Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Image:Yellow-tailed black cockatoo.jpg

Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoo[edit]

Reason: A high quality image of an unusual species of cockatoo - I say unusual as I only ever see them once a year if that. Good technical and enc value = a worth FP candidate IMO.

Please Note: Do not judge the image by the picture on the image description page which has become oversharpened because of the media-wiki downsizing script.

Articles this image appears in: Yellow-tailed Black Cockatoo
Creator: Fir0002

Support as nominator Fir0002 11:21, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support Alternative 1, although it is a tad too sharp. Dengero (talk) 12:08, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
week oppose They are both indeed a bit oversharpened as they start sprouting halos. Lycaon (talk) 15:47, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Reduced sharpening on both - this should correct your concern --Fir0002 22:12, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support both - both look good. --ZeWrestler ^Talk 15:49, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose all three. Top one is an unfortunate angle, lower one shows too little of the bird. Samsara (talk • contribs) 16:50, 9 February 2008 (UTC) Flight picture does not lend itself to identifying the bird. We also already have a host of pictures showing birds in flight for general purposes, including several brilliant FPs. Samsara (talk • contribs) 13:29, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Could you elaborate on "unfortunate angle"? For a wild bird this angle is about as good as you'll ever get - normally they'd be more obscured like in the alt, but the original is exceptionally well composed as it has the tail visible as well as the body. Please make sure that you don't let past incidents affect your vote - judge the picture only and if you don't feel you can then don't vote. Note: I'm not accusing you, just giving you a suggestion. --Fir0002 22:12, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - I don't think this needs any further comment. Samsara (talk • contribs) 20:05, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - An explanation of "unfortunate angle" would be helpful considering you're opposing on those grounds --Fir0002 01:35, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      - Level with the bird is always the preferred angle. pschemp | talk 01:50, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose both. Weird halo around bird. Sky looks artificial. --Janke | Talk 19:41, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Please remember that the angle (this bird was perched near the top of a medium size tree) this shot was taken at means the background sky is high above the horizon where the sky tends to be a deep blue - particularly on sunny days like this one --Fir0002 22:12, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - Yeah, but why the halo? Even looking upwards on sunny days, I don't see such... ;-) --Janke | Talk 08:56, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - See below - I think that's what people are referring to in terms of a "halo" --Fir0002 01:35, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support with preference to the original. The sky looks like a wonderful sunny summer sky. What's wrong with it? Encyclopedic pose, and nice and sharp. Kudos! Clegs (talk) 20:10, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Ha, interesting, seeing as these were taken in the middle of winter! : ) thegreen J Are you green? 04:40, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Comment The smaller-radius halos are gone now, but there's still a large radius one around each bird, making the sky look off. thegreen J Are you green? 23:00, 9 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- My guess is that Fir selectively lightened the birds to accentuate the detail (if so, mentioning wouldn't hurt). That's probably not much different from using exposure blending or HDR, which both can result in similar halos. --Dschwen 04:41, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - Yeah you can think of this as a HDR; the new Camera RAW processor in Photoshop has two nifty sliders - recover and fill. These effectively bring back blown highlights and lift dark shadows in much the same way as a conventional multi shot HDR - except here multiple images wouldn't be possible since the bird is moving so instead I'm using the large dynamic range stored in the RAW file. Without this the parrot would be largely black without much detail - particularly in the tail. So I think the pros overcome the (minor IMO) cons. --Fir0002 09:09, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - Hah, has Fir0002 decided to use RAW format now? I thought you could do everything you needed to with JPG? ;-) Diliff | (Talk) (Contribs) 22:11, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      - I guess we live and learn ;-). JPG still does the job in virtually every setting for me but in bright midday sun there certainly is advantages to RAW's extra dynamic range --Fir0002 05:15, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support with preference toward the alternative. faithless (^speak) 09:57, 10 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose both - The second one isn't showing the entire bird and so isn't encyclopedic enough and the first one still looks oversharpened, making the border where the bird and sky meet look un-natural. And the WOW factor is completely absent. pschemp | talk 01:36, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- Come off it pshcemp - considering you nominated Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Wild Boar which has far more of the animal obscured, saying that the enc of the alt is reduced by the tail being covered is completely unfair. And incidentally the boar suffers from over sharpening on the snout as well as offering little in the way of WOW. However with regrads I think I can help you with WOW in Alternative 2 --Fir0002 01:57, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  - Just once Fir, I'd like you concentrate on the actual picture being discussed but now twice here, you've resorted to a lame attempt to hint that people who don't support your pictures have bad judgement. So I have to say I'm sorry, I am entiteled to my opinion and to whatever extent I choose to explain it. A bird is not a boar. That picture was encyclopedic for other reasons, including habitat and the actions of the pig. In this rather boring picture of a bird, there is no other action going on so it needs to show the whole thing. I really can't take you seriously when all you do is lash out at anyone who disagrees. However, I have better manners than to dredge up past incidents as "proof" of your bad judgement. Cut the crap and focus on the task at hand. pschemp | talk 02:03, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    - Ugh this is frustrating. Can I ask you a question pshcemp? How do you judge your own photos - or the photos you nominate for FP? How do you judge wether you think they're worthy of being nominated? For me it is by comparing them to other photos which have passed through FPC recently. So, and lets take an extreme hypothetical, if I saw a panorama with fairly obvious stitching errors pass through this process with accolades, I would expect to receive a similar reception for a panorama of my own with stitching errors. So to apply that here: wild boar and cockatoo are both wild animals so the subject is similar. Both are in their natural habitat. So if I see that people are OK with most of the boar being obscured by it's natural habitat (the mud) in the linked nom I expect people to be ok with the cockatoo's tail being obscured by its habitat (the tree) here. I don't see any "action" in the pig photo giving higher enc value to it than the cockatoo. Boars wallow in mud, cockatoos rest in trees. Fairly straight forward I should think - and hardly deserving of the above tirade against my character. Think about it with this simple analogy: think of our (Aust) legal system - we have laws (our WIAFP? criteria) but we also rely heavily on judical precedents (how other photos are judged). So by questioning comments I see as having unsound basis I'm just focussing on the task at hand as you are urging. Feel free to similarly question my own votes if you feel it would improve the outcome of the nomination. --Fir0002 02:26, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      - Every picture is different. No two are alike and thus no two should be judged by the same standards. pschemp | talk 02:33, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        I don't see that at all. True all photos are different (they wouldn't be much good if they were all the same) but they definitely should be judged by the same standards. Back to the law analogy - all crimes are different as they (usually) involve different people but they certainly are (and should) be judged equally. What sense would there be for WIAFP? to exist if not to try bring some standards to judging? How could we categorize images as Wikipedia's best if each image was judged with different standards? --Fir0002 02:48, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        I think the general feeling was that the boar was running under a "typical behaviour of an animal in its natural habitat" banner. Since it was encyclopaedic of a behaviour, it didn't need to be encyclopaedic for the species. Samsara (talk • contribs) 02:59, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        Exactly. Let me be clear because you've misinterpreted my statement Fir. I always use FP standards, but that isn't the standards I meant. Since each picture is different, different considerations are made according to the standards due to the unique featuers. This means you can't compare the artistic elements 1:1 from picture to picture. (Technical one yes though.) pschemp | talk 03:07, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        OK, so long as we're clear on the need to have technical standards. And yes artistic standards are obviously very flexible, but to me the enc value (as a criteria in WIAFP?) falls more under the technical standards umbrella, in which case cross comparisons between other recent noms is useful. In response to the point Samsara raised I would submit that this also falls under the "typical behaviour of an animal in its natural habitat" banner - sitting in a tree is very much typical behaviour in a natural habitat for a cockatoo. --Fir0002 03:29, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        I think we can safely exclude "resting" as a behaviour, just as "death" is not usually regarded as a behaviour. Regards, Samsara (talk • contribs) 03:46, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        I'm not so sure - if an animal spends a large proportion of its time doing a particular thing, I think it becomes part of its typical behaviour. And this is the case with the cockatoo sitting in the tree. I mean a koala sleeping is typical part of its behaviour, whereas this might not be the most enc behaviour for a different animal. From my experience (living in the country) I would say that the only time you don't see a cockatoo sitting in a tree (like this one) is when its flying past you. Hence photographing this cockatoo in this posture (or exhibiting this behaviour) is just as enc as a boar wallowing in mud. --Fir0002 04:14, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        That's clearly false since they have to feed and mate to survive (as individuals and species, respectively). Let's not continue this line of reasoning. It's not fruitful. Foraging, mating, cleaning, nest-building, are behaviours. Resting is not. Wikipedia has no article on it, and until this moment just now, it hadn't occurred to you to add the picture to such an article. This is a dead duck, almost literally. Samsara (talk • contribs) 04:45, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support original but would like to perhaps see a slightly tighter crop. There's a lot of tree on either side and a crop could perhaps leave a little tree to give context, but take out what I see to be excess. Neutral Alt1, its fine, but I like the original more since it shows the whole animal including the long tail. Weak Oppose Alt 2 because it is difficult to tell what is going on especially in thumbnail. Perhaps a brightening and a slight sharpening around the facial region would resolve the problem?D-rew (talk) 02:46, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak oppose original and alt 1, neutral alt 2 per Janke. Following Fir's explanation, I can't help but think that the masking could have been done a bit better. thegreen J Are you green? 21:47, 11 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

No consensus MER-C 04:44, 17 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]