Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Soviet Wehrmacht Soldier

Soviet Wehrmacht Soldier

File:Bundesarchiv Bild 101I-236-1045-15A, Russland, Einheimischer in deutschen Diensten retouched.jpg

Original - A Soviet member of the German Wehrmacht, fighting in the southern Soviet Union in January 1943.

Reason: This image meets most of the criteria outright. Although "small" (not 1,000px²), the image has a good composition and I did some work to get rid of major scratches. This is one of the better quality images donated by the Bundesarchive to Wikipedia Commons. The image is historic and so I know that a number of images have been passed without meeting the minimum resolution requirements given their historic value. As if to underscore the historic value of the image, this image is fairly popular in published books; this is a well known image to WWII Eastern Front historians. This is amongst Wikipedia's best work relative to the subject it represents; the photograph cannot be retaken, and there are few images available for Wikipedia on Russians who fought for the German Army during the Second World War. It has a free license, adds values to three articles (insofar) and is accurate.
Articles this image appears in: Wehrmacht, Russian Liberation Army, Heer (1935–1945)
Creator: Waidelich; retouched by Catalan

Support as nominator --JonCatalán^(Talk) 18:40, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Note -- I tried increasing the resolution. JonCatalán^(Talk) 19:46, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Support - Spiffing. 82.0.93.62 (talk) 20:27, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
oppose interesting composition and subject. The image quality is low though - it has lots of compression artifacts. There is no way to "increase resolution" without going to the original data or negative. de Bivort 20:19, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

I know, but I was hoping that the historical value of the image would supersede the obvious lack in image quality given the conditions the image was taken in and who the picture was taken by. JonCatalán^(Talk) 20:21, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. The issue with the image quality is not something relating to the conditions the image was taken in. It is a digital reproduction issue. Also, you can't just 'upsample' the image to 1000 pixels to make it through FPC. The alternative image looks fairly awful as a result. The original film/print would have far higher quality than this. Whether it is obtainable, I don't know, but this version will not pass at this res, IMO. Diliff | (Talk) (Contribs) 22:26, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Note. In that case, withdraw the nomination. :) JonCatalán^(Talk) 22:28, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
- For what it's worth, it is a pretty good photo. Only the size and image quality stop me from wholeheartedly supporting it. ;-) Diliff | (Talk) (Contribs) 22:32, 6 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Regretful oppose for technical reasons. The type of image I call a heartbreaker during archival searches: encyclopedic, interesting composition, but just too short on technical specs to consider for featured picture candidacy. Keep up the good work and do continue searching, please. Historic FPs are rare finds, even with restoration. About 1 in 1000 has the right stuff. Best wishes, Durova^Charge! 03:33, 8 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Not promoted - Withdrawn by nominator. --jjron (talk) 13:30, 9 January 2009 (UTC)[reply]