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GeneralFrustrating low quality thumbnails

26th Apr 2009 15:34 UTCCarles Millan Expert

Many thumbnail photos shown at the Mindat database have a difficult to explain poor quality that I even consider frustrating.

Just compare the following photos with each other:

First example

http://www.mindat.org/gphotos/0067856001240755348.jpg

http://carlesmillan.cat/minerals/2774S-arsenopyrite.jpg

Second example

http://www.mindat.org/gphotos/0193962001240687001.jpg

http://carlesmillan.cat/minerals/8110S-topaz.jpg

Each pair has exactly the same full size source. The first photo of each has been reduced by the Mindat engine. The second has been resized by myself by using a standard and simple drawing program. And they're not the only ones. Indeed there are a lot more.

I hope Jolyon Ralph (or his team), who I know is an excellent internet programmer, will be able to improve the system.

26th Apr 2009 15:43 UTCDavid Von Bargen Manager

An incentive to view the full size photo.

Actually if you want to get good thumbnails you should reduce the photo in a number of steps with tweeks between reductions rather than doing it all at once.

26th Apr 2009 16:44 UTCCarles Millan Expert

Hi, David!

The thumbnails I posted above in the second position have been reduced in a single step with PaintShop Pro and from the same picture I uploaded to Mindat. And they seem perfect.

I can't understand yet why the Mindat system creates such awful reductions.

27th Apr 2009 06:31 UTCRock Currier Expert

I have noticed the same phenomenon. In one sense it is an inducement to view the larger image, but I think rather the result of poor TN image quality will cause most users not bother to looking at the full size image even if they realize they can do so by clicking on the image. I never cease to be amazed at how rudimentary most peoples knowledge is about things computer. There are way to many TN images to click on them all for full size images unless the user believes that it is really a good specimen to start with even if you have a high speed link. With a normal link there is even less incentive to click on a TN image to see the larger one. In working on the Best Minerals project I have indeed looked at many thousands of them.

If something can be done to improve the algorithm that resizes our images to TNs I think we should consider spending the time to do it. In many instances the TN images are our main contact with people using the site and if they are inferior, the site will suffer accordingly. But I know that there must be many demands on Dave's time and this problem may not rate a very high priority. Perhaps if there are several common methods of making TNs better and depending on the situation one would be better than the other(s) but there is no way of telling for sure which one would be better without viewing them, perhaps they could both/all be created and displayed by clicking a button below or adjacent to the default TN image. But I am just talking wild blue sky without any knowledge of the realities involved in creating and displaying TN images.

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