User:Pdanese/My Attempts at QI Nominations etc.

June 2025

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  🔴 I was blind to the gigantic blurry blade of grass in front of the sparrow.
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May 2025

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  🟢 I know it's a feeder shot, but this is about as good a shot as I'm gonna take.

February 2025

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  🔴 I think this was dinged because a large number of my early uploads have the wrong camera metadata on them. Gotta find time to fix that programmatically.
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January 2025

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  🟢 I can't tell if this is over-processed or not.
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  🔴 I'm often initially surprised by rejections. Then ... they usually make sense. This one primarily dinged because I didn't get focus on the eye.
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  🔴 CAs on the wing (didn't notice, but definitely problematic). Haloing around the bird (def problematic). Breast feathers not sharp--I don't think that's problematic, but 2 strikes is enough for a 🔴.
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December 2024

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  🟢 I didn't intend for the deer to be encircled by those flowers, but it turned out well.
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  🟢 This fella was puking up some type of seeds.
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  🟢 Nice shadow, but I think the crop is too tight.
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  🟢 This one was doing the throat-flutter thing, but it wasn't exceptionally hot that day.
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  🔴 Largely for low contrast.
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  🟢 Re-touched to remove an annoying branch.
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November 2024

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  🟢 I need to start lowering my standards for qi noms.
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  🟢 As a friend told me, "The deer are like squirrels over at Cedar Hill"
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October 2024

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  🟢 I could see this one getting declined, but the LoD is there, so who knows.
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  Currently adrift in the sea of indifference :'-(. 🟢
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September 2024

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  🟢 User:Tagooty seems to like the duckweed. As do I.
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  🟢 Should make it through due to near 1.3 ångström resolution.
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  🟢 Stalking...
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  🟢 I like the pose. No clue if the LoD is enough.
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  🟢, but probably borderline ...
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  🟢 A remarkably mean-spirited sandpiper.
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  🟢 Good light.

August 2024

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  🟢 Came out better than I expected, especially given the black & yellow subject on a dark background.
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  🟢 Old South Cemetery is either dead (pun intended) or teeming with birds.
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  🟢 Even a bad day at Pleasant Valley is better than a lot of good days elsewhere.
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  🟢 Decent lighting. Beaver Brook & Old South Cemetery are two places where the birds often let you get close.
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  🟢 More Old South Cemetery.
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  🟢 I submitted this to the August Photo Challenge on "Dust."
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  🟢 Augustgeyler was kind enough to nominate this. I would not have nominated it because it didn't seem sharp enough, but the "action" was enough I guess, and the reviewer had mercy on it. I'll take it.
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  🟢 This one should get through simply on "sharpness." If the background were not so cluttered, it would have been really nice.
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  🟢 This one might be "DOA." I like it, but the brights may be burned out and may not be sharp enough. Background & the 🌽 stalk are nice, though.

Prior to August 2024

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  🟢 This was taken moments before (or after) the adjacent 🦆 photo and it was processed in the same way. Background goes a long way.
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  🔴 This one got two 👎👎. "Looks posterized" from @User:Fabian_Roudra_Baroi and "the photo is overprocessed and posterized" from @User:Granada. I'd have to go back and look, but I think the issue is that there's a lot of quasi-wavy vegetation in the background and my lens wasn't good enough to give me "creamy bokeh" so that background vegetation ends up looking overly processed (even though it isn't??). The subject itself was pretty much as you see it. Very close to the 📷 with a lot of detail. Nevertheless, I suppose if it looks like a 🦆 (or looks over-processed) and quacks like a 🦆, then it's "over-processed."
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  🟢 I think this is the first pic that I nominated for QI.
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  🟢 I wish I could see these 🐦s more often.
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  🟢 🐦 looks proud.
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  Soft 🔴 Actually, I think I withdrew this one. @User:Tagooty should have outright rejected it. It's almost a good shot, but I snipped the 🐦's tail. I thought it might be salvageable with a tighter crop, but I couldn't get something that I liked.
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  🟢 Nice bokeh. Compare to mallard drake photo below.
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  🟢 One ugly baby 🐦.
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  🟢 Meh.
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  🟢 Same wren. I used to like this photo (mostly from the anthropomorphic "attitude"), but it looks over-processed to me now.
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  🟢 This juvenile wren has no tail feathers. A wildlife expert told me that the 🐦 should definitely have tail feathers at the time of this photo, so it probably lost them trying to escape from the clutches of a raptor.
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  🟢 If i had a 🪙 for every well-focused mockingbird photo that i’ve taken, I’d probably have 🪙🪙🪙🪙.
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  Soft 🔴 User:charlesjsharp commented that it looked oversaturated. Looks like I did go heavy on the saturation there.
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  🟢 A nice looking 🐦 taken at a beautiful wildlife sanctuary.
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  🟢 I had considered nominating this for FP, but I'm too thin-skinned for the scrutiny. And the background is a little too busy.
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  🟢 I like this photo for several reasons. I can see how people might dislike it because of the man-made fishing line, but that was part of the point here. A lot of people leave their non-degradable 🗑️ @ Keeney Cove and the wildlife have to deal with it. In this case, I think the phoebe might have gathered the line for nesting material because I don't think that spool could have gotten up so high by the ✋ of any rational human.
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  🟢 by User:charlesjsharp but he feels it needs a crop.
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  🟢 Not much to say here except the sparrow looks like Tony Montana about 2 hours into Scarface.
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  🟢 One of the few photos that I've taken that I genuinely like.
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  🟢 The chopped stick on the left is problematic. I should have removed it by inpainting, but that stuff usually feels like cheating, especially with such a large object. The details on the 🐦 are nice, however, given the fact that it is darkly colored.
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  🟢 Nothing says "Quality Image" like a junco posing on the roof of a mobile home. #murica
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  🟢 @User:Tagooty said he thought it was a real 🦆 at first. I guess that's a testament to the skill of the decoy manufacturer. I wish that damned stick wasn't draped across the decoy. The 🧊🧊🧊 crystals on the decoy provide a sense of how cold it was that day.
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  🟢, almost certainly because of sharp focus. The background is blah. Shot by sitting in the passenger seat of my 🚗 and stabilizing the lens on the partially rolled-down window. A nice 💑 had left birdseed on the ground at the wildlife management area, making it easy to shoot the locals.
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  🟢, but only after a disputed rejection. Strangely, @User:Poco_a_poco felt that the background was fake. It's a boring 🐦, but this and the two other photos of the same subject (not shown) are probably my best photos--not saying much.
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  No verdict / Soft 🔴. @User:C messier indicates that "There is a halo around the beak." I don't see the 😇 and I'm not sure what a 😇 would be. I suspect it means the reviewer feels like there's a post-processing artifact that created some type of 'halo.' I wasn't really in ❤️ enough with the photo to fight for it. It's also quite possible that I just suck at seeing 😇s.
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  🟢 reluctantly by @User:Charlesjsharp--damned with faint praise because the subject was looking away. I thought the pose made the 🐦 look pensive. de gustibus....
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  🔴 1 vote to promote and 2 opposed. @User:Charlesjsharp led the rejection with "Oppose technical quality from high ISO". I'm not exactly sure what that means other than the ISO was too high and I went heavy on the denoise?? User:BigDom cast the deciding 👎. It was a borderline photo, so the 2 to 1 vote probably makes sense.
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  🟢 Decent shot of a somewhat uncommon 🐦.
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  🟢 Most likely promoted for good focus. An otherwise uninspired snap.
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  🔴 by @User:charlesjsharp for the purple halo around the head (and rightly so). I should look at these more carefully before I nominate!
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  🟢 See previous comment.
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  🟢 Definitely a flawed photo, but the lighting is decent.
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  🟢 I'm not sure how this got promoted. I guess the focus carried the day, but as noted on the earlier chickadee photos, the lighting isn't great here and the blacks are very ⚫.
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  🟢 Looks like I'm trying to collect the complete assortment of boring subjects. But the 🐱 does look nice.
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  🟢 That is one colorful bill.
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  🟢 One of my favorite photos. Lotta personality in that leap.
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  🟢 Feeder shot!
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  🟢 Pretty sure the person who rejected the previous "bokeh photo" (User:Plozessor) simply gave up and promoted this one out of pity. Well, at least I got more of the espresso cup in focus this time (at the expense of blurry bokeh).
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  🔴 I was enamored with this shot, but the rejection was understandable--not enough was in focus! So, I re-shot at a higher F-stop.
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  🟢 Same gull. Same spot. I like that you can see detailed shadow of the feathers across the eye.
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  🟢 I like the lighting on this one. And it helps when the 🐦 just stands there 3 meters from the 📷 and poses.
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  🟢 Another feeder shot and another boring subject, but I like the background.
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  🟢 Yet another boring subject, but I'm happy with the photo.
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  🔴 I challenged this one, too. But I got shot down for the same reason as with the blue jay. I fought the law, and--well--the results were as expected.
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  🔴 I disputed this rejection, but the feeling was that it looked over-processed. Like I ran it through two different sharpening filters. Can't win 'em all.
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  🟢 Taken in the backyard (another birdfeeder shot -- don't tell anyone!). I find that juncos are either photogenic or hideous. This one was photogenic.
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  🟢 Birdfeeder shot (soooo trite), but nice background.
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  🟢 I would not have been surprised with a rejection, but I probably got points for getting reasonably good focus while the gull was in flight. Gull appears to be annoyed with the Paparazzo.
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  🟢 Same song sparrow as earlier. I had to get low to the ground to get that blurry background. A remarkable feat for my 55-year-old-ass.
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  🔴 I was initially surprised by this rejection, but the reason provided is understandable in retrospect. @User:FlocciNivis opposes because the "... branches in the foreground distract from the woodpecker...." I was too enamored with the sharp focus, but the branches are definitely problematic. I was stabilizing the 📷 on the roof of my 🚗 and in the 10 seconds it took me to mount the 📷 on my monopod, the woodpecker took off.
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  🟢 See previous comment. I like the pose on the 🐦 in this one a little bit more.
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  🟢 This and the accompanying photo are probably the first two decent pics that I've ever been able to take of a chickadee. The reasons for my lack of success are two-fold: first, it's difficult to get good detail from their black feathers. Second, and more important, is that I have no talent. Took me years to get these two shots and basically it was just blind luck that I had the sunlight hitting this 🐦 in the right way.
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  🟢 The pic is in focus, so I can understand the promotion, but definitely not my favorite. The sky is an ugly shade of blue. One of those pics where, the more I look, the less I like.
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  🟢 User:D-Kuru was kind enough to recommend promotion. S/he is correct, though, stating: "Partially covered, but still a good shot (and the focus is on the eye anyway)" I figured this was a borderline nomination. The focus is good, but I wish the 🐦 had crept out a little more and had turned its head toward me.
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  🟢 Was concerned that it would get rejected as "overprocessed" but the 🐦 was really close to the 📷 and remained still for extended periods, so the details came out remarkably 'crisp.' Other than de-noising (DxO soft setting), I didn't do anything.
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  🟢 I have no idea what makes a good skyline photo, but I think this will get promoted. Taken during a slightly more optimistic less pessimistic time.
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  🟢 You can't see the 🐦 feeder because I cropped it out of the photo.
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  🟢 Background is _almost_ nice.
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  🟢 Strangely, I had uploaded two other photos of the same 🐦 months ago, but I came across this one recently and this one strikes me as better than the other two.
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  🟢 I know, I know, it's a boring 🐦 in a banal location, but I like the half-blink and the detail on the 🪶s & 👀. Otherwise, guilty-as-charged.
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  🟢 I like the shot, but there's a good chance of rejection simply because I didn't nail focus on the 👀.
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  🟢 The evil lady brown headed 🐄🐦.
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  🟢 I had to kneel in the mud for this baby.
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  🟢 I'm having good luck with Swiss Basics Moisturizing Formula. Also having good luck with Tree Swallows posing close to me.
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  🟢 ditto.
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  🟢 🐦 has the head "fade"
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  🟢 pretty 🐦
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  🟢 Almost looks fake. But Nice shadows & color.
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  🟢 This dude stuck around for much longer than I expected.
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  🟢 Headless Heron. More of an interesting shot than it is high quality.
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  🟢 Heron Close-up.
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  🟢 I see a lot of herons and not much else. But the color and shadow are nice on this one.
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  🟢 Background worked well here.
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  🟢 Photographed this in the back yard shortly after heavy rains.
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  🟢 Never quite sure if these types of shots are "Q" enough to make QI.
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  🟢 In my opinion, this should be QI, but it may get rejected because of the darkness. However, it has a lot of detail and the shadows accentuate that detail (again, my opinion). Update: Looks like it's headed for a "soft rejection," which is understandable. Update 2: Lots of weirdness. Looks like a sockpuppet account tried to promote this image in an effort to muddy the waters over its promotion of other QI candidates. But that effort was shot down fast. I'm not sure what the potential gain is by this behavior. But amateurs cheat at on-line chess, too--human motivations are weird. Update 3: This pic is getting absolutely wrecked with faint praise. But it will probably get promoted. As my grandmother used to say ... "whaddayagonnado?" ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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  🟢 Seemed like an "easy" QI, but I've been surprised before.
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  🟢 The quality here is borderline, imo, but I thought I'd give it a shot.
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  🔴 User:Plozessor noticed a halo around parts of the subject's head. Then I realized I clipped the turtle's front left foot. I'm an idiot for nominating this.
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  🟢 Initially thought this should be an easy promotion, but it might be too dark, which should be fixable.
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  🟢. Not sure on this one. Well composed, but detail/focus is borderline.
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  🟢 Background isn't great here, but the detail on the 🐦 & its prey are 👍.
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  🟢 Yes, it's a feeder shot, but still looks nice
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  🟢 I like the (derpy) look on the mockingbird's face. Also, the cemetery stone has an interesting "glow" to its underside.
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  🟢 Kindly nominated by User:Augustgeyler
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  🟢 Kindly nominated by User:Augustgeyler. This is definitely "QI" (in my opinion), but I never nominated it because it's not as vibrant (i.e. bright yellow) as some of my other cedar waxwing shots.
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  🟢 Kindly nominated by User:Augustgeyler. Someone has commented that there's a halo around the 🐦's head. I went back and looked at the raw file. The only thing I did was boost the shadows. Update: @Augustgeyler: pointed out that shadow boosting could cause the halo. I didn't think that was possible, but he's correct. I ran a little experiment using color read-outs near the bird and away from the bird and my shadow boost raised the brightness of the pixels near the bird more than those away from the bird (hence the halo). I guess I learned a little bit about how sensitive the shadow transform is because the pixels near the bird are *barely* darker than those away from the bird. Anyway, the revised version is, at the very least, less "halo-ey".
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  🟢 Kindly nominated by User:Augustgeyler. I forgot about this pic, but I think the duck came out looking pretty good here.
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  🟢 Trying to get the whole set from this series under QI