Off-Topic Forum

I personally would like to even see a crappy quality picture of a card, just so I know what to look for.  

What does it matter right it's scanned or an actual picture of a card?   I know I'm not alone on this thought

You are not alone. However, ADMIN has set forth the standard  of qaulity he wants so that is what it is. Feel free to message him but good luck. BTW I agree for stuff that are SN 100 or less but will go with ADMIN

https://www.tcdb.com/FAQ.cfm?ITEM=Photographs

Yep, ultimately it's Admin's rule so if you can't convince him to change it, it's gonna stay.

I would be more in favor of them if the vast majority of photos submitted here didn't look flat-out awful. Some people can't even be bothered to remove their cards from penny sleeves and or top-loaders, or photograph them on display stands. That's totally fine for a personal album or listing on eBay, but they don't give you the level of detail that's useful here, especially when you're trying to discern tiny differences in variations. Also, some are just ridiculous, like the ones where you can clearly see the submitter's and their phone's reflections on Chrome and Prizm cards.

Maybe a certain standard of quality for photos could be established so they'd at least be decently close to what scans produce: a good flat, rectangular image that's properly lit and cropped.

I get it for the vast minor differences like panini does, and I respect the admins. Just so many cards I have that don't have pictures and so many more I need that I don't have a clue what they even look like.  Lol. 

Just to clarify, there is one Admin, the owner of this site, and the person whose rules we're following.

The nature of the database being crowdsourced is a double-edged sword, with missing images being one of the negatives. Fortunately, members keep adding them all the time, plus there are other good sources when you strike out here, especially COMC (make sure you use the "include sold out" feature) and eBay/WorthPoint.

With the boom of the hobby and people chasing the hits, there are so many cards that will never be scanned on this site, but we do have photo evidence of

Its going to be awkward when the old buzzards wiith scanners connected to their desktop computers at their dedicated computer desks start dropping off and no new images are uploaded to the site. But that is a story for another day...

This is why photos are not allowed.

I don't see any reason why we couldn't allow photos in a separate section of the card's page from the regular scans and still have set standards for how the photos should appear.  They could still be subjected to IRs if they're crappy photos the same way we flag crappy scans. It would help quite a bit with identifying cards.