Help and F.A.Q. group posting on GLOBOsapiens

How to rate pictures

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mortimer Premium account Joined: Jun 04 Points: 15075 Posts: 528 Posted: 2004-11-14 20:20:00    Hi GLOBO's We had an intense discussion about how to rate pictures and came up with the following guideline. First of all we think that everyone of us should try to rate every single picture he looks at. The more votes the fairer is the rating, it's like security in numbers. Now to the rating process: judge a picture according to technical quality. Consider focus, lighting, colour, shading, contrast and composition. * poor (uninteresting, not travel related, personal pictures) ** below average (mediocre, out of focus, somewhat boring) *** good (interesting, nice subject, in focus, good composition) **** very good (great, high quality, clear, interesting, I wish I had taken it) ***** excellent (amongst the best, amazing, I could stare at this all day) Before rating, one may adjust ones own value of a picture by adding or deducting a star (or even two) for creativity, originality (never seen before on GLOBOsapiens) and even artistic value. When rating, always keep in mind that this is a travel site, pictures here should show the diversity of places, nature, our world and its people. Pictures with "Me in front of" and "Me with my friends" are generally not wished for. See Pictures-of-the-Month for the best examples of excellent pictures. I hope to have shed some light in the rating process and am looking forward to a lot of votes on all the pictures! Martin [ This Message was edited by: mortimer on 2004-11-14 20:20 ] --- Today is the first day of the rest of your life, enjoy it! Reply    Reply with quote    Contact mortimer   kandath Premium account Joined: May 04 Points: 6895 Posts: 35 Posted: 2005-06-17 11:27:00    I went through these guidelines regarding rating of photographs with interest. Still there are a few things I am ignorant of after loading a reasonable number of photographs which were reasonably rated here and also being lucky enough to win the album of the month award for May 2005. I would be grateful if someone could help me with the following points: 1) After almost 1 full year at Globo and loading all these fotos I still have no idea as to how to rate the fotos. On the report side it looks far more straight forward as far as the rating procedure is concerned. You have easy access to the repots grading box with the provision for making your own comments for the benefit of the report writer as an extra bonous. Here I cannot see a similar way of grading fotos at all or am I being daft? Am I missing something very easy? Please tell me how to go about rating somebodys fotos after getting into the pictures box of a particular member. 2) The second thing which surprises me is the speed at which some of the fotos get into 5* status as soon as they are posted and some others falling rapidly in grading to 4 or 3 * after making its entry at 5*'s. Does it mean it has rapidly became less popular to the group as more and more people vote? Is there a simple way of seeing the grading system for individual fotos as in the case of reports so that the fotographer may have a better idea, a more reliable one of how his or her fotos are doing at Globo. I assume the fotos are rated by the popular votes by the members as opposed to a group of experts doing it. I am writing these lines only with a view of improving the already very high standards here at Globo even further. I have no complaints whatsoever and still think that this community is one of the or the best in the net. I look forward to seeing the reactions of my fellow members and perhapes getting myself more knowledgeable in the process. Cheers, --- "As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy!" - Abraham Lincoln Reply    Reply with quote    Contact kandath   spaceout Premium account Joined: Jun 02 Points: 20307 Posts: 56 Posted: 2005-06-17 12:56:00    I do agree with you Kris. I have been with Globo for quite a while myself, and I don't agree with many of the picture ratings within the system. I see that some pictures which don't deserve one or two stars, get a 5 stars immediately after uploading. All this 5 stars rating on poor pictures makes Globo less and less credible. It's a shame. I myself don't really gage my own pictures by the rating on them, as I did notice that depending who's logged on while I upload my pictures, I get 2 and 1 on all my pictures, regardless of the quality or the contents. Sure not all my pictures get 5 stars, and I do agree that some of them only deserve 1 star. But I'm aware of that...Therefore I add information on globo for my own family and friend who aren't even Globo members, yet they enjoy seeing and reading about my travel journeys. I hope that one day there will be honest people rating pictures for what they truly are regardless of who the member is. Credibility is important, especially when a website as Globo has so many good pictures that only has 2 stars. I sometimes go through long ago uploaded pictures and rerate them as they should be. VK --- Festina Lente (Hurry Slowly) Reply    Reply with quote    Contact spaceout   bear495 Joined: May 03 Points: 8634 Posts: 177 Posted: 2005-06-17 15:19:00    Martin, Thank you for summarizing the lengthy discussion that many of us had last summer regarding the rating of photos. I am certain that this can help many of the newer members as they try to load their presentations. Kris, I am uncertain about what you are asking. It sounds as though you do not understand why some photos are rated high and then fall rapidly. As Martin mentioned, these ratings are based on the votes of the members. Obviously, that makes the ratings subjective, based on the interpretation of the viewer. Most of us who have been here for a longer time try to follow the ratings suggestions that Martin mentioned, along with personal tastes for the subject matter (as in, is the picture travel-related). If one person rates a picture as 5 stars, then the next person gives a 2 star rating. then the average is 3.5 stars. That is why photos rise or fall rapidly. Many of the newer members have not read the fora regarding ratings, and therefore rate according to his/her own whims. That is sad. As Martin mentioned, we need to rate as much of what we view as is possible. Only in that manner can a fair rating be found. Large numbers of ratings on a photo help to show a true value of that photo. I agree with Spaceout that many photos are not rated at the level that I would believe them. They still have value to me, though. As for the photos in the albums, that is a different criteria. To my knowledge, the albums are not rated by the members, so receiving the award for album of the month does not reflect upon the value of the photos inside, only the presentation of the whole. Russ --- "Own only what you can carry with you; know language, know countries, know people. Let your memory be your travel bag." Alexander Solzhenitsyn Reply    Reply with quote    Contact bear495   spaceout Premium account Joined: Jun 02 Points: 20307 Posts: 56 Posted: 2005-06-17 15:35:00    Bear495, The picture rating use to mean something to me, now it doesn't. Many people come on this site for travel information, they are no necessary globo members either. Those people when they look at the 5 stars pictures and see the pictures that are rated by persons rating on a whim (as you described) they must be quite disappointed, because although many pictures do deserve 5 stars, some deserve 2. Unfortunately that may cause Globo to lose its credibility. Because of all that, now I only 'do what I have to do' and log off. It's sad but that's the way it is. VK --- Festina Lente (Hurry Slowly) Reply    Reply with quote    Contact spaceout   mortimer Premium account Joined: Jun 04 Points: 15075 Posts: 528 Posted: 2005-06-17 15:57:00    Kris You can only rate pictures when you have them opened up individually... when you see it like that: http://www.globosapiens.net/davidx/pictures-ely-cathedral-from-west-21560.html or when you click directly in the picture and it opens up in a pop up window in both cases you can give your rating below the picture there is a drop down list of stars available... you can only attribute stars no comments are possible. as long as pictures only have a few votes the average vote will change very quickly as russ pointed out so the more votes the better. You can see the number of votes above the picture and the attributed stars are always rounded up to the next higher so 3.2 would be 4stars... If you click on enlarge to size L on a picture you posted yourself you get the accurate average and the number of votes... Hope it helps Martin --- Today is the first day of the rest of your life, enjoy it! Reply    Reply with quote    Contact mortimer   davidx Premium account Joined: Dec 04 Points: 34719 Posts: 440 Posted: 2005-06-17 17:20:00    Hi Spaceout Your last message upsets me because it feels like the bad guys win if people like you are logging out because of silly ratings. Your other one about going over older work and rerating it sounds so much more constructive and I, for one, hope you will keep doing it. I don't like it when not many people have looked at what I consider a good picture and it's stuck with a poor rating - whether it's my own or someone else's. I'm too old to bother about the rating as such but a poor rating is a deterrent to looking at a photo properly and that seems sad. I am persuaded by your comment that I shouldn't even look at previous ratings before giving my own - so you have influenced at least one person - don't log off too lightly and deprive us all of your wise words. Best, David --- Grieve not for that which you cannot do but rejoice in that which you can. Reply    Reply with quote    Contact davidx   bear495 Joined: May 03 Points: 8634 Posts: 177 Posted: 2005-06-17 22:34:00    Great words of wisdom, David. I heartily agree. I do not know all of the frustrations that you have with the system, Spaceout, but I appreciate the contributions that you have made. Only by all of us contributing to the ratings of reports and photos can we have a system that shows the feelings of the majority. As Martin states, the greater the number of ratings, the more likely that the rating will be accurate. If three people judge a picture to be 5 stars, that is not as significant as if 50 rate it thus. The same is true of the lower ratings. Russ --- "Own only what you can carry with you; know language, know countries, know people. Let your memory be your travel bag." Alexander Solzhenitsyn Reply    Reply with quote    Contact bear495   rangutan Premium account Joined: Aug 04 Points: 34752 Posts: 1044 Posted: 2005-06-18 01:50:00    There are now over 18000 pictures online and I think I’ve rated about a third of them, certainly more than 80% of those uploaded the last year. Rating is very important, I indicate what is valueble to me and the rating system tells me what other members think of my pictures [3 were even banned!] and I have learnt a lot, BOTH ways. Rating pictures takes time, how can we motivate members to do that! This “rating” thing is very important, as noted by Vicki, for the image and future of GLOBOsapiens, we want the BEST pictures displayed first, for us, our friends, the community and the whole world! I want to encourage all members to upload all their QUALITY pictures that might be USEFULL to the community for past and future travels, please not those unfocused, neither pictures of backyard home scenes. Quality? Sometimes the perfect pic may be good at home on slide/photo but wrongly scanned or uploaded a disaster! Bear wrote: „Only by all of us contributing to the ratings of reports and photos can we have a system that shows the feelings of the majority.“ I fully agree and this is fact! The first rating is not the true reflection of the communities view. Only after many ratings the picture then reaches its correct position, this may take time, perhaps months and even change over years. Staff Control: I would like Andy and the Staff to answer this question: Does Staff know exactly who rates what and how? While the community is open to rate according to there own discretion and as they wish, I have the feeling that some rate ***** just to get a picture ( or report) up or * to get it down to what they may think they wish! If staff could sporadically observe the rating system and that members are not rating 4-stars less (or 3-stars) deviant from the average. Honestly not possible but perhaps the case. I have never done this and hope others also do not. If staff could just confirm this and make members BEWARE, I think rating would be more honest. Spaceout wrote: „I see that some pictures which don't deserve one or two stars, get a 5 stars immediately after uploading.“ Examples? I have often been the first to rate pictures first, also some ***** . Please give us examples of such * and ** pictures and we will all learn more. Mistake: spaceout: Of thousands of ratings I rated your pic * by mistake, my wheel-mouse done this again (under my own silly command!) now FOUR times. I apologised to the others and now here to you. I suppose this is your current grievance. I hope one or two members will add a star for me for www.globosapiens.net/spaceout/picture-bird-sanctuary-sitatunga-21542.html *** and a half! Mortimer wrote: „If you click on enlarge to size L on a picture you posted yourself you get the accurate average and the number of votes...“ thanks, I never new this before, very useful seeing the EXACT rating not only just after rating, and now see the exact rating also for my own picture too! Mortimer wrote: „so 3.2 would be 4stars... „ I always observed that that rounding UP is from/above 1.5, 2.5, 3.5 and 4.5 not “point two or other less than five” davidx: „...Spaceout your last message upsets me“ me too! I enjoy zoos and architectural details, some members sometimes less., nevertheless still valuable to some travellers, Vicki please continue sharing your brilliant travel eye with us! Some pictures (before) are just never rated or just rated once, wish that staff could put a list up for us of pictures rated only ONCE that they can also reach there true worthy position. See www.globosapiens.net/topic-please-rate-this_46_1246_0000.html I usually rate everything I can (according to time available), wish more members would, and as said, after 10-20 ratings by various and diverse members the picture the true quality and usefulness is then correct! My current comments/ratings: Sorry David, just current examples, willing to help all members... www.globosapiens.net/davidx/picture-cathedral-lantern-from-east---internal-21563.html Terrible picture, almost blasphemy, which members rated this *** or www.globosapiens.net/davidx/picture-2nd-oldest-building-21566.html www.globosapiens.net/davidx/picture-pembroke-college-chapel---wrens-first-work-21567.html both not **** but **? On the other hand, www.globosapiens.net/davidx/picture-studely-royal-21568.html www.globosapiens.net/davidx/picture-autumn-colours---studely-royal-21569.html www.globosapiens.net/davidx/picture-studely-royal-21568.html I rate these as ****, could be ***** and PoM if scanned/uploaded correctly. Andy and Staff, I think you have ghost members/raters jealous of your fantastic achievement. Check it out! Serious members also see the old Forum topic: http://www.globosapiens.net/topic-picture-rating_46_1220_0000.html Love all of you members and wish peace to all, Rudi [ This Message was edited by: rangutan on 2005-06-18 02:40 ] --- Rudolf "Rangutan" Graspointner Reply    Reply with quote    Contact rangutan   kandath Premium account Joined: May 04 Points: 6895 Posts: 35 Posted: 2005-06-18 03:46:00    Wow, I am still gasping for air after the series of honest, passionate and without doubt healthy reactions I triggered from fellow members after posting a reply to the original guidelines on rating pictures by Martin. As expected by me while writing it, that indeed gave me the answers I needed and also I can see a beautiful, wonderful chance for all of us together to take Globo's standards to dizzy heights. As the saying goes 'Union is Strength' and this is without doubt one of the wonderful sides of democracy. It always brings about a very healthy debate and may hurt a few in the process but believe me at the end of the day will surely benfit members as a whole. I want to thank Vickie for her original reply after my initial post. It was by a sincere person who had noticed an-unfairness in the grading system. She was merely airing her opinions in an emotional and passionate way (which she is entittled to do with her track record at Globo!). Wow what a stunning achievement her's is ! ( inspiring to junior members like me always) and Vickie to me is someone senior (in Glob-travel terms along with Britman, David, Rudy and Co.) and her opinions are very important indeed. Martin's 2nd posting with tips on how to get into the pictures answered my first query. I never knew you can click on the blue description of the foto to get into it. I was always opening the individual fotos by clicking on them missing all the features of rating them and checking the ratings. The second query is still not fully answered yet. As David, Russ and Rudy wisely pointed out, it is something only Globo members can eradicate by massive participation in grading individual fotos intelligently and fairly. Armed with this new info I am going to have a serious bash at making our grading better by grading as many fotos as possible while on internet. Our situation can be compared to an election in a country where the polling is say 35% to 45% ( because people are so dejected of the bad government ruling them and think that there is no point in voting!). In actual fact by not turning up to vote they are helping the same government to stay in power. Let us work together and not let that kind of predicament fall on our foto rating. Once again my sincere thanks to you all for this wonderful debate. I can surely say that it benefitted me enourmously. I look forward to working together with you all to make Globo the very best. Cheers, --- "As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy!" - Abraham Lincoln Reply    Reply with quote    Contact kandath   Page: 1 2 3