Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Hartford Line

Hartford Line[edit]

Voting period is over. Please don't add any new votes. Voting period ends on 8 Feb 2019 at 16:45:45 (UTC)

Reason: High resolution, used in article as marque image, free license, widely used by Google. Unusually good lighting and interesting composition. Complete high res picture of locomotive and passenger car in CT rail livery.
Articles in which this image appears: Hartford Line
FP category for this image: Wikipedia:Featured pictures/Vehicles/Land
Creator: Jehochman

Support as nominator – Jehochman ^Talk 16:45, 29 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - cut off on the right hand side. MER-C 18:12, 29 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

The train is also cut off on the left hand side. :-) I framed it this way on purpose, but maybe my sense of aesthetics is weird. To advance my understanding of this process, if not for the framing issue, would you support it? Jehochman ^Talk 20:13, 29 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

No, but my other concerns are fixable if you still have the original image from the camera - the JPEG quality is too low (resulting in visible artifacts and a little loss in sharpness). Also, the image appears to be slightly tilted. The train being cut off on the left is fine, however a better composition would not only contain all of the locomotive but also some lead room. MER-C 20:39, 29 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for the explanation. I’ll keep that in mind for the future. Jehochman ^Talk 21:08, 29 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - Would generally agree with MER-C about the right crop. The composition is otherwise quite good. Ditto the light/color. The reason I'm commenting, though, is because there's something I think is implied in a comment above that may not be clear. I believe when MER-C says "if you still have the original image" it's based on the assumption that a stand-alone digital camera was used. From the EXIF, it looks like it's an iPhone picture. Smartphone pictures have come a long way, but it's still going to be really really hard to get FP-level quality with one. It just can't get the level of detail. "The original image" would likely reference the raw file a digital camera could take, which could then be processed before jpeg compression (and customize that compression). I learned all of this the hard way, sending my smartphone images through QIC on Commons... the beating they gave my phone's camera was my motivation to buy an inexpensive mirrorless camera. :) — Rhododendrites ^talk \\ 22:17, 29 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for that advice. We have a couple nice digital cameras in the family. I just need to nick one from the kids. This was the most interesting photo I've uploaded, so I wanted to see if it was deficient, and how it might be deficient, to use that information for making a serious effort to take some FP's. The above image was a chance happening, unprepared. Next time I'll bring a real camera and take a sequence of shots so that at least one of them will have acceptable lead room. At least I know where to stand and what time of day to get a great shot. Jehochman ^Talk 22:45, 29 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

I agree with this sentiment. You've got the right idea, it just needs some refinement. (My comment about "the original image" was referring to RAW, or the original high-quality JPEG.) MER-C 12:26, 31 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Comment – Aside from the tight crop, this unpeopled shot of a EMD GP40 diesel-electric locomotive, of which thousands have been built, seems unexceptional. Also, this 60-mile rail link, while of regional utility, doesn't seem particularly significant, despite the 2,000+ -word target article about it. – Sca (talk) 14:07, 31 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

If thousands of this engine have been built, it is a significant engine, yet we have no featured pictures of it. This particular one is a very rare GP40-3H, not the standard EMD GP40. There are exactly six of these in the world. If I go take a proper photo, composed like this one but with lead space and eliminating the JPG artifacts, will you still object? Jehochman ^Talk 16:46, 31 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Is the 3H version noticeably different in appearance from the standard GP40? That might give it some EV. But in general, photos of machines (and other objects) are more interesting if they include people doing something. (So happens I took this photo of a (GP-9?) loc., but I wouldn't offer it as an FP candidate – too static.) – Sca (talk) 18:21, 31 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Any change is internal. What about the engineeer? You can see his arm but his face is blocked by the mirror. If I alter the vantage point slightly I could get him in the shot. Fortunately this train is in the same place every day at approximately the same time. Jehochman ^Talk 19:16, 31 January 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Not Promoted --Armbrust ^{The Homunculus} 19:19, 8 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]