Forum:Images and animations

Forums: Yew Grove > Images and animations

This page or section is an archive. Please do not edit the contents of this page. This thread was archived on 29 November 2008 by Azaz129.

One thing has been bothering me recently. I've noticed that images and animations of a single player are appearing all over the wiki at astronomical pace. It deja vu all over again, as this issue was debated in July. See the link below for the thread.

• Forum:Animated Images and the characters in them

Some of the things that clearly bothers me:

• Replacing perfectly good HD images - with the same animated version of the player
• Overemphasis of the player in the image - especially since all the images have the same costume. (This is the reason of my deja vu.)
• Animations are used where images would be perfectly fine - Used for item articles (i.e. players wearing a certain armour/costume.)
• Creating new images, instead of uploading newer versions of the images. - This creates a lot of "orphaned images".
• Using a lot of animations clearly slows down the load time. This is because animations are generally larger in terms of size, compared to its still images. Quest articles are bogged down when there is a lot of animations.

This is what I think should be the case:

• Replacing old images (i.e. pre-HD) with HD images (not animations).
• Uploading the image into the same filename (i.e upload a newer version of the image), instead of creating a new one and changing the link within the article.
• Use of animations only where it is required. (i.e. where action is involved, not when the player is displaying the Worn Equipment, Equipment stats, etc.)
• For example, animations may be permitted for:
  • Fight sequences.
  • For use in templates.
  • Sequence of actions that explains something, and is important (i.e. casting a Magic spell, a Spinner exploding.)
• Bad examples:
  • Non-player characters (i.e. Ticket vendor bouncing, Ringmaster bowing, etc.)
  • A player just standing at a location (i.e. in quest-related locations).
  • A player doing nothing important (i.e. juggling).
  • A player "rotating" in the Worn Equipment interface.

I'm assuming good faith here, but if this trend that I'm seeing is not stopped, I won't be amazed if all images within this wiki is replaced with animations of this person. I have nothing against this person, but I like variety and seeing this person in the same costume all over this wiki is definitely not variation, it is repetition. There are positive contributions, but clearly the negative outweighs the positive.   az ^talk   07:36, 11 September 2008 (UTC)

This depends on which person you are talking about. If it the one in the Fire Cape, then we're replacing her. All of those images are pre-HD. If you're talking about one in the Bomber Gear, he's doing all the replacing. While I agree with your point I think you're being a little harsh. I'm all for banning the "rotating" images, and you don't need a .gif for a location spot (unless it's skill-related or a minigame). But NPCs should have animations, so long as they are doing something besides standing around. bufar_(talk) 22:26, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

The one in the bowman hat is Tarikochi and the one in the bomber outfit is TEbuddy. I like what you're saying that we don't need certain gifs. like a monster just standing in a treasure room, but I don't think there needs to be a wide diversity in the characters in a gif. I think whoever wants to upload a gif. they can, and I don't care if it is the same 4 guys doing all the gifs. There is nothing wrong with repetition. -- Spencer ^{(Talk | Edits | Contribs)} 04:00, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

Many of our contributors only have dial up internet, and/or older computers. If the pic does not require animation we need to leave it out. Being thoughtful of others is not a crime. And variety adds more color and life to the wiki. Since we could never get a consensus on this, just go ahead and change any pic you don't like. What the hell, its what hes doing anyhow.--Degenret01 05:53, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

People getting all up in arms about stupid stuff like this is what made me contribute less to this wiki. A gif image gives more detail than a still image ever can, and the nature of Runescape's graphics allow them to be easily made. Not only that, but whats with all the hate? If you even cared to glance at my user page, you will see a list of every image I have uploaded or replaced. Very few of these images are bad quality, or pointless. I find it pretty disturbing that I am being personally insulted because of a certain users opinion. Dialup users do not make up a majority of this wiki's internet traffic. Making pages more friendly to them is something we should do just as a courtesy, it should not be our priority. Even some of the more complex gifs usually don't use more than 500kb of storage space. On a residential dsl connection which the majority of internet users have, an image of that size would load instantly. There are an excess amount of gif animations, and I agree that having pointless ones like a monster standing in a treasure room are a waste of time and storage space. I'm not a mindless gif replacing zombie whose goal is to spread the revolutionary bomber uniform to everyones monitors. Capturing these images can be very difficult and time consuming, its not something as simple as taking a normal screenshot, and because of that I don't waste my time.

My biggest problem with this is that users are complaining about a useful resource that they themselves are not willing to replace, yet they feel it necessary to place limitations and guidelines on it that drive away new users interested in it, and make it harder for the people who already make the images to get them placed on the wiki. TEbuddy 05:10, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps a good example of somewhere to replace some of Tarikochi's images would be on the Skill cape emote page. They are all in low detail mode and none of them even show the hood. I suggest recreating all the skillcape emote to a certain width specification (perhaps keeping the 200px width as they are now) in HD with anti alising and wearing relevant clothing. For example, the fishing emote would look good wearing blue or perhaps wearing pirate clothing. The woodcutting would look good with the user wearing lumberjack clothing (see below for an example I made).

http://img353.imageshack.us/img353/420/woodcutskillcape2er8.gif

By having unique looks for each skillcape it would give the page a bit more of a fresh look rather than looking so repetetive. I have the following level 99's, str, att, fish, cook, fletch, woodcutting. If noone objects i might start updating the skillcape animations of the ones I have this week. -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 14:15, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Take a look at the Skillcape (emote) page now I added a few as an example. Will make a fletching and strength animation if people approve. Otherwise revert back to the old animations. -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 18:00, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Nice, I like it. I support the idea of having unique looks for images. The look must suit the subject of the image (i.e. relevant clothing). However, the animations are quite slow to load.. is that the smallest size you can manage with animations? I'm not familiar with animations, educate me.   az ^talk   18:13, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

The animations I did are smaller in file size than the old ones. The other ones were fast to load because they were cached probably. When you go to the page now they will load nice and fast. -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 18:24, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

I haven't read this whole thing, so go ahead and kill me if I bring up something someone already brought up, but it seems to me that one of the things you're suggesting is that users should only upload images and animations in HD? Ilyas Talk Contribs 20:20, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Its got nothing to do with the quality or size of the animations, just the sheer number of them. It will happen the same with too many images on one page. We do need new animations, but perhaps with that change we should do as other gaming wikis have done and use a text link to link to the animation, or a single still frame that links to the full animation. I'm on a residential dsl connection and it takes upwards of 20 seconds to load every animation fully on the page. TEbuddy 21:43, 16 September 2008 (UTC)

Ilyas, no. I never stated users should ONLY upload images and animations in HD. I stated that animations be used only where it is required. (Every single image doesn't have to be an animation.) Another thing I mentioned is: HD images should NOT be replaced with another HD image, or with an animation, unnecessarily. Basically, that's the summary of this discussion.   az ^talk   06:02, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I think I agree with you about the rotating inventory image. I uploaded the one for the Lumberjack clothing because it replaced one that was already there but there isnt really a need for it to be animated and would probably be better as a static image as more colour detail is preserved. Perhaps in the future we should refrain from creating these kinds of images where a user is just holding one item.

I do feel though that all NEW images should be created in HD to reflect RuneScape as Jagex like to show to others. If possible the images should be taken with anti-aliasing ON.

As for the skillcape emote page, that will always be slow to load initially but such is the nature of the page, it's meant to showcase all the animations for the emotes. People should expect to wait a little longer for the page to load. I agree with Tebubdy about dialup users being in the minority, all the research suggests that dialup users make up a very small proportion of users on the internet these days. Quest guides however should be relatively free of animations unless neccesary so preserve fast loading times for all users.

HD animations should only be replaced by other HD animations if the new image is more optimised or has anti aliasing etc. People should not be replacing HD images just so they can show their own character in the image. I think this is common sense, but it is happening and should be clarified.

Where possible the animations should show the character in relevant attire and not have the same look in all animation. I have tried to create a nice unique look in each of the skillcape animations I have made to steer away from the samey look that Taro did that can easily get boring.-- Mercifull ^(Talk) 09:02, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

To elaborate something i just thought of. Perhaps an animated image might look good for a full set of something such as Lumberjack clothing or Granite equipment or Bandos armour (bad example as there should not be two seperate images with/without boots) but static images should be kept for individual items like is shown on Granite body. Places innapropriate for animated images probably are Bandos boots and Magic secateurs which shows off the persons character more than the item itself. Perhaps single item images should be kept static and only full sets or outfits should be animated? -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 12:13, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

A little dissapointed at the lack of response from people... -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 07:48, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Lol, you're right. I'm kinda new in this wiki, so I hope I'm not offending anyone, but I've noticed that people here do not seem interested in these type of things. As quoted by Degenret (see above), "just go ahead and change any pic you don't like."   az ^talk   16:01, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

I have to confess that I get tired of seeing the same character repeatedly throughout the wiki. Variety, as they say, is the spice of life. Additionally I have to agree that way too many images are needless animations that add virtually nothing to the image at hand. Anyone who has ever played has seen a character just standing there.

Would a change of costume be too much to ask? Really now?

These images are an utterly worthless waste of bandwidth in my opinion and I'm referring more to mine and other wiki visitors and not just of Wikia.

1. REDIRECT user:kytti khat/sig 17:05, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

"I do feel though that all NEW images should be created in HD to reflect RuneScape as Jagex like to show to others. If possible the images should be taken with anti-aliasing ON." - Only the very newest computers can run HD, and RuneScape is aimed at people with low end computers, so it would be wrong to make it so new images may only be uploaded in HD. Ilyas Talk Contribs 17:50, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

I agree with HD, however, have you tried putting transparency on an anti-aliased image? If you're proposing that we forgo transparency, then by all means, yes antialiasing should be part of the image, additionally it could look good with animated images (if the image format supported more than 255 colours at least in concerns to those many coloured images).

Note however that your proposal to cease using transparency should be put into a new topic.

1. REDIRECT user:kytti khat/sig 08:05, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

I'd forgotten about transparency tbh. Perhaps anti aliasing only for animations and images which do not require transparency. I disagree with needing a top computer to have AA tho because mine is over a year old and isn't that great and runs anti aliasing with no problems at all. -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 16:28, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

A year old computer is a very new computer, and I said that you need a top computer to play HD, not to use AA. Ilyas Talk Contribs 19:18, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

I would still disagree. An optimised computer will run HD even if its many years old. My work laptop which is at least 4 years old plays hd (without aa) no problems. -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 22:18, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

My point is RS is aimed at people with low end computers (and btw, I have a four year old computer and it can't run HD, so it has nothing to do with how old the computer is, it's just that only very new computers, with a few exceptions, can handle HD) and it would be wrong to just cut out the image uploading rights of probably one third or even one half of the wiki. Ilyas Talk Contribs 22:46, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

It would? If one user can upload images that are of higher quality than another, then we obviously use the higher quality image. There is no need to maintain support for new non-HD images when we have many users who could take HD ones. That said, we don't need to enforce a "delete on sight" policy for new low-detail images, either—it's better to have a low-detail image than none at all. Skill 23:21, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

Going back to the original topic, I do think animations have been somewhat overused as of late. There are some cases in which the extra bandwidth and loading time required for an animation is excessive compared to the additional information conveyed by it, and these animations should probably be replaced by still images. However, in just as many instances the animation shows the user a significantly greater perspective than a still image would, and these animations should be embraced. For this reason, it is generally a bad idea to place sweeping restrictions on animation content.

In the past, it has been suggested by some users that the lack of variety in animation characters is actually a positive rather than something to be avoided. This is almost certainly incorrect in my view. If the animations happen to depict a small number of distinct characters by coincidence and they are the highest quality available, there is no need to make arbitrary restrictions in the name of variety. On the other hand, the idea that we should deliberately attempt to make all animations similar for reasons of "consistency" is flawed. I would much rather see variety in the characters shown than the same character over and over, and it's likely that many other users share this aspect of my opinion. My two cents. Skill 23:21, 21 September 2008 (UTC)

A non-HD image is surely better than no image at all but people should not worry about overwriting someone elses image and getting shouted at if they are replacing with a higher quality picture. -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 08:38, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Don't kill me if I say something stupid here, as I didn't really read everything above.

I am one of the users that appreciates Tarikochi's and TEbuddy's animations. But I am also a user who at least wishes they would mix it up a little on their outfit. Seeing Tari’s “leaf” (I KNOW it’s a bowman hat, ‘kay?) and her fire cape is getting extremely old…and fast. When Total was here under the name of Daedryon, he suggested a VERY ridiculous outfit for everyone to wear-3rd age melee armor. Not only is this re-presenting the problem at hand by forcing EVERYONE to get it, but it’s also crazy expensive armor; only the richest players would be able to buy the full set, with the dumbest actually using it in their animations, mainly because there’s really nothing specific (animation-wise) to 3rd age.

I saw a suggestion that claimed we should try to wear colors and outfits that “match” the animation, and if you HAVE the means to make it better, go for it. Red/orange/yellow clothing would work for the Firemaking capes emote, for example, and if you happen to have an Inferno Adze, then by all means if you think it’ll make the animation look better, try it. I don’t know what else to say, now…https://i.imgur.com/7kyt1iT.gif --WINE OF GOOD HEALTH _{(Actually Stinko)}

Noone is thanking poor old Mercifull for making the new HD skillcape emotes :( lol -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 21:14, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

Adressing the issue of non-HD images, I created a [[:Template:sd|template]] and a :Category:Low detail images|category that I believe well help speed the replacement of older images (just as the transparency and JPEG templates and categories have.) Aburnett001 ^{{Talk} {#}} 00:36, 26 September 2008 (UTC)

for a perfect example of useless replacement of images with animations- seethe Glitch page, under the "Invisibility Glitch" section, you will see that hapi removed a whole gallery of perfectly good images and replaced them with a single animation featuring (you guessed it) himself!!! This really ticks me off- there was absolutely no reason for this to be done, the images were in high detail, taken from good angles, and frankly, they showed the glitch better than the animation does. Even the Image/media policy says that "images should not be used in articles", but here it is, hapi replacing images for no reason other than to plaster his character's face on every page of the wiki!!! whew... Aburnett001 ^{{Talk} {#}} 20:53, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Does this make it *cough* ''illegal'' *cough* to upload low detail images? If it does you can expect me to break the wiki rules for the first time =P. Ilyas Talk Contribs 21:00, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

I just think people think that high detail looks better, i see no reason to "outlaw" standard detail, but i think that people should not be replacing perfectly good images with overkill animation for no reason at all like hapi has repeatedly done! Aburnett001 ^{{Talk} {#}} 21:09, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

I never said anything about replacing images with animations, I'm just addressing the extreme hatred towards standard detail images. Ilyas Talk Contribs 21:14, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

To me, i feel that their one in the same. people don't replace the standard detail images because they look bad, they replace them so that they have a shot at getting their characters picture on the wiki, and that's a problem, we need a way to remove that motivation so that if a picture aint broke, then there will be no need to fix it. Aburnett001 ^{{Talk} {#}} 21:18, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

That's true, but it's a good thing to replace standard with high, just not an image with an animations when not needed. That motivation is a good thing but it's driving people to the point where they put the same character with the same outfit in half of the wiki's images, even when doing something completely unrelated to the subject. Ilyas Talk Contribs 21:23, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Couldn't have said it better myself! Aburnett001 ^{{Talk} {#}} 21:26, 28 September 2008 (UTC)

Ahem... Don't tar us all with the same brush please. With the exception of my pink hair not a single image or animation that I have uploaded showed off my own character in costume. Also I dont think there is a hatred of standard detail images but they should be replaced by high detail images where possible. -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 13:48, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

I think they meant Hapi, but I might be wrong.   az ^talk   13:53, 29 September 2008 (UTC)

your right az, we here talking about hapi, and I don't really mind that he looks the same in every picture, its when he removes perfectly good pictures and replaces them with his animations that I have a problem. Aburnett001 ^{{Talk} {#}} 00:08, 30 September 2008 (UTC)

I will probably make a few more skillcape animations this week. I will try to make my character a little bigger too like the farming and skillcape animations and re-do the other ones I made -- Mercifull ^(Talk) 07:49, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

About animations displaying a player "rotating" in the Worn Equipment interface, my personal opinion is like Mercifull stated before, it is fine for a whole set of armor, but not for a single piece of equipment. And I think the rotating picture should only be displayed on the set page. Also, I don't think replacing a rotating animation with a static picture of bad gif quality (see Image:Ghostly_and_Shadow_Sword.gif history) is the solution to improve the wiki. A good way to reduce Equipment interface animation file size I think would be to speed up the animations up to 4x, and then adding delay between images (see Ringmaster_costume, the 78 KB file in history is 8x normal speed and a bit too fast). --^{http://i364.photobucket.com/albums/oo87/rsYunie/RsYunie30.png}Yunie^{TalkContribsSign}  05:52, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

Fixed the speed, file size increased.. Buzz ^{(Talk • # • √ • P )} 07:24, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

I was not really asking for a fix, but was suggesting a downsized prototype with less fluid animation, but still shows all around. Better than replacing animated gifs with low quality non-animated gifs if you ask me. ^{http://i364.photobucket.com/albums/oo87/rsYunie/RsYunie30.png}Yunie^{TalkContribsSign}  16:22, 13 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree that the same character being showed over and over again is just plain boring not to mention self-serving. And a big thank you goes to Mercifull for making images that does not just show off his character over and over and over again. Piscesvisionary 15:22, 18 October 2008 (UTC)

I totally agree with changing things up. Even better is when the attire matches what is being presented. For example look at the one and three feather chompy hat articles, same style of character picture for each article but with variety.

1. REDIRECT user:kytti khat/sig 00:39, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

Its kind of funny. The people who want the animations changed aren't the ones making them, so nothing is being changed. TEbuddy 06:57, 30 October 2008 (UTC)