11 January 2007
Parks Canada Website - A Citizen's View (6)
In the Parks Canada National Photo Gallery webpage, I did a search on "monument" in the "Keyword" space, leaving the other three search spaces blank.
It returned a page showing thumbnails of photographs of monuments in Canada, with this note: "For a larger view...click on photo".
To see what the "larger view" looks like, I clicked on a thumbnail, "Rogers Pass Monument commemorating opening of Trans-Canada Highway, 1977".
The thumbnail is 150 pixels wide. The "larger view" option brings up a photo only 300 pixels wide. Just twice the size! This is so 1990s.
Like most people using the Internet these days, my screen is 1024 pixels wide. The "larger view" should be much larger than 300 pixels wide – that is if Parks Canada wants to show off its photo collection to advantage, making best use of the characteristics of the Internet as it exists today.
The "larger view" should be at least 700 pixels wide, and 900 would be better.
Parks Canada should take a close look at Wikipedia's excellent way of providing larger views of small thumbnail photos embedded in its articles. For example, see Wikipedia's Field Hill. This article includes a photograph (350×236 pixels) of the "View from the cab of a Canadian Pacific Railway locomotive at the 'Cathedral' signpost as it ascends the Big Hill." Immediately below this image, to the right of the caption, there is a standard graphic indicating that a larger image is available. Clicking on this graphic brings up a larger view (800×540px) of the same photograph. Immediately below this image, we see a link "Download high-resolution version...". Clicking on this link brings up an excellent full-screen view 1024×691px). All this is done using a single full-size image stored on the Wikipedia server, with the reduced sizes generated on demand, immediately before downloading.
Another example can be seen in Wikipedia's Cape Breton and Central Nova Scotia Railway. This article includes a photograph (300×127 pixels) "CB&CNSR freight train northbound on the Abercrombie spur." Immediately below this image, to the right of the caption, there is a standard graphic indicating that a larger image is available. Clicking on this graphic brings up a larger view (800×338px) of the same photograph. Immediately below this image, we see a link "Download high-resolution version...". Clicking on this link brings up an excellent full-screen view 1207×510px). Again, all this is done using a single full-size image stored on the Wikipedia server, with the reduced sizes generated on demand before downloading.
A third example can be seen in Wikipedia's List of national historic sites of Canada. This article includes a photograph (180×114 pixels) of the "Hartland Covered Bridge National Historic Site." Immediately below this image, to the right of the caption, there is a standard graphic indicating that a larger image is available. Clicking on this graphic brings up a larger view (800×508px) of the same photograph. Immediately below this image, we see a link "Download high-resolution version...". Clicking on this link brings up an excellent full-screen view 2048×1300px). Again, all this is done using a single full-size image stored on the Wikipedia server, with the reduced sizes generated on demand.
A fourth example (many hundreds are available) can be seen in Wikipedia's Athabasca Oil Sands. This article includes a photograph (300×127 pixels) of the "Minesite at Syncrude's Mildred Lake plant." Immediately below this image, to the right of the caption, there is a standard graphic indicating that a larger image is available. Clicking on this graphic brings up a larger view (800×600px) of the same photograph. Immediately below this image, we see a link "Download high-resolution version...". Clicking on this link brings up an excellent full-screen view 1024×768px). Again, all this is done using a single full-size image stored on the Wikipedia server, with the reduced sizes generated on demand.
(Later): A friend commented by e-mail: "That's all very well, but those large full-screen images have very large file sizes, and take too long to download" (he has a 56k dial-up connection).
My reply: Some of the full-screen images do have large file sizes, but if good photographic software is used to compress them properly, they can be kept within acceptable file sizes while maintaining high-quality on-screen images. For example, Parks Canada's larger view (above) of the Rogers Pass photo, a tiny 300×200px, occupies 74 kilobytes, compared to only 108 kilobytes for the full-size 1207×510px CB&CNSR photo (above). The full-size Mildred Lake photo (above) 1024×768px occupies only 135 kilobytes.
Addendum: January 17, 2007 16:35 UTC
Here's an example of a high-quality online rendition of an historic document, a superb archived copy 2417×3000px of an old map of Hillcrest Mines, Alberta.
It returned a page showing thumbnails of photographs of monuments in Canada, with this note: "For a larger view...click on photo".
To see what the "larger view" looks like, I clicked on a thumbnail, "Rogers Pass Monument commemorating opening of Trans-Canada Highway, 1977".
The thumbnail is 150 pixels wide. The "larger view" option brings up a photo only 300 pixels wide. Just twice the size! This is so 1990s.
Like most people using the Internet these days, my screen is 1024 pixels wide. The "larger view" should be much larger than 300 pixels wide – that is if Parks Canada wants to show off its photo collection to advantage, making best use of the characteristics of the Internet as it exists today.
The "larger view" should be at least 700 pixels wide, and 900 would be better.
Parks Canada should take a close look at Wikipedia's excellent way of providing larger views of small thumbnail photos embedded in its articles. For example, see Wikipedia's Field Hill. This article includes a photograph (350×236 pixels) of the "View from the cab of a Canadian Pacific Railway locomotive at the 'Cathedral' signpost as it ascends the Big Hill." Immediately below this image, to the right of the caption, there is a standard graphic indicating that a larger image is available. Clicking on this graphic brings up a larger view (800×540px) of the same photograph. Immediately below this image, we see a link "Download high-resolution version...". Clicking on this link brings up an excellent full-screen view 1024×691px). All this is done using a single full-size image stored on the Wikipedia server, with the reduced sizes generated on demand, immediately before downloading.
Another example can be seen in Wikipedia's Cape Breton and Central Nova Scotia Railway. This article includes a photograph (300×127 pixels) "CB&CNSR freight train northbound on the Abercrombie spur." Immediately below this image, to the right of the caption, there is a standard graphic indicating that a larger image is available. Clicking on this graphic brings up a larger view (800×338px) of the same photograph. Immediately below this image, we see a link "Download high-resolution version...". Clicking on this link brings up an excellent full-screen view 1207×510px). Again, all this is done using a single full-size image stored on the Wikipedia server, with the reduced sizes generated on demand before downloading.
A third example can be seen in Wikipedia's List of national historic sites of Canada. This article includes a photograph (180×114 pixels) of the "Hartland Covered Bridge National Historic Site." Immediately below this image, to the right of the caption, there is a standard graphic indicating that a larger image is available. Clicking on this graphic brings up a larger view (800×508px) of the same photograph. Immediately below this image, we see a link "Download high-resolution version...". Clicking on this link brings up an excellent full-screen view 2048×1300px). Again, all this is done using a single full-size image stored on the Wikipedia server, with the reduced sizes generated on demand.
A fourth example (many hundreds are available) can be seen in Wikipedia's Athabasca Oil Sands. This article includes a photograph (300×127 pixels) of the "Minesite at Syncrude's Mildred Lake plant." Immediately below this image, to the right of the caption, there is a standard graphic indicating that a larger image is available. Clicking on this graphic brings up a larger view (800×600px) of the same photograph. Immediately below this image, we see a link "Download high-resolution version...". Clicking on this link brings up an excellent full-screen view 1024×768px). Again, all this is done using a single full-size image stored on the Wikipedia server, with the reduced sizes generated on demand.
(Later): A friend commented by e-mail: "That's all very well, but those large full-screen images have very large file sizes, and take too long to download" (he has a 56k dial-up connection).
My reply: Some of the full-screen images do have large file sizes, but if good photographic software is used to compress them properly, they can be kept within acceptable file sizes while maintaining high-quality on-screen images. For example, Parks Canada's larger view (above) of the Rogers Pass photo, a tiny 300×200px, occupies 74 kilobytes, compared to only 108 kilobytes for the full-size 1207×510px CB&CNSR photo (above). The full-size Mildred Lake photo (above) 1024×768px occupies only 135 kilobytes.
Addendum: January 17, 2007 16:35 UTC
Here's an example of a high-quality online rendition of an historic document, a superb archived copy 2417×3000px of an old map of Hillcrest Mines, Alberta.
# posted by Ambrose Bierce @ 1/11/2007 12:15:00 p.m. UTC 
