deskthority

Guys, remember to compress your images. These don’t need to be any larger than 100k to retain full quality. Mine are like 70k. Save Matteo the repetitive optimising task!

I use this. It’s open source. There’ll be equivalents for your platform.

https://imageoptim.com/mac

Muirium wrote: 11 Jan 2019, 14:45 Guys, remember to compress your images. These don’t need to be any larger than 100k to retain full quality. Mine are like 70k. Save Matteo the repetitive optimising task!

I use this. It’s open source. There’ll be equivalents for your platform.

https://imageoptim.com/mac

You can just drop a whole folder on this and it compresses everything in it. I’d rather post a high-quality image in here and then it can be compressed and recompressed and altered later from the high-quality source.

Won’t someone *please* think of the robot!

the robot has already created a script that resizes, compresses and uploads the new pictures to the headers folder.

New images will be added in a few moments (imagemagick+jpegoptim). but thanks Murium for thinking of me

let me just add that the important thing is that the aspect ratio is correct... not that I couldn't fix that too, but it's a little unpredictable what is going to be centered inside the 1200x480 window.

Now I'm getting artsy.

you can now get a list of active headers here: headers.php

matt3o wrote: 11 Jan 2019, 17:32 you can now get a list of active headers here: headers.php

Sweet!

Really like that kinesis one. Looks great

I'm resubmitting my "Wheel Writer Barrel Plate Caught in a Prism". Deskthority can use this image as they like, but it is still my property.

Dingster wrote: 11 Jan 2019, 17:38 Really like that kinesis one. Looks great

Yay! I did something right for once! Thanks for the kind words!

An oldie, updated.

Here is a selection of quite a few images for your consideration. Please use them or not as you wish. All of these are my own originals, so no other permissions would be needed. I have encapsulated them within "spoilers" to save space. Thanks.

The graphs aren’t a good idea, but there’s some nice photos in amongst the bunch for sure.

Muirium wrote: 18 Jan 2019, 21:57 The graphs aren’t a good idea, but there’s some nice photos in amongst the bunch for sure.

Yes, I was particularly unsure about the graphs, but I thought they might provide something rather different from boards, caps, and switches. In any event, whomever selects images for the DT header is free to use any of the images I submitted or not. They are essentially all "potato pics". I do not own a good camera, and I am certainly not a good photographer such as you and a number of other DT members are.

Thanks for the compliment. Don’t worry about your camera. Your phone is easily enough nowadays. Worry about your light!

I am a tech oddity. I have 10 modern computers, all functioning, and > 200 keyboards, mostly vintage and mostly functional, but I do not even own a mobile phone, smart or otherwise. When I work, I use a desk and desktop computers. When away from my desk, I enjoy the rest from all forms of electronic communication.

My camera is a little point-and-shoot Canon Sureshot that I share with my wife.

Although I am not a photographer, I do appreciate the importance of two things: composition and lighting. Whereas I am hard put to make a good photo myself, I know a good one when I see it.

I have been thinking of setting up a light box that my wife could use for making photos of items to post on eBay and that I could use for pics of keyboards to post on DT.

At present, I rely on a feeble task lamp at my desk. This is still better than the natural light most of the time in Michigan, which is similar to what you have in Scotland.

Hypersphere wrote: 18 Jan 2019, 23:40 At present, I rely on a feeble task lamp at my desk. This is still better than the natural light most of the time in Michigan, which is similar to what you have in Scotland.

I, personally, only use natural light unless I am forced to use house lighting for a quick pic. That's why you see less pictures from me in the winter. I get home when daylight is over so I have to wait for weekends. I use two rigid corrugated white plasticized sheets for the background in almost all cases except when items are white. I'll use the hardwood floor as a background for white items or items too big for the plastic sheets.

Same here. Of all my headers, only one I can remember is shot by artificial light: that flash shot of SSK and Realforce back to back. This is the time of year a good strobe can be most handy.

In defense of artificial light, this is the "natural" light of my home and work offices. I keep the window blinds closed and use low-wattage incandescent task lights on flexible arms to illuminate my work areas. Thus, the way I see my keyboards tends to match the way they appear in my photos. The "temperature" is shifted toward the warm end of the spectrum.

Yes, don’t do that!

What photography wants is a smooth but strong, broad spectrum light. Daylight is the best for this. I like a sunny day, but direct sunlight is unnecessary and even undesirable. For example:



Matteo: These images are not for headers!

See how harsh that looks? Too much direct illumination. Needs more scatter. It does look a little better from lower down, though, emphasising the shadows:



Why you’re really looking for, lighting wise, is contrast. Too little contrast is almost guaranteed to look poor. There’s no magic lighting rule to always make a great picture, but certainly the more of it, and the more it is like outdoor daylight, the better your chances.

Thanks for your illuminating lessons.

I have strange lighting preferences. I do not like sunny days. I prefer the low-hanging pewter skies that are prevalent in my part of the world. Sunny days make me feel out of sorts. I also cannot tolerate fluorescent lights. I am thankful that my employer allows me to keep the overhead fluorescents switched off and to rely instead on my own installations of incandescent track lights and task lamps, as I have at home.

Nevertheless, I see your point, and I might try to find a place in the house where keyboard photos could be taken in oblique sunlight on the relatively rare occasions when such natural light is available.

Otherwise, I still might construct a light box with clamped flood lamps and diffusers for use during the majority of times when skies are gray.

Ha! That’s *not* the lesson I intended. I should learn by now that a picture deletes a thousand words.

Sunlight is not necessary.

See these?
viewtopic.php?p=433850#p433850

All taken in daytime, all natural light, but no sun. You don’t need it. In fact, a soft cloudy sky can be your best light source of all.

Just get near a window! And turn off those damn bulbs.

Hey there,

here are some of my HHKB

My favorite! Was a header file on the last design <3 Two other you might like

Updates a few headers, I couldn't use some of the pictures because a bit small

I've just checked the header.php the quality of my images seems to suffer a bit, did you had to upscale them? I've purposely downsized them on 1200x400 but I can add higher quality pictures. So that it doesn't look too pixelized.

You can do whatever you want with these 2 pics I took when I made a craigslist deal of a 5140 at school lol. They aren't great quality pictures, but I hope that somebody can out them into use somehow.