Old Photos for new

[oldboots]

What do people think we should do with 10-15 year old pub photos being submitted as "new", some long closed pubs others where the name was changed years ago, others where the signage is datable by the obsolete style or defunct brewery name.


It surely doesn't look good for pubs to have a photo dated May 2020 when it was obviously taken about 2008?

[ETA]

Depends on why it's been posted. If there's no other photo it might help identify the building, and if it's part of a historic continuum it's good to see how things have changed.

But if it adds no actual value, adds nothing to the story and doesn't provide any practical help, let's not waste server space.

[rpadam]

It surely doesn't look good for pubs to have a photo dated May 2020 when it was obviously taken about 2008?
Quite, but they still have some interest, so I am approving but generally suppressing them from the front page where the decoration and/or signage has obviously changed in the meantime.

However, I'm not sure whether other dwarves are taking the same approach?

This also brings to mind an old thread (that I haven't tried finding) which noted that backdated reviews could have the correct date applied through the 'BITE Mass Migration Tool' but the same doesn't apply to photographs.

[Rex_Rattus]

I would say that if it's the only photo then it's better than nothing, but if there's a more recently taken one then the old one should be suppressed. Enlarging the question slightly, in the case of a photo uploaded some years ago which was current when it was uploaded, should it be suppressed when a more recent one becomes available? My view would be 'yes' if the appearance of the pub has changed in the interim. I don't think it helps to have an old photo on the front page, but of course any old superseded photos are still available to anyone who wants to view them and can provide a useful historical record of the appearance of the pub over the years.

[RealAleRobUK]

Personally, I like looking at old photos, but it would be helpful if there was a way of "backdating" so they appeared with a date from the correct era.

[sheffield hatter]

Personally, I like looking at old photos, but it would be helpful if there was a way of "backdating" so they appeared with a date from the correct era.

I presume this thread was started because Adam Bell has uploaded shed loads of photos since lockdown. I've only uploaded a handful of photos that are "old" in the context of this discussion - a few times I've written a review and realised that I'd forgotten to upload the photo, for example (but that's usually only a matter of days later; ok, up to a few weeks, maybe). Or recently I realised that on one of my very first cycle rides where pub photography was "a thing" (autumn 2010), I'd photographed about 10 pubs in Cambridge but only uploaded three or four.

Surely the date the photo was taken is included with the information that is uploaded? (Or, at least, the date that the camera/phone "thought" it was.) Would it be possible to extract this information so that it can be displayed alongside the photo? Sounds like it could be a lot of work and not really worthwhile. It would be nice if older photos could be identified as such, but I personally would not exclude them from the site if they couldn't be.

[RealAleRobUK]

I presume this thread was started because Adam Bell has uploaded shed loads of photos since lockdown. I've only uploaded a handful of photos that are "old" in the context of this discussion - a few times I've written a review and realised that I'd forgotten to upload the photo, for example (but that's usually only a matter of days later; ok, up to a few weeks, maybe). Or recently I realised that on one of my very first cycle rides where pub photography was "a thing" (autumn 2010), I'd photographed about 10 pubs in Cambridge but only uploaded three or four.

Surely the date the photo was taken is included with the information that is uploaded? (Or, at least, the date that the camera/phone "thought" it was.) Would it be possible to extract this information so that it can be displayed alongside the photo? Sounds like it could be a lot of work and not really worthwhile. It would be nice if older photos could be identified as such, but I personally would not exclude them from the site if they couldn't be.

I guess that during lockdown, people have more time on their hands to go through old photos, so I guess this is bound to happen.

Perhaps a workaround could be that the uploader of the photo adds a one line review to the pub giving a bit more info on when the photos were taken. Not ideal and no guarantee anyone would look at it, of course. But for pubs that don't attract a lot of reviews, it could be worth it.

I guess the other angle is that the dwarf approving the photo then has to realise it is a historical photo and suppress it in favour of more recent examples. For some photos I imagine it would be pretty obvious, especially if they date back decades, but for photos that are only 10 years old or so, it might not be obvious at first glance.

[rpadam]

I guess the other angle is that the dwarf approving the photo then has to realise it is a historical photo and suppress it in favour of more recent examples. For some photos I imagine it would be pretty obvious, especially if they date back decades, but for photos that are only 10 years old or so, it might not be obvious at first glance.
As previously mentioned, this is what I try to do, but just adding a 'Date taken' field to be entered when uploading a photograph (even if only approximate in the case of older pictures) would seem to be the easiest answer?

NB - If photographs are renamed, resized, rotated, cropped or otherwise modified in any way (e.g. contrast or colour balance) the date / time metadata will probably be lost so it would appear very difficult to automatically extract the required information in many cases?

[sheffield hatter]

Perhaps a workaround could be that the uploader of the photo adds a one line review to the pub giving a bit more info on when the photos were taken. Not ideal and no guarantee anyone would look at it, of course. But for pubs that don't attract a lot of reviews, it could be worth it.

I guess the other angle is that the dwarf approving the photo then has to realise it is a historical photo and suppress it in favour of more recent examples. For some photos I imagine it would be pretty obvious, especially if they date back decades, but for photos that are only 10 years old or so, it might not be obvious at first glance.

Your suggestions are good ones, but when I stop to consider how much hassle is potentially involved, I begin to wonder if this is really a problem that we have to go to such lengths to solve. If there's a simple solution, easily obtained from the data attached to the photos, that's one thing. But expecting extras, such as you propose, by multiple individuals and then expect nothing to go wrong...

I would suggest that, if there is no simple IT solution, we should just leave things as they are.

[oldboots]

Surely the date the photo was taken is included with the information that is uploaded? (Or, at least, the date that the camera/phone "thought" it was.) Would it be possible to extract this information so that it can be displayed alongside the photo? Sounds like it could be a lot of work and not really worthwhile. It would be nice if older photos could be identified as such, but I personally would not exclude them from the site if they couldn't be.

You are alluding to Metadata which will be embedded in a photo taken on a digital device, obviously a scan will not include this, sadly loading onto Pubs Galore appears to strip the Metadata. It may remain somewhere in the database, Dave would be able to say (probably).

[sheffield hatter]

You are alluding to Metadata which will be embedded in a photo taken on a digital device, obviously a scan will not include this, sadly loading onto Pubs Galore appears to strip the Metadata. It may remain somewhere in the database, Dave would be able to say (probably).

Hmm. That's a bit of a bugger.

[RealAleRobUK]

As previously mentioned, this is what I try to do, but just adding a 'Date taken' field to be entered when uploading a photograph (even if only approximate in the case of older pictures) would seem to be the easiest answer?

That would appear to be the sensible solution, without trying to get too fancy.

[oldboots]

That would appear to be the sensible solution, without trying to get too fancy.

Depends if it gets used, it would need to be mandatory to stand any chance of being useful, remember some people can't even get a photo the right way up or indeed attached to the correct pub.


It doesn't need to happen, it may not be important to some people that a visitor looking at a photo labelled May2020 would assume it was taken close to that date, a quick look at other photos of the same pub may reveal to the viewer that it was an incorrect date label, their reaction is likely to be "what a bunch of useless numpties, can't even get the photos in the right order, must be a crap site"

[RealAleRobUK]

Depends if it gets used, it would need to be mandatory to stand any chance of being useful, remember some people can't even get a photo the right way up or indeed attached to the correct pub.


If there was a mandatory "date taken" field when uploading a photo it would at least mean that some can be correct, whereas at the moment no historical photos can be.

However at the moment there is no prompt for confirmation once a photo is uploaded, so it would require the photo upload process to be redesigned which could be deemed to be too much work for too little reward.

I do think there would be some value in adding a preview of the photo prior to submission, maybe even include a basic zoom/rotate/crop tool for those who don't have the skill or inclination to edit beforehand. But again, that's not going to be a quick easy thing to add to the site so I can't see it being high on the to-do list.

[Dave M]

You are alluding to Metadata which will be embedded in a photo taken on a digital device, obviously a scan will not include this, sadly loading onto Pubs Galore appears to strip the Metadata. It may remain somewhere in the database, Dave would be able to say (probably).

We decided from the start it would be best to strip that data out from the publicly accessible photos as you may not want people to know exactly when you were somewhere or what kind of device you have for example.

However I do still have some access and in theory can still get hold of meta data, it is often not as reliable as you might hope though.

What I've been thinking is maybe when you upload a photo there is another button that user can decide to click that assigns the photo to the day they took it rather than the day they uploaded it.

I can't promise that feature any time soon however I'll have a word with Adam Bell and see if he'd mind me updating some the dates of his photos retrospectively.

[Dave M]

However at the moment there is no prompt for confirmation once a photo is uploaded, so it would require the photo upload process to be redesigned which could be deemed to be too much work for too little reward.

I do think there would be some value in adding a preview of the photo prior to submission, maybe even include a basic zoom/rotate/crop tool for those who don't have the skill or inclination to edit beforehand. But again, that's not going to be a quick easy thing to add to the site so I can't see it being high on the to-do list.

I need to write a new photo upload process for another site at some point to allow some pre-upload editing, if that goes well I may be able to push some of those features back into the PG upload process.

[Dave M]

NB - If photographs are renamed, resized, rotated, cropped or otherwise modified in any way (e.g. contrast or colour balance) the date / time metadata will probably be lost so it would appear very difficult to automatically extract the required information in many cases?

Photo editing software does often change the metadata, there is usually a field called 'DateTimeOriginal' which shouldn't get changed, however some software removes all of the metadata.

If there are any users who'd be happy having the 'date photo taken' shown on the site for their photos I'll have a play about with the data and see what I have.

[Mobyduck]

If there are any users who'd be happy having the 'date photo taken' shown on the site for their photos I'll have a play about with the data and see what I have.

I wouldn't have a problem with that, though from albeit a somewhat shakey memory, I think most if not all my photos have been current to upload dates within two or three weeks.

[Brainypool]

Photo editing software does often change the metadata, there is usually a field called 'DateTimeOriginal' which shouldn't get changed, however some software removes all of the metadata.

If there are any users who'd be happy having the 'date photo taken' shown on the site for their photos I'll have a play about with the data and see what I have.

I don’t mind, I definitely have a few photos on here that were uploaded long after the fact.

[Lady Grey]

Photoshop has a tool to allow text to be written on images. I sometimes write the date that the photo was taken, onto the image.

[Quinno]

Photo editing software does often change the metadata, there is usually a field called 'DateTimeOriginal' which shouldn't get changed, however some software removes all of the metadata.

If there are any users who'd be happy having the 'date photo taken' shown on the site for their photos I'll have a play about with the data and see what I have.

Yeah fine with me for mine :)

Some of my earliest uploads here were actually already a few years old - at the time there weren't so many photos on the site so it didn't really matter too much...

[Blackthorn]

Fine with me too, although I think all mine have been uploaded pretty much as soon as they were taken (with the notable exception of the recently uploaded ones for The Goathland Hotel (https://www.pubsgalore.co.uk/pubs/53447/) which were about 15 years late!).

[Tris39]

We decided from the start it would be best to strip that data out from the publicly accessible photos as you may not want people to know exactly when you were somewhere or what kind of device you have for example.

Would it not be possible then just to display the data for only the month and year?

My oldest photos were only taken six months before I joined the site and after that, my pics usually go up within about 48 hours. The majority of pictures I've taken are of pubs I've never visited, indeed many I'd never want to visit.

[Dave M]

Would it not be possible then just to display the data for only the month and year?

I think that would be a good idea.

Still looking into extracting data to find out how useful it is.