User:Buidhe/Why you should take more pictures and upload them to Commons

Like many of you, I don't have a high confidence in my photography skills. So many popular subjects are already illustrated by hundreds of pictures on Commons, many of which are much better than my limited abilities and camera could produce. For a long time, I wouldn't take pictures of notable subjects that I happened upon in the course of everyday life, or if I did, I wouldn't upload them. The first few thousand of my Commons uploads are other people's pictures, largely of historical interest. What follows is the few of my own photographs that have been added to Wikipedia articles.

Then in early October 2024, I climbed up to Camp Muir (4,600 feet (1,400 m) elevation gain from Paradise, about two-thirds of the way up Mount Rainier) on a clear day and took a handful of pictures. I figured that since Camp Muir is a well known hike and camping place on the most common ascent route for climbers of one of the tallest mountains in North America, there must be a lot of pictures of it already on Commons. Unfortunately, when I got back to an Internet connection I discovered it was not true. The one picture we really needed—an overview of the camp from just below it—was one I hadn't taken. I did upload the pictures I took, which looked much better than I expected due to the great photography conditions and my new Pixel 8a, which has a much better camera than did my Huawei Mate Pro 8 from 2016, and added some of them to the article.

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  New lead image for Camp Muir
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  Swapped in a better pic of Muir Snowfield below the camp, looking down towards Paradise

Since I managed to get to Camp Muir in only three and a half hours, I figured I was up for some longer and more difficult hikes than my previous hiking partners were interested in. I realized that there was open spots on a shuttle that would enable me to through-hike the Enchantments on 11 October. Finding a parking spot at the trailhead—which is often full well before 5 a.m.—is only the start of the challenges of this hike, which include a poorly marked trail, extremely steep scrambling up Aasgard Pass, and a 20-mile (32 km) hike back to your car. I started before sunrise and it took me 16 hours, so I did half the mileage in the dark. This time I took a lot more pictures with my new phone, but unfortunately, I was not fully aware of the Wikipedia articles that most urgently needed new photographs. As a result, the pictures I ended up adding to Wikipedia did not show the subjects as clearly as they could have.

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  Remnants of the glacier to the left of Colchuck Peak (upper center)
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  Aasgard Pass, viewed from near the shore of Colchuck Lake
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  The trail through the Enchantments is poorly marked, leading multiple routes to develop without any indication which one is official (near Perfection Lake)
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  Upper Snow Lake dam at dusk (11 October 2024)
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  Nada Lake after dark, taken with night vision mode on my phone camera—an imperfect picture is way better than no picture!

Upper Snow Lake at sunset with 8 miles (13 km) to go

During the 8-mile (13 km) hike out from Snow Lakes, which I did entirely after dark, I tagged along with some climbers who had summited Little Annapurna earlier in the day. I explained my plan to day-hike from Sunrise to Mystic Lake and back, and he told me I wouldn't need to day-hike it since it is easier to get permits to camp in October. I showed up at the White River Ranger Station a few days later and snagged a same-day campsite at Indian Bar overnight 13–14 October, one of the most scenic and difficult to obtain campsites in the park. Despite a chance of rain in the forecast, the weather was beautiful, especially the first day.

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  Panhandle Gap—a new article illustrated with two of my pictures from the Indian Bar trip
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  Updated picture of Fryingpan Glacier showing its current extent

Two pictures of Indian Bar made it into the encyclopedia:

Added this panorama of Indian Bar, with the NRHP-registered group shelter visible to the left and the Ohanapecosh River in the foreground, to the Wonderland Trail article

Ohanapecosh River was missing pictures of the river near its source, where it passes through Indian Bar (right and foreground) then goes under the Wonderland Trail bridge at Wauhaukaupauken Falls (center-left)

On the way back, I ditched much of my gear near Panhandle Gap and did a side trip to Banshee Peak, which yielded even more pictures useful to the encyclopedia.

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  Tamanos Mountain, viewed at a different season, different face, and from closer than all other Commons pics
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  Sunrise Road—new article illustrated by my picture of the road winding its way up the mountain
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  Updated photo that shows the current extent of the Sarvant Glacier, with better context than the previous picture

Volunteer Park Cafe & Pantry—persuaded a friend to upload it

I learned that you don't have to be an expert photographer to contribute useful images, and you often don't know in advance if the image will be encyclopedically valuable. If you're interested in contributing more photographs, Wikishootme can help you locate Wikidata items without an associated image. Photographing notable people at public events can be helpful, although it is hampered by difficulties encountered by Wikimedia volunteers obtaining press passes to larger events. Even if a place is highly notable, it may not have a lot of pictures—especially if it is hard to access (many mountains in the Cascades lack good pictures taken from the summit).

Another consideration is just because a subject already has a photograph doesn't mean that your photograph couldn't be quite useful. Many subjects change over time or look different depending on the season and weather, so even if there are already images on Commons yours could well provide new information. For example, glaciers are in retreat due to climate change, so a picture in October 2024 showing the glacier's minimum extent is going to be much more encyclopedically valuable than a photograph taken in June 2007, no matter how pretty it is. Sometimes the "wow factor" of a really stunning photograph or other techniques for pretty pictures such as golden hour can actually reduce the encyclopedic value of an image by taking focus away from its subject, when a plainer photograph taken in sunlight at noon might be superior.