User talk:MrLizard

Talk to me here! &rArr; MrLizard (Contribs • &uArr; top &uArr; • Email ) 19:18, August 22, 2020 (EDT)

Monster Images - Style
I noticed that on your userpage, you have a project to upload images for monsters that are missing them. I've had a thought of doing the same, although I'm still relatively new to the wiki. I have started taking screenshots of monsters I see that don't have images, but now I am paused at what to do next; specifically, I wanted to see if there are any guidelines or recommendations on how to crop the images (note: I only have MS Paint), what format to save them as, or...anything else I might -not- know about. Since you have this as a project of your own, I figured I would ask you for tips and advice! If you could tell me anything and everything someone would need to know on what to do to upload a -good- image, what criteria to fulfill, that would be greatly appreciated! &rArr; TheWarforgedArtificer (Contribs • Message • Email ) 13:37, October 7, 2020 (EDT)
 * Don't worry, I am also new to the wiki. I must confess I am not an expert on taking pictures of monsters and uploading to the wiki. I also need some advices. I will detail the procedure I usually go through when taking pictures of monsters, but as you will see, it can be VERY painful. There MUST be a easier way to make good images. I use GIMP do edit the images (it is free software and available for windows), and usually upload them in png format. The procedure assume you are playing DDO on Windows 10:
 * 1: Make sure the Snipping Tool of Windows 10 is configured to be used directly with the Print Screen key. This will make the process far less painful.
 * 2: Open DDO in windowed mode. This will allow you to take screenshots from 'outside' the DDO window. I have noticed that at least the Steam screenshot (F12) can reduce the image quality.
 * 3: Engage the monster you want to take a picture. Zoom in until you enter in first-person view mode. Make sure no hirelings/pets/summons, DM messages, or damage numbers are in your screen.
 * 4: (Difficult part!) Have a good angle, wait for the 'right moment'. Full monster and floating name must be on screen (if possible). Then, click outside the DDO window (can be on the windows taskbar) and finally call the Snipping Tool using the Print Screen key. This will freeze your screen and allow to cut the image. (Be sure you are overlevel, because the monster will be attacking you while you cut the image!)
 * 5: Click the notification generated by the Snipping Tool after cutting the image. This will open a new window with the screenshot. By doing this, you can take any number of images of the monster without losing the previous screenshot.
 * 6: Click on Copy in the Snipping Tool, and open GIMP. Paste the image in there, it will create a new file. Save it in the native xcf format for later editing if you like.
 * 7: Edit the image using GIMP as you like, then export it as png.
 * 8: Upload the image to https://compresspng.com/. This will normally reduce the size of the file in about 60%. Download the compressed png file.
 * 9: Upload the compressed image to the wiki.


 * Feel free to give me tips and advices or ask me any questions! &rArr; MrLizard (Contribs • &uArr; top &uArr; • Email ) 20:06, October 7, 2020 (EDT)
 * Huh. I play DDO in fullscreen mode, not on Steam, and have Win7 OS. I don't know about image quality, but I have at least gotten the art of capturing the "right screenshot" down already, I think. My DDO documents folder is filling up with screenshots, I just am unsure where to go from here. Like I said, I only have MS Paint, not GIMP. I could just crop out a box with the creature in question from my interface-filled viewing window screenshot relatively easy using MS paint and just upload that, but I wasn't sure if there were any other details I should know about, since the wiki-help pages on screenshots didn't have enough of the information I was looking for. Hmm. You know, if the "Village Pump" is basically the forum for this wiki, I wonder if it'd be worth it to start a topic on this there...I don't know how much traffic it gets, though. &rArr; TheWarforgedArtificer (Contribs • Message • Email ) 13:45, October 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * I agree. There is a image_help channel in the DDOwiki discord, however it would be nice to have something documented in the wiki itself with specific recommendations for monster images. As I said, I am far from being an expert. Just wanted to share my -painful- procedure. Thankfully I was able to get some good images, such as in Blood Tide Sailor and Ir'gorthulzz. &rArr; MrLizard (Contribs • &uArr; top &uArr; • Email ) 14:11, October 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * There aren't many recommendations for monster images anyway. Try to not include other monsters/players/NPCs in the screenshot. Try not to have any effects going on. Try to get the full monster in the image. Try to have the monster in the center of the image and about 1/3rd of it (the 1/3 comes from studies in selfie pictures). However, even if you are unable to take the perfect image, any image is better than no image; and if you take a better image than the existing one, you can upload a new version of the old image. As for how to take screenshots... the default keybinding to take screenshots is CTRL+P and then you find those screenshots in "Documents( and Settings)/Dungeons and Dragons Online". Editing the screenshots with Paint to crop the interesting part is sufficient. Compressing the images as mentioned above might be good practice, but not required. &rArr; Faltout (Contribs • Message • Email ) 09:53, October 9, 2020 (EDT)
 * Thanks for the advice! Forget my crazy methodology... I don't know why I always do stuff in a more complicated way than necessary. &rArr; MrLizard (Contribs • &uArr; top &uArr; • Email ) 00:17, October 11, 2020 (EDT)
 * Ah, all good info Faltout. Yeah, for all those recommendations about how to -take- the pics, I've already been doing all that, but it is very good to have that list of recommendations. With cropping with Paint being sufficient and maybe compressing, I now know there isn't any weird special things I should be aware of beforehand, I just wanted to make sure there were no "unknown unknowns" when it came to best-practices/standards in uploading images. I've got a fair library of screenshots built up now, I will begin uploading them as soon as I can make the time. &rArr; TheWarforgedArtificer (Contribs • Message • Email ) 18:45, October 11, 2020 (EDT)

Monster Images - Categorization
I also noticed that you started another project to categorize all monster images that don't have that proper categorization. I also noticed you stopped at some point, so I though I might assist a little...but then I realized, there is NO reason to do all this work by hand. Literally all you are doing is adding to the bottom of each page, right? And you've created a diagnostic tool of your own to locate every image that is used in a monster page but not categorized as a monster image. SURELY this is absolutely the kind of work meant for a bot, right? (Unless you were already using a bot but stopped it for whatever reason, of course) &rArr; TheWarforgedArtificer (Contribs • Message • Email ) 13:37, October 7, 2020 (EDT)
 * Thanks for contacting me! Indeed, this is exactly what I am doing, but without using a bot (all my edits were made by hand!). I still need to learn how to use a bot. It will be great if we can automate something like "Add to the end of every File: page linked from U:MrLizard/Diagnostics/Uncategorized monster images". &rArr; MrLizard (Contribs • &uArr; top &uArr; • Email ) 15:24, October 7, 2020 (EDT)
 * Right, so, did a little digging, and there are resources out there on bots in mediawiki software. https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Bots and  https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Manual:Creating_a_bot, although if you aren't actually a wiki-vet yourself, probably would be a good idea to get in touch with one of the admins/other vets of this wiki and work with them to create a bot to automate this work. &rArr; TheWarforgedArtificer (Contribs • Message • Email ) 13:39, October 8, 2020 (EDT)
 * I am trying to verify in the DDOwiki discord if I can use AWB for this, or maybe ask someone with more credentials to run it. I will be creating other diagnostic pages for other purposes as well. &rArr; MrLizard (Contribs • &uArr; top &uArr; • Email ) 14:11, October 8, 2020 (EDT)