Wikipedia:Featured picture candidates/Sword dance

Sword dance

Reason: Another early twentieth century archival photo: a military sword dance in celebration of an Ottoman victory during World War I. Unfortunately no data available on exact date or location, but a fascinating cultural document with an attractive composition. Restored version of Image:Men dancing with swords.jpg.
Articles this image appears in: Sword dance
Creator: American Colony (Jerusalem)

Support as nominator --Durova^Charge! 21:47, 28 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support A great image which meets the criteria. The encyclopedic value seems huge. Nick Dowling (talk) 11:21, 29 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Weak Support. The angle is kind of akward, and the sword dance is blurry (but that's understandable; they're moving!), and that detracts from its EV, but it's the best illustration of a sword dance on the page, and the quality is good. What sells it are the expressions on the onlookers' faces. Intothewoods29 (talk) 16:02, 29 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support Shoemaker's Holiday (talk) 05:55, 30 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose for being overexposed, grainy, and not very sharp. We can forgive technical flaws of historical images if they are super-encyclopedic, but I think this is only moderately encyclopedic. Sword dancing does not appear to be an extinct practice, so I expect a good photographer with a modern camera could take an amazing picture. Fletcher (talk) 22:58, 30 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
- The Ottoman Empire ceased to exist very shortly after this image was taken and the successor state actively turned its back on much of its distinctive customs. Durova^Charge! 09:16, 31 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. A valuable and interesting image, but the quality is not quite there in my view.--ragesoss (talk) 16:09, 31 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support Edit 1 - The quality is now decent and the image still has a very high value. --Arad (talk) 16:53, 1 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose It's too hard to see the actual dance that's going on here. This image of a Bedouin woman dancing with a sword is far more compelling visually and would be much more helpful to readers of the article. I'm starting to restore it, then I'll upload it. Calliopejen1 (talk) 20:00, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I've put my alternate image to the right. I think this would be a much better lead image, because you can actually see the person dancing with the sword. It's also a really interesting cultural document in its own right--this isn't the stereotypical image of a Middle Eastern woman. Calliopejen1 (talk) 22:12, 2 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was looking at that one too when I selected this. Durova^Charge! 03:09, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This one is faar more special with the WWI setting. Just my 2 cents --66.36.134.61 (talk) 04:36, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose, but Support the new one! --Blechnic (talk) 06:43, 3 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose. Angle helps to get a good view of the crowd, but also helps to obscure the action of the dance. Clegs (talk) 15:03, 5 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Not promoted MER-C 12:28, 6 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]