Alamy QC - does this look soft to you?

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joescrivens

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Sent a few pics to alamy, haven't done any for ages and they were rejected, fair enough I thought must have been due to a little noise as I did think the shots had some noise in them, went to look why and was surprised that the reason for it was "soft or lacking definition"

I didn't think it looked particularly soft, so maybe I need to redefine my definition of soft and sharp, does it look soft to you?

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I can't see your photos, but I've been surprised by the things i've had rejected for this by Alamy. Normally though their forums are really good for answering this sort of question and one of their QC time will give a fuller explanation
 
Pixel peeping me thinks...if I enlarge that image to 200% of course it looks soft as its a small low resolution image, but I can see no real issue bar on my screen it having slightly lower contrast than I would normally use myself.
Perhaps he/she doesn't like green or took exception to that one grass seed head just to our right of the squizzer.. it seems to stand out a bit against the background.
 
Joe,

I know this is a daft question, but this is the image you failed on, not one of the set that failed because one picture was SOLD.

Hugh
 
boyfalldown said:
Joe,

I know this is a daft question, but this is the image you failed on, not one of the set that failed because one picture was SOLD.

Hugh
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nope they failed me on this one, then of course the rest of the batch didn't make it either.
 
Forbiddenbiker said:
Maybe they've noticed the focal point is a tad forward, kinda looks that way ...that eye does look soft though Im thinking, even for that crop ...not very much in it though. :shrug:
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well it was shot at f/4 200mm subject distance of 4.47m away which gives a depth of field of 7 cm. The little blighters head isn't even that long so even if i focused on the nose the eye will still be in focus.
 
Haven't submitted anything for years but I remember that they didn't seem to get shallow DOF shots
 
joescrivens said:
well it was shot at f/4 200mm subject distance of 4.47m away which gives a depth of field of 7 cm. The little blighters head isn't even that long so even if i focused on the nose the eye will still be in focus.
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Well in focus as certain sizes yes sure ... but 7cm of DoF is about 4cm behind the nose, and how sharp is that gonna look viewed full size? …ears just going out that kinda thing.

I'm wondering if its just down to the narrow DoF, good shot nonetheless so it seems a bit anal... but if they want stock printed at any size I can kinda understand.
 
Ok, second batch just got rejected too, same reason on this pic. It must be the shallow DOF because I fail to see how this is soft, if anything it's sharpened too much and I know they say don't do that so I'd think that would be a fair reason to eject, but soft?

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That second one looks over sharpened for them. I know its not helpful of them, but the do sometimes put the wrong rejection reason on an image
 
boyfalldown said:
That second one looks over sharpened for them. I know its not helpful of them, but the do sometimes put the wrong rejection reason on an image
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i'd have accepted that reason, seems strange to do it twice though

Ok third batch is in there now and has this image in, surely this is neither soft nor over sharpened

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They get squillions of images and have to keep the standard high. A lot of the time they're just saying we've got loads like this already, or that's a boring pic, or by God that person is ugly.

But they don't want to say that because people don't want to hear it and it's quite subjective anyway. Much easier to reject on technical grounds, whether it's true or not. They don't really care.
 
HoppyUK said:
They get squillions of images and have to keep the standard high. A lot of the time they're just saying we've got loads like this already, or that's a boring pic, or by God that person is ugly.

But they don't want to say that because people don't want to hear it and it's quite subjective anyway. Much easier to reject on technical grounds, whether it's true or not. They don't really care.
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Alamy's policy is they don't reject on content grounds. Look how many sunsets there are on there. I've also got some right old crap in my library with them. They are very strict on technical grounds though
 
HoppyUK said:
They get squillions of images and have to keep the standard high. A lot of the time they're just saying we've got loads like this already, or that's a boring pic, or by God that person is ugly.

But they don't want to say that because people don't want to hear it and it's quite subjective anyway. Much easier to reject on technical grounds, whether it's true or not. They don't really care.
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also I looked specifically for the squirell shot with space to the right for text etc, there are only a few.
 
jerry12953 said:
The foreground and background of your first image is "soft and lacking definition". They probably didn't notice that the subject was perfectly sharp. It's happened to me too.

:cuckoo:
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^ I'd go with this but might suggest that 'they' are not actually they but 'it' as in a computer program designed to read images and accept or reject based on a set of predetermined standards such as sharpness (possibly taken as a percentage of the entire image?), tonal range etc.
I can't imagine that someone or even a team of someones sits at a computer all day and looks at the images coming in, I'm sure they'll have it automated to a degree.
 
andephotographic said:
^ I'd go with this but might suggest that 'they' are not actually they but 'it' as in a computer program designed to read images and accept or reject based on a set of predetermined standards such as sharpness (possibly taken as a percentage of the entire image?), tonal range etc.
I can't imagine that someone or even a team of someones sits at a computer all day and looks at the images coming in, I'm sure they'll have it automated to a degree.
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That's exactly what I was told, but not from the horses mouth.
 
I do find them a little soft, not much with the little girl but certainly with the bushy tailed rat.


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Well, it seems that I'm going against the grain here but none of these look right to me. The fur around the squirrel's eye for instance looks metallic and almost like an artist's impression. The other crop from the grass makes me think that it's over-sharpened (particularly when you look at the bokeh). It's a similar story for the rest of the photographs, they're not soft but I believe they do lack definition, if only because of the sharpening process.

They have extremely strict rules regarding sharpening so the rejections don't surprise me. Have you tried working from the originals with no or minimal sharpening? As a contributor myself I can feel your pain but I'm sure the less is more approach will pay dividends here.
 
I'm with Mr T. I certainly wouldn't have expected these to pass QC on 'lacking definition' grounds. Some pronounced artifacting and 'smearing' of detail for want of a better phrase. The second pic shows it quite severely - almost like a painting. As far as Alamy submissions go, technical quality at 100% is all that matters.
 
gman said:
I do find them a little soft, not much with the little girl but certainly with the bushy tailed rat.
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Have you submitted to alamy before, they ask for no sharpening at all, sharpening these anymore would have led to certain rejection anyway
 
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Mr_T said:
Well, it seems that I'm going against the grain here but none of these look right to me. The fur around the squirrel's eye for instance looks metallic and almost like an artist's impression. The other crop from the grass makes me think that it's over-sharpened (particularly when you look at the bokeh). It's a similar story for the rest of the photographs, they're not soft but I believe they do lack definition, if only because of the sharpening process.

They have extremely strict rules regarding sharpening so the rejections don't surprise me. Have you tried working from the originals with no or minimal sharpening? As a contributor myself I can feel your pain but I'm sure the less is more approach will pay dividends here.
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I think I wouldn't be surprised to have these rejected for other reasons like you suggest. Certainly over sharpening I can see.

It was the softness comment that just puzzled me. The last image is yet to be approved or rejected so we'll see if you are right in a few days or if they accept this one then I'll be very confused.
 
joescrivens said:
Have you submitted to alamy before, they ask for no sharpening at all, sharpening these anymore would have led to certain rejection anyway
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"does it look soft to you?"

That was your question which I answered and took time to demonstrate.

I don't submit to Alamy but looking at their terms it says they reject images for excessive sharpening.

http://www.alamy.com/contributor/help/prepare-images.asp#QC

I wouldn't say I've used excessive sharpening but then I was working from low-res images. The 100% crops do show a lot of sharpening, the kind I see when I sharpen in LR3 rather than Photoshop, which I prefer to sharpen in.

Would you have an unsharpened version of the shot?
 
Dudie said:
I'm with Mr T. I certainly wouldn't have expected these to pass QC on 'lacking definition' grounds. Some pronounced artifacting and 'smearing' of detail for want of a better phrase. The second pic shows it quite severely - almost like a painting. As far as Alamy submissions go, technical quality at 100% is all that matters.
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Joe, I am sorry but I have to agree 100% with this comment. The 3 examples do look lacking definition either due to focus or processing issues.

I have successfully submitted a number of similar photos from 30D and 40D, uspsized to 16MP, not a single one failed QC so far.
I am yet to try uploading from 1DsII (edit: I have just uploaded 2 at 48MB to 'try it out'), and 50D (will try as next batch).

When they say no sharpening, it means none (or very little ~0-20% in LR). If the shot isn't very sharp at 10MP size and 25% 1px radius sharpening (default) then I wouldn't bother with it any further.

Noise seems to be an important factor here. Heavy noise reduction introduces artifacts, that are likely seen in your pictures. It should look fairly clean to start with, and only use very low level of luminence smoothing (~10%) if absolutely necessary. Slightly grainy images have more chance than the ones with excessive NR.

Are your files from 5DII or 7D or something else; what lenses? Are they heavy crops, enlarged back to 16mp? 5D in particular should nail them down perfectly. When they are sharp, they are razor sharp even at 100%.
 
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I can't really add much that hasn't already been said but to me they do look soft.
 
gman said:
"does it look soft to you?"

That was your question which I answered and took time to demonstrate.

I don't submit to Alamy but looking at their terms it says they reject images for excessive sharpening.

http://www.alamy.com/contributor/help/prepare-images.asp#QC

I wouldn't say I've used excessive sharpening but then I was working from low-res images. The 100% crops do show a lot of sharpening, the kind I see when I sharpen in LR3 rather than Photoshop, which I prefer to sharpen in.

Would you have an unsharpened version of the shot?
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Actually that link you posted has a great example of what I think is wrong with the shots, it's the artifacts as previous people have mentioned. Click on the excessive sharpening link and you'll see what I mean. The monkey images look like this when zoomed in with these artifacts suggesting over sharpening and not under-sharpening.

thanks for your opinion though, it's taken on board :thumbs:
 
daugirdas said:
Joe, I am sorry but I have to agree 100% with this comment. The 3 examples do look lacking definition either due to focus or processing issues.
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No need to be sorry, as stated above I agree with it too :thumbs:

daugirdas said:
When they say no sharpening, it means none (or very little ~0-20% in LR). If the shot isn't very sharp at 10MP size and 25% 1px radius sharpening (default) then I wouldn't bother with it any further.

Noise seems to be an important factor here. Heavy noise reduction introduces artifacts, that are likely seen in your pictures. It should look fairly clean to start with, and only use very low level of luminence smoothing (~10%) if absolutely necessary. Slightly grainy images have more chance than the ones with excessive NR.
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thanks for these tips, will keep them in mind next time I go to process something for submission

daugirdas said:
Are your files from 5DII or 7D or something else; what lenses? Are they heavy crops, enlarged back to 16mp? 5D in particular should nail them down perfectly. When they are sharp, they are razor sharp even at 100%.
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The monkey shots are from the 7d with the 70-200 f/4 L and very little cropping. The girl is from my 5dMkII with the 24-70 with slight cropping. None are enlarged.

Now to confuse things further though the little girl shot has passed QC so that would appear sharp enough to them, but to further confuse the issue and really baffles me they have also passed QC on this shot which to me looks exactly like the other monkey shots to me. What's different about this one to the others?

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andephotographic said:
^ I'd go with this but might suggest that 'they' are not actually they but 'it' as in a computer program designed to read images and accept or reject based on a set of predetermined standards such as sharpness (possibly taken as a percentage of the entire image?), tonal range etc.
I can't imagine that someone or even a team of someones sits at a computer all day and looks at the images coming in, I'm sure they'll have it automated to a degree.
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You could be right about the computer program. It is said that they are very strict on first submissions, but once you get accepted, ie your first batch are all "sharp and well-defined" you can submit images which do have soft foregrounds and backgrounds and "get away with it" :suspect:

Personally I was discouraged as soon as I received my first rejection. If it is a computer program that makes these decisions, or even one of a team of boxwallahs, it makes their whole setup seem inappropriate.

I'd be interested to know more about the way alamy works, actually, if anyone here knows!
 
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daugirdas said:
When they say no sharpening, it means none (or very little ~0-20% in LR). If the shot isn't very sharp at 10MP size and 25% 1px radius sharpening (default) then I wouldn't bother with it any further.
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I always sharpen prior to submission, any failings I've had in QC have never been due to excessive sharpening in their info :thinking:
 
joescrivens said:
Now to confuse things further though the little girl shot has passed QC so that would appear sharp enough to them, but to further confuse the issue and really baffles me they have also passed QC on this shot which to me looks exactly like the other monkey shots to me. What's different about this one to the others?

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These 2 may look similar at first sight, however the accepted one has much finer hair detail when you look closely. It looks less 'pixelated'. I remember I have sent them something with similar level of details before.

Also note, they only randomly check some of the photos, not all of them.

I am still puzzled why 70-200mm isn't resolving on 7D. It still look good enough on 50D when it is well focused. Could it also be focus error or very slight camera shake?
 
jerry12953 said:
You could be right about the computer program. It is said that they are very strict on first submissions, but once you get accepted, ie your first batch are all "sharp and well-defined" you can submit images which do have soft foregrounds and backgrounds and "get away with it" :suspect:

Personally I was discouraged as soon as I received my first rejection. If it is a computer program that makes these decisions, or even one of a team of boxwallahs, it makes their whole setup seem inappropriate.

I'd be interested to know more about the way alamy works, actually, if anyone here knows!
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Somewhat I doubt it. It would require a very sophisticated program to do so, and then it wouldn't take weeks to process the first batch. They only randomly check a couple photos of the successive uploads, hence things can go through more easily.
 
daugirdas said:
These 2 may look similar at first sight, however the accepted one has much finer hair detail when you look closely. It looks less 'pixelated'. I remember I have sent them something with similar level of details before.

Also note, they only randomly check some of the photos, not all of them.

I am still puzzled why 70-200mm isn't resolving on 7D. It still look good enough on 50D when it is well focused. Could it also be focus error or very slight camera shake?
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I guess I don't agree that it's not resolving so hard to answer that question :shrug:. I find the sharpness from the 70-200 on my old 7d to be spot on, and the same with my 5d :thumbs:

another example with 7d and 70-200

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A few are shot at ISO500, I'm not sure but would that have any effect on the image when being sharpened?
 
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