Tips, Suggestions, Ideas about Course Photos

[stsren]

I was curious, what does the "community," or at least the vocal part of the community, like to see when looking at course photos?

I ask because I recently went to a lesser played course in my area, University of Central Florida, and took photos.

During the process, I realized that it can be a lot of work! :gross:

My thoughts were to try to show each hole in a way that someone who has not played the course would be able to have a decent idea of what to expect. How well that was executed, I'm not sure.

My method:
Take a picture from each tee pad (Gold Tee and Black Tee)
Take a picture from the approach (or somewhere along the fairway where you could actually see the basket, since on this course the baskets are hidden like Easter eggs)
Take a picture from the basket towards the original tee pads (with the basket slightly in view).

I then took all the photos, saved them in a scaled down format, and tried to photoshop in a rough translation of where the basket is in relation to the tee pad.
Additionally, I added the hole #, distance, and sometimes a blurb about the hole into the actual photo.
When uploading the photos, I labeled the hole #, and what the pic was (Black Tee / Approach / Basket to Tee)
I also elected to NOT put up the "Gold" Tee pad pics, because I have no idea where the basket is from them, and because half of them can't even be found.

My thoughts on this process:
Photo taking = fairly fast and easy.
Photo editing = slightly drawn out and time consuming
Photo uploading = unnecessarily time consuming (can only put 5 pics up at a time)

Anyone have any tips, suggestions, ideas, critiques, etc???
Do people like to see more, or less? Was what I did overkill?

Also, I think it would be nice if there were a way to view the large format pictures and be able to click "Next Photo" from that image, rather than having to go back to small format thumbs...

Fire away! :thmbup:

 

[solomon.trenton]

great job. the only i wouldnt do is draw a line to the basket. i hate when people do that. if its a long hole take one from the teepad, one from where your second shot would land, one from your approach and if the basket is hidden one straight on from the basket.

 

[DavidSauls]

Personally, I'm a fan of the "reverse view", from the basket looking back towards the tee. It often gives a better idea of the approach than a picture taking 100-150' out.

Photoshopping in flight lines, markers to show the route, etc. is nice, but more trouble than necessary.

I don't expect the photos to be navigation aides....just to give an idea of the style of the course and it's best features to entice me to play it.

 

[billnchristy]

I also prefer untouched photos...I want to see what the course looks like, not a gran turismo beginner mode racing line.

 

[stsren]

I didn't add flight paths or anything to my photos...but I did add an image of roughly where the basket would be since there is only 1 hole out of 18 where the basket is visible from the tee pad.

 

[billnchristy]

Yeah that makes sense.

 

[bcr123psu]

if its a long hole take one from the teepad, one from where your second shot would land, one from your approach and if the basket is hidden one straight on from the basket.

Personally, I'm a fan of the "reverse view", from the basket looking back towards the tee. It often gives a better idea of the approach than a picture taking 100-150' out.

I think this should cover all your bases:

Tee shot (from the longs, unless you're going to shoot every tee)
Approach shot (on longer holes)
Basket (if obfuscated)
Reverse from basket

So, a minimum of two (tee & reverse from basket) on up, depending on the hole length and number of tees & baskets.

This will make all the HOD threads easier too

 

[bazillion]

I like the aerial view that you get with Bing's "birds eye". That gives you a really good idea of what the hole looks like overall without your getting confused and distracted by all them pesky trees. Sort of like the one I did for El Dorado, except skillfully ...

Hate Bing, love the birds eye view. Oh well, in a perfect world, we'd just go out and throw plastic all day long

 

[raydancer]

I really like the aerial view, too. Check out the Disc Orlando site. It has some really nice photos of Orlando area courses.

 

[stsren]

^^^
I found that site after I posted all of those pics...had I seen that before I may have "borrowed" them for this site.

I like the interactive arial view on that site, which allows you to click on any hole for multiple photos / views.

 

[NateDiscFlip]

Picture to Picture

My brother works in computers, as he has suggested one of the best things for showing off a course is to use software, such as Flash, that will allow players to input several pictures that will each dissolve into the next.

What he asked me to do is go out to my favorite course, and start taking shots about every 3 to 5 steps.....for best quality going up/down/left/right.....take small steps and lots of pictures.

Basically, each hole, depending on it's lengths, was snap shotted from the teepad to the basket. It usually takes about 30-40 shots. When dissolve each shot into the next, it almost appears as a HIGH Quality video footage. It worked better than I thought. The key is to get a site to adopt such an idea. I have snaps for all of Oshtemo, MI.

RECOMMENDATIONS:

1) make sure no disc golfers or discs are in the pics(this may take time on a highly visited course).

2) take more shots around corners, or up or down hills

3) Well lighten times of the day are helpful.

In the end, I would hope this is a good way to show direction through a course(maybe on a website) minus the need for audio input, as well as people not being able to view video, which can be low quality and take up bandwidth.

The tough part is developing the flash system to play this...my brother is working on it, so if DGcoursereview is interested in finding out more, let me know. One of the main task being to have people go out and take the same pictures I did for each course. Messing the photos up is pretty hard to do, but to have a uniformity for everyone to submit under would be a good idea.

gl:hfive:opcorn:

 

[dgaficionado]

I'm a fan of the way playdg.com shows (via a toggle selection) multiple pin placements as well as closeups of the basket with short descriptions for baskets hidden from view. It allows you to see as little or as much as you want. See #4 at Brandywine for example.

 

[RussMB]

I like to minimize the photos, adding more if necessary. Obviously, if it's a straightaway hole then you might get a pic of the basket, but you don't really need one of the fairway. Only if I feel there is relevant info to be had from the location of the basket. (i.e. it's in a group of trees, along the water, next to a playground. etc) Occasionally, I might snap a pic of mid fairway. ...again, only if it communicates something relevant. (Dogleg, hidden water, etc..)

I don't like to clutter up the picture, but sometimes there are valid reasons for it. If the basket doesn't show up on the pic, I'll go in with photoshop and just highlight the basket enough to make it stand out. If I'm feeling lazy, I'll just go ahead and circle it.

I'm with Dave though, I like the looking back from the basket Pic's as well!

 

[stsren]

I'm a fan of the way playdg.com shows (via a toggle selection) multiple pin placements as well as closeups of the basket with short descriptions for baskets hidden from view. It allows you to see as little or as much as you want. See #4 at Brandywine for example.

Pretty cool. I like how it's done there, too!