Commons:Categories for discussion/2016/02/Category:Graphics

See also: Commons:Categories for discussion/2014/07/Category:Illustrations by work.

See also: Commons:Categories for discussion/2013/08/Category:Engraved illustrations of people.

The category description points to en:Graphics which defines graphics as "visual images or designs on some surface, such as a wall, canvas, screen, paper, or stone to inform, illustrate, or entertain. (...) Examples are photographs, drawings, line art, graphs, diagrams, typography, numbers, symbols, geometric designs, maps, engineering drawings, or other images." Unless I've missed something, that's all images. This category, however, is a sub-category of both Category:Illustrations and Category:Images. I'd either like a more specific definition, or a redirect to Category:Images. Themightyquill (talk) 08:02, 10 February 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I also agree, but the description you give is not there. I interpret "Graphics" much more narrowly than the definition you quote (which is effectively for all images but not for all graphics).

Anyway, as it is hard to draw a deadline for graphics, my opinion is that this category should be directly merged into Images (but there's a lot of images stored directly here that should rather go to "Uncategorized images". But the subcategories listed here (Charts) are pertinent for inclusion in "Images", with some adjustments (and there should be differences between computer generated graphics, including most charts, and artistic creations, which may be computer-aided but finalized by lot of artistic choices, and handrawn graphics, which in fact can be recategorized as paintings, caligraphy...).

This category is currently a real mess mixing in fact almost all types of contents we can find on Commons (except audio files, but including PDFs and scanned images, photos, and animations). Its pertinence is really extremely low the way it is structured now and used (because many people have very different visions about how they understand the term). verdy_p (talk) 23:10, 14 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I've added the CFD template to Category:Visualization and Category:Illustrations as they seem similarly ambiguous. Images of illustrations taken from books is clear enough, but does anything that illustrates (or could illustrate) an idea fit in Category:Illustrations ? en:Visualizations is just a disambiguation page. - Themightyquill (talk) 07:53, 9 May 2016 (UTC)[reply]

• {{O}} Photos are images, but not graphics.   — Jeff G. ツ 05:52, 15 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Jeff G.: I'm not sure I understand. Are you saying graphics are not images, or photographs are not graphics? The proposal was to potentially do away with Category:Graphics and replace it with Category:Images. That wouldn't put photographs in Category:Graphics but it would but graphics in Category:Images. Any photographs should all be sub-categories of Category:Photographs anyway, so they wouldn't be directly affected. - Themightyquill (talk) 14:32, 15 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

 Oppose I was writing off the cuff, sorry. Looking deeper, these two categories are 11+ years old. They and their descendants combined contain the majority of our files. Before we impose the mess that is Category:Graphics on Category:Images and insult all the graphic artists, I think we should have a wider announcement of this Cfd at COM:VP.   — Jeff G. ツ 23:07, 15 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

I think a better definition of "Graphics" would be to exclude photographs... AnonMoos (talk) 06:39, 19 November 2017 (UTC)[reply]

@Themightyquill, Jeff G., Verdy p, and AnonMoos:

• "Graphics" are visual presentations which are on a surface. (en:Graphics)

• Photographs are graphics. The very word photograph is "photo" (light) + "graph" (graphic). A photograph is created by light on a surface.
• Videos likewise are graphics, in that they consist of a visual presentation on a surface.

• "Images" are artifacts relying on visual perceptions. (en:Images)

• Sculptures are images rendered in three dimensions, not necessarily depicted on a surface, and so therefore are an image that is not a graphic.
• Images formed without use of a surface, such as mental or holographic images, would likewise not be graphics.

• As far as I can figure, all "graphics" are "images", but not all "images" are "graphics".
• For the purposes of categorizing by media type, there is no discernable difference between the two...i.e. I cannot think of a media type that we can host on Commons that would qualify as one and not the other, since Commons files which display visual information are artifacts and are displayed on a surface.
• For the purposes of categorizing by topic, we may indeed have graphics which depict images that are not graphics. For instance, a photograph of a statue would be a graphic (photograph) of an image that not a graphic (statue).
• In common modern colloquial usage, "graphic" has a more restictive connotation, as being an image in which the contents are artificial, such as a drawing, information graphic, or computer-generated image of some sort. Photographs and videos are not commonly considered "graphics" in this context.
• In common modern colloquial usage, "image" is also more restrictive as generally being understood as a 'snap shot' single frame presentation such as a photograph or picture (or even a still from a video). Sculpture and videos are not generally referred to as an "image" in non-technical usage.

It strikes me that would first need to decide whether we are going to go by the technically correct definitions of "graphic" and "image" or the modern colloquial usage of these terms, as that has a big impact on how we should determine the content and structure of both categories. The technically correct definitions lead to a much clearer structure and definition, but I think the vast majority of users will approach these categories with a colloquial context, so I really am not sure which is the right path. Thoughts on which would be better to implement? Josh (talk) 16:28, 4 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]

@Joshbaumgartner: What about a new Category:Visual files, for all files with a visual aspect (not audio)?   — Jeff G. ツ _{please ping or talk to me} 13:05, 5 October 2019 (UTC)[reply]