....it seems that photos that are embedded in the streamkeeper pages are being resized incorrectly causing distortion.

Here is an sample photo

[www.americanwhitewater.org]

and here is how it looks when embedded, (sized much larger).

[www.americanwhitewater.org]

I've noticed quite a few pages where this is happening. It really detracts from the quality of the page and the photos.

The photo you linked to: AW ID 16666, appears identical to me on both pages. I am using Firefox browser on Windows xp. On my screen both images are 2 3/8 inches wide by 3 1/2 inches tall. Neither image appears distorted. What are you seeing?

Tom O'keefe recently complained that small images were being resampled to larger sizes to their detriment, but I thought that Ryan changed stuff so that images smaller than 800 pixels or so, would not be resized to anything larger.

I'm using IE. and the photo in the second link is being diplayed at roughly doulble the size of the photo in the second link. Sounds identical to the problem you mention reported by Thom.

Hello all,

I am using IE,Yahoo and windows xp and the photos are definately different. The width was 2" and 3". I did not measure the height, and yes the larger picture was blurry, especially at the bottom.

One possible work around is to just resubmit the picture in a larger size if it is your own picture. I know the streamkeeper instructions say to make the main display picture small, but I don't think that is necessary or advisable any more. The website now resizes big pictures to usable size for the main picture and maybe for the rapid pictures, though I am not sure on that. It had been resizing small pictures upwards to fill the space also, but I remember a message from Ryan that he was changing that. Perhaps it did not get changed quite enough for the IE browser.

People are uploading huge pictures now and it does not seem to be a problem. I still reduce the size of the pictures that I submit but only down to full screen size or a bit bigger. For no definite reason, I have been resizing my images to 1,500 pixels on the largest dimension, so 1500 x 1200 or there abouts. They are bigger than full screen and you have to scroll just a bit to see everything, but unless you look at the original image option, the website reduces the size to less than full screen and they look pretty good. Size tends to be around 500 Kb, which is fairly big, but lots of people are now uploading 2 Mb files straight out of the camera and nobody seems to be complaining about it.

Tom O'keefe was talking about the work he put into making small image files look really good with just the right sharpening and such. But I think he has given up on that as his most recent image uploads are 2.5 Mb jpegs! I think that is overkill, but in the future the website could autamitically reduce the size of all large image files to some ideal size and delete the original very large files.

So back to my original suggestion, if the image is your's, take the original and make a copy that is at least 800x600 pixels, but preferably somewhat bigger, i think. Let the website reduce the size of the images as needed.

Paul,

Sounds like a good idea, it's just that a lot of the older pages have small images so resizing all the images might be a real PITA. Maybe Ryan has something worked out as you mention, but jsut hasn't been able to deploy the fix

Going forward I'll certainly use larger sized images, butt would be interesting if the frame size could be set more easily though. Really makes for a nice look and feel to a page when the right image is used.

TH


[b][/b]pmartzen Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> One possible work around is to just resubmit the
> picture in a larger size if it is your own
> picture. I know the streamkeeper instructions say
> to make the main display picture small, but I
> don't think that is necessary or advisable any
> more. The website now resizes big pictures to
> usable size for the main picture and maybe for the
> rapid pictures, though I am not sure on that. It
> had been resizing small pictures upwards to fill
> the space also, but I remember a message from Ryan
> that he was changing that. Perhaps it did not get
> changed quite enough for the IE browser.
>
> People are uploading huge pictures now and it does
> not seem to be a problem. I still reduce the
> size of the pictures that I submit but only down
> to full screen size or a bit bigger. For no
> definite reason, I have been resizing my images to
> 1,500 pixels on the largest dimension, so 1500 x
> 1200 or there abouts. They are bigger than full
> screen and you have to scroll just a bit to see
> everything, but unless you look at the original
> image option, the website reduces the size to less
> than full screen and they look pretty good. Size
> tends to be around 500 Kb, which is fairly big,
> but lots of people are now uploading 2 Mb files
> straight out of the camera and nobody seems to be
> complaining about it.
>
> Tom O'keefe was talking about the work he put into
> making small image files look really good with
> just the right sharpening and such. But I think
> he has given up on that as his most recent image
> uploads are 2.5 Mb jpegs! I think that is
> overkill, but in the future the website could
> autamitically reduce the size of all large image
> files to some ideal size and delete the original
> very large files.
>
> So back to my original suggestion, if the image is
> your's, take the original and make a copy that is
> at least 800x600 pixels, but preferably somewhat
> bigger, i think. Let the website reduce the size
> of the images as needed.

I can relate to the PITA! I have a lot of old images that I "intend" to replace with larger copies "someday".

Easier ways of using different sizes of pictures is worth discussing. Using html, there are ways of specifying the size of pictures in the body of your description or in the rapids descriptions, but I don't think you can do that for the main header picture.

Originally, if you recall, the main picture was not resized in any way, so the size that you uploaded was the size that was displayed. I tried uploading larger pictures for awhile, because they looked so much better, but it totally screwed up the formatting for the rest of the page. The present situation where you can upload a large picture and the website reduces it to an optimum size is a big improvement.

So, should that optimum size be changed somewhat, or should each streamkeeper have some sizing options for different streampages?

Personally, I think the top of the streampage, the title and photo arraignment could use further improvement, but I lean towards the idea of a universal photo format, so that if the page format is changed in the future, all streampages can be easily and automatically updated. Otherwise, streamkeepers might have to go reformat their pictures for every page that does not perfectly conform to the new page format.

On your specific problem described above, I will submit a new bug tracker ticket, with a link to the examples that you gave, and your description of the problem. Also I will submit a ticket to change the instructions about photo sizing on the stream edit page.

Paul

pinecricker Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Paul,
>
> Sounds like a good idea, it's just that a lot of
> the older pages have small images so resizing all
> the images might be a real PITA.

I am out of the country at the moment and trying to catch up on stuff. Here's what is supposed to happen. You can load a full resolution image (e.g. 5 megapixel). It is then resampled to 800 pixels wide for screen viewing but then you can get back to the original file by clicking on the "See the Original File". The advantage of having this option is we can more easily access images for print media (e.g. the journal, outreach materials, etc.) We are often scrambling for an image to use last minute for all sorts of purposes and having them readily available at higher resolution has been a huge benefit.

If you select an image to appear as the title photo on the river page it should be resampled to display at 300 pixels wide. There were some problems with this with certain OS/browser combinations (where for example photos would be resized in the x dimension but not the y dimension). I am not sure if these have all been resolved but the feedback is helpful and some recent changes have been made. Then there is the issue of how older photos that were uploaded at a smaller size are handled. For a while a 300 pixel wide image that someone submitted was resampled up to 800 pixels wide resulting in a severely distorted image. I believe this issue has been fixed but have not confirmed it on all OS/browser combinations.

Ryan may weigh in with any further information but otherwise I will try to follow up and do some testing when I get back in another week. Thanks all for the feedback!

Thomas O'Keefe
Pacific Northwest Stewardship Director
American Whitewater
3537 NE 87th St.
Seattle, WA 98115

425-417-9012
okeefe@amwhitewater.org

So it sounds like we should all upload images at the full resolution they were originally taken, whatever that full resolution is. Tom, you give an example of 5 megapixels, but I assume you just mean that as an example of a common full resolution image. I typically shoot between 5 and 10 megapixel images. I try to shoot more important images at 10 megapixels, which result in around 4 MB files. Is that still good, do you think? Ought to be able to print a nice magazine spread with one of those images.

So, from now on I will submit full resolution images, though might play with the jpeg compression a bit, try setting it at medium high or there abouts. As I feel like it, I will resubmit full resolution images for older ones that I originally downsized.

To resubmit an image, find the image in your list of photos and click on edit. Use the browse button to find the full size image on your computer. When you hit submit, the new image will replace the older image.

Also, to clarify something Tom stated above. When you select a photo to use as the title photo on a river page, still use a full size picture. The website will automatically display a downsized version.

Paul M.

I think you're on track Tom. One of the problems I have with IE is the ability to set a relative minimum size. The way I handle that is by fixing the size in IE, which distorts the photo. In the next version of IE (released this month) and we'll cease to have this problem. Users of old IE versions will still see a distorted photo, but 80% of users should see the normal sized photo.