Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Killer whale mother and calf

Killer whale mother and calf

Reason

This gorgeous picture illustrates two important themes of the

cetacean

. I think it would be a sweet one for the Main Page on May 13, which in many countries is Mother's Day. I hope the pink and green stripes down the side can be edited out - maybe someone more Photoshop-savvy than I am could do it?

Articles this image appears in

Orca

Creator

Robert L. Pitman

Nominator

Kla'quot

• Support — Kla'quot 02:52, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose, blurry, weak color and poor image quality in general. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 03:05, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Neutral for all, preference for Edit 3. I'll give it credit for being a neat shot, but the technical aspects, such as the purple fringing and blur prevent me from supporting. I also agree that an edit would improve the sides. --Tewy 03:33, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support Edit 1 fringing taken care of pretty well, colors look better now too and of course the subject is marvelous. In fact so impressive is the scene I would have supported the original. -Fcb981 06:16, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I love the edit. Thank you!! Kla'quot 07:07, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • My pleasure. thanks -Fcb981 03:48, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• One more edit: I cropped the discolored border and did some color correction. I agree with Fcb's sentiment on the subject. ~ trialsanderrors 07:13, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose all edits The entire picture seems to be slightly out of focus. It's a nice scene, but it isn't enough to convince me to support it. --Mad Max 07:37, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose Blurry - Adrian Pingstone 09:07, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support, looks sharp enough to me, very good encyclopedic picture -- Chris 73 | Talk 11:13, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment - I hate to say "you missed a spot", but there's still a big hair in the lower right and a small hair on the belly of the mother.
  chat} 16:08, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply
  ]
  • Yeah, I hate to hear you say it. I uploaded a new one (the string removed) over the old (I assume you're going to support now. ; p ) -Fcb981 03:46, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support its a great action shot, and very encyclopedic-Nelro 20:25, 20 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose - I'm not sure what it is, but it looks more like a still from a digital movie than a real photo. The quality is very poor, which is bizarre given the amazing subject matter and composition. Something weird is going on. Stevage 00:26, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Neutral/comment - the overall softness and poor definition is due to the scanner on which it was digitized, I think. It looks like the original, although sharp, may not have been a chrome but a color neg, which would explain the "color noise" (which is actually film grain) and lack of overall density. I feel I can't vote for this in its current form, not because of this but because of the noise reduction edits: a crop and clean-up were needed, but everything else has reduced definition still further. mikaul 08:48, 21 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Update I have e-mailed the photographer asking if it's possible to have the original re-scanned at higher resolution. Thanks everyone for the comments, edits, and advice so far. Kla'quot 04:46, 22 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support I'm not a photographer, so the technical criticism may be valid. But as WP reader, the picture is just amazing. Far, far above the quality of the average POTD. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.176.114.213 (talk)
• Oppose as anti-whaling propaganda..... but seriously, it's very nice, but too grainy, blown out highlighsts, and overly dull in some areas. gren グレン 21:22, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • just as a comment, its hard to prevent blowing highlights on snow. -Fcb981 22:49, 23 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support anti-whaling propaganda? Its displaying the social interaction of the mother and the calf, its a zoological picture. Chris_huh^talk 00:38, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • It's a joke. This nom and this one have been opposed for being propaganda... which I think is an improper reason. So, I was just joking around. The second part of my comment is why I opposed. gren グレン 01:12, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Oh i see, never mind then. Chris_huh^talk 10:50, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support All Tomer T 11:18, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• (Oppose all) - edits have made some improvement but the original is very poor quality. Blur won't be fixable by any amount of editing, and there's also a lot of fringing. Looks to have been taken a long time ago with a not-superb-quality film camera, and deteriorated before being scanned. --YFB ¿ 23:07, 24 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support edit 2 only The others don't look so great. With proper clarity, it is a compelling image. YechielMan 00:26, 26 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Also support edit 3. I assume that's the new option that Kla'quot wanted me to know about. It's as good or better than edit 2. YechielMan 06:41, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Oppose Blurry, and the colors somehow don't feel right. Something with the white balance, or the off-white orca with the whiter snow.--HereToHelp 23:35, 26 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm not sure if this is what you were referring to, but I guess I should mention that the orca colourings are correct. Although most orcas are black and white, young calves are black and yellowish, and adult Antarctic orcas also have this yellowish tinge because of the diatoms in the water. Kla'quot 05:16, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
    • Edit 3 improved the color a little, but there's still the band of blurry snow and another could always be taken. I now weakly oppose the image.--HereToHelp 23:22, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support Edit1 and Edit 2 A striking image --AGoon 12:13, 27 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Update Edit 3 just came in and procedurally I don't know what to do with it. My question at See Wikipedia talk:Featured_picture_candidates#What_to_do_with_an_improved_version_of_an_almost-closed_candidate.3F hasn't been answered yet, so I'm taking a guess and putting it here. Kla'quot 17:10, 28 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Still No, Image quality just isn't up to standards. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 06:22, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Still no - edit 3 is nice, but it's still a very low quality image. And it doesn't add much to Orca that the other photos don't. Stevage 06:52, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Support Edit 3. This has always been a great 'moment' shot of very high encyclopedic value. Can I respectfully suggest that those opposing it on "quality" grounds read
  WP:FP? point 1, paragraph 2 and then make a decision. Any points it might lose on 'critical sharpness' criteria is more than made up for with the unique nature of the capture. This is a quality image by WP:FP standards. mikaul 08:24, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply
  ]
  • They're not extinct. Another picture could always be taken. There's nothing spectacularly informative about this one to override the quality issues. Night Gyr (talk/Oy) 14:16, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Still oppose all - We've seen some good editing on this image. That's of benefit to the article and to be encouraged, even if the result still isn't FP-standard. To me, this is a nice image but by no means unique or irreplaceable, even if it's a pretty rare scene - if it was a photo of a Great auk or a Thylacine then the quality would be acceptable. As it is, the quality of the original is just too poor, and the edits have very little to work with. An interesting and encyclopaedic photo, but not among our 'best' wildlife images. --YFB ¿ 15:18, 29 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • Although the image is, in theory, replaceable, mikaul's point is not far off. The Type C orca lives only in Antarctic waters. Photography in polar conditions is no joke. There are no captive or dead specimens of the Type C orca. There are few people who have seen Type Cs, and only a handful of closeup pictures available of it, copyrighted or not; this photo was taken by one of the leading scientists studying these animals.[1] As he is a scientist first and a photographer second he think he has lent the original to someone and can't find it anymore. There is strong evidence that the Type C orca is a new species, in an age when it is common belief that all the large mammal species on the planet were discovered long ago, and all the more poignant because we just lost a cetacean species. Add to this the fact that we are looking at an intimate moment between two individuals who, if what we think we know about orcas is true, will never separate. I believe this is an iconic picture of the most stable bond known in the animal kingdom. Can we forgive the fact that the snow doesn't look good? Kla'quot 04:14, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Weak support my own edit, oppose the others. If the ugly discolorization of the original is fixed the picture meets the bare minimum for tec. Enc and art seem generally supported. I'd like to have a wider crop than my own, but so far no one has fixed the ugly border. The whales themselves are ok, barely. Edit 3 is also far too yellow on my monitor. ~ trialsanderrors 07:47, 30 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]