Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Grand Army Plaza

Grand Army Plaza[edit]

Fiddling around...

This is a close-up view of the quadriga high atop the Soldiers' and Sailors' Memorial Arch at Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn, New York City. Access to the top of the Arch is pretty rare, so I took advantage of a recent opportunity with Open House New York. I've never submitted anything here before, so advice would be helpful; this is the first photo I've taken that seems roughly in the FP league. I am utterly ignorant of photo-editing software, so the current image has lost some quality with rotation; ~~if I could e-mail someone the original~~ (eh, it's good enough, we can just edit the existing image) to process it properly, that would be great. I realize there are some "imperfections" with the photo, but I think that, particularly in high res, it really shows off the energy of the horses and the sublimity of the heralding Victory, aspects which cannot be appreciated from a street-level view.

Nominate and support. - Pharos 04:12, 10 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Can you perhaps increase the contrast. It's quite hard to make out details at the bottom of the picture. - Mgm|^(talk) 10:58, 10 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- I can say it does look better in high res. I've tried a higher contrast, which just seemed worse to me, but as I said I don't really know about these things. I've posted a lightened and monochromed version which might be a direction worth considering... lightening deals with the details at the bottom, and it was pretty darn monochrome to start with anyway (with the bonus that now noone will be disappointed by the lack of blue sky and the slightly discordant red brick apartment building).--Pharos 03:21, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
An excellent first effort but probably (since you ask for comment) doomed to mostly "Opposes" because of the blank sky. It's a shame we can't dial into our camera the sky we'd like! - Adrian Pingstone 11:50, 10 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
But maybe you can... [1]. ;)PiccoloNamek 11:19, 11 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- Good try, but there's a new problem. There's now a white border all round between the sculpture and the blue sky - Adrian Pingstone 14:05, 13 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

That's OK, because I wasn't seriously suggesting it as a replacement, hence the winking eye face... ;)PiccoloNamek 14:12, 13 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies, I didn't spot the winking smiley - Adrian Pingstone 20:59, 13 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

- Nice :)... it does beg the question, though, of the real value of another Big Beautiful Blue sky background. Some of the other changes you made are quite legit, and I would appreciate someone uploading a high-res alternate version with the "imperfections" corrected.--Pharos 02:56, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
I changed it a bit (enhanced, adjusted the contrast...) in a different file. It's... Thelb4! 18:39, 12 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Great potential here. I personally think the featureless sky is the perfect backdrop to the statue. I'd support the lightened and monochromed version if it were made horozontal, like it is in Piccolo's blue sky version. encephalon 11:38, 14 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- Great. Can someone make a good horizontal version? (I don't have the software or know-how.) Thanks.--Pharos 16:55, 14 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- I don't understand, how is PiccoloNamek's "blue sky" version horizontal? Like all the rest of the Grand Army Plaza pics here it's in vertical format (often called portrait format). The format couldn't be changed or there would be huge areas of white (or blue) either side of the pic. What do you mean by horizontal? - Adrian Pingstone 17:48, 14 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

He means make the horizon horizontal. And I did just that. I used the measure tool to determine the proper angle and then rotated it in photoshop. Unfortunately, parts of it were cropped off, but this is really unavoidable. I also did a custom desaturation and sharpening job, I think it looks much more striking now.PiccoloNamek 18:05, 14 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Nice job, but I wish the margin, particularly on the left, wasn't slightly cut off. Given that this is a free-standing piece on a white background, couldn't you just widen the area a bit before you rotate it? Either that, or copy the marginal area before and paste it, rotated and enhanced appropriately, into the final image. Isn't this possible? I would argue we don't even need the hardly visible 'ground' base if that's what's getting in the way.--Pharos 18:51, 14 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Ok then, how about this?PiccoloNamek 22:55, 14 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
OK, I'm supporting "Horizontal non-cropped" Image:Grand_Army_Plaza_Herald4.jpg. Plus a gold star to Piccolo for his helpful efforts in WP:FPC :) encephalon 07:59, 16 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
- Yes, thanks so much, Piccolo, for your fine help and forbearance.--Pharos 08:09, 16 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. This statue could be anywhere. Some background to put it into context would have been nice. --Dschwen 14:42, 18 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. It doesn't have any content that makes it contribute significantly to the article. I need to see some of the arch, and ideally the feeling that it is indeed elevated significantly above the surrounding area. - Bevo 10:11, 20 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]

Not promoted Raven4x4x 07:59, 24 October 2005 (UTC)[reply]