Astro Boy Image Collection

[TasZero]

Just an idea I've been bouncing around for a while. I think it would be popular if it could be done right.

Basically I'd like to put togther a collection of Astro Boy pictures, not just the best of the best but a full gallery, that means 1000's of pictures from all the generations sorted and stored somewhere we could all look at them, while also ensuring the links don't expire over the years.

I'm happy to go ahead and start collecting heaps of pictures by myself but I think some construcive input or suggestions on what to include first would be great.

Some things that need to be settled first though.
1. Hosting, I was thinking about something like photobucket since it has the ability to use categories and also has a huge bandwidth. Private hosting would be an interesting idea, but you'd have to remember that the gallery would use a lot of traffic (given its nature)
2. What to include, every possible worthwhile picture will take a very long time, so a good starting place may help gather interest in the project.

Hope the idea is a good one, feedback would be appriciated.

[AprilSeven]

I like it!!! Is this something we can do from within this site? It would add to it's appeal and value. That would be my suggestion.

[Alittleacorn]

yeah i think that sounds awesome count me in! =D

[TasZero]

Cool, glad some people are interested. Currently I've decided that imageshack is the best idea since unlike photobucket it doesn't have a 500 picture limit.

Just a couple of other things that would be important before we start uploading 1000's of picutres to anywhere.

1. Is Imageshack a good idea?
2. Should we try and have it so anyone can upload the pictures or just have one person doing it (myself)
3. Image naming method
4. Image tagging methods
5. Image Album methods

Basically this is so the pictures are well sorted and its easy to find what your looking for. Suggestions on how to do it... or maybe a better site than imageshack

[AprilSeven]

We could post gobs of stuff on that site, but what happens to everything if suddenly it goes out of existence? Where is this site hosted? -- it would seem most advantageous to have all the files (whether filed through a moderator or by individuals) somewhere "permanent."

As a webmaster, I've lived through too many server/hosting service crashes/disasters to suggest trusting "cloud storage" -- hopefully one of the moderators for this site can make a suggestion about how to proceed.

Love the idea though!

[TasZero]

Yes. I too have seen the problems involved with webhosting, hence wanting to find a good place to put them before starting. I do understand that such a gallery would be a huge bandwidth eater though.

I have images on sites like photobucket and imageshack which I uploaded several years ago, that are still there so I believe it is the best we can do. Of course, should someone be willing to host it, then we could come up with an interesting design, layout and effective sorting system.

[fafner]

I don't know how to make the links stable, but I know how to make the gallery by itself stable. If someone centralizes the gallery on a server, even slow, it is possible for anyone to get all the gallery. This way, if this central person for some reason goes away, someone else can take the role and continue to gather images, from who other people can update their own copy of the gallery.

I personnally have a server, but it is damn slow for uploads (30Kb/s, that makes easily 1 second for a decent image for a single person). However what I can do is maintain an external account on imageshack or anywhere else. What I need is a little script that does the update. This wouldn't prevent the gallery from disappearing should imageshack disappear, but I could update the script to put the gallery back online on photobucket for example. Links would be broken of course, but the gallery would still be online in a reasonnable amount of time. Downloading directly from my server would be a possibility of course, providing you are patient.

[TasZero]

It sounds like a working idea. I like it.

The best speed saving idea I can think of is to have the gallery of thumbnails linking to the full sized images. This way the viewer can see the pictures faster while also not needing to waste time downloading every image in full size.
Hosting a bunch of thumbnails on your own server wouldn't be too difficult I don't think and if it turns out to be too slow we could always link in thumbnails from either imageshack or photobucket.

Backup on photobucket or imageshack is a good idea. I will also make sure to back it all up onto my laptop.

It sounds like this could come together well, though before we start collecting pictures I think we ought to try and get a working prototype of what the page could look like.

[jeffbert]

As much as it may seem odd for me to say this, seeing that I have posted many images, I have been careful in creating new image-laden threads to keep the number of them rather low for any episode. I do not want to give the impression that I am giving away the entire plot by posting so many images. OK, when I have restored the missing images from older threads, I usually just upload and link to all that I had previously posted, even if there were 20 or 30. I often felt bad about so many, & sometimes reduced them to 320 by 240, as though that made it ok. My use of images in my reviews of episodes is centered around the different versions of the stories, and consists largely of 100 by 100 portraits. I think long and hard before I post full screen images, and always cite sources, etc.

I know many threads are here that feature as many as 40 to 50 images from each episode; I had not given this any thought until now, but this is taking for granted Tezuka Co's tolerance. Now, some are talking about 100s of images from each episode. I think it would be presumptuous to simply make so many images available to anyone. None of us has any license to do with the images as we please, and, thus, we should not feel free to do so. If we can justify this, then what stops us from justifying making the entire audio tracks available?

Tezuka Co. tolerates us so far, why press our luck? irate: Moreover, there are the regional license holders who may not like this internationally available site hosting so many images.

[TasZero]

As much as it may seem odd for me to say this, seeing that I have posted many images, I have been careful in creating new image-laden threads to keep the number of them rather low for any episode. I do not want to give the impression that I am giving away the entire plot by posting so many images. OK, when I have restored the missing images from older threads, I usually just upload and link to all that I had previously posted, even if there were 20 or 30. I often felt bad about so many, & sometimes reduced them to 320 by 240, as though that made it ok. My use of images in my reviews of episodes is centered around the different versions of the stories, and consists largely of 100 by 100 portraits. I think long and hard before I post full screen images, and always cite sources, etc.

I know many threads are here that feature as many as 40 to 50 images from each episode; I had not given this any thought until now, but this is taking for granted Tezuka Co's tolerance. Now, some are talking about 100s of images from each episode. I think it would be presumptuous to simply make so many images available to anyone. None of us has any license to do with the images as we please, and, thus, we should not feel free to do so. If we can justify this, then what stops us from justifying making the entire audio tracks available?

Tezuka Co. tolerates us so far, why press our luck? irate:

I understand your point. These sorts of issues are always present. However. There are two sides to the arguement. Put simply, your threads and use of the pictures is one of the main factors that I am considering purchasing the 60's series on dvd.

The idea behind the gallery isn't to include "episode guides" such as your threads but rather a collection of images based on characters, revealling little about the story instead simply being an archive of picutres to make us smile and enjoy the characters we know and love.
Nor is it meant to infringe on the rights of Tezuka Co. and if they say they don't like it then I would be only too happy to take it down.
On the other hand such a gallery may in its own way be benificial to the Astro boy community and to Tezuka co. If even one person who sees the gallery decided they want to investigate the dvds then that is a win for the official release.

And of course, I encourage everyone to buy Astroboy.