posted February 27, 2009 by trek7k

You may have noticed some changes to the way we display trail photos here on singletracks over the past couple weeks and we’re finally ready to let you know (officially) what’s up. We’ve kept some things the same while improving and adding new photo features:

• You can still upload trail photos the same way you always have. View a trail listing, click the “Add photos” link on the left and upload your pics. In addition to trail pics we’ve also added photos to mountain bike races and MTB gear review pages. Same deal – find the race/item, click the “Add photo” link and your pics will be linked to that page.
• We simplified photo ratings and comments. Best photos rise to the top – simple as that.
• Photo and thumbnail resolutions have been improved to show more detail. Sweet!
• Improved ability to edit photo captions and delete your own photos.
• Photo tagging is still available and the new system makes even greater use of tags (more on that later).
• New photo category page shows thumbnails of the best pics and lists popular tags, new photos, and more.

So, why did we make these changes? For one thing, we felt like the old system was a bit too limited. Sure you could upload trail pics but what to do with pics of driveway jumps and sick bikes? The new photo system lets you categorize ANY type of MTB photo and there’s no limit to the number of pics you can submit (though we may have to remove photos that are inappropriate or completely unrelated to biking).

To organize all the new and old photos (nearly 13,000 pics!) we’re relying on your help. Members can tag any photo with descriptive phrases separated by commas. To those who are new to tagging, a brief example:

This is a photo I took at Santos last year so I tagged it like this: “santos, jump, drop, transition”. Notice the tags are separated by commas and describe a number of things in the photo (the location, the bike, the action). Now whenever anyone searches singletracks for photos of Transition bikes or Santos or jumps they’ll find this photo. Sweet, huh? Some magical tag searches to get you started: specialized bikes, bike art, 29ers, and freeride.

All the photos you upload (regardless of tagging) will show up in your personal photo album like the one below. Use related tags on the right to explore similar pics and to get an idea of which tags are most popular. Album photos are ordered by highest rated to lowest/unrated.

Other changes: photo contribution points have been re-scaled from 2 points per photo to 1 per photo to accommodate all the new content. Some trail photos may have been lost in the transition (less than 2% or so) and if you notice any specific weirdness use the “report a problem with this photo” link on the photo page to let us know. For general questions, feel free to post in the comments and we’ll respond directly.

Stay tuned for more news regarding the MTB photo system including upcoming contests and more…

Related posts:

1. New MTB Photo of the Day Feature on Singletracks.com
2. New MTB Review Features
3. Mountain bike photo contest
4. MTB photo contest: Garmin Edge 205 GPS to the winner!
5. Name That Trail Photo Contest Starts Monday

Tags: photos

This entry was posted on Friday, February 27th, 2009 at 4:23 pm and is filed under Hors Categorie, Singletracks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response by logging in and using the form at the bottom of this post, or trackback from your own site.