User blog:Belle pullman/About Photos

I know I drone on about photos and file names and it gets super boring - but it's with good reason, I promise!

Just the other day I was explaining how, if you find a mis-named file, you need to flag it up with me to correct the filename because just editing the description isn't enough... and now, a mis-named file I was too lazy to change the filename and just edited the description got mis-attributed. Entirely my fault for causing the confusion by not bothering to edit when I knew I needed to! The internet is a mess, to be honest, and some software deals with special characters and some doesn't - so adding (brackets) and .periods in names can break the image. / slashes break the wiki coding! - hyphens and _ underscore are usually reliable, but not always, so best to keep away from all such characters in the file names. Categories are important, as this is what you need to use to check if your image isn't already uploaded. There's "Images of Mistoffelees" and "Images US Tour 6" - there's also categories for specific numbers from the show, for backstage, etc. Don't add categories that don't already exist though, ask first. "Why don't we have this?" is a very good question!
 * So. The most important piece of information about a photo is the character/s it shows.  That's what the filename needs to tell us first.
 * Next most useful, in terms of finding a particular image, and if you're checking if that image already exists in some form, is the performer - if known, of course there's a lot where we don't know for sure who is in the photo.
 * The third bit of vital and almost always trackable info is the production.  There's some confusion with press photos from one US Tour or another, but they're usually good at providing the first two pieces of info which helps narrow it down.
 * Then, we need to have the date - again, if known, it's super useful especially if some of the other info is missing.
 * Finally, add an "01", "42" number, this is to avoid conflicts - there may already be a photo of that performer in that year, so this is "02".
 * Adding a description is useful when there's a load of info that couldn't possibly fit in the file name, like 6 characters - use the description to include the performers.
 * Try to avoid "Cats" or "Group" as filenames.  At the moment we have 14,000 images that are all "Cats"!
 * Use full names if it's a solo picture "Mistoffelees" - but shorten the names for multiple "Misto Tugger".  These character names are magnificent but get very long, very fast!
 * Given that the files are sorted alphabetically, please use "Mungo" not "Jerrie", and "Rumple" not "Teaser" - people are more likely to be looking under "M" for Mungojerrie than "J", etc.  But then Tugger is always "T" not "R", and the jury's out on Old Deut?!

When you're uploading photos, the first thing to check is if they're already up here. I know, a LOT of the images do NOT follow the naming convention described above, and it makes life harder! I am going through and changing them as and when I can, but real life gets in the way and to be honest, it's a super boring job. If you find a very similar photo, then you need to consider if yours is needed as well. Each photo should have something new to it, something different. If you're not sure, then ask!
 * If you find there is already a version of your photo, but yours is much better quality, then open the image, and under the image there's info (size of preview, file size, etc) and below that are tabs "About", "File History" and sometimes "Metadata".
 * Click "File History", and it gives you the option "Upload a new version of this file".  So do that!  But note it must be the same format, .jpg over .jpg or .png over .png.   The big advantage of this is the photo shows up automatically, no extra coding needed!

Then there's the question of cropped photos like this:

Which is better? The .jpg version is better quality (not great, I had to edit a load of text off it, that's the streaks) but the .png version is full length and a better composition.

I don't know, so I'm leaving it for now. But I'd appreciate feedback, if it seems obvious to you which should be kept and which should be deleted!