The whole site is broken atm.  I'm sure they're working on it!

PJF: How many general users know how to or are willing to take the time to learn to hack the CSS to get the gallery to properly display images full-size?  I'm willing to bet not many.

Quote - To me, it seems that Renderosity has nothing to lose and everything to gain in getting rid of the gallery resize, or at least make it an option (with the improved resize code) for those who still use tiny screen resolutions.

Pride maybe? he he.  But think of how many happy artists (who are potential customers) they would gain...

Holy Crap, StaceyG, that'd be AWESOME! =D  (just so you don't think I'm negative all the time I do like a lot of the new stuff!)

Can we please get the "Uploaded on: Date XXX Time YYYY" information put back below the images?  I realize that this info is on the little pop-up, but it makes it much harder to figure out where one left off in browsing the galleries, since the "uploaded 3 days, 5 hours, 7 minutes ago" is constantly changing and provides for a very poor fencepost in gauging what is new since you've last browsed the site.  Having to hover over images for a pop-up is cumbersome.

Direct link to my gallery:

http://excalibur.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?browse&user_id=365403

Worked yesterday and this morning.  Right Now (2:12pm PST, appears to be 4:12pm server time, it's giving me "Cannot find server".

The galleries appear to be completely unaccessible at the moment.

Regarding ebots, what about the ones that notify you when someone has left a comment on your artwork?  Are they fixed too?

While it's not my preferred solution to the issue, I believe that this new actual re-sizing approach will be better than before.  I will reserve final judgement until I can see the quality of the resizing that is done, but I don't think it can be worse than it is now.

Thank you for listening to our concerns.

However, this begs for the question: why can't Renderosity borrow the approach taken at Renderotica where deciding whether or not to rescale the images to fit the browser is a choice each user may make?

I feel like this thread is getting a little hostile.  The admins are going to stop responding to it and dismiss our problems as those of trolls. :(

I was instructed to keep discussion to the same thread, so that nothing is missed.  In that  interest, bringing over from my other thread "RE: FAQ and info on the New Galleries":

Quote - StaceyG         Q.      Why are you resizing images?

 

       A.     There is no resizing algorithm in the gallery software. You are viewing the full-size image, we have instructed your browser to display it at a smaller width. If you are seeing jagged edges, you might investigate the resizing algorithm of your browser. Last night all the images we looked at in Safari, Firefox (Mac and WIndows), and Internet Explorer (Windows) looked absolutely fabulous.

It might also be a problem with your screen depth settings (16-bit, 32-bit, etc).

Just a suggestion. But we aren't resizing. Your browser is.

This is quite misguided.  First of all, telling users to somehow "replace" the resizing algorithm used by their browsers is just downright comical.  AFAIK, there isn't even a way to do this.  If there is, I'd like to see the method of doing so provided.  How many people would really go through that rigamarole and instead just remain unaware of it and look at the jaggy images thinking its the artist's fault?

Please take a look around thread. Some of us have posted screenshots of what we are seeing with the gallery's forced downsizing of images.

I am using WinXP SP2 using 32-bit color depth and a desktop resolution of 1280x1024, and I've checked in IE 6, 7, and Firefox on all with the browsers' "Automatic Image Resizing" turned OFF.  Your galleries are adding "width=700" to the tags in the galleries and it is causing browsers to shrink the images with horrible distortion and compression causing artifacts such as jagginess.  Telling people to switch browsers is not a solution (especially since I've tried several and all have the same issue).

Quoting from the general gallery feedback thread:

Quote - svdlI definitely DO NOT like the resizing of the images. Too much quality loss, and the fixed format does not take into account that higher resolution screens like 1280x1024, 1600x900 or even more are getting more common everyday. User options to select whether you want to see large images resized to a predefined screen size, or to view them as uploaded would be so much better. Take a look at how the Renderotica gallery software works if you want to know how it should be done.

That is an absolutely fantastic idea, svdl.  The way that Renderotica does it is pretty much perfect, IMO.  The option is in plain sight and visible so that people will see it, and it lets you know that the images you're looking at may have been shrunk (just as poorly over there as they are here I might add) to fit the screen.  This makes the option to turn it on or off available and informative.

Quote - svdl I definitely DO NOT like the resizing of the images. Too much quality loss, and the fixed format does not take into account that higher resolution screens like 1280x1024, 1600x900 or even more are getting more common everyday. User options to select whether you want to see large images resized to a predefined screen size, or to view them as uploaded would be so much better. Take a look at how the Renderotica gallery software works if you want to know how it should be done.

That is an absolutely fantastic idea, svdl.  The way that Renderotica does it is pretty much perfect, IMO.  The option is in plain sight and visible so that people will see it, and it lets you know that the images you're looking at may have been shrunk (just as poorly over there as they are here I might add) to fit the screen.  This makes the option to turn it on or off available and informative.

Bingo!  There it is right there.  SkoolDaze picked it out.  Look at willamsn's signature: "I <3 MY MAC".  I'll bet that's what he's viewing these galleries on.  Mac vs. Windows aside, I'll bet that all of us seeing this issue are using Windows.  However, saying "switch to mac!" is not a valid solution.

Find a PC and look at the examples provided,williamsn.  I'm sure you'll see the issue that we all are.

Williamsn, are you looking at the zoomed in images and saying they're fine?  B/c on my screen, on the dragon image linked in Modus0's original post, the non-zoomed image, the girls legs are all jaggy b/c of the HTML shrinkage routines.  Yes, if you open up the zoomed image it looks great, nice anti-aliased, no problems.  But the issues is that people see the crappy mangled version first and often won't click to see the correct version.  Take a look at the screencaps I posted to show you how these things are showing up for people.

As another poster mentioned, it serves little purpose to force images down to 700px b/c you're not actually saving any bandwidth.  The image file size stays the same, you're just telling the browser to display it in an ugly fashion.

Williamsn, for an example, take a look at my newest upload:
http://excalibur.renderosity.com/mod/gallery/index.php?image_id=1237827

Look at how horribly aliased the shrunken version is (my first comment is even about that, and the blame was assigned to me instead of your new gallery format).  Now click on it and see how it all goes away, b/c it's not there in the originally uploaded image.  However, it's very bad that the first impression that viewers get of our artwork is one that's been mangled through HTML shrinking routines.

In case you are seeing a beautifully anti-aliased shrunken image on some magic uber browser you have, let me show you what I'm seeing in IE 6, 7 and Firefox.  These are unaltered screencaps of what shows up in the shrunken version versus the "zoomed" image that displays when you click.  The only editing on this screencaps is cropping to keep the file size small.  Notice all the jagginess around the legs in the shrunken version.  This occurs over the entire image in my browsers, and apparently at least one of my viewer's browser (look at the first comment on my image above).

Shrunken version vs "Zoomed" Original version

I would suggest allowing a "Shrink to Fit" option (defaulted to off) for people who want it, and know that they are degrading the quality of the images they are seeing.  However, to force that upon all images by default is pretty inconsiderate of the artists.

Overall I think the new galleries are HUGE step in the right direction, but the main thing that's downright terrible:

The shrinkage of images to a max of 700px wide when viewing the image page.  The fact that there is a "Zoom In" option does not cut it, because the first thing that people see is the crappy, compressed, aliased image.  This is not representative of our works, and in fact I received some negative comments today and had to explain that it was the website's work not mine.  Once I explained how to view the image properly (by clicking on it or clicking the "Zoom In" button) the negative comments were rescinded.  However, we shouldn't have to do that in the first place.  Display images at their uploaded resolution.

Still, there's lots of good, the format, the CSS customization (though I'd like to put the menu back on the left where I used to have it), the advanced gallery stats, and the comment boxes.  I can tell a lot of hardwork went into this and the Rendo folks should be commended for it.  Once they take care of all the bugs, there's no doubt that this will continue to be the best 3D art community that I've seen on the 'net!