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Images need to be 210 pixels high for the contest, and in landscape orientation. John Cavan asks if that means 211 pixels is the minimum width.

Is that the case, or is there some other minimum to really qualify as landscape, or are square-format images good enough?

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I was teasing you! :p – John Cavan♦ Jan 5 at 23:03

2 Answers

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The two rules as stated:

Images must be 210 px high and up to 375 px wide. This is the requirement for the header. Please feel free to provide a link to a larger version, but as explained above, the primary focus is on the header image.

For the same reason, images must be in landscape orientation.

The only firm requirement is that images must be 210px high and a maximum of 375px wide. The requirement for "landscape orientation" isn't needed, but is sometimes noted when someone posts a 375px high by 210px wide image. The second rule isn't needed at all as long as the first is followed, importantly with the correct px high and wide.

As far as I'm concerned, you can post a 210px high 1px wide image to the contest, all the way up to 210px high by 375px wide - the choice is that of the poster. The second requirement should be removed.

More clearly stated the new rule could say:

Images must be 210px high and between 1-375px wide. This is a requirement for the header.

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That's how I read it as well, but I do hope that people at least give the appearance of trying to keep the design of the site in mind. A few px off of the 375 isn't a huge deal, but a vertical would leave a hole in the design. Think about it in terms of bidding on a contract for a double-page spread—you vertical might be the bestest picture ever, but it doesn't fit. This is a header image contest, not a photo contest as such. – Stan Rogers Jan 5 at 23:10
@StanRogers - Agreed that the header consideration is important. I would hope that if someone posts a 210x1px image that people just don't vote it up, but I think if we get a 210x210 image it would work fine with the site design, although not optimal unless the CSS floats over and I don't think it will. – dpollitt Jan 5 at 23:12
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I would prefer that we have a minimum width. Below a certain width...probably 210px (which would make a square 1:1 image), I think the header would start to get a little weird looking. I don't think we could really support portrait-orientation images, as they would have to be very narrow. I would also suspect that images that are too narrow would cause problems with the CSS formatting, which is touchy enough as it is. – jrista♦ Jan 6 at 5:31
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Just for reference, here's what it looks like with narrower images and the current CSS.

Current, width 375px:

enter image description here

Square, width 210px:

enter image description here

Portrait 2:1, width 105px:

enter image description here

The narrower formats do mess up the layout. It would be nice if we could support any aspect ratio people care to submit, but then we would have to modify the CSS.

Can we do that?

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What do you mean "mess up the layout"? Are you referring to the text on the right of the image "winter day, picture of the week, etc"? Just checking because that is the only thing I see that moves at all. – dpollitt Jan 6 at 23:38
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@dpollitt Yes, that's what I meant. In the original, you see the left margin of the "winter day... etc" text block lines up with the start of the search box above as well as the "Welcome!" block below. I expect that's by design. With the narrower pictures, that's no longer the case. I think the CSS modifications would be simple - fix the "winter day, etc." text block in place, and center or right-align the image - but I guess the stackexchange web designers would have an opinion on that. – j-g-faustus Jan 7 at 0:05

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