Category talk:Screenshots

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Can someone more knowledgeable than me with wiki syntax explain to me why {{Category:Screenshots}} is necessary on this page? It prevents it from acting as god intended, as a gallery, and makes it into a list of files, which is a bit useless for a media category. --Santax (talk · contribs) 23:40, 31 August 2009 (UTC)

Look at the GWW equivalents; due to the high amount of images in there, displaying thumbnails is not a good option. Also licensing categories are not really a good place to start looking for nice images anyway. That's what the other image categories are for (which then can offer a lot more navigation with subcategories and such) poke | talk 00:02, 1 September 2009 (UTC)
Is it really necessary at the moment though? I mean, it's not like we have more than one page of screenshots anyway, and filenames are hardly descriptive enough to find images from there, making the nav unnecessary. --Santax (talk · contribs) 15:55, 8 September 2009 (UTC)

Organization[edit]

→ Continued from here and here
With the second trailer, there was some discussion about how to organize categories and images here. Regardless of how there was no opposition on that discussion, later there were some complains, so here's a discussion about how to organize the screenshots.
Before any naming scheme was implemented (which means, three days ago) this category was a big mess. Different files had the same name, with the only difference being file type, there was no order so images about different subjects were close together, and there was no pattern to the names. I have tried to implement a naming convention under the following ideas:

  • It's not in the best interest of the wiki to merge old screenshots, from before the release of the game, with screenshots from after the release. Looking at Guild Wars 1 screenshots explains why: things change a lot and often between the early (and not so early) stages of game development and the final release. Having a screenshot named "Rata Sum.jpg" showing something that would not look like what players would see when they were inside GW2's Rata Sum would only be confusing. Thus, screenshots from before release would have a different naming convention than those from after release. Given how we have very few screenshots (only those available from the two trailers and a few from the website), using a rigid naming convention for those images isn't really an issue.
  • Again looking at GW1, there is a considerable difference between screenshots from the early stages of the game and from those at the World Preview Event, even if both were before release. Likewise, to allow people to easily see the evolution of the game, I believe the screenshots between now and release should be organized focusing on when they are from. Hence, I think all current screenshots should have their date (year and month) on the title. Of course, when we have the final images (release) this would be unnecessary, and would help users to know what's "real" (screenshots from after release) and what isn't (thing from before release).
  • We have, for now, way more pieces of concept art than screenshots. As there's absolutely no naming convention, it's not really possible to know if "Rata Sum.jpg" is a screenshot or a piece of concept art. In order to make clear what each image is, I think we should add to the filename what each image is, again until release.
  • A few screenshots have been made available from the Guild Wars 2 website, and are named "Human 01", "Human 02", etc. Those filenames are hardly descriptive or helpful at all; they are more filenames than titles, so I see no point in keeping the exact same filename on the wiki. I would rather change the filenames so they fit within the proposed naming convention, while keeping the original words.

So instead of [[:File:Screenshot 9 4.jpg]] and File:Asura-01.jpg, we would have File:2009 december website asura 02 screenshot.jpg and File:2009 August Hrangmer.jpg. Long filenames, but the titles say everything important about the file (when it's from, source, what it is about and what the file is), and allow this category to be used easily, as it's organized by date, then source, then theme.
Once the game is released (or we have the beta, given how we have been told it will happen close to the release of the game anyway), we can name the new screenshots under simpler names (such as Hrangmer.jpg), making clear which screenshots were from before release and which ones were the "true" ones.
Does anyone have a better idea, other than going back to the mess this category was? Erasculio 00:03, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

Are you suggesting that we rename concept art also? I disagree with that because concept art only needs a category. As for giving the screenshots names as you suggested, I'm for this as long as we only use the convention for pre-release screenshots.-- Shew 00:22, 14 December 2009 (UTC)
Ok, I guess we could leave the concept art with simpler names then. It's not like they will change over time like the screenshots, anyway. Erasculio 11:32, 14 December 2009 (UTC)
Just a note, the "screenshot" part is redundant, since the vast majority of our images will be screenshots. --Xeeron 18:26, 14 December 2009 (UTC)
In the future, yes, which is one more reason why I don't think we should use this naming convention in the future, but right now it's the opposite - we have more than three times as many pieces of concept art than screenshots. Considering how, for now, screenshots are a rare commodity (and a valuable one too, as they are a more direct look into the game than concept art), I think it's worth adding the screenshot name to those images. Erasculio 20:54, 14 December 2009 (UTC)
I accept the use of screenshot in the name only if we guarantee it doesn't get used ever after. However, I would rather that a category was used to capture the same information, for instance a "pre-release screenshot" category, and completely avoid the complexity in the naming. -- Aspectacle User Aspectacle.png 21:49, 14 December 2009 (UTC)
Yes, that would save us a lot of hassle with renaming, once we get more screenshots flowing in. Better to plan for the long term right away. --Xeeron 00:07, 15 December 2009 (UTC)
My concern is how this page is useless without long filenames allowing people to sort by name, and this page is the only way to sort through the images. Would you people oppose if, instead of having all screenshots visible on this page, we sorted them in categories linked here? That would make it possible to reduce filename (a bit; we can't have a category tree too complex or the template responsible for adding the categories wouldn't be able to deal with it). Erasculio 01:26, 15 December 2009 (UTC)
I think that would be much better.-- Shew 01:36, 15 December 2009 (UTC)
Still wouldn't allow us to go with one word filenames, though. I think it's worth keeping the date on the filename; given how the only images with dates on the title will be screenshots, we could remove the "screenshot" from the filename. It's also a way to be 100% sure that images added after release won't overwrite the ones we have now.
We could use categories to indicate the source of the image, though. Between removing this and the "screenshot" part, we would go from "File:2009 december website asura 02 screenshot.jpg" to "File:2009 december asura 02.jpg". Erasculio 10:42, 15 December 2009 (UTC)
I was thinking about using the following category tree:
  • Screenshots
  • Before release screenshots (although I wish someone could find a better title for this, "before release" is kinda meh)
  • Trailer screenshots
  • Website screenshots (for screenshots from the official website)
  • Other screenshots (for screenshots from other websites if they allow external use)
Common screenshots (from after release) would just be within the main Screenshots category (which means easier categorization) and would be without the date (which means easier file naming). Erasculio 11:09, 16 December 2009 (UTC)
This all sounds reasonable, Erasculio. The shorter names are much better. Thank you. -- Aspectacle User Aspectacle.png 23:06, 16 December 2009 (UTC)

HR screenshots[edit]

Does anyone know what happened to the High Resolution Screenshot function. I can't find it on the controls window. Did they remove it all together 24.132.133.74 13:14, 22 July 2012 (UTC)

They removed the option to keybind, so unless theres some way to force all screenshots to be highres through a target line extension, I believe they removed it completely for the time being. I really hope they bring it back for launch. --Saranis 07:49, 24 August 2012 (UTC)

Stereoscopic[edit]

What can I do with the *.jps files that the stereoscopic screenshots create? I can see they are 2 images on one JPEG, but what do I do with them? HimmTaeguk (T/C) 06:11, 29 August 2012 (UTC)

[Shift] + [Print Screen] not working[edit]

This combination doesn't seem to work for me, I always get screenshots with UI... Any advice (turning UI off, making Screen Shot, turning it on is NOT a fix for this for me, imagine doing that during big battles... not acceptable!)? SethreaUser Sethrea sig.png 09:24, 10 September 2012 (UTC)

You are correct, SHIFT + PrtScrn does not make a screenshot without UI and while you can redefine the key to take a screenshot with there is no 'function' that would allow you to take a screenshot without UI. I will adapt the article. Amy Awien 12:46, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

File format .png[edit]

Does Guild Wars 2 Wiki:Image formatting still hold, i.e "the only files that should be .png are icons [..] Most files should be uploaded as .jpg or jpeg otherwise."?

Checking the numbers
  • Total number of images in the category Screenshots containing .png in page name: 45
  • Number of images in the category Screenshots containing .png and not containing User in page name: 44
  • Number of images in the category Screenshots containing .png and User in page name: 1
Images in category Screenshots containing .png and not containing User
Images in category Screenshots containing .png and User

--Tolkyria (talk) 09:25, 25 September 2020 (UTC)

It still does hold does: A lot of them are actually user images that simply aren't named as such and therefore weren't moved to userspace or files labeled screenshot but were icons/concept art. After that, the majority left are map/guide images that need to be converted to .jpg and a handful of NPC pictures that are redundant with the Shared Model project. I'll see if I can't shrink this list down today. - Doodleplex 13:52, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
Okay, thanks! I had the feeling that the current numbers are still doable and could be resolved in reasonable time before in a few month it might get too much. --Tolkyria (talk) 15:23, 25 September 2020 (UTC)
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