The Reading Vent & Rant Thread

[graycyn]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

As a mystery reader, I'm hoping to one day solve the mystery of why I invariably go for the largest and highest resolution cover images I can find for epubs destined for my 8-inch eink reader.

No mystery to me. My eyes positively *do* notice differences between higher quality images and more compressed images. For my money, you can't put the quality *back* once you've done away with it, so I'd rather have a larger epub with a good quality image, than a light epub with a low quality image.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by Uncle Robin

I'm sure I've mentioned this one before, but it's beginning to irk me - which is a real achievement as I tend to be very laissez-faire about such 'errors'. But someithng about the increasingly widespread use of "discrete" for "discreet" really pushes my buttons

You aren't entirely discrete discreet about disliking it

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by gmw

I assume what you're talking about here is where they've taken a small image and tried to blow up to the minimum required by sites like Apple, rather than producing a new original image of the right size and compression. Most of the time I find the opposite, where the covers are high-res and saved at super high quality so the available quality far exceeds anything but the most detailed inspection. And sometimes these resource hogs are sitting on short stories!

No, not upscaling. The issue I'm referring to is when you zoom in, and look at what is supposed to be a section of solid colour, but instead it's all blotchy from the artifacting. It's like they ran the cover through MS Paint at one point.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

You aren't entirely discrete discreet about disliking it

A hit, a very palpable hit!

[gmw]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

No, not upscaling. The issue I'm referring to is when you zoom in, and look at what is supposed to be a section of solid colour, but instead it's all blotchy from the artifacting. It's like they ran the cover through MS Paint at one point.

I'm a bit confused. You say "not upscaling" but then also "when you zoom in". If you are zooming in only enough to get to 1:1 then sure, I agree that the image should have been created to look clean at that level. But after that you're upscaling with all the inevitable issues.

But that's not something I've ever noticed on covers unless it was undersized and so required upscaling - in which case I'd blame the image size rather than JPEG compression. I do see plenty of undersized covers. If they're JPEG they go blotchy in the solid colours, if they're PNG they just go pixelated, and neither is attractive.


This all makes me think of those TV shows where they're showing surveillance footage and they manage to blow up three pixels into a clear image of a face and then they pick out the reflection of the killer in the person's eye or something.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by gmw

I'm a bit confused. You say "not upscaling" but then also "when you zoom in". If you are zooming in only enough to get to 1:1 then sure, I agree that the image should have been created to look clean at that level. But after that you're upscaling with all the inevitable issues.

But that's not something I've ever noticed on covers unless it was undersized and so required upscaling - in which case I'd blame the image size rather than JPEG compression. I do see plenty of undersized covers. If they're JPEG they go blotchy in the solid colours, if they're PNG they just go pixelated, and neither is attractive.


This all makes me think of those TV shows where they're showing surveillance footage and they manage to blow up three pixels into a clear image of a face and then they pick out the reflection of the killer in the person's eye or something.

If I view the image at full size is what I should've said, but I was tired and caffiene-deprived.

[issybird]

The one that’s driving me positively barmy these days is the use of “retrospective” to mean “retroactive”. The only saving grace is that it seems much more prevalent among British writers than American.

[Hitch]

Originally Posted by gmw

I'm a bit confused. You say "not upscaling" but then also "when you zoom in". If you are zooming in only enough to get to 1:1 then sure, I agree that the image should have been created to look clean at that level. But after that you're upscaling with all the inevitable issues.

But that's not something I've ever noticed on covers unless it was undersized and so required upscaling - in which case I'd blame the image size rather than JPEG compression. I do see plenty of undersized covers. If they're JPEG they go blotchy in the solid colours, if they're PNG they just go pixelated, and neither is attractive.


This all makes me think of those TV shows where they're showing surveillance footage and they manage to blow up three pixels into a clear image of a face and then they pick out the reflection of the killer in the person's eye or something.

IME, I've found that there are innumerable instances of self-pub DIYs that end up putting thumbnails of their covers--seriously, say, 200px x 300px--in their eBooks. Now, at Amazon, they've tried to stop that, but having a separate cover upload, but some people upload books without a separate cover, so the renderer uses what's available.

I've also found, over the years, that there's just...people don't understand size versus resolution, pixels (PPI or DPI) versus inches, etc. It's a bit of a hopeless battle. Those that don't understand it rarely have enough interest to pursue it and many who would be interested don't have a math brain and thus, kinda get it but don't.

What's killer is that for an ebook reader/device, anyway, it's not even that damned hard to figure out--take a glimpse at the average pixel dimensions of the screen and use something close.

(sigh).

Discrete and discreet are a pair of my bugaboos, too. But...my take is, those of us who care are dying out and being cheerfully replaced by cavalier users, so in maybe a single generation, we'll simply be gone and happily forgotten.

Hitch

[issybird]

OK, I’m being a pest, but could we try to keep this thread a little more ranty? Once people start going deep tech diving, perhaps they could move the discussion to the TV&R thread with a link?

[ekbell]

I've found myself reading about a very tired but still hypervigilant protagonist.

I eventually figured out that the author had confused the words weary and wary.

[Witty Username]

Dear author of the book I just read - please do a little research on the locations you set your story in. The bad guys' secret lab, hidden in the dense, evergreen Shetland forest? Nope, no way. Shetland is famous for having virtually no trees at all.

[andyh2000]

Originally Posted by Witty Username

Dear author of the book I just read - please do a little research on the locations you set your story in. The bad guys' secret lab, hidden in the dense, evergreen Shetland forest? Nope, no way. Shetland is famous for having virtually no trees at all.

Not a book but my wife was very taken aback when we first went on holiday to a Greek island and the landscape was rocky, scrubby and pretty arid. We'd been watching Xena and Hercules on TV battling in and around lush rain forests*.

Andrew

*Filmed in New Zealand I believe.

[Uncle Robin]

Originally Posted by Hitch

(sigh).

Discrete and discreet are a pair of my bugaboos, too. But...my take is, those of us who care are dying out and being cheerfully replaced by cavalier users, so in maybe a single generation, we'll simply be gone and happily forgotten.

Hitch

You're absolutely right, but at least it has the virtue of always being on topic here. And the frequency of my complaints about it here can in their turn become others' very own "reading rants" win-win

[Aleron Ives]

Originally Posted by issybird

The one that’s driving me positively barmy these days is the use of “retrospective” to mean “retroactive”. The only saving grace is that it seems much more prevalent among British writers than American.

I've noticed that Brits tend to use "where" when they meant "were". That one drives me nuts.

[ownedbycats]

Fanfics where the authors manage to spell major character names wrong.