Image size testing

[middle.road]

Bruce, if I may point out something. Not all of us have 'unlimited' bandwidth. Despite it being 2022 some internet connections are still 1999.
Several of our members here are on low quota/bandwidth internet connections, and if they happen across a post that is picture-laden, it chews up their allotment for the month.
I personally, for the majority of my pictures, reduce them down to under 512KB before I post them, even though my cameras and phones snap images well in excess of that.
For images that I post that are full-res, I put them in a "spoiler" with a notice that 'there be large images contained herein...'.
That way a member has the choice of viewing them or not.

Now back to the image reducing issue.
I'm going to make another post right after this one and let's see what happens. . .

_Dan

 

[middle.road]

Image test... No.1, v.01, rev.A
Let's see what happens. . .

5.6MB, dragged and dropped into the post.
:<<<< 100 lb. Lab photo bombing. . .
6.3MB, again dragged and dropped.


6.58MB once more, dragged and dropped.

 

[middle.road]

Next test, rev.B

Images dragged and dropped, then removed from post and thumbnails inserted.

 

[middle.road]

In both instances it would appear that the Forum SW is reducing the images down to ~84KB.
I can't find any of my older posts with full size images, but on others where I uploaded reduced images they stayed the same size.
Now I'm only a Gold member and I'm not even sure what that gives me as far as an image size allowance.
If more detail is really required perhaps the image should be placed in the cloud with a link to it.
Storage space for a Forum such as H-M is getting incredibly expensive, and it is easy enough for members to help out with mitigating that.

 

[WobblyHand]

In both instances it would appear that the Forum SW is reducing the images down to ~84KB.
I can't find any of my older posts with full size images, but on others where I uploaded reduced images they stayed the same size.
Now I'm only a Gold member and I'm not even sure what that gives me as far as an image size allowance.
If more detail is really required perhaps the image should be placed in the cloud with a link to it.
Storage space for a Forum such as H-M is getting incredibly expensive, and it is easy enough for members to help out with mitigating that.

Oddly enough, I was told that HM didn't have a storage problem at all. I asked. The problem is mostly bandwidth on the user side, as you observed.

It would be great if one could post a pic with a warning that it's big. Then one wouldn't have to open it. I thought that was the function of a thumbnail. The thumbnail is displayed at lower resolution. But on HM there is no practical difference between thumbnail posts and full posts. Click on a thumbnail to view and get 920x720 if you care to download. Click on the full view and download, the picture size and resolution are identical. This is what would be good to change. I'd post thumbnails in threads. If things were working correctly, everyone would see lower resolution pictures. Only if one clicked on the thumbnail would one be able to access the higher resolution. Only last year, it seemed that was the way HM was set up.

The problem with linking to the cloud is other providers, or URL's don't last long. Then the threads become increasingly uninformative. Remember the photobucket debacle? Want half of HM threads without pictures? That would be bad.

 

[vtcnc]

I want to clarify something that is being bantered about here. Storage is not a problem - until it is. We have somewhere around 3TB or storage space.

I will reiterate, the issue with image size is more about bandwidth at the client side. I’ve been pretty consistent about this.

I haven’t had a lot of time to look into this since we last talked Bruce. I’m hoping to spend some time on this Thursday night.

With THAT said, I dont want donating members disappointed with the features of the sight. And I also don’t want people like yourself and others thinking I’m just dismissing your concerns. BUT, I have to try and ease our way to a point where everybody is happy, or something close to satisfied. Hopefully I can get us closer to 2022 in the next couple of days.

Yes, I would like to think you should be able to upload your photos here exclusively, and I also know that there are proxy services that have relatively infinite more space than 3TB. However, when I say we have to recalibrate expectations, I’m asking for a reasonability test here: do we have to use engraving on a chuck with flash glare in a wide shot as the standard for what is satisfactory?

I’m not sure that should be the standard to measure our performance, all things being equal.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[WobblyHand]

I want to clarify something that is being bantered about here. Storage is not a problem - until it is. We have somewhere around 3TB or storage space.

I will reiterate, the issue with image size is more about bandwidth at the client side. I’ve been pretty consistent about this.

I haven’t had a lot of time to look into this since we last talked Bruce. I’m hoping to spend some time on this Thursday night.

With THAT said, I dont want donating members disappointed with the features of the sight. And I also don’t want people like yourself and others thinking I’m just dismissing your concerns. BUT, I have to try and ease our way to a point where everybody is happy, or something close to satisfied. Hopefully I can get us closer to 2022 in the next couple of days.

Yes, I would like to think you should be able to upload your photos here exclusively, and I also know that there are proxy services that have relatively infinite more space than 3TB. However, when I say we have to recalibrate expectations, I’m asking for a reasonability test here: do we have to use engraving on a chuck with flash glare in a wide shot as the standard for what is satisfactory?

I’m not sure that should be the standard to measure our performance, all things being equal.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I know that you volunteer time on HM. So, not upset, but do think photos on this site could be improved. I think they add a lot to the experience. For example, I benefited a lot from viewing higher resolution photos of HSS lathe tooling. Helped me understand better how to grind them, and what to watch out for. Fuzzy photos don't help, but good photos do.

To directly answer your question, no I'm not expecting ultra-fidelity, so resolving engraving in the presence of lighting glare isn't required. (No flash in that photo) It was a convenient test image, which visually showed the effects of aggressive compression loss. It would be great to have these high levels of resolution, but no, most of the time it just isn't required. So I am agreeing with you.

So if you can work on making some of the photos a bit nicer, it would be greatly appreciated by myself and others. Looking forward to the changes. Peace.

 

[WobblyHand]

Checking if there are any improvements. Reading the current Donation privilege chart indicates that my membership level should enable unlimited size upload photos. Upload image properties: 4032 x 3024 pixels = Pixel 4a standard camera resolution. Bytes: 5.4MB. We shall see what the download properties are.


The donation status indicates unlimited pixel resolution upload. However, it says nothing about the quality of downloads. Can one presume that a reasonable expectation is that the image quality would be preserved? Perhaps that is where some of (my) confusion is? In the original image, one can clearly read the end plate of the lathe. We shall see in a moment if this detail vanishes in the download.

 

[WobblyHand]

Yes, the detail vanishes. The text on the end plate is unreadable in the downloaded image. At 150% image size, the original image text was readable. The compressed image needs to be viewed at 670% to get a similar view and the text is smeared and unreadable. The compressed file is now 960 x 720 pixels and only 227 KB. @vtcnc it seems the downloaded version is heavily compressed. Is this considered normal for the forum software?

Is the download resolution independent of donor status?

Does the sw consult a database by donor status for upload and download? Are there two databases one for upload and one for download, and one is not in sync with the other?

So, just trying to understand what is happening. If I was just silver, would I be able to upload a 4032 x 3024 pixel picture? If not, what would it do, just reject the upload? Issue an error code of some sort? This isn't something I can test from here. However, on other forums, one gets a (cryptic) message and the upload is rejected if the picture size is too large.

Attached: original detail and downloaded detail. Please note both