overall view cannot, and shows it attractively. Fg2 (talk) 20:33, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Sure it's nice enough, but given this recent rather contentious FP promotion of a similar image of the same place by the same photographer at possibly the same time, I'd tend to think not. Plus agree with above reasons about being too cut off; the other one's already been promoted with that issue in mind. --jjron (talk) 23:34, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose The reflection from what I assume is glass between the capybara and the photographer and the unfocused rear of the capybara in the water together damage the overall quality too much. -Enuja(talk)02:25, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
(Today's lesson in photography...) The "reflection" is around Capy, similar to "framing" a subject. There is/was no glass. The depth-of-field is intentionally narrow to draw your focus to the Capy's face; the rear is just outside the focus field on purpose and the face/head extremely crisp. That's how real cameras work, rather than the "everything in the frame is in focus" of a disposable camera. (Not sure how much of this was known or would be known to future readers/voters; please do not take offense to this as I'm not intending to talk down to someone who does know while at the same time inform someone who may not.) Personally, I have my own nitpicks that have nothing to do with the focus (which is excellent!). Anyway, all in good fun; I didn't expect one of my photos would end up here ever anyway! :-)VigilancePrime (talk) 02:50, 18 December 2007 (UTC):-)[reply]
Thank you for looking; Thank you VO for the nomination. I agree with the decision (though for different reasons). I'm flattered that one was deemed good enough to be looked at at least! Thanks to all who contributed thoughts! VigilancePrime (talk) 06:27, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think its a great picture. There might be a little contrast problem, but if I could get some support to fix it, or anyone be interested in seeing other photos I have of Iguazu Falls and choose the best one, I will put them up
I hope you know that Iguazu Falls is a long stretch of falls, and the one in the article is the "devil's neck". My picture is different one. --Mitchipr (talk) 02:30, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Please stay civil. Saying an image is of the worst quality is not helpful to any and doesn't justify your points. Anyhow this image does meet the resolution requirements, so that's not a valid reason on its own, and boring is a very vague and subjective comment. thegreen J Are you green?21:11, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Wow, I don't know what your problem is Aitias, I'm just trying to be friendly and thought it'll be a nice picture to see. If you want to complain that it's boring and all, why don't you go ahead and take an image of it yourself? Muhammad Mahdi Karim and Thegreen, thank you for your kind comments :) --Mitchipr (talk) 02:30, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
LOL: He is just saying his opinion straightly. Its just my humble opinion, that an image must be more than just nice to be a FP. It has to meet some criterias which lift it up. This image doesn't fit in such criterias - It's an averagely image: That's not enough for a FP. Sorry. —αἰτίας•discussion•22:05, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, and don't you think one opinion is enough? Why are you spamming this page now? All I need is one vote/opinion from one person, now you're just trying to make everyone agree with you and pushing your opinion. --Mitchipr (talk) 05:02, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Would "spamming the page" include commenting on every single opposition vote? Please don't take it personally when someone is critical of your image, nominating an image for FP is an invitation for criticism. No need to reply to every single comment. Cacophony (talk) 02:34, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, it is my picture and I do want people to know how I feel about it. If they reply positive, I thank them, if nagative, I thank them but yes, you are right, I kind of took Aitias personal. But I still think its nice to comment on every comment. For now, I'll put it on picture peer review. Note that I did not take your comment personal, and replied generally, --Mitchipr (talk) 01:30, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - Champ de Mars from the Eiffel Tower. In the distance is Tour Montparnasse and the dome on the left is Les Invalides.Edit 1, by Fir0002Edit 2, by AzaTothNo fog, by AzaToth
Reason
Spectacular view and very well taken. The gradation between top down perspective and side on perspective is a bit odd, but IMO doesn't detract from this fine image
The original needs to be cropped at the bottom (un electable this way) Oppose original. The edits seem to have done that, but they also made the image bluer. Care to comment on what you edited instead of just putting two new images there? It would help. --Dschwen13:22, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose edit1. Downsampleed to far, oversharpened, overcontrasted. edit2 does a helpful rotation but the contrast enhancement makes it unnatural looking too Weak oppose edit2. --Dschwen13:26, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Strong oppose edit3. If a nomination needs this many edits maybe PPR would be a better place. I'd probably weak support a slightly rotated original with the black pano-void cropped off though. --Dschwen00:14, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Which would be Edit4 ;-). BTW, what's an Alternative and what's an Edit? People are voting on edits, but I only see alternatives. Why aren't these being named according to convention? An Edit is a modification of the original, an Alternative is a different, but similar, picture. I assume these are really all edits, but none have been called that. --jjron (talk) 08:22, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ooops, that was pretty sloppy editing on my behalf. Never noticed that before. The issue of warm vs cool is a difficult one. On one hand, I know that from being there at the time, there was a slightly warm tinge due to the atmospheric pollution (I'm yet to see Paris on a crisp clear day!), but you can simulate a slightly clearer day by cooling the colour balance which is what has happened in the edits. To what degree do we require absolute commitment to the view on that particular day? I admit that the edits are more aesthetically pleasing without significantly losing accuracy of the subject matter. My vote is a Weak support edit 2, but its not one of my most impressive photos. Diliff | (Talk)(Contribs)19:07, 17 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The main thing is that I did a poor job of cropping the bottom of the frame and there is some leftover blackness from the stitch. ;-) Other than that, its all much of a muchness really. Someone should (or me when I get the chance) just overwrite the existing image with one that crops a few pixels height off the bottom but otherwise leave it alone. Diliff | (Talk)(Contribs)12:57, 18 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Correct. I haven't. “All objections should be accompanied by a specific rationale that can be addressed.” Should(!) means: Nothing required, not a must. Just an advice, nothing more. Am I right? —αἰτίας•discussion•22:14, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Not really. :) This is a wiki, not a dictatorship, so no one will ever "force" you to write something. It is, however, considered poor etiquette to oppose and not provide a rationale. Such votes will, furthermore, bear less weight when it comes to closing the nomination. Chris.B (talk) 22:31, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
support edit 1 I like edit one the best, I agree with AzaToth, some fog is needed to make the pictures look good, but too much fog doesn't help the picture either. S♦s♦e♦b♦a♦l♦l♦o♦s(Merry Christmas!)01:52, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - A Red-capped plover chick, Charadrius ruficapillus, adopting a camouflaged pose that helps it avoid detection by predators such as gulls and crows.
Support Gorgeous, though the composition seems off to me. I would probably prefer to have most of the foreground (forewater?) cropped out to make the pic closer to ~700 pix high. Matt Deres (talk) 04:04, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think so, because the actual subject remains unchanged. That is now has clouds is pretty irrelevant to subject of the picture. --Fir000204:37, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The perspective on the clouds is wrong, seeing the very tops of cumulus columns as we do in the edit would put the base on the ground, they look fake. -Fcb981(talk:contribs)22:01, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Bear in mind cumulus clouds often do look like they're touching the ground so the perspective is fine. In fact the image I got those clouds from had a hillside just below where the roofline is. Not all cumulus clouds make thundering columns in the sky ;) See also Image:Roman Baths in Bath Spa, England - July 2006 edit3.jpg which has a cumulus cloud peaking from behind the roofline - taking at a lower angle (as this image seems to be) there'd be even more clouds. Another example is this: Image:Tower bridge London Twilight - November 2006.jpg which looks like the cumulus will touch the ground. So I'm 99.25% :) confident that the cumulus in this cloud is possible. And you've always got Edit 2 if you want something more realistic! ;-) --Fir000205:11, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I'm still on the fence about the edit. I agree rationally with Fir that the focus is on the building, not the sky - but emotionally, I cannot get past the addition of the sky, and it's hard for me not to see flaws in the addition of the sky or otherwise even focus on the rest of the image. deBivort06:37, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose original, weak oppose edit 1 ...and LOL on edit 2 overexposed sky, and would prefer symmetry in an architecture shot like this. The edit and the size are also small concerns. --Malachirality (talk) 20:56, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose all A blown sky is a blow sky. The perspective on the clouds is wrong as we are seeing the tops of cumulus columns where we shouldn't be able to. Even if the sky job was perfect (it isn't) I would still have trouble offering my support. -Fcb981(talk:contribs)21:58, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - During World War II, and especially in 1943, Hamburg, Germany was severely damaged by aerial bombardment, with some 55,000 people killed. Clip from the Motion Picture Division of the U.S. National Archives.
Reason
Another wartime propaganda film, with combat footage and some scans of the damaged city and damaged aircraft.
# 3 says "...among the best examples of a given subject that the encyclopedia has to offer..." now how can all war videos be the best wiki has to offer? H92110 (talk) 17:49, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose As a piece of propaganda it's not very interesting. As archival footage, it's overly dramatic, and not very informative. The quality also isn't very impressive. I'm sure better could be found. —Pengo05:17, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment-- Me not being a Muslim, I am not familiar with the Day of Arafat practices. What exactly is it that these boys are doing, and how is it different than what they might do on a different day, or at a different place? Spikebrennan (talk) 13:55, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The boys are "praying". There are several supplications that are recited asking for forgiveness, increase in sustenance, etc. These boys are reciting one of them. The Hajj comprises several practices and not all of them include praying and supplicating. Repentance and supplication is mostly done in Arafat on Arafat, whilst other activities are done during the other times. Hence what these boys are doing can not be done effectively during another time or place as Arafat is the designated place. For more info please read the article. Muhammad Mahdi Karim (talk) 14:20, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
My question is, are they praying in any way that is visually distinct from the way that they would pray at annother time or at another place? Since this image is being offered as encyclopedic of Mount Arafat and Hajj, I am trying to understand how this image is encyclopedic specifically in reference to those topics. Spikebrennan (talk) 22:54, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If the garments are special, I would suggest altering the caption to specifically call attention to this. The image might also be encyclopedic with respect to articles about those garments. Spikebrennan (talk) 14:30, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Question. Just looking at the size, I was wondering if this was a crop or just a downsize? If it's a crop, you don't have one with the lefthand guy's foot and a bit more at the bottom do you? It's a good and useful image, but I'm not sure it's FP quality - other than being unique on wiki, is this something that is very rarely photographed or hard to photograph for some reason, and that may excuse some of the issues? --jjron (talk) 12:31, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Its not a crop, just downsize. It is rarely photographed because this event occurs just once a year. Also because when one goes to Arafat, one has to spend the night there and do a lot of walking the next day, hence luggage is also kept to a minimum. Most people have cameras on their phones and consider taking another camera a burden. Hence the few good images.
Oppose, I don't think that really captures the size of hajj or the villages on the plains of Arafat, etc. Sorry. In any case, Happy Eid (late). grenグレン13:08, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The pictures of the tents are good and as you say, "really captures the size of hajj" but I believe pictures like these too illustrate Hajj. I mean, how often do you see youths praying :)? Thanks for the Eid greetings. Muhammad Mahdi Karim (talk) 17:01, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose While encyclopedic, this picture has too many technical flaws, and doesn't have the wow factor to outway them. The contrast is messed up, especially with some of the white on the robes glowing, almost to the point of vignetting, and some goofiness with the man on the left sticking out from the background. If these problems could be rectified, I would change to support. Clegs (talk) 05:50, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - An Aston Martin DBR9 qualifying at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. The DBR9 is the race-ready version of the road going Aston Martin DB9. First built in 2005, the DBR9 name is derived from the original 24 Hours of Le Mans-winning DBR1 car, named for then-owner David Brown.
Reason
Not too much background or frontal clutter, the shot shows a nearly full side with some front sheetmetal and grille area, and shows the DBR9 in it's "natural" element, which is in a professional racing format like the Le Mans.
Original - A scenic view in Yosemite Park with characteristic granite cliffs and woodlands. Taken in September 2007Edit 1 by Fir0002
Reason
A well composed view of one of the most iconic National Parks in the world. The original doesn't have great technical quality and is only provided here so that people can have the opportunity's to make their own edits as they see fit - but these concerns are addressed (IMO) in the edit.
Weak oppose A bit too common tourist snapshot, an image without any special features (got a few myself). A superstitched 10,000 px image would be something else... --Janke | Talk08:54, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - Pronounced sun dogs on both sides of a setting sun in New Ulm, Minnesota. Note the halo arcs passing through each sun dog.
Reason
An amazing photo of this peculiar phenomenon. Quality may not be perfect, but given the conditions, etc, it's reasonably good, and to me any minor issues are far outweighed by the other virtues of the image and encyclopaedic value.
The sun dog article describes them as "common", and I see them pretty frequently (at least several times a year, and more frequently than, say, rainbows). I've found them to be fairly common both in the Mojave Desert and in western Pennsylvania, which have very different climates. I don't say this as criticism—I just don't want people thinking they're very rare. I think most people just don't notice them—my wife doesn't, unless I point them out. The photograph is better than I could usually do when I see sun dogs—most of the time, I only see one of the two, or one is much brighter than the other. The photograph also has a nice, clean, low horizon that does not obstruct the sun dogs. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Coneslayer (talk • contribs) 14:23, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - A Mercedes SLR C199, the only Supercar Mercedes produces, in motion. Photographed at the 2007 Stars and Cars eventEdit 1 by Fir0002Edit 2 by Dschwen
Reason
The well controlled slow shutter speed gives this image the kind of motion blur essential in photographing a supercar in an interesting way. Good enc and technical quality.
Ok, this might look like WP:POINT, but seriously that edit1 is totally unbalanced. Weak support edit2, Oppose all edit1. --Dschwen02:50, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
sure, I thought the change in my edit was evident. Edit1 shows too much street, the car is too far up in the frame with its wheels being centered horizontally. I shifted the crop upwards. --Dschwen04:39, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Ah, OK. The road does detract quite a bit. I thought perhaps you were referring to the smaller tilt correction in yours. --jjron (talk) 04:45, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
..."with its wheels being centered horizontally" - you are quite incorrect Dschwen. I had only used my eye for this crop, and so it is quite vindicating to see I nailed it pretty well dead centre --Fir000205:14, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry I actually meant vertical and them being centered is a bad thing. To me the optical center of the car is a bit further up. --Dschwen12:20, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose all. Agree with general sentiments in the nomination, but the awkward, unappealing background does it in for me. Additionally, for best encyclopaedic value, a car photo should be done at an angle so that you can see (preferably) the front and one side, not just be directly side-on. I personally think there's better photos for encyclopaedic value, not just possible, but currently in the article. --jjron (talk) 03:43, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose all. Might have required some skill to take, but ultimately it's just a car photo. A nice photo certainly, just not exceptional in any way. Gatoclass (talk) 08:49, 19 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - Fénis Castle is an Italian fortress that dates back to as early as the 1242 AD. It was constructed under the direction of Prince Challant who ruled over the region of Val d'Aosta at the time. The purpose for the construction of this castle was to control the area's iron trade.
Reason
A view looking up at a famous and beautiful castle in the Val d'Aosta region.
I'm afraid that is unlikely. Size issues are generally only excused if the photo is impossible or very difficult to reproduce, and as the castle is still standing this doesn't apply here. We can't simply expand the image you have uploaded. The only way for us to get a larger version is for you to provide one. Debivort's reply on your talk page sums it up pretty well. Raven4x4x (talk) 07:46, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well, this means it only fails one section. Does this mean it is totally out of the running, or is there any chance it can get approved. I think it could be a featured picture (considering you don't judge against the size). Any advice or response would be greatly appreciated. RedmarkviolinistDrop me a line02:20, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Featured pictures must meet all criteria unless there are special circumstances (historic photos), and 1000 px on one side is more or less a bare minimum. Bigger pictures present a greater degree of detail, and so are more encyclopedic. At least IMO. --Malachirality (talk) 03:10, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Even at this tiny size the picture is also low quality - JPG artifacts along almost every edge. That's a second criterion that it fails. The composition isn't that brilliant either. Like Malachirality says, the size is the first criterion which any prospective FP must pass before it gets judged on other aspects, and this one fails at the first hurdle. If you have a bigger version, or a different angle, upload it. The camera it was taken with (Canon PowerShot A70) isn't particularly good (released in 2003, 3.2MP) so the image might not be sufficient quality even at full res, depending on what settings you had on the camera. —Vanderdecken∴ ∫ξφ11:07, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose: No. In details it's not sharp enough. It's even no where very sharp. The overall impression: No bad picture, but not enough for FP. Sorry. —αἰτίας•discussion•20:44, 20 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - The Flatirons, as seen on a winter morning, are rock formations located near Boulder, Colorado. The most iconic of the formations are the five numbered Flatirons, located along the east slope of Green Mountain (numerous smaller named Flatirons can be found on the southern slopes of the mountain and among the surrounding foothills).Edit 1 by Schcambo.Edit 2 by →AzaTothEdit 3 by Schcambo.
Reason
Absolutely stunning picture of a very iconic mountain; I'm including the original version here just for reference, I've edited it to tone down the blue colors, apart from that I think it's technically very good.
Support edit 1 only (oppose original): Not very sharp, but a quite interesting picture. Admirable, in my opinion, even when there are some technical weak points, it's enough. —αἰτίας•discussion•20:38, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment I'm not as photography or PS savvy as some of the folks here so correct me if I'm wrong, but the colours on this just don't look right. In trying to correct aberration on the original, you may have gone too far. Sunrise always gives you 'odd' colouring, but the yellowish tint on this seems unnaturally strong. Matt Deres (talk) 03:45, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Looking at the Flatirons page, the other pictures show that the rock is naturally yellow in tone; certainly the blue is not normal, even in morning sunlight. Schcambo (talk) 16:32, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Edit 2, I am the photographer -- I feel that edits 1 and 3 have way too much of a yellow cast that does not match the actual colors I saw that morning. I remember in my 'mind's eye' a soft pink glow on the sunlit areas, and a subtle blue in the shadows. These are the colors I experienced on this snowy landscape at first light. I like this sharpened version (edit 2) Molas (talk) 18:29, 24 December 2007 (UTC).[reply]
Original - Painting Thangka in Lhasa, Tibet. In Tibetan the word 'than' means flat and the suffix 'ka' stands for paintingEdit 1 by Fir0002 - noise reduction and recovered some of the original Adobe RGB colours which get lost in the original (left out red areas as they seemed over saturated)
Reason
We don't get many people shots on FPC, and I think this one is really quite nice - as it is not only shows a painter, but a (relatively) unusual style of painting.
Neutral The focus really doesn't bother me. The act of artist creation has been captured. I just don't particularly care for the composition (the placement of the head, and the way it is cropped, along with the dead space and side of the canvass on the right side.-Andrew c[talk]15:55, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose both The edit is problematic because at 100%, the lines just look weird. By lines, I mean areas that, if drawn with a pencil, would be lines (such as the edge of the body of each seal, or the details around the face). In fact, everything seems to have a strange quality of it that looks like its been through one of the photoshop artistic filters. This can especially be seen on the body/fur, which appears "soft". These qualities seem to be inherited from the original. I suspect noise reduction is the culprit.-Andrew c[talk]15:51, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - A steam turbine produced by Siemens AG Germany used in power plants to extract mechanical work from pressurised steam. Steam turbines benefit from their high efficiency and high power-to-weight ratio compared to other technologies, leading to its widespread deployment from electricity generation to marine propulsion.
Reason
A breathtaking photograph of something that's rarely seen. Provides a sense of scale and impressiveness of the machine.
OpposeSupport It's very annoying that the turbine ist cropped and not shown completely. Thats unencyclopedic and the quality of the picture is not very high, too. Sorry. —αἰτίας•discussion•02:21, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Do you know the scale of these things? They are taller than a person and longer than a bus, inside a cramped area. Please enlighten me on your method of capturing the whole turbine with one shot while still being able to discern the blades on the turbine itself. --antilivedT | C | G02:38, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Superlative industrial photograph. Note that even if it were not cropped, it would be impossible to see the far side that's hidden by the shaft. But it's not important. The far side looks like the near side and the blades are identical all around. Symmetric objects don't have to be photographed in full to be encyclopedic. In my opinion, this is quite appropriate for an encyclopedia. Fg2 (talk) 04:30, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - Spectacular sandstone formations in Upper Antelope Canyon, Page, Arizona.
Reason
True we already have an FP of Lower Antelope Canyon, but this one is of higher res, has a person for scale and IMO depicts a more interesting scene. Technical quality is also very good in terms of sharpness and handling of the challenging lighting involved.
Weak Support While encyclopedic, the technical issues due to the subtle hues of the stone and the overall "brownish" color are noticeable to the trained eye. --Sharkface21723:47, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose The rock face in the foreground overshadows everything else. Many Yosemite views are indeed spectacular, but this image doesn't convey it very well, sorry. --Janke | Talk10:07, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - Panoramic view of ships in the harbor of Valdez, Alaska.
Reason
Fantastic high resolution image of a notable city; great contrast between natural backdrop (perpetual sunset and mountain range) and the human activity (ships and major petroleum loading station).
Oppose Very obvious stitching flaws, from obviously visible overlap to drastically different exposures in different segments (especially in the far left segment when compared with the others. Clegs (talk) 05:26, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: There is no mis-matched exposure. I examined the EXIF data from all the photos and they were all taken with the same settings. F/4 aperature, 6mm focal length, shutter speed of 1/160, Pattern metering mode. The dark clouds on the left were indeed dark. The original photo of that segment goes until the end of the first blue-hulled ship named Blue Note. I do agree there is a stitching error towards the right side of the image. Would a crop satisfy the community? Or are there other more intrinsic problems? Thanks for your comments. Saket (talk) 06:00, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose, I am opposing this not only because of the stitching errors, but also because of the lack of technical quality. The picture is unsharp, slightly noisy and there appears to be some fringing at the edges of the mountains. --Aqwis (talk – contributions) 13:53, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Composition and background is too messy, doesn't show the fruit to advantage. Also, motion blur; poor focus. Please study the FPC requirements, thanks. --Janke | Talk18:32, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
comment maybe the alternative shot from the same set? It shows the inside of the fruit as the outside begins to disappear. Furmanj (talk) 18:45, 23 December 2007 (UTC) (NB: Original pulled... I didn't see the focus issue)[reply]
Original - A womens eight person shell at the Head of the Charles Regatta.Alternative 1 -I prefer this one unless the Original manages to update the full res (see nominating reasons)
Reason
Ahh, I just reprocessed the "Original" in RAW to get better colors and sharpness but the full size hasn't updated. The image page represents the composition. I would have put the alternative as the original but it isn't in any articles. So... unless the original updates I prefer the alternative. Why nominate, they are well taken dynamic sports pictures of what is really not the easiest sport to photograph (especially from shore).
You may prefer the alternative in which there is very little overlap between the boats. Naturally, I had pictures with only one boat, but I thought that the dynamic nature of having the two boat racing would be better. -Fcb981(talk:contribs)16:47, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Not because of bad photography but because of bad rowing. Some of the girls (they're probably novices) are looking out of the boat, and in the alt you can clearly see the rightmost two oarblades aren't feathered (rotated) with the leftward two. They look like their diving out towards their oar, rather than just leaning, and not all the backs are aligned. See these photos, although none are particularly good from a photographer's perspective (no pun intended). I also think that the dartmouth boat in the background is a little distracting, so don't let a lack of other boats prevent you from uploading other pictures—look fo fluidity and togetherness in the rowers and you're likely to spot good technique. --HereToHelp22:10, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - A house made in the Saltbox style, outside of Concord, MA.Edit 1 Complete desaturation of the white snow (the shadows obviously are still blue as they should be).
Reason
I think the picture is not only technically good, but also encyclopedic and artistic to a high degree. The highlights are hovering on the edge of pure white but this in itself is a feat. The scene had just about 6 effective stops of dynamic range and I actually tried a tone mapping sequence but there was little gain. Sunlight reflected off snow is pure white. That is, our eyes see it as pure white. It is somewhere around LV 17 (very bright). Anyway, it is a perfect Saltbox so I think very encyclopedic. I also think it is a very pretty scene with the fresh snow and the picturesque setting. Decide for yourselves.
Comment It looks too blue. You've said that sunlight reflected off snow is pure white, and that our eyes see it as pure white. Yet the snow is quite blue in the photo. It's normal for snow in shade to photograph blue when the photo also includes snow in full sun, but I'd find the photo more appealing if the snow were neutral. (I've tried it on this picture and it looks good to me.) Fg2 (talk) 04:19, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Support edit 1 The colour on the edit is superior, so I am leaning toward that image, but there is way too much dead space in this shot to get my full support. A shot of the same image size that focused solely on the house itself would be a better shot IMO. Considering the lack of focus in the surrounding area (particularly the gate), I think you'd be as well off just cropping. I understand you were probably on the edge of private / restricted property and might not have been able to get closer. Matt Deres (talk) 04:52, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Reluctant oppose. It's a nice picture, it really is -- good composition and color, and it is a perfect saltbox. But this photo doesn't show the asymmetry very well because the side wall is so deep in shadow. --Dhartung | Talk08:56, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - A 2.04 m statue of Augustus Caesar, found in 1863 and on display today at the Vatican Museums. Cupid, son of Venus, rides on a dolphin at his feet, a reference to the claim that the Julian Family was descended from Venus.
Reason
Good size and technical quality, enc. for the man himself (facial features are accurate) as well as for the sculpture styles of the culture (Greek/Hellenistic inspirations and styles)
Original - A Tau Emerald, Hemicordulia tau, in flight over a creekEdit 1 by Fir0002 - removed minor noise/artefactingAlternative 1
Reason
This spectacular shot has excellent enc and technical quality. In order to get this shot I had to use my 70-200 with it's rapid autofocus, and the flash was used to freeze the rapidly moving wings. The last image for a while, but certainly not the least. Merry Christmas to everyone on FPC!!
Oppose Looks like you needed to crop alot so we are seeing some degraded quality, it could just be artifacts from the (slow synced?) flash but the quality's a little sketchy. Do you have any others?? Merry Christmas to you too fir; everyone: happy holidays! -Fcb981(talk:contribs)03:04, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Umm hello?! Reality check! Have I got more than two perfectly focussed close up images of a dragonfly in flight?! No Fcb, I don't --Fir000204:42, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, that does make sense. Seeing as I have 0 perfectly focused pictures of any insect in flight :-\. But There is some kind of artifacting and I think it takes away from the full size quality, IMO -Fcb981(talk:contribs)13:59, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak support original I know the standard is pretty high for insect pictures nowadays, but still...the dragonfly in the image is actually in flight. It has to take some crazy skill to get a sharp, detailed image of such a fast-moving subject. I'm willing to overlook the minor artifacting. CillaИ ♦ XC03:20, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Very cool that you caught a dragonfly in flight. But what's it showing that you wouldn't see 10 times better if it were perched? —Pengo05:06, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Well primarily it wouldn't fit into the Insect flight article, but the enc value for a dragonfly article is tremendous as it shows you something you can't see with your eyes - how it uses it's wings for flight. You don't get that from a static perched shot --Fir000205:29, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You don't really get it from a static flying shot either. You'd need a sequence of shots, or an animation to show it. —Pengo07:06, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Come on, that's asking a bit much isn't it? This is pretty damn good and as good as you're ever going to get. I'm just still in shock with the reception of this photo, once upon a time such photos were acknowledged for what they are worth. Now I dunno... people just seem to be making up excuses to oppose. --Fir000223:21, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You're missing the point. You seem to think it should be featured just because it's technically a difficult shot of an encyclopedic support. And yes, technically, it's a good shot. Bravo. Congratulations for catching a dragonfly in mid flight. Now we can have a photo on insect flight. Great. But if you think it's actually illustrating anything more encyclopedic than a resting dragonfly, then you're sadly mistaken. If I wanted to know about how a dragonfly flies then a single frame of flight isn't really telling me much. The hoverflies tells a story by itself that you couldn't catch on the ground, so the unanimous support isn't so surprising, and I would probably support that one myself. When you've nominated as many pictures as you have I'm surprised how personally you take it. I'm not telling you to go out and make a movie of a dragonfly flying, but I am saying that's what you'd need to illustrate its flight. Either that or use a cloud of neutrally buoyant helium-filled soap bubbles and record the airflows in the wake of a dragonfly with stereo photography. That would be truly encyclopedic. :) But seriously. If you really think this is "as good as you're ever going to get" then please just get over yourself. —Pengo04:18, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I do not see how you can claim that this isn't an encyclopeadic image when clearly it makes a fine illustration for insect flight and indeed dragonflies. What you are saying is that somehow this image is less encyclopeadic than a shot of it stationary on a branch. How can this be? How can a shot showing interesting and rarely photographed behaviour be less useful to Wikipedia (less encycolpeadic) than an addition to the large gallery of perched shots available in the dragonfly article? You couldn't ask for a more encyclopeadic photo. Beyond the fact that it illustrates insect flight very well, it makes for an excellent illustration of the Tau Emerald, and indeed of a dragonfly (so much so that I've added it to the dragonfly article). Because the remarkable thing about this image is that it has all the features and detail available in a stationary shot, but it also combines this with a rare and specatular view of it in flight - giving it a massive wow factor. Hoverflies mate sitting down on a leaf or perched on a branch, but getting a shot of them doing so in flight is spectacular - the same rationale applies here.
I could only understand your demands for an animation if you'd made the same demands elsewhere. For example here - sure it shows a part of a fuel dump (same as my photo shows a part of a dragonfly's flight) but it doesn't show how long this dump goes for, how the flames are moving etc which you could get from the kind of slow motion movie you want for the dragonfly flight. Same deal for this image, - how long does that cloud stay there for? How does it dissipate? How large does it expand? I'd need a movie. And this, how fast is he moving? How high did he go? What happened next? Even this could be a whole lot more enc if you could somehow slow it down and see how the individual sparks of lighting spread and pulse. What I'm saying is you have to be content with what is possible, not some fantasy.
It is because of my experience on FPC, not despite it, that I'm so aggravated by the response. After three years of nominating, commenting on other images and finding out how other people in the community view other images IMO I have a pretty good understanding of what an FP is. Some of the images I nominate here I'm not so sure about, but some I am. And when I took these dragonfly shots I got a little tingle, because I knew I'd just taken a FP. This image is exactly what an FP should be IMO - and I would defend it whole heartedly whether it was mine or someone elses. When someone looks at say the seal nomination below, they're harldy going to be dazzled by it and go wow I bet that's an FP. But for 99% of the population as soon as they see this shot they'll think wow, that's pretty cool, that looks like an FP. At least that is what I strongly feel --Fir000208:57, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I think you'll find I opposed that fuel dump picture, and for a similar reason: despite it being spectacular, it doesn't have a lot of information content. All your image shows is that a dragonfly has its front wings down while the back ones are up. I'm not saying it's unencyclopedic, just that it's not a lot of extra information content, especially considering the quality is not as high as a still (perched) image could be. What other actual information does it actually add to insect flight? It's information content, not spectacle, that I look for in a FP. Others might give greater weight to spectacular images, but I don't consider it to be of prime importance. I mentioned an animation (or photo showing vorticies) as an example of something that would give real information content to the insect flight article. It was not as a personal request for you to go out and do it. I don't really care if you consider it "possible" with your own equipment. While this photo is a welcome image to insect flight (and whatever other articles it is in) I don't see it giving people any great insight into the subject. —Pengo12:50, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
<sigh> OK I give up. If you can't or don't want to see the value in this spectacular photo there's nothing else to say. Farewell --Fir000201:06, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support original/Edit 1 Per CillianXC. The quality is sharp, the fact that it's in-flight make that all the more commendable.-DMCer (talk) 12:26, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Strong Support Edit 1 and strongly urge others to do so as well. With all due respect Pengo, I'm not sure how you can claim that the shot is of only equal or lesser ev than a stationary shot; here, the wings--in flight--are distinctly arranged, with the front and back pairs moving in opposition to each other. Wouldn't the complete motion of flight just be an intuitively obvious interpolation from this still? However, it is the first step--understanding that the four wings on a dragonfly are not all synced together--that is not necessarily obvious; b/c Fir0002's picture shows this, it is perfectly, and highly, encyclopedic. With the initial quality concerns addressed, Fir0002 packs more information into this picture than a still would provide, with minimal to no loss of quality IMO. --Malachirality (talk) 04:33, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - An Australian Painted Lady, Vanessa kershawi, feeding from a flowering shrub
Reason
A highly enc shot of this beautiful butterfly, showing not only it's colouration but also has the bonus of showing it's proboscis whilst feeding. High technical quality compliments this perfectly IMO
Weak OpposeSupport - lovely shot but the focusing is very distracting. some of the rhs wing is in focus, some out and the same with the antennae. For me the DOF is compressed too tightly - Peripitus(Talk) 02:05, 23 December 2007 (UTC). After an instructive few hours with a good DLSR+field of butterflies I'm changing my opinion - On reflection the focussing is not a major issue - Peripitus(Talk)00:56, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment Image was shot at f/13 - as large DOF as possible without degrading quality. Furthermore f/22 wouldn't have got everything in focus. Please bear this in mind ( and I hope the closer treats comments as such with appropriate weight) --Fir000204:47, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - A Common Brown Robberfly, Zosteria sp, feeding on a hoverfly. It is approx 25mm in length, and is sitting on an Apricot tree leafAlternative 1
Reason
A very interesting shot of on of the most voracious predators of the insect world, the robberfly, with it's prey. It was quite challenging to get near enough to photography this guy, both due to his desire to eat alone and the windy conditions. It is memorable to me for a variety of reasons, it was taken on one of my first shoots with my macro flash, it was taken the day before my English exam, and last but not least because a bee decided to sting my foot whilst I was taking these shots (ouch!). :)
Original - Canon's latest in its prosumer DSLR range, the Canon EOS 40D pictured with a Canon 85mm f/1.8 lensAlternative 1
Reason
Probably my best studio shot yet (lighting provided by my new MT-24EX), this 3 shot focus bracket has excellent technical quality and enc value as well. Hopefully Canon will fare better than Nikon ;)
Oppose original, weak oppose neutral alternate 1 - It is nothing more than a reasonably well taken photograph of an every day object. There is nothing special or eyecatching about it. TheOtherSiguy (talk) 02:09, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As an encyclopaedia, Wikipedia is primarily concerned with informing people. Hence, images such as this, have a valid position as an FP (IMO). Images such as the Antelope Canyon one below are pretty, but they are no more valuable than this (and no harder to take). Studio shots like this, are deceptively difficult to take. Take for example the image on the 40D article my shot replaced: Image:Canon EOS 40D img 1325.jpg - it has white balance issues, poor DOF, and very poor lighting. The value in these shots is similar to the value of FP's of static 24/7 365 days a year buildings like this (and indeed most of Diliff's impressive portfolio) - it has been executed extremely well. --Fir000205:01, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Can I request Aitias that you become a little less cryptic in your comments. "Ineloquent: Not eloquent, Eloquent: having or exercising the power of fluent, forceful, and appropriate speech: an eloquent orator." - dictionary.com --Fir000205:01, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
As Janke wrote below, not everybody is a native English speaker. So it would be very nice, if you were not so arrogant. This dictionary said me that uneloquent is the correct word. If that's false, I'm very sorry. But the point is, that your picture is insufficient for FP. I hope I was able to find the correct word. —αἰτίας•discussion•21:56, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Indeed, reflections in lens are quite unsightly. (I think that's the gist in Aitias' comment - we aren't all English speakers, you know...) Also, reflection of camera on tabletop is distracting. A FP of a subject like this needs to be perfect. --Janke | Talk18:37, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oh really? That's quite interesting because I went to some length to get those reflections (both in the lens and on the white surface)! I thought they were a nice touch --Fir000221:40, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Oh what the heck. Because it's a nice shot, very good focus, obvious attention to detail. No technical flaws. The lens is distracting, but Fir doesn't control the effects of glass on light, there's nothing that can be done about that. My only issue is the weird light effect on the very top of the camera.. not that big of a deal --ffroth04:30, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Very weak support While technically brilliant, I do not know if it is very encyclopedic. Of course, it is possible that some on Wikipedia (as it is an international entity) are not familiar with cameras. --Sharkface21723:45, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Hehe I'm actually glad you made that comment because it proves my point re:f/22 perfectly. If you are complaining about the sharpness of f/13, I'd hate to submit something shot at f/22 --Fir000204:50, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Per issues raised last time - lacks sharpness and detail, particularly around the geyser, in the trees and in the clouds --Fir000200:59, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Oppose for overall poor composition: too much foreground, not enough sky, etc. Moreoever, mentioning "FP on Commons" is not IMO a very strong or useful reason for a nom here, as English Wiki's FPC traditionally has much more stringent standards than Commons concerning quality and enc. value (of which Commons has none). Just a thought. --Malachirality (talk) 05:00, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Oppose — sorry, but as mentioned above, it's not particularly well composed, and there are definite sharpness issues that are distracting. The foreground is wonderful, though. --Haemo (talk) 07:43, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. Image looks good to me, and sufficiently sharp. Caption could be better, to give an idea of how big the "castle" structure around the mouth of the geyser aperture is. Spikebrennan (talk) 22:42, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support. This fire was a widely publicized event in Finland. The old warehouses were located in central Helsinki between the Parliament House and the Central Railway Station and there was considerable debate over whether they should be torn down or kept. A new music hall is now being built in their place. The photo itself is very good, too, I think. --KFP (talk | contribs) 22:47, 25 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The horizontals also look to be tilted - the ground, the top of the 'burning' wall, and the top of the wall further in the distance. --jjron (talk) 11:53, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Oppose Does not appear in any articles, and as far as I can tell it has gained nothing from being taken at night. Instead it has lost detail in the shadows and gained those horrible blue lights. --Fir000201:01, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment; "I can tell it has gained nothing from being taken at night." I know hat you mean, but it accurately portraits how it looks at night now.--Svetovid (talk) 16:45, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose The blue light in front of the building is awfully distracting. The first thing I thought of when I looked at it was not the building, but a Star Wars lightsaber. Clegs (talk) 03:54, 26 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it gained the blue lights. They are actually part of the building design now, and they are not visible by day. They might not appeal to your eclectic taste, but them being visible should not be held against the picture, bout in favour. I'm still going neutral here, it is a HDR shot, but I believe slightly more light with non black shadows and non pitch black sky with visible building contours would have helped the picture. --Dschwen00:10, 27 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment My point is that the blue lights are not part of the building, but a distracting part of the foreground. If you look closely, you'll see that they are on the edge of the sidewalk in the foreground, and have nothing to do with the building. Happy New Year!Clegs (talk) 01:10, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support - (including expansion from my original comments)
Is of a high technical standard.
Very nicely done. The blue lights accent the image. Night makes it dynamic and interesting. This is the whole point. It has been pointed out that the top of the dome is out of focus. The top of the dome is IN focus; the statue on the top may be on the edge of the focal plane. Unless this were a photo specifically of that point, how can that .5% of the image be killing the entire image? No, the building from left to right, front to back, is clearly in focus and the statue atop the top of the dome is only arguably out-of-focus (or it's the function of resolution and small area of the image).
Is of high resolution.
3000x1520 I think qualifies. No debate on this point apparently.
Is among Wikipedia's best work.
Don't see many like this often (this is a really subjective criteria, mind you). Too subjective to really be an argued point. This is a "do we like it" question. We do. The photo is fantastic. There's no such thing as a perfect photo.
Has a free license.
Creative Commons Attribution ShareAlike 2.5 - No debate on this point.
Adds value to an article.
The article has many photos, but most are blah, daytime, architectural snapshots (nice ones, mind you). This particular one is very nice and the nighttime aspect adds punch and dramatics to the photo and article. Okay, the image was added afterward, but the point is that it is there now and it adds value to the article. All the other images add minimally, but this one adds dynamics. Someone pointed out that the blue lights detract from the building, but as it has been pointed out, the lights are part of the building, which only reinforces the value of the image in depicting the building.
Is accurate.
Yes. As described above, the lights are a part of the building, not easily seen in daylight. This "criticism" actually lends credence to this as the image is more accurate a representation of the building than a similar image in the daytime.
Has a good caption.
Yes. "This image shows the Federal Administrative Court in Leipzig, Germany at night." No debate to this point either.
Is neutral.
Don't see how it could be not neutral in this instance. No debate on this either.
Avoids inappropriate digital manipulation.
Looks good. It is a composite, but not an altered composite, and there has been no debate on this point.
The only complaints on this image have been the blue lights, the statue atop the dome, and the so-called tilt. The image is exceptionally well-done. The focus issue is marginal at worst (and non-existant at best), the image is not rotated (the appearance referred to is a function of shooting from the side, and the image is very well-oriented), and the blue lights are a large part of what makes this image so great. It appears as though a lot of the issues are "I don't like it" arguments, and that's fine (because I'm including an "I like it" angle), but the actual criteria, objectively stated, are clearly and easily met. This image is (should be) a gimme for featured status. VigilancePrime (talk) 22:29, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
But we're not just judging quality - refer to Criterion 1, dot point 3 "...it has good composition and has no highly distracting or obstructing elements." So you're telling me those blue lights aren't 'highly distracting'? (Look, maybe if it was just that one off to the right you could argue it's not highly distracting, but it's that one in the middle that kills it). To me it also fails on Criterion 3, dot point 2, due to the lights. --jjron (talk) 08:00, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support The photo shows great detail on the building itself. I think the blue light, along with the perspective of the shot, gives an interesting twist on the building pictures that we see here on FPC. tiZom(2¢)10:48, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose The blue lights are a very recent addition. This version shows the building before, and also shows that it's really not very well lit at night. For encyclopedic purposes, a daytime shot would be much better. Creatively speaking, its a really nice shot and the blue contrasts superbly with the warm floodlights, however a long-standing consideration for WP:FP is that creative flair becomes a negative factor if it reduces the enc value overall. This candidate illustrates the reasoning behind that very well. --mikaultalk17:26, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support++ I dont see why the blue lights matter for a featured picture. I think this is a great high-res photo that fully illustrates the building and shows its current state. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Teque5 (talk • contribs) 23:59, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support Per comments above, while the blue lights might not be a pretty design choice, that does not by any definition violate a FP criterion I know of. It is, in fact, specifically denied so. Given that no nigh time picture can be taken showing a global view of the building like that without those poles, I fail to see how they can be held against the image. Circeus (talk) 01:48, 31 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - Tenzin Gyatso, the fourteenth and current Dalai Lama, is the leader of the exiled Tibetan government in India. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989. Photographed during his visit in Cologno Monzese MI, Italy, on december 8th, 2007 (from image description page).
Reason
sharp, high res, interesting facial expression (clothes are enc. as well I believe)
Oppose Sorry but the flash is just too harsh - very strong and obvious shadow behind him. I also dislike his expression and the fact that his cloak is cut off lower RHS --Fir000222:28, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose A good subject and a pretty good shot but there are much better shots of his holiness and I don't think this quite makes the cut for FPC and for the best we have to offer. Cat-five - talk06:22, 30 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
A really pretty image I think. I was waiting outside for the right light but the interior lights weren't coming on, so I went in to complain and the director was finishing his coffee before turning on the lights inside. I might have also gotten a good one of the interior atrium and if that turns out good I'll upload it. Merry Christmas.
Support original, Oppose Edit 1, good job. Good light, high technical quality, encyclopaedic. The edit doesn't show the entire building, which is necessary to be as encyclopaedic as possible. --Aqwis (talk – contributions) 14:05, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
OpposeOriginal Pretty colours but the composition isn't particularly good - too much carpark and sky and not enough of the actual library. The crop I posted is better, IMO, but is a bit awkward still; hence weak support edit 1 --Fir000223:10, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
You may be interested that the cement on the sides of the atrium building is actually part of the library but if you prefer your crop thats your right.-Fcb981(talk:contribs)23:14, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Support edit 2 Very nice light & exposure but sky-heavy composition was killing it. The tight crop was nice but for enc value I agree we need to show the whole building. Logical conclusion: crop to a pano format. I've also tweaked the perspective a little to correct some distortion that was taking the main "spire" off vertical. --mikaultalk18:46, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Original - The Prunksaal in Österreichische Nationalbibliothek is divided, after the original list of the books, into a "war" and a "peace" side, which is reflected also in the wall frescoes, from Daniel Gran. Here we see the fresco of war and law.
Original - The Prunksaal in Österreichische Nationalbibliothek is divided, after the original list of the books, into a "war" and a "peace" side, which is reflected also in the wall frescoes, from Daniel Gran. Here we see the fresco of peace and heaven.
Original - Two Japanese Imperial Marines who committed hari-kari by shooting themselves rather than surrender to a U.S. Marine, Tarawa, Gilbert Islands in the Pacific
Reason
This does an excelent, if somewhat disturbing, job of conveying death by suicide during World War II.
Comment I've removed the photo from seppuku. Seppuku is suicide by slicing the abdomen. It is not a synonym for "suicide." The photo illustrates suicide, but not seppuku. This comment is not about the photograph but about its use. Fg2 (talk) 11:32, 21 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Doesn't illustrate suicide per se. The soldiers might have been killed as well (I am not doubting they committed suicide though).--Svetovid (talk) 16:12, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose Quality low, and in no way a unique picture. There probably are lots of shots of suicided soldiers. The Burningmonk.jpg on the suicide page is much more iconic. Find a large scan of that, and I'll support it. --Janke | Talk10:32, 30 December 2007 (UTC) (PS: Sorry for being late here, I somehow missed this candidate earlier - holidays...)[reply]
Original - An image of the resident of my backyard in Sydney Australia, taken on boxing day 2007 - this Eastern Water Dragon has taken up permanent residence here.Another backyard resident of mine (lucky me, truly), in a drain pipe: Blue Tongue Lizard
Reason
A few examples of how creatures going back some 20 million years adapt to human environment.
oppose - nice pic good focus on the head, but the background is too distracting and the animal is only partially shown. Also this may not be its typical habitat. deBivort07:07, 28 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Comment. Thanks for all the happy snaps, but FPC is not a personal photo sharing site. You can nominate an "alternative" image to give voters the choice, but clearly that is not what's being done here; this is just a collection of basically unrelated photos. I have reduced the size of the extras so they don't chunk up the FPC page so much, but I recommend they be removed. --jjron (talk) 11:43, 29 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Not promoted --jjron (talk) 14:02, 1 January 2008 (UTC)
(Note: this nom had been removed from the FPC page by the original nominator without any formal closing, withdrawal, etc (see here) - I found it and have now closed it). [reply]
is the version in the article. I like the dog, but besides the ineligibility, the washed out colours don't do it for me. --jjron 08:09, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
Oppose - colour noise in the dog's fur, JPG artifacts everywhere, not used in any articles (although that can easily be changed, the first two can't). —Vanderdecken∴ ∫ξφ 10:54, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
Oppose Stitching error (as per crop). 
Done -- Laitche (talk) 05:24, 7 December 2007 (UTC)
Support As per above, could be better but a very nice shot nonetheless and a very hard one to get I'm sure. Cat-five - talk 07:17, 9 December 2007 (UTC)
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of the same place by the same photographer at possibly the same time, I'd tend to think not. Plus agree with above reasons about being too cut off; the other one's already been promoted with that issue in mind. --jjron (talk) 23:34, 18 December 2007 (UTC)
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Support Works for me - good feather detail --Fir0002 05:20, 19 December 2007 (UTC)
Strong Support Very nice shot. Cat-five - talk 04:12, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
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Promoted Image:Tau Emerald inflight edit.jpg MER-C 02:14, 30 December 2007 (UTC)
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