This Forum discussion follows from a short article I wrote for the August 2018 Newsletter. Please read the full article before engaging in discussions.

Requesting and holding 'print quality' image files in the back-end of our website, for photos represented in the Premier Bird Image gallery (PBIG), would be an effective option. Similarly, we could also consider holding such files for images that were appraised and assigned a star rating of 2 or more.

It is unrealistc for BLP to hold 'print-quality' files for the complete digital library, this would encompass some 20K additional files, and many of these are unlikely to be a Download Request.

How do you currently organise you portfolios and does this include down-sized 'web-quality' and 'print-quality' post-processed files? Do you include a portfolio of only your very best photos? Have you discussed with you family your wishes for your portfolio when you are deceased? Your thoughts on this topic would be appreciated?

Regards - Graham Cam, BLP President

Hi Graham,

I can answer some of your questions regarding the organization of my picture files. I start by ruthlessly culling RAW files based on my image quality criteria. I then consider the 'content' and its purpose, for example, does the image show bird ID points particularly well or have I captured a characteristic or unusual behaviour. These are my most common objectives but occasionally I am lucky enough to capture an image with multiple layers of interest, the kind of image one might consider entering in a comp. The RAW files meeting my image quality standards are archived in day (date) folders and from these I select a few of the very best for development and finishing. The finished file is a hi-res TIFF which I save in a version set and catalogue by species. From this file I generate hi-res print files if required, and a downsized JPEG for BLP which is also saved in the version set. When someone asks for a hi-res print file I usually go to the hi-res TIFF and convert to a hi-res JPEG but on rare occasions I have been asked to supply a hi-res TIFF for printing.

A related matter is the maximum size of images currently accepted for the New Images Gallery. I think it is time to increase the maximum width to say 1920 pixels as many viewers are now using displays with up to 3840 pixel width and even higher. Soon we will probably need to consider accepting images sized to suit 4k displays. One of the bird photography websites I keep and eye on recently increased the maximum acceptable image width to 1920 px and this has made a huge improvement to the viewing experience. An image width of 1920 px is well suited to displays capable of handling 2560 px and more.

I think the suggestion to archive the best BLP images in a hi-res format is a good idea. Maybe a trial gallery could be established where some examples could be made available to gauge the response of our members.

Cheers,

Ian

Sorry for the late response but it was posted while I was away and I therefore missed it. An excellent idea to seek high resolution images of the best photos in our collection. My only significant concern is the work involved in sending requests and handling the submissions. If that could be automated or semi-automated, that would solve the problem.

As for individuals alerting their families about their wishes for future use of image holdings, a sensible idea and one we should all consider acting on. Whatever is done there will have to be up to individuals involved based on their surviving family members' abilities and resources. The hard bit after the event for BLP will be identifying the responsible individual. To that end, perhaps we should add an additional field to each user account so they can record the person they wish to nominate as a next of kin in this regard?