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Have you noticed a reduction in image quality on POL
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Message
Posted
Odd things are happening, I know that changes have been made recently, but I think the quality of uploaded images has reduced. I'll confess I'm no tech-head, so I have to present my thoughts in a pedantic way.
For a start, I use a desktop computer with a 25 inch screen (that's across the diagonal, of course). If you use an Ipad, phone or something similar, you may not see the difference...because the screen is smaller.
I uploaded a pic this morning, it looked awful. A cartoon I made is A5 size, that's about 6 x 8 inches. I save these at high res, but for POL I reduce the res to 100 DPI, and the resultant image size is about 5 x 7 inches. This has always been adequate...in fact after the big website revamp a while ago, I thought the graphics looked great. Not so now.
Recently each upload has taken ages and resulted in an error page...but the pic has uploaded. In the gallery my pic is enlarged to more than A4 size (I held a A4 sheet to my screen...my image on POL was larger than this.) The pixel size of my uploaded cartoon was 511 x 700 at 100DPI, on POL it's screened at 400 x 548 pixels at 72 DPI. So the program is reducing the resolution of my pic, whilst increasing the size it's shown at.
That's why it looked naff on my screen.
I removed it and uploaded a higher resolution version of my cartoon. Slightly better, but not good.
If this is the norm now, I won't be uploading my little cartoons, I don't want my pics to look worse than they are.
I suspect if you upload larger paintings this may not happen. I'll experiment by uploading a old group of small pics, to see if they look better that way...4 or more small pics in a group.
First experiment... I'm uploading my low-res version here, to see if they look different on the forum...
...I now need to look at this after I've posted it.
Has anyone else noticed this?
...I now need to look at this after I've posted it.
Has anyone else noticed this? 
Posted
I’ve been getting that error message for six months or more, and as you say Lew, it still loads up - it takes a good minute before the error 404 message appears.
I might be wrong here, Dawn will probably have the answer, but there’s no need for you to reduce the size of your files, the website will automatically apply the correct resolution, which I believe is 72dpi.
I’ve not noticed any reduction in image quality myself.
Posted
Yes Alan, your paintings are much larger than my A5 size cartoons, and so, don't get shown about 4 times bigger than they really are. POL res is 72dpi, my pics are getting reduced in res and inflated in size and look awful. Just posted an old group painting of 6 small pics...it looks fine...I'll have to stop posting solitary small pics.
Lucky to have the site. I just want to find the best way to show my smaller pics.
Posted
Thank you Tony. I realize most people with ipads and the like will wonder what I'm talking about. I won't stop posting my cartoons but I'll wait 'til I have 4 or 6 and post them as a group. My experiment posting the old Dickens group of 6 x 4 inch pics in the gallery looks OK.
I must stress THAT I'M IN NO WAY COMPLAINING ABOUT THE SITE. I'm grateful that they provide this wonderful resource.
Like everybody else, I want my pics to look OK. That's all.
Posted
I had some problems a few weeks ago, but I think the issue lay with me - having reverted to an older camera than I had been using, I found my last one reproduced just about perfectly. I'll re-photograph one that certainly didn't work: it too was small, and the image was very blurred when it appeared. I'll use my older camera, and hope... (not today, don't go looking for it).
Posted
Still thinking about this. The issue may lay with me (as Robert said about one of his paintings), but I'd have thought my style of picture making would reproduce well. I'd thought it was just my smaller pics...A5 etc. On my PC screen my pics are reproduced in the gallery larger than A4 size with a reduced DPI resolution, some have looked poor. But I would expect the larger pics to look good.
This one, posted a few weeks ago, brought it home...(it's an A3 size drawing).
Until I post this I can't tell how it looks in the forum...in the gallery it looked fuzzy and even on my 25inch screen I had to scroll to see all of it.
This picture may be my fault, I'd left the background 'soft'. It's just how I want it in the painting, and looks fine on my PC in file explorer and Photoshop. When posted in the gallery it looked awful.
So, I'll stop posting pics where I've used this technique. I've upped the resolution on my pics (Alan was right, they do load and the software sorts them out...unfortunately, for some of my pics, not how I'd wish them to be.)
Today, I posted two A5 size pics together at a higher resolution. They seem OK.
Until I post this I can't tell how it looks in the forum...in the gallery it looked fuzzy and even on my 25inch screen I had to scroll to see all of it.
This picture may be my fault, I'd left the background 'soft'. It's just how I want it in the painting, and looks fine on my PC in file explorer and Photoshop. When posted in the gallery it looked awful.
So, I'll stop posting pics where I've used this technique. I've upped the resolution on my pics (Alan was right, they do load and the software sorts them out...unfortunately, for some of my pics, not how I'd wish them to be.)
Today, I posted two A5 size pics together at a higher resolution. They seem OK.
