Hi Adrian,

its a very good initiative....particularly for a amateur photographer like me... from time to time, I c tht some of my photos are -vely voted by the admin.... some of those photos seem to be quite good to my eyes but I never get an explanation regarding what went wrong?? here are some of my photos which are voted down, PLZ check and if possible explain me:

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Uttarakhand/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-h9m5RC9...

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Night_photography/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-e...

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Night_photography/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-H...

thanks for ur critical suggestions..

---Sukumar

Hi,

My photo (link below) was voted down and I received a mail from "Raphie" that it doesn't respect the Quality Chart as it is "badly exposed". I totally disagree, and the exposure is intentional to show the late afternoon sun reflecting off the sea. If you were there when I took this photo, that is what you would have seen. If this photo is regarded as over exposed then the two sunset photos in the same article should be regarded as underexposed, even though I regard them both as great photos that capture the atmosphere of Guincho Beach very well.

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/f8bcmhfrvnr3b-tap4PLCMLzs

If the Quality Chart is used to vote down and / or eliminate photos like this then we might as well restrict Fotopedia to boring point and shoot snaps and real photographers will go elsewhere. It would be a shame, Fotopedia is a great site but over zealous quality control will ruin it.

Michael.

OK for Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu article but voted down and off Sports.

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/ezamprogno-yzhx6zlsz6I

Michael, that photo is over-exposed.  The high-lights are very blown out.

This is what's know as clipping.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clipping_%28photography%29

Dan,

I know what clipping is. The exposure and the resultant clipping in the photo is intentional and creates the effect I was after. It is neither wrong, nor a mistake. 

I can understand what you're doing there, but for me it goes a bit too far.

This would be a good example, taken in similar light:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/26518954@N07/3937001385/in/set-7215760...

Clipping the shadows, rather than the highlights works better.

Any explanation from anyone regarding the photos that i posted before??

one more: http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Bridge/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-DJa76qMlbZM

is this not a bridge or the photo is bad....?? this is the photo of the famous chain bridge of Budapest.....what went wrong??....I couldnt understand....

My opinion on the links above. Many people vote, like Dan (who knows a lot more about photography than I do, thanks for taking part in this forum!), I just try to help you understand why a photo didn't make it to the top and what could improve it. If you want more feedback please use one of the many photography forums out there.

Sukumar:

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-h9m5RC9d3Rk/slideshow: The framing globally lacks dynamism. No particular element is emphasized. It would have been interesting to use the rule of thirds.

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-eESpn33N54c/slideshow: The horizon isn't straight. The building isn't in the center of the photo and not enough out of the center to make the framing interesting. Finally, the exposition isn't great, some parts of the building are burnt. A little less light would have darkened the sky and given a less importance to the background (we see a part of the town behind which disturbs the eye), and more to the building. The reflection would have been more detailed.

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-HXYe2StYwsM/slideshow: the framing is much more interesting. Yet there is a compression or post production issue visible particularly on the base of the statues and on the pavement. It makes the photo look a little blurry and disturbs the eye. Maybe you applied a digital noise reduction. Anyways this photo did make it to the top in the Budapest article.

Emerson: http://www.fotopedia.com/items/ezamprogno-yzhx6zlsz6I/slideshow: When I look at your photo my eye has trouble finding where the focus is. It is a bit blurry.

The quality of a photo is also judged relatively to the photos already in an article. In the sports article the quality of the photos is much higher than in the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu one. Some of the photos you submit, Sukumar, have received votes in one articles and made it to the top, but not in another.

I hope this was helpful.

I'm really grateful for deserving such accurate analyses. I do accept your points, and I am comfortable with the idea of a photo being evaluted in comparison with other pictures of the same article. I'd be hypocrite otherwise, since I myself have already decided my vote this way at times.
But could you confirm it is OK voting down a picture because of its quality and not only because of its relevance to the article?
I'm asking this because of a particular comment by Dan Marsh in the original thread of discussion, which reads:

When you vote on a photo, you are indicating whether or not the photo is relevant to the article.  It's not for rating photos for aesthetics, or for how much you like the photo.

If people are using it to indicate whether they like the photo or not, then we're bound to have problems, because we have different tastes.

You can use the report button, which is an exclamation mark in a triangle, to inform the photographer about any technical problems with the photo, i.e. over-exposed, out of focus, etc

On the overlay of a photo, when you vote, it is written "relevant to the "article name" article". On Wednesday it will change to "Is this a great photo to illustrate "article name"". Quality is taken into account when voting and it is good. Yet as Dan says voting isn't about liking a photo or not, but rather judging the photographic quality and its relevance for the article. I hope the new sentence on the overlay will help new members to vote well.

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-HXYe2StYwsM/slideshow

Looks like too much sharpening on this one.

Dan,

The example you gave (clipping the shadows) is a different kind of photo, capturing the sunset. I have plenty of those too. My photo is capturing the brightness of the sun reflecting off the water, it's the effect I wanted, I didn't want a sunset photo.

Every time I post a photo I'm really proud of it seems to rack up negative votes.

I would appreciate any feedback you may be able to provide on where I went wrong with this one:

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Drop_(liquid)/candidates

Burch

Hi Burch!

The article is called drop, whereas your photos are of splashes, and maybe not so relevant?

This one would be a good example for drop...

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/flickr-353172766

Thanks Dan.

I based the submission on some of the other photos in the article where the drops/droplets resulted from the impact with the still water. 

I believe I'm becoming over sensitive to the negative voting issue since the forum started.

Thanks again for the feedback.

Burch

I'd say there's quite a few photos in that article which aren't relevant, one even looks like some bubbles.

Please use the inappropriate button to report any photo that is irrelevant. It is amazing how such a simple thing as a drop isn't that simple to illustrate :)

I would like to know why was this photo voted down ? I cannot see any major issues with it.

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Milan_Cathedral/items/flickr-4723114595

I would really like to improve my quality of photos so any good explanation would be nice.

Looks fine to me.  Was the pink light there when you took the photo?

I think may be the colours are making people think the photo has had some extreme processing.

The pink is original. I did not do any post-processing. There is a very big screen on the right side of the dome and at that time there was an advert which shed a pink light over the building.

I think it was an interesting moment but the voters seem to disagree. :( 

Another photo which I cannot understand why is voted down is

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Oradea/items/flickr-4496773324

I is not post-processed, it is not over-exposed, it does show a landmark of Oradea - Black Eagle Palace so it is on the subject. Maybe you can enlighten me. Any comment would be great. Thank you !

I think in some cases, voters want the clearest, most explicit images, so if our photos are not really explicit it can be -not that good....but

Yes...some moderators are kinda blind, or don't take enough time to check on the photos or... I don't know

It would be dissapointing to have bad moderatos in fotopedia... let's just think no

I have checked some pictures negative voted from all you guys, and some of them should not be neg voted.

There's something really funny about over exposure... that's absolutely subjective

check this two BEAUTIFUL pictures:

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/flickr-3551019373  --- I gave this picture the 5th vote

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/4gplsc3334anh-eznftgPq8fI --- my picture

So funny, because I just found this photo and is the counterpart father/mother without me knowing before.They are both intentionally over exposed with the same end. We are not talking about scientific photography

words are no necessary about this beauty, and yes, moderators told me that my photo was badly exposed

I don't know certainly, but I think we hundreds of photographers dicide in the end which photo makes it and which don't. This is not property of a few people with such a questionable photographic judgement and/or interest for their work. So, the existence of this forum is really great, let's all keep in touch and vote for all those photos that are considered by our mind and hearts as -pictures for humanity.

Thanks, greetings everyone

Sabin - hard to know exactly why that photo was voted down.  Might be because it is an indoor shot, where as I think people are expecting to see landscape, i.e. cityscape, photos in that article.

Shame there is no article for that shopping centre on wikipedia.

There is another photo of mine that is being constantly voted down

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Polaris/items/flickr-4804902145

In my opinion people who vote this photo down have no knowledge in astronomy. Please see the resolved photo here  http://www.flickr.com/photos/usabin/4804902145/

I doubt there are much better photos for these stars except maybe for those taken with a multi-million dollar equipment as Hubble or such.

What people would expect to see here ?

Maybe someone can clear this up for me.

Thank you !

Hi Sabin,

I can recognize Polaris, yet on your photo the Ursa Major and Minor are not easy to spot. Photos in the top here are in my opinion much better illustrations. Someone with no knowledge about stars wouldn't learn anything from your photo in the Ursa Major article for example.

Best,

Adrian

Hi all,

I just think sometimes photos are voted down for no good reason at all. I suspect that other posters occasionally vote photos down to gain a place in the queue... Sad but true (and nothing can be done about it i guess). Ah well, that's life.

Why else would this Beijing photo be voted down?

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Beijing/items/eq304r1pgkg9a-tfS1F9kcpxQ

Hi Guys,

I need some advise. This photo got 2 negative votes and I need some input to help me improve my shots. I loved this photo and the one of the duckling spreading his little wings. The ducking got 2 votes and the follow -2. Any suggestions? 

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Duck/items/burch-5OesMApb-z0

I am interested to know why this picture lost a point going from 1 when I put it on to 0.

Unless the person who deducted a point reads this I may never know the reason.Not that it upsets me but I would like to know to help me add pictures that are suitable for the article.

It seems to me that the article had ten pictures of the henge on  nice sunny days, I felt that it would balance the article to put one on showing the stones on a cold and misty morning.

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/cn6fj7v4hbdu9-UPmLVsfk4J4

Any suggestions would be welcome. I hope the link works correctly.

Mike

Hi Mike,

This photo is doubtless more representative of Stonehenge. A much more appropriate weather :). I see it is now in the top.

I see Philip's photo is also in the top. I guess it is sometimes worth waiting a little to get more votes on a photo.

Burch, I have difficulties with the focus on your duck photos. The duck spreading his wings is very cute though, nice timing :)

Adrian

Adrian,

Thanks for you comments on Stonehenge, the voting down is not the point in its self but I sometimes do not understand why people vote a picture down, not just mine. I would like the voter to tell me why. Baffles me sometimes.

Thanks again.

Mike

Hi ! I can't understand why this photo was voted down?

Can anyone explain me please, i will be very greatfull for your feedbacks.

The link is not of the same photo but they are almost the same, the original photo is no more in web so i couldnt uploud it again.

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/5apho91afj3i6-9UA5sSFMQ68

Thanks .

Hi Ana Gabriela,

Your photo has a lot of noise. I guess you shot at low light.

Best,

Adrian

Hi Thank You!   for your last post, I have 3 more links  I would like you to tell me what  is the wrong thing they have .

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Clover/items/5apho91afj3i6-wWUo2qoRbfo

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Wall/items/5apho91afj3i6-6A9XPDPQLNg

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Clover/items/5apho91afj3i6-nBA1hu-VCkw

I'll be very greatfull for your  good coments.

Hi Ana!

I'd say the focus looks a bit soft on those 3.

Hi all, here's mine :)

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Natural_arch/items/flickr-4891793873

it fits the article (Natural arches commonly form where cliffs are subject to erosion from the sea), I thought that even though the light is not great (it was shot in full sun, with a polarizer for the sea color), it would be nice to have a different kind of arch… maybe not enough context?

Looks fine to me.

Wondering why this photo of mine has been voted to -1 http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Barn_Swallow/items/flickr-4193932885

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Grey_Crowned_Crane/items/flickr-4658612849 this photo too....

Hi Tarique,

The Barn Swallow photo has a lot of noise, I would have voted it down. Regarding the Crane photo I'm not so sure. The focus is a bit disturbing to me.

Looks like some movement blur in the crane photo, plus some JPEG compression artefacts.

Hi all,

I updated the help pages and created one focused on voting only here.

At the bottom of the page there is a list of reasons why a photo can be voted down. It would be great if you could help me complete the list in order to help new Fotopedia members.

Why do you vote a photo down?

Thanks!

Tarique Sani,

Both photos look like they were shot at long focal length, perhaps with a zoom kit lens at around 55mm, and then subjected to an extreme crop. I'm not saying that's what you did, but that's what it looks like.  What I'm certain of is you are cropping too tight on an image that doesn't contain enough detail to sustain the crop.  The result is a general lack of detail, a soft focus and a hint of grain. Actually a little bit more than a hint of grain with the barn swallow shot.  :-)  You can see the same in the head shot of the crane, but for some reason it doesn't hurt the quality of the image nearly as much.  On the head shot you can also see some purple fringe in the black areas, which probably would not be noticeable had it not been cropped so tight. All are beautifully composed and nicely captured, but you just don't have the glass to get that kind of shot from a distance.  No doubt if you got any closer your subjects would have quickly departed.  :-)

Thailand Photos, Perhaps that is why fotopedia should show EXIF information.

Barn swallow - agreed poor image - taken at 4

Both pictures of Crown Crane are taken with a focal length of 1000mm with a Canon 1DMkIII - the head is a 2/3rd crop but the full body shot has just been cropped to fit the 4:9 ratio, the head shot does show compression artifacts and that is the one I had expected to be voted down but the full body shot is razor sharp on my 27" imac monitor and I don't understand the comments about motion blur etc  but thanks for replying, I was just getting a feel on how this community thinks :-)

Tarique Sani,

That's very interesting.  Not sure why you got those results considering the high-end equipment you're using.

Thailand Photos, I know exactly what is happening :-)

Tarique Sani,

I'm not good at reading between the lines, but I just popped over and looked at the original on Flicker and its definitely blurred.  Viewing it there, I'm inclined to agree with Dan that it is probably motion blur, particularly when I also see it was shot at 1/125.  Using a 1000mm focal length you are pretty much guaranteed to get motion blur when shooting a grazing animal at that shutter speed.

This was taken with a 50mm f1.4 at ISO800, Nikon D90:

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Komodo_dragon/items/flickr-4972846501

I do not understand why it was voted down. It seems pretty sharp to me and the noise does not seem to be bothering. Maybe it should be another rule like: no photos with ISO more than 200 or 400 or whatever.

Thank you for any comments !

Sabin

Hi Sabin,

The noise in your photo can be easily fixed, using Lightroom 3, for example, which is very good at smoothing out noise.

Also, it is possible it has negative votes due to the very shallow field of focus at f/1.4.

Hi there,

Same for me. My photo has been voted down. Recieved a mail about the quality chart: please let me know what the problem is. I my opinion, it's a good illustration of the "Pointe des Poulains" in Belle-Ile. But maybe I'm wrong?

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Belle_Île/items/OUcoQacXz0A-Ws8RU-5tvRI

Thanks,

Nicolas

Nicolas,

I think it is fine, but some don't like dark photos.  To me, it sets a mood.  You might try breaking the 1/3 rule and crop out a large portion of the foreground.  Because the scene is so dark, some may find the foreground a bit distracting.  With the contrails in the sky I think the cropped version will still maintain a good balance. 

I do find it interesting that your photo was voted to a negative 1, and you got an Emial about it, when the B&W candidate right next to yours is horribly grainy, but survives with a +2.  :-)

Nicolas, the moderation mail said your photo is "badly exposed". Underexposed in this case.

Thailand photos, you can report a photo as having to much noise. The author will then be asked to remove it from the encyclopedia :)

OK! Thanks for the feedback :)

I've resubmitted another version of the same picture...We'll see. I've also added another one that I love :)

Let me know.

Maybe wrong posting place but I would like to know why all my pacfic ocean pics where deleated from the pacfic ocean and also from my front page.

Oscar, photos with a negative score get deleted after a week if they don't move back up. It is explained here in the "What happens once my photo is added" section.

Sorry if wrong posting. Yesterday i've got the mail that "One of your photos, Phuket sunset, made it to the top in the Phuket Province article", but when i visit my page i saw that this picture was voted down and has rating -3. I'd like to know is it mistake in e-mail?

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/LfYQUaSHM3w-pPW5a6YkRv8

Dmitry,

I had a cat photo jump from 0 to +11 and back down to +2 within a span of 12 hours!  Those cat people are a tough audience.  :-)

Hello all,

Time for me to ask the question as well: why is this photo of mine voted down? Are some offended by it?

http://www.fotopedia.com/en/Monkey/items/2v22pfbsj3dk6-lUCQ1XHj9QY

Benny,

I doubt people are offended.  More likely its because the photo is too soft in some areas.  Looks like it might be a problem with depth of field.

Benny ,

Try some tighter cropping and see if there is any difference.

Charles

Benny, there's a fair bit of digital noise in the photo.  But, it should clean up, if you apply some noise reduction.

Thanks for the advice all. Actually it s one the few attempts a i had at HDR. Could explain the noise.

Hi All,

could someone please explain why these two photos are voted down??

these are true light settings at different time....please explain the possible errors in the photos and how to improve it....

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Ghent/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-Se6Q3t0k3W8

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Ghent/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-Se6Q3t0k3W8

thanks for your time...

 --SR

Hi!

You've linked to the same photo twice.  It looks fine to me, and has votes.

sorry...I meant this photo as well...

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Ghent/items/4naurjl8ch3f7-KdAUKKSu3X4

actually..these were suddenly from +4 to 0.....so was wondering where exactly I did the mistake....

It just seems you couldnot choose between including the reflection in the water and not doing so. The result is that this small part of the reflection has a disturbing effect. Also, nothing seems to be straight in Ghent, which might be explained by it being in Belgium, an absurd country anyway. ;-)

I agree with Benny , about the reflection and pronounced barrel distortion on the second picture.

The first one looks good but , the color is strange . Also the tilt of the building on the left side is not good.

Charles

Hello Everyone,

 I follow this blog with great interest. I have seen excellent feedback to questions of why photos were getting negative votes. This feedback normally provides an insight I missed when looking at the photos in question.

Another I have learned is when several people (negative voting) are critical of my entires, I delete them from the albums. I recently added several photos from the area of Harrogate England. I was excited as I believed the shots to be some of my better entries. Most received 1-3 negative moves within 24 hours, so I removed them. Historically, many of the photos I shot with a point and shoot have received lots of positive votes but the pictures I believed would do well get killed. I wish the system provided a feedback option from the voters, I would like to know where I'm going wrong.

Burch,

You might want to leave your photos your photos up for a bit longer.  It is quite common for many of my photos to immediately get negative votes and then climb back up and get voted in.  It seems there are some here that are quick to vote on all new contributions and are very harsh.  Let the rest of the community have a look before deciding to remove a photo. :-)

Its a sad thing to say but like "other" photo sites the element of ego, and dishonesty seems to rear its head. I have watched quite bemused at some of the voting patterns. I even sent a private mail to another photographer asking has he upset somebody because his rankings were no indication of the quality of his work.

There must be a known group of negative voters? Does Admin not keep a tab on these people?

I am not going to post any samples of my negative voted images simply because I am a new boy on the site

Hi Steve!

The staff at fotopedia can, and do notice any malicious voting patterns.

But, I don't think we should always assume that someone is being malicious, if they are making many negative votes.  The thumbs-down is there to be used, after all.

The standard of photography on fotopedia is now higher than it was at the beginning.  So, I think that some averagely good photos, are going to get negative photos, whereas they may not have done a year ago.

It's also worth bearing in mind that a technically excellent photo might get negative votes, just because it is not so relevant or encyclopaedic, and perhaps needs to be added to a more relevant article.

Thanks "Thailand Photos" for the feedback. I will consider not deleting my photos so quickly. I believe I fall somewhere between frustrated and discouraged when I add a shot and it gets a dozen positive votes then a week later it has a minus 3.

I believe Dan, Adrian and the crew do an excellent job of monitoring the process but agree with Steve Bailey that there appears to be a few folks that are either overly critical or plain nasty with their voting.

I encouraged several of my friends to join and post their photos. They have all stopped participating due to the frustration of negative voting.

Too bad, it's a great site with the opportunity to learn from the many talented photographers that post their work. 

Without question there is an element here that votes by a very critical standard.  No doubt there are also those that vote with a competitive agenda, rather than focusing on the true goals of the project.  This is guaranteed to happen anytime you create a competitive environment.  That said, I think both are in the minority, and the majority tend to cancel out their actions.  The only real damage they do is make it that much harder to get voted in, but I see it as a complement when one of mine immediately goes negative and later gets pushed back up by the majority.

Fotopedia has done a good job at minimizing the social networking hooks that result in mutual back scratching we see on so many other photo publishing sites.  The only real strong tool people have for influencing votes is the follow feature, and it's pretty obvious who is using it for that purpose.

I think it is important to understand that it only takes two individuals to move a photo from +1 to -1, just two people!  It takes 4 people to move a photo from +1 to +5.  That's twice as many! It only takes one to move a +5 back to a +4 and 6 to move a -1 to +5.  Of course, this is an oversimplification, as a photo could bounce up and down by one or two points during the short time it gets its initial burst of attention.  We don't get any data on the history of voting for a particular photo, but my observations suggest it isn't nearly that volatile at first exposure to the general community.  What usually happens is one or two people quickly knock a photo down, and then it is up to the majority to decide if it actually has merit, which takes place over a longer period of time.

A photo that receives a + vote gets a lot of attention, while those receiving a negative get none.  Also, if a new photo is added to the same topic yours is in it will once again receive a lot of attention.  By my observation, it is when a new photo gets added to the collection you are most likely to see a dramatic shift in your photo's ranking.  Your photo also gets a burst of attention when the daily news goes out in Email.  In this case your photo is being put in front of those that are following you or the subject your photo has been submitted to.  Either way the focus, or agendas, of these people is most likely very different than that of the community at large.

Fotopedia members are a melting pot of all different types.  Some have extensive photographic training, others none, and everything in between.  In my opinion, this isn't nearly as big of a problem as one might think.  The rules of photography have been established to help us produce an image that is appealing to the untrained eye, so people don't really need any formal training to adequately evaluate a photo's quality. I don't care what anyone says, if people like a photo, it's a good quality photo, provided they are viewing the full sized version, which many do not.  I've seen plenty of photos that break the rules yet are absolutely astonishing and an equal number that are technically perfect but unappealing.  Only the hardcore technical snobs explicitly vote something down for breaking the rules, but for the majority it's totally a subjective call.  I think those that place too much attention on technical accuracy need to occasionally remind themselves that this project is intended to be of value to the general public and is not an academic exercise.  If the photo is appealing to the eye it's a good photo…simple as that.

There is no way to know how much emphasis is being given to appropriateness when members cast their votes. My guess is most simply report them to the moderators and focus on over-all appeal.  That said, I do think people vote a photo down when they think it's not a good fit for the subject, even if it's technically applicable.  A good example that comes to mind is the subject of walls.  The Wiki article only has photo examples of the type of walls that are used to create a barrier, like a fence.  Thus, all the photos being submitted were of similar nature.  When I tried to introduce examples of walls used in a structure they were challenged.  I was able to defend my position on this, but it told me that members do tend to get focused on one idea and reject anything else.  My guess is this happens because people don't read the full article and rely more on the example photos it contains and those submitted by other members.  The only way I see this getting fixed is to ask members to focus their votes on quality and report anything they think isn't a good fit.  

There are also those subjects that have a higher standard, if you will.  Quality and appropriateness aside, it all comes down to one thing.  Do people like your photo for that subject?  The colors blue, red, green, yellow, and pink are this way.  Any topic requiring photos of people are as well.  These topics, and many others, are very difficult to gain acceptance in.  I enjoy them the most, because they are very challenging, but success has as much to do with hitting peoples' hot buttons as it does quality or appropriateness.

The point of this very long piece is there are a lot of variables that come into play, and some are not easily controlled.  But no one else has been able to achieve what the founder and staff of Fotopedia has…not even close!  If you come from an environment where it was easy to receive accolades for your works, and do not enjoy the same here, you were playing in a fantasy world.  If your contributions can gain acceptance here then you truly have something to be proud of, because this is the only site on the Internet that has achieved anything close to a true peer reviewed process.  It has its flaws, and as it builds there will certainly be growing pains, but there is no other place that will give you as honest a review of your creations as Fotopedia does.  

I've never been very good at evaluating my own works.  What I think is great others hate and what I don't care for everyone loves.  So I toss it out there and wait to see what happens, and from that I hope to gain a better understanding of what is good and what's not.  I know there will be some hidden agendas in all of it, but at least I'm not being told my stuff is great by people who only really want my vote.  At least I'm getting honest feedback.  In my opinion, that's how you have to look at it if you are going to play at Fotopedia.  If you think it's tough now, wait until you see what things are like a year from now.  By then I might not even be able to play. :-)

Sorry this got so long.  When I sat down to write it was only supposed to be a couple of paragraphs.  This post is not directed at anyone in particular.

Wow! Thanks for this long and great post!

Excellent, thoughtful and thought provoking comment 'Thailand Photos'.

I posted this image http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Cathedral/items/wywnAYOaM3w-iGrn2z4hbuA in the Notre Dame category and it was voted down very quickly to the point of being removed. This photo has not been post-processed in any way whatsoever, it's pretty much straight from the camera and I am struggling to work out why it bombed so badly. I reported this to the moderators but didn't receive any response. Can anyone provide any feedback on this shot as I was labouring under the misconception that it was actually one of my best photos! All feedback, however critical, very welcome.

at the moment is +2 ...

In my opinion there is no central point of interest plus the orange color cast is unappealing.

plus maybe the voting is not directed to the aesthetic side of the picture but to the content which is more appropriate to the chandelier article.

Charles

Lauren ,

btw your rats pictures (and almost all of your pictures) are amazing , are they attached to any article ?

Charles

The rats were uploaded to Rat, Fancy Rat and Rodent articles but they were considered too post processed so most have been removed I think. Thanks for your feedback.

Lauren,

I think Charles makes some good points, although I don't find the ambient light yellow cast distracting in this case.  I would add that the photo is a bit soft and lacking in detail.  I also notice the image size is 908 × 607, which seems non standard and suggests it has been resized.  It is just a guess, but I suspect you resized the image and did not resharpen it.  I can't quite tell, but it looks like the image, straight off the camera, is a bit grainy, which is masked by the smaller size.  If that is the case, then it would contribute to the lack of detail.  Also, there are those out there that are not very forgiving of wide angle lens distortion.  I personally think it depends on the photo, and in this case it is not distracting, but there are those snobs out there.  :-)

As for your rat photos...FABULOUS!  I've not had time to look at all your photos, but I really love the cat face shot, as well. 

Defend your work!  I've already voiced my opinion on this concept of too much post processing, so I won't repeat it here. Anyone that  thinks your decision to present the images in B&W means they have too much post processing hasn't heard of Ansel Adams.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ansel_Adams

OH....wait a second....perhaps his work would also be rejected for his and Fred Archer's post processing methods which were applied as part of their world famous Zone System http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zone_System

People who have only lived in the digital world need to read up on the good old film and lab days.  There is no such thing as too much post processing.  A photo is either appealing to the eye , or not.  And in my opinion your rat photos are quite appealing to the eye.

Lauren,

I thought your Notre Dame photo was excellent (it got my vote). I don't have the critical eye a lot of the more experienced photographers but for me it was an appealing shot. 

Sometimes I'm glad I don't have the trained eye many of our members have. I look at a photograph and if I find it pleasing to my eyes, I don't go to the critic review mode and look for faults, I give it one of my positive votes. I see lots of photos I don't care for but simply move to the next without submitting a positive or negative vote. I must find a photograph to be really terrible (again to my eyes) to register a negative vote.

I will now check out you Rat photos. Keep submitting shots like Notre Dame and I promise you they will get at least 1 positive vote!

Burch

I think anyone will struggle to get their photo voted up, in such a popular article, if the photo was taken hand-held, at a high ISO, in low lighting.

It is possible to get a reasonable result, if you spend some time cleaning the photo up, i.e. noise reduction.

This is the best I can manage, and RAW file processed using Adobe Lightroom 3.0.

http://www.fotopedia.com/items/photomage-Kb-VWuVUeis/slideshow

Still, it's not so good.

A tripod, and a long exposure at ISO 200, or so, is the only way to get a great photo.

Thank you all for such comprehensive, constructive and encouraging comments. I didn't realise the photo was resized to 908 × 607 (must have been resized for uploading elsewhere) so I may revisit the original at full-size and replace the image as this wasn't cropped at all as far as I can remember. I will have a look at the noise and seeing what Photoshop can do with it.

Again, thank you all for your valuable input!

Best wishes
Lauren

Many of my photos of the last few weeks have generated negative votes. Never massive voting, it 's just enough to get them into a negative total. Since we are all here partly for the learning experience, I was wondering about something. Most of these photos are a result of batch developing and editing, starting from raws (Nikon nefs). This means they are all edited initially with the same settings. Afterwards I did some more editing more specific for each picture for some. I am now wondering if this batch editing I did gives a certain look (due to the batch editing settings I chose) that doesnot please they eye of some of the voters here. Im including the link to 2 of the photos:

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Ponte_Sant%27Angelo/items/2v22pfbsj3d...

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Arch_of_Constantine/items/2v22pfbsj3d...

Any comments will be appreciated.

Ciao,

Benny

Hi Benny!

I don't see any major problems with either of those 2 photos.  Only a couple of minor things.

They look like they might be a bit over sharpened.

And, the pixels in the sky are not so smooth, possibly due to JPEG compression. Check you file save options, and adjust the compression, see if that helps.

Also, this one might look better with a tighter crop:

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Ponte_Sant%27Angelo/items/2v22pfbsj3d...

So that the head of the statue is higher in the frame.

Also, there's a few feint dust marks in the sky, on that photo of the statue.

Dan,

Thanks for the observations. You really have a sharp eye.

There may be indeed some dust marks since i actually did have that problem for a while. Correcting this wasnt always a succes.

I could agree with the over sharpening, since I ve heard similar criticism in a different context. Also the sharpening settings are different from the ones I used in most earlier contributions and are common to most of my recently added photographs.

JPEG compression I will look into.

Maybe I just need to wear my (recently acquired) reading glasses more often while fiddling about with pics. ;-P

Thanks,

Benny

Benny,

The issue I would have with both photos is parts of each are a bit washed out.  I also find the short contrail in the statue photo a bit distracting.  What I have found in working with photos is the bright hard edges in a photo will over sharpen rather quickly, leaving the rest of the photo too soft. If the photo is too bright or has washed out areas it will increase the potential for this problem.  That is what I think is happening in both of your photos.   And I do have my reading glasses on.  :-)

Thailand,

Thanks for your comment. It does confirm the over sharpening issue. Im definitely having a closer look at the settings I used for the complete batch of photos I developed and edited. I think what you are describing is even more so in another one I submitted:

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Ponte_Sant%27Angelo/items/2v22pfbsj3d...

I really dont remember if I did notice the contrail when I shot the first statue photo. Maybe I should try to remove it or it may be an idea to add it to the contrail article? ;-)

Since it is so much activity on this topic I thought I should ask about three of my photos which went down to 0 very quickly. Maybe you can enlighten me.

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Remetea_Mare/items/flickr-5134553923

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Frankfurt_Cathedral/items/flickr-5031...

http://www.fotopedia.com/wiki/Blue/items/flickr-5132934342

Thanks

Sabin

Benny,

It's just my opinion, but in my experience batch processing delivers average results, much like taking film for processing to the drug store for a one hour turn around.  I think you will enjoy much better results if you take the time to process each photo individually. :-)

Sabin,

Just some very quick comments as it is rapidly approaching my bed time.  :-)

The first photo is unappealing to the eye, largely because there is no subject for the eye to focus on.

The second photo is absolutely fabulous...no quality issues that I can see.  My only guess is the subject is not primary enough to please people...its too far in the background.  Just a guess!

The third photo is also a fantastic shot, but it will never survive in the "blue color" topic.  Its just not what the audience is looking for.  Nothing wrong with the quality.  You just didn't hit peoples' hot buttons.  Welcome to the crowd...I'm a member.  :-)

Sabin Hi ,

I generally agree with "Thailand Photos" ... Also ...

The cathedral photo has 2 issues for me.

A) the crane on the left of the cathedral destroys the photo.

B) The river steals attention from your main subject which should be prominent.

The "blue" photo of yours does not belong in that article. Technically is fantastic though. Maybe better suited in the "reflection" article ?

Charles

Thailand, Dan and others,

It just dawned on me that it's not just the fact that my last contributed photos differ from earlier ones by the batch editing. Another difference to before is that I started using the Fotopedia client more and created my first albums. Then I selected photos from the albums to add to articles. The result seems to be a smaller size then what I usually had adding photos through the web interface. Is it correct that the client downsizes the photos so that the shortest side is 1080pix? Can this bring about quality loss? Maybe I should just test it with one of the photos I posted about here yesterday.

Benny,

You bring up a good point and it is actually something I've been meaning to post about.  I have only ever used the client, and I noticed from the beginning that both the client and Fotopedia adjust the full sized image to fit the screen it is being viewed on, or at least that appears to be what is happening. For those with a smaller monitor, such as I have, it reduces the image quite a bit, particularly those shot in portrait.  So I downloaded your photo and viewed it at full size and you are absolutely correct, the hints of over sharpening are gone, and I can see much more detail in the photo.  Areas of the photo are still washed out a bit, but a lot more detail is visible when viewing it at its actual size.  What this means, I think, is the larger the photo's dimensions, the more it will be degraded when viewing in FP.

Yes, I have noticed that as well, now that you mention it.

I think the obvious answer is to display the full sized images at their actual size.  Adrian had previously mentioned they are working on a new way to display photos, so maybe this issue is already being addressed.

I'm finding the negative voting quite strange. Many of my submissions have disappeared from articles as they sit at -1 for a week. Some of these articles are really obscure, with only one or two top photos and no other candidates and I am starting to suspect foul play.

As others have said, it takes four people to vote a photo to the top but only two to cause complete deletion. In popular articles I see photos naturally fluctuating up and down and this is nice...especially when perfectly adequate photos that are negatively voted get corrected over time and vice versa. Unfortunately this doesn't appear to happen in the more obscure / less popular articles as they just aren't seen by many people. I uploaded a few photos to the "Bridle" (horse bridle) category the other day and most have been voted down. I'm not sure why. Same goes for the "Horse Tack" article.

Can I throw a suggestion out there? Why not have the requirement that a photo has to reach -5 to be deleted...or have to be sat in the negative for a month rather than just a week? This would give the less popular articles more exposure and counteract fixed/biased voting.

Hi Lauren,

I just took a look at some of your photos which have a negative score, and the first thing that springs to mind is that they have been cropped to non-standard aspects.  That might cause people to vote them down.

Standard aspects are 4:3 for compact cameras, and 3:2 for D-SLRs.  Fotopedia is optimised for a 3:2 aspect, so if you're using a compact camera, you could always crop to that size.

To check the aspect of an existing photo, divide the length in pixels of the longest side, by the shortest side.  The result should be 1.5 for a 3:2 aspect, or 1.333 for a 4:3 aspect.

Ah, I wasn't aware that that would be a reason for negative voting, a bit harsh. I always crop for the photo rather than to fit in with universal standardisation but perhaps I should change my habits for this purpose.

Thanks for the speedy response.

Lauren,

I have already had the same discussion privately with Fotopedia staff and the answer basically is its the lesser of two evils.  Currently they can not easily distinguish between popular topics and those that are not, when removing photos that have gone negative for more than a week.  So it is for the greater good that those in less popular topics get deleted, even though they should be given a longer time.  I'm not pleased with this policy, but it does fall into the category of growing pains and will hopefully be addressed in the future.