User:Ryan McGrady/assignments/contributing to the commons

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WORK IN PROGRESS/TEMPORARY
(copied from User:Ryan McGrady/spring2014/com257/extracredit)

=Wikimedia Commons photo project=

Basics
This is an optional extra credit assignment. It will be due by the morning of section 002's final exam (May 2).

Through this project you can earn up to 5 extra credit points (added to your final grade). This is, of course, a substantial bump, so be advised it will take a lot of work to get all 5.

Description
For background, this project was inspired by the Wikipedia Takes (Your City), Wiki Loves Monuments, and the suggestions articulated in Photograph your hometown. Looking to those pages will provide more context for what I'm expecting.

Look around on the Commons for things you might want to take pictures of, noting what it doesn't currently have. Also look around at Wikipedia articles to find what subjects do not have images present in the article. Then put together a list/plan, present it to me, take the photos yourself (this is not a "find a photo" project; it's about your own work), upload them to the Commons, and include them on the Wikipedia page that currently lacks an image.

Wiki Loves Monuments was an initiative to get people all over the world to take pictures of monuments (including historic places, landmarks, etc.) and upload them to the Commons. In 2012 it attracted 15,000 participants from 35 countries who uploaded 350,000 images -- only a fraction of what's possible. It was organized again in 2013 and likely again in 2014. We won't be participating in this contest, as in takes place only one month out of the year, but the website was designed to encourage its continuance throughout the year. For example, if you go to this "Find a Monument" tool and type in your zip code, you'll see a map covered with green and red markers. These are the monuments we want pictures of (taken from the register of historic places and several other sources). Green markers indicate a picture has been uploaded already. Red markers are opportunities for you. There are dozens just within a mile of campus, for example, and hundreds more throughout North Carolina.

Images you take will fall into one of two categories:
 * 1) Requested images. These will almost always have Wikipedia pages associated with them. In the rare case a Wikipedia article does not exist for one of them (for example, some obscure place on the register of historic places), it still counts for the purpose of this project.
 * 2) *Everything at the Wiki Loves Monuments project falls into this category.
 * 3) *Wikipedia also has a template people can add to an article requesting an image of the subject of that article. Use of this template adds pages to a category or one of many subcategories you can find at Category:Wikipedia requested photographs.
 * 4) Unrequested images. These are images you see a need for, even if nobody has requested them. For each of these there must be a Wikipedia article it can be used on.

Be sure to talk to me as early as possible about your plan or to ask questions. The amount of extra credit will vary depending on the amount of work required.

What You Will Need

 * digital camera or really good camera in your phone
 * little bits of paper, index cards, a little white board...something for reference shots (see below)
 * time

Submitting
First, upload everything to the Commons.
 * Be sure you're logged in.
 * Wiki Loves Monuments automates this
 * See links at the bottom for some guidelines.
 * Be as clear, precise, and descriptive as possible. Fill in as many of the information fields as possible.

Useful Tutorials and Information

 * commons:Commons:How to take pictures for Wikimedia Commons - photography basics, but also a little bit on naming conventions and editing.
 * commons:Commons:Image guidelines - a whole lot of details, technical and otherwise, dealing with what makes for the ideal Wikipedia Commons image. Just as there are Featured Articles, so there are Featured Pictures.
 * commons:Commons:Contributing your own work
 * Picture tutorial - this is about using pictures on a page, not shooting or uploading them