The Ambassador Images group has now been in existence for three years. The original idea was "... to show images by our members that are particularly worth seeing and that represent the spectrum of their work in the greatest possible diversity. It is not a 'best-of' group." It is now time to evaluate whether the group has achieved this goal or whether adjustments may be necessary.

The current inventory shows that of the total of 1264 contributions, 533 (42%) come from 81 group members. A further 731 (58%) contributions came from 200 other ipernity members. This shows that the group members not only have their own images in focus, but also appreciate the works of others. This commitment deserves to be honoured.

On average, 44 ipernity members submit suggestions every month. However, the average number of submitted images is higher (62) as one submission per week is possible:
Time period since the group rules were modified with regard to the number of possible submissions

Once a month, an editorial team categorises the image submissions according to their level of noteworthiness. The more noteworthy half of the proposed images will be accepted into the group. This is 16 to 30 pictures per month. As in our Gallery of the most popular current images, only one image per submitter is taken into account to ensure a fair chance for everyone, regardless of their productivity.

The thematic analysis of the image collection reveals the following spectrum:


As expected, nature motifs such as landscapes, flowers, plants and animals dominate with a total of 55% of entries. Images of people account for only 17% (in the genres People, Street and Sport), while human activity is represented by 22% (including Architecture, Technology, Art and Still Life). Remarkably, images of fences, which flood the gallery on Fridays, rarely make it into the Ambassador image pool (1%). Also remarkable is the respectable proportion of artistic works (6%), although only a small proportion of these are represented by AI-generated images. Last but not least, it is noticeable that there aren't any food images in the group.

It should also be assessed whether the jury succeeds in not simply producing another 'best-of' group, i.e. not being too impressed by perfect aesthetics, but always taking sufficient account of the emotional impact. As my co-admin Raingirl expressed in a discussion about noteworthyness: "Usually it is what might be called the imperfections of an image that make me love it."

To this end, the correlation between aesthetic quality and the editorial team's rating was analysed. The AI-based assessment tool Excire Aesthetics was used to score the aesthetics (horizontal, 0 ... 100%). The grading by the editorial team is plotted vertically:

One can recognise, even without statistical knowledge, that the editorial team classifies a wide aesthetic range as worth seeing.

All in all, it can be stated that the group's objective has been fully achieved. It shows a selection of the most worth seeing images of our community in great diversity.

However, the editorial team had the impression that the visual appeal had declined somewhat recently:


In the diagram, the blue dots show the average score of the accepted images. The grey bars show the range of ratings. However, a check with the above mentioned objective, AI-based evaluation tool Excire Aesthetics revealed that this subjective impression was misleading:


It is possible that the jury's subjective impression is due to habituation effects. The originally envisaged permanent renewal of the editorial team barely took place. Almost all of the team members have been on the job for more than a year, but this also has great advantages. In addition, the team is very balanced with 10 members from 6 countries on 3 continents and a good female/male ratio.

The editorial team will revisit this issue. It will also ask the 21 group members who have not posted any contributions of their own whether they are still interested in participating in the group.

St. Johann in Tyrol
April 20, 2024
Bergfex (admin)