New submissions - general complaint

Seoman · Oct 10, 2013

I have a custom of clicking, clicking, clicking and voting, voting, voting in my spare time. Usually it's pretty nice but from some time I get really upset from some of new submissions. Reasons:
1) RESOLUTION! Sadly, there is no more horizontal resolution cap. Sometimes people make pictures with even 4.288 × 2.848 resolution and thoughtlessly put it on site. There is no good need to do that, it loads too much data and it SCALES on viewing. And it takes time and looks awful. On the other hand, there are also submissions with the size of a post stamp (I'm looking on a 154x154 picture right now).
2) No cropping. Huge margins around the figure. Sometimes when I load next picture, I see a tip of the head on the bottom of my full hd screen. I have to scroll down to see the rest.
3) A million of different angles of one figure on separate pictures. I get really tired of seeing the same figure on a dozen of pictures loading one after another. It's a two minutes work to create one picture with few best angles. Sometimes it's understandable - with some complicated diorama or sophisticated figure - one picture with "artistic" shot, one with few others for better viewing - but I guess you know what I mean.
4) Blurred pictures. That completely amazes me. Why would anyone want to put a blurred image, with barely anything visible, on a site for voting?
5) Invalid depth of field. Most prominent parts of the figure are blurred, some less important details are sharp.
6) Bad light - there is quite a few pictures, when the figure is lit with some strong yellow source of light and colors are almost indistinguishable.
7) Parts of the figure - pictures with only a hand, a weapon, a piece of cloak... What should I do with that?
8) Early WIPs - pictures of figures barely glued, sometimes basecoated - what for?

People should perform some little sanity check before uploading another image. How to make them aware of that? Maybe some mandatory tutorial/instruction/FAQ on creating an account or uploading first pictures?

Dragonsreach · Oct 10, 2013

Most repeated views of the same figure don't get through our moderation process (we limit to 3 normally).
WIP's usually get dropped as well.

Can you provide any examples and I will inspect.

Seoman · Oct 10, 2013

Although - many of the WIPs are reasonable.

To be clear - what I'm complaining about is absolutely not the work of administrators

I would just expect a little of reflection from people before uploading a picture.

Talking about resolution...
http://www.coolminiornot.com/332784
6.878 x 5.818!! Nice.

Bailey03 · Oct 10, 2013

Ha, wow, some of those are truly awful posts. I love the completely out of focus ones. Did the poster not even look at their pictures?

Yeah, the multiple posts of the same figure annoy me. It feels a bit like laziness, you can see that 99% of the posts are collage images. It also feels like they're messing with the rank system. How about I just post my best figure 5 times, that should make my rank shoot up. Now, I don't think that's really the intention and if all the images don't get 50+ votes then that won't really matter. But it's still irritating.

The only time I don't mind this is when someone has a complex figure/diorama and wants to post an overall image collage and then one with detail images. For example I feel like this is fine
http://www.coolminiornot.com/316571
http://www.coolminiornot.com/316572

The other things you bring up are certainly annoying, but in my opinion people who make those sorts of mistakes probably aren't serious painters or are CMON novices and are still learning how things work. Maybe 'serious painter' is the wrong description... but if you're putting almost no effort into the photographing (bad light, depth of field, focus, etc) it feels like you just want to post something and don't care if it comes across in the best way. Don't get me wrong, I've had my fair share of mediocre photos when I was just starting to post here. But at some point I said enough is enough, I need to do what I need to do to learn to take some good photographs.

Since I consider a lot of those to be 'newbie' mistakes I try to overlook them. I have no interest voting on them either. Oh great, it's a picture of a dreadnought arm... what am I supposed to do with that? If you really want my opinion post on the WIP forum section, not the gallery.

ten ball · Oct 11, 2013

Remember there are loads of children who post also.

Wombat85 · Oct 11, 2013

Not everyone can afford a high end camera and lens kit with a lightbox. I can agree about the multiple posts thing but the other stuff is kinds eletists. Its CMoN, not only people with high end photography skill can post.

Seoman · Oct 12, 2013

Wombat85 said:
Not everyone can afford a high end camera and lens kit with a lightbox. I can agree about the multiple posts thing but the other stuff is kinds eletists. Its CMoN, not only people with high end photography skill can post.

Too high resolution? No cropping? Out of focus pictures? Parts of figures? WIPs? How high end is that to avoid? Light is the only thing that requires some little skill - but there is a lot of people making decent pictures on their working tables without any hi-tech equipment.

Bailey03 · Oct 12, 2013

Yeah, I understand your point, but as Seoman said focusing, showing only a part of a model... doesn't take much to fix that. And, just for the record I made my light box out of a $3 ikea trashcan, some printed out backgrounds and my painting lights. So you don't need to break the bank to do a decent setup. There are plenty of tutorials online to make your own. Of course not everyone wants to do that and that's okay. There are all age ranges and skill levels that post here. So you can't expect everyone to make an expert post. It's just nice to see a little effort and awareness on the part of the person posting.

Wombat85 · Oct 13, 2013

Bailey03 said:
Yeah, I understand your point, but as Seoman said focusing, showing only a part of a model... doesn't take much to fix that.

Except for a camera lens with a high depth of field and the ability to adjust ISO, which most base level cameras and phones cant really do. The problem with the resolution is tricky, CMoN can do some weird re-scaling to images, had it happen to mine on more times then I care to remember that makes getting that right tricky. What I see you asking is that people spend a few hours learning about the correct manipulation of digital images as the base standard to being able to submit, which I think is unreasonable. If they want better score, which presumable they will, they will pick up there photo skills so they can get better scores, but saying you cant post unless all your images are in perfect focus with the correct Depth of field, adjusted the reslotion to the size formatting, ect all so you dont have to move your index finger to scroll down to see a big image or simple vote a 4 with a comment because you cant make it out just seems wrong.

Seoman · Oct 13, 2013

First: nobody said anything like "you can't submit unless..."

Second: With very basic equipment you can do very decent pictures in a short time. We have a lot of examples on this site. I was surprised, when I asked some great painters about their cameras and setup and I found they have simple equipment - they just put some effort to use it.

Third, most important: I expect submitters to consider other users of this site before uploading. You don't operate in a void, you should think about other people before throwing some garbage here. Some minimum effort is expected.

Now about the resolution - some time ago CMON scaled pictures with horizontal length exceeding the limit - and it was better to do it by yourself. Sadly, that functionality is gone. Now - pictures are scaled on the page, but they are loaded in full resolution - which is SLOW and looks UGLY. When someone loads a 5000x6000 picture it scales badly, and when you click it, it's much bigger than your screen, so you won't watch it anyway. It takes only few seconds to resize a picture and requires no knowledge. It's a kind of laziness not to resize your pictures.

Wombat85 · Oct 13, 2013

Seoman said:
First: nobody said anything like "you can't submit unless..."

Maybe some mandatory tutorial/instruction/FAQ on creating an account or uploading first pictures?
Looks like a "cant submit untill" to me

Seoman said:
Second: With very basic equipment you can do very decent pictures in a short time. We have a lot of examples on this site. I was surprised, when I asked some great painters about their cameras and setup and I found they have simple equipment - they just put some effort to use it.

I can agree, but they wont get the score they want untill they do this, so the motivation is there already to put in the effort.

Seoman said:
Third, most important: I expect submitters to consider other users of this site before uploading. You don't operate in a void, you should think about other people before throwing some garbage here. Some minimum effort is expected.

Heres where I really disagree, who's to say that a 4 isnt hours of effort to them, I would happily comment on 100 3 score paint jobs then a 10. The 10 doesnt need my help, the 3's do. I see this site as more of a come and learn then a showcase sight. There are plenty of sights where minimum standards are required for your mini to be shown, this hasnt been and never should be one.

Seoman said:
Now about the resolution - some time ago CMON scaled pictures with horizontal length exceeding the limit - and it was better to do it by yourself. Sadly, that functionality is gone. Now - pictures are scaled on the page, but they are loaded in full resolution - which is SLOW and looks UGLY. When someone loads a 5000x6000 picture it scales badly, and when you click it, it's much bigger than your screen, so you won't watch it anyway. It takes only few seconds to resize a picture and requires no knowledge. It's a kind of laziness not to resize your pictures.

It requires at the very least Gimp/photoshop ect and how to manipulate a picture. I dont think it should be a prerequisite to do it, it should be something you do after feedback because you want a better score.

Seoman · Oct 14, 2013

Wombat85 said:
Maybe some mandatory tutorial/instruction/FAQ on creating an account or uploading first pictures?
Looks like a "cant submit untill" to me

Well, showing someone a mandatory (to read) tutorial is definitely not forbidding him from posting.

Wombat85 said:
I can agree, but they wont get the score they want untill they do this, so the motivation is there already to put in the effort.
Heres where I really disagree, who's to say that a 4 isnt hours of effort to them, I would happily comment on 100 3 score paint jobs then a 10. The 10 doesnt need my help, the 3's do. I see this site as more of a come and learn then a showcase sight. There are plenty of sights where minimum standards are required for your mini to be shown, this hasnt been and never should be one.

Nobody claims that there should be some minimum quality level of paintjob. But - I'd expect some level of presentation. Achieved not by forbidding - it's virtually impossible - but by education.

Wombat85 said:
It requires at the very least Gimp/photoshop ect and how to manipulate a picture.

And mouse skill. And a web browser knowledge. All those are comparable, in everyone's range. Resizing is EASY.

Wombat85 said:
I dont think it should be a prerequisite to do it, it should be something you do after feedback because you want a better score.

I believe that one should be taught as early as possible. I believe that standards are a good thing. I believe that few hours to learn some useful skills is not a waste of time. And - that you should consider other people when you want to join their community.

sm51498 · Oct 14, 2013

Barriers to entry, on a free website that is all about cool miniatures, are a supremely bad idea. This website is not here for any one person's convenience. It is a tool and the better you know how to use it the better the results. So don't get irate about people who don't know how to use the tool available to them, let them fail, they will either learn or not.

Seoman · Oct 15, 2013

sm51498 said:
Barriers to entry, on a free website that is all about cool miniatures, are a supremely bad idea. This website is not here for any one person's convenience. It is a tool and the better you know how to use it the better the results. So don't get irate about people who don't know how to use the tool available to them, let them fail, they will either learn or not.

For the one last time

My idea was not to forbid anything to anyone. I'd rather educate. Somehow.

New submissions - general complaint

Seoman

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Dragonsreach

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Seoman

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Bailey03

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ten ball

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Wombat85

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Seoman

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Bailey03

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Wombat85

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Seoman

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Wombat85

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Seoman

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sm51498

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Seoman

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