Suggestions for Images Editors

[williamwan]

I have some suggestions to the Images Editing Community who have been so helpful with their images.

1) Whether the community cd provide image of actors/actresses in movie which provide full credit of actors/actresses and their roles. E.g Men suddenly in black. This will help in matching image to name and build up an images library of lower tiers actors/actresses and also those not published anywhere.

2) To reduce the number of pictures of the same actor/actress per movie to 1 (frontal view prefered). This will increase loading speed.

3) To avoid very dark images which cannot be seen anyway.

If the above suggestions offend anyone, I apologies. I mean well. Please feel free to shoot me with any form of rebuttal.

If my "1)" suggestion is acceptable, i will go thru my records to provide a list of movies for you all to help me.

I thanks you.

[Bearserk]

Credits with roles is always nice to come by, but not always so helpful as one should think for a number of reasons, role, say a name, might not be used in the movie at all, or can be used without really referring to a person, or the role can describe a large number of people requiring several movies as one usually do it anyways to match images for an ID.
But it might speed up ID's a bit on newer movies.

I go by 1 image for each role, which usually is 1 image a movie for each actor, but can occasionally mean that an actor get 2 or very rarely 3 images in a movie. I actually prefer an image which is a bit to the side of the face, so you get a nice view of both the face and can make out the ear, but it all comes down to what you can get from the movie, you don't always has the luxury to be picky

I don't think anyone adds images where you can't see the actor in the image, even though it can be hard at times getting a proper image, where you just have to go by the best you can get, and try to increase brightness and contrast.

As I have stated before if there are any movies someone wants me to go through then just send me a message and I will put it at the top of my list.

[ewaffle]

WILLIAMWAN wrote:

Whether the community cd provide image of actors/actresses in movie which provide full credit of actors/actresses and their roles. E.g Men suddenly in black. This will help in matching image to name and build up an images library of lower tiers actors/actresses and also those not published anywhere.

I agree that this would be useful and I have attempted it in the past but run into some problems. The main difficulty for me is my lack of mastery of the interface used to add images to the DB--I am pretty slow already and find that adding more information--movie title, character name--slows things down to a crawl. A crawl often filled with errors to be fixed.

Expanding slightly on Bearserk's point, there are too many "generic" type role names among those lower down in cast lists to be useful. Describing someone as "thug", "white thief", "black thief", "snake sect member" or "devil sect member"--all of which are fresh in my mind since I just posted some images from Bruce Li in New Guinea wouldn't be very helpful.

If I could figure out a way to streamline getting more info on each image, though, I would be happy to try.

[Bearserk]

Yes, the process of adding the images is already a long task, I would love to see a batch uploading appear which would have sped up the process a lot.
It already takes 2-3 hours going through a movie gathering images, in addition to the time it takes to upload them.

I would also love to see all the portrait images upload to be of equal proportions, all sides in the image the same length, as this is really easy to accomplish, at least in photoshop, where you just hold down the SHIFT key when marking the area you want to crop. It looks better when the images are shown side by side, and it would make a better impression if the same standard was used throughout the entire DB.

[Gaijin84]

2) To reduce the number of pictures of the same actor/actress per movie to 1 (frontal view prefered). This will increase loading speed.

I'd have to agree with this one, unless the actor has radically different looks throughout the movie. For example:
http://hkmdb.com/db/movies/images.mhtml?id=4766&display_set=eng
One ID of Lily Ho Li-Li is probably sufficient here - no need to weigh down the load time for 5 images which are very similar. The same with most of the other cast members as well.

I would also love to see all the portrait images upload to be of equal proportions, all sides in the image the same length, as this is really easy to accomplish, at least in photoshop, where you just hold down the SHIFT key when marking the area you want to crop. It looks better when the images are shown side by side, and it would make a better impression if the same standard was used throughout the entire DB.

I'm an offender when it comes to this, so I'll try and start making height and width the same on my IDs.

[Harlock]

please you or not i will continue to add many pictures of the same actor or actress as i feel it

[Brian Thibodeau]

Yes, the process of adding the images is already a long task, I would love to see a batch uploading appear which would have sped up the process a lot. It already takes 2-3 hours going through a movie gathering images, in addition to the time it takes to upload them.

Due to time restrictions, I don't upload as much as I'd like to, but if there was a batch feature, it would certainly be a big motivator for folks like me who aren't too keen on the wait time (especially if the site is slow) between each picture when uploading directly into the DB, as well as all the extra clicking.

I would also love to see all the portrait images upload to be of equal proportions, all sides in the image the same length, as this is really easy to accomplish, at least in photoshop, where you just hold down the SHIFT key when marking the area you want to crop. It looks better when the images are shown side by side, and it would make a better impression if the same standard was used throughout the entire DB.

Isn't this something Bob could do to the actual architecture of the site? Could a photo "frame" be created that treats all photos submitted equally, without "squishing" or stretching dimensions horizontally or vertically? That way, everything we added would automatically have restrictions on the dimensions, and the box would "trim" the photo just slightly where needed without cutting into someone's face.

[Bearserk]

2) To reduce the number of pictures of the same actor/actress per movie to 1 (frontal view prefered). This will increase loading speed.

I'd have to agree with this one, unless the actor has radically different looks throughout the movie. For example:
http://hkmdb.com/db/movies/images.mhtml?id=4766&display_set=eng
One ID of Lily Ho Li-Li is probably sufficient here - no need to weigh down the load time for 5 images which are very similar. The same with most of the other cast members as well.

Yeah I can't really see the reason why there would have to be so many images of each actor from the movie, most of them got plenty of images already in the DB. Sure they're pretty to look at, but that's all.
One for each role should suffice, that way the ID and roles of that actor has been confirmed.

Isn't this something Bob could do to the actual architecture of the site? Could a photo "frame" be created that treats all photos submitted equally, without "squishing" or stretching dimensions horizontally or vertically? That way, everything we added would automatically have restrictions on the dimensions, and the box would "trim" the photo just slightly where needed without cutting into someone's face.

I think that would be way to much work for Bob to implement, and it would also be very hard to accomplish, as most times the portrait will have substantial longer height then base length, if you look at at normal portrait photo. Which would either result on the image clipping of the top and bottom, or simply stretching the image out of all proportions, as the difference between the 2 sides can be quite big.
It's far easier to get the people adding pictures to the DB to work "right"

[Brian Thibodeau]

It's far easier to get the people adding pictures to the DB to work "right"

Agreed.

I guess a batch feature would be the best thing for someone like me, though, since until then my particular version of working right will be to post my screencaps in a forum thread (tedious enough, sometimes, but at least Photobucket has a batch feature now, which helps immensely) and let you folks work your magic as time permits. As I mostly stick to credits, hopefully it's not too much of a bother. I do upload photos directly to the DB on occasion, but usually only if I've got a few odds and ends sitting on my desktop to get rid of.


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[ewaffle]

It's far easier to get the people adding pictures to the DB to work "right"

Agreed.

As do I. There aren't many people adding images to the DB and the rules are simple enough for even those with the most rudimentary skills to follow. I know because I have and do.

To get back to WilliamWan's initial point, part of which was having more info on pictures that are posted, in my case those images that I can't ID (most of them) I will add the name of the movie so that if the image is encountered on a page other than the movie one initially looked up it will have some additional context.

Not sure if that last sentence makes sense.

[Gaijin84]

please you or not i will continue to add many pictures of the same actor or actress as i feel it

OK, but is there a good reason? I guess I'm missing something.

[Brian Thibodeau]

please you or not i will continue to add many pictures of the same actor or actress as i feel it

Didn't even notice this one get slipped in here! I hope it doesn't moot the whole discussion.

As much as I value Mr. Harlock's phenomenal gallery collections, there have been several occasions where I simply hit the 'back' button because a gallery for a particular Shaw film is just taking too damned long to load (regardless of who uploaded the gallery, I should add!!). In all fairness, perhaps that says more about the speed of the site at certain times than anyone's uploading practises. I thought I saw a front-page post from Bob a few months ago that mentioned the site was running faster, or would be soon, but now I don't see it. Maybe one day, when the world can click any size web page—no matter the content—and have it load instantaneously 24/7, we'll truly see the value of multiple shots of the same actor/actress from the same movie.

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[Harlock]

please you or not i will continue to add many pictures of the same actor or actress as i feel it

OK, but is there a good reason? I guess I'm missing something.

first, i do that for mostly 1960 movie that must have 100 click per years and most of them must be by me

second, when the cast have maybe ten names i find agreable to have 3 photo per actor and the reason that sometimes some have 4 or 5 is because i want to keep it 3same actor by line

third, there's no rule saying we can't do that and i hope it never appears

fourth, i have a medium highspeed internet (4mb) and i had never a problem loading a big cast page that i need to stop it....

fifth, for me i never had enought picture of beautiful womens

[Brian Thibodeau]

fourth, i have a medium highspeed internet (4mb) and i had never a problem loading a big cast page that i need to stop it....

Well I certainly have to stop it sometimes, and I'm paying for top of the line high-speed (then again, I'm using Bell, so who knows what I'm actually getting through the line). Most times it's fine, but when it does happen, it's frustrating. I always open a new window and check a different site, and if it loads normally, then I can at least assume it's not my connection, which it never is. Different strokes as they say, but keep up the good work (and nice to finally see you back in the forums, Harlock)!

Oh yeah, and 100 clicks per year seems quite good, actually! I'm sure there's 90's movies and beyond that don't see that kind of action!

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[Gaijin84]

Thanks for answering honestly. I may not agree with some of them, but at least there is a reason behind it.

With this:

second, when the cast have maybe ten names i find agreable to have 3 photo per actor and the reason that sometimes some have 4 or 5 is because i want to keep it 3same actor by line

I think this is fine if the actor/actress has less than 10 IDs, but with some of them that have 25+ , it just tends to add clutter to an already packed portrait page when you have 3 or 4 from the same film.

You're right there, there is no rule... just looking to streamline.

Keep up the great work with your great IDs!

[williamwan]

Hi Guys!

So nice to receive your feedbacks and I now understand better the constraints and reasons behind your actions.

Maybe, a clearer picture wd emerge if Bob cd enlighten us whether lots of pics wd slow loading speed. If yes, what cd be done to improve the speed.
E.g increase capacity, reduce pics load etc.

As a contributor to this site, paramount on my mind is it success.
I believe that accurate, useful and beautiful contents are the most important. 2nd is the speed and ease of access. Sometimes in life, our eagerness cause us to lost sight of the our objectives. I often lost mine.
Only a kick in the back brought me back.

Thank you for your open and mature responses. I am impress.