Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/delist/File:Lowering the flag on Zuikaku.jpg

Delist: Lowering the flag on Zuikaku

Voting period is over. Please don't add any new votes. Voting period ends on 13 Sep 2015 at 00:49:58 (UTC)

Lowering the flag on Zuikaku

Reason: Excessively low resolution combined with very poor quality of reproduction. Well below featureable quality, despite its importance.
Articles this image appears in: 1st Air Fleet (Imperial Japanese Navy), Battle of Leyte Gulf, Japanese aircraft carrier Zuikaku, Shōkaku-class aircraft carrier
Previous nomination/s: Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Zuikaku sinking
Nominator: Adam Cuerden ^(talk)

Delist — Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 00:49, 3 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
~~Keep~~ Comment Considering the rarity of pictures depicting the Japanese side of the war, I feel the historical value of this picture outweighs the negatives at the present time (Few of the available Japanese pictures are of great quality anyway.) Is there a replacement image available? I would gladly support a delist-replace. Dusty777 03:15, 3 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- I'm not sure the insistence on delist-replace in these things is productive. While rare, I'm not convinced these are so rare that a confusing composition, very low-resolution, extremely low-quality and heavily-damaged reproduction, and poor documentation at the file page are all overcome.

Now I don't mind if an image is a little under resolution, but 740 × 529 is too low to reproduce at much more than postcard size - and the low quality means it won't look particularly good even then. This simply isn't amongst our best images.Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 03:55, 3 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Concerning the quality of this photo, you are surely right, Adam. But are there reasonable alternatives in better shape? We need to check first before voting. --Tremonist (talk) 12:47, 3 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I don't see any obvious replacements, and I did a few searches to see what I could find, but that shouldn't matter - it encourages the searching out of images if there aren't featured ones already, and strongly discourages it if there isn't. For example, one of the other images I found when lookign through the older images was an Eisenhower image, of which I did find a higher resolution version. I suspect, had it not been featured, and thus taken off the search for many, that a higher-res version existed would have been learned long ago. I think a good criteria is: if every other website on the subject has images about as good, about as high resolution, and about as sharp, what is the point of drawing attention to the image by calling it featured? Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 13:51, 3 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

All right, Adam. Delist then. --Tremonist (talk) 12:58, 4 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

I was always under the impression that the reason we pick Featured pictures was... To show which pictures contribute the highest amount of value to Wikipedia articles, not based off of how much a picture, or similar pictures are used across the internet.... Am I interpreting your statement correctly Adam? (Tell me if I'm wrong. I'll only bite once.) Dusty777 00:37, 6 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Delist - I will agree with the nominator. Presumably the original photograph still exists and could get a better scan with some restoration. Mattximus (talk) 16:52, 3 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
Delist as above. I am not convinced that the rarity can outweigh the huge technical problems. Josh Milburn (talk) 10:23, 4 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
~~Comment~~ Does a ~~higher resolution~~ and better quality version actually exist? The comments on the image's composition are a bit confusing: think about the circumstances this photo was taken in! - the carrier was listing by a truly alarming level (compare the deck to the horizon), the photographer would have been fearing for his life, and it shows a pretty remarkable ceremony by the crew. Nick-D (talk) 23:40, 4 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]
- A large (24 Mb) tiff file of a similar scene is available at [1]. I imagine that a tiff of this photo is also available there (but can't find it...) Nick-D (talk) 23:46, 4 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

And that's MUCH higher quality. Not perfect, but you can at least do something with that. I think we've proven my point. =) Thanks, Nick! I'll get on that. Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 01:27, 5 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Searching Zuikaku finds this image pretty quickly: http://www.history.navy.mil/our-collections/photography/numerical-list-of-images/nhhc-series/nh-series/NH-73000/NH-73069.html Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 01:33, 5 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Great work Adam - for some reason my search for the same term didn't find it! If anyone is interested in restoring the image, it would be worthwhile given its very strong EV. Nick-D (talk) 02:04, 5 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

@Nick-D: Which of the two, though? Adam Cuerden ^(talk) 02:16, 5 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Both have lots of EV, but I'd recommend the current image (eg, [2]) - there are less arms in the way and the tilt of the ship is more apparent. Alternately, the pair would make a great dual FP nomination ;) By the way, I'm moving to delist as it's clear that a much superior version is possible. Nick-D (talk) 02:21, 5 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Delisted --Armbrust ^{The Homunculus} 01:00, 13 September 2015 (UTC)[reply]