NLI parish registers - reduced image quality

Hermy

I've just noticed that the savable images of parish registers at the NLI site have been significantly reduced in quality from in excess of 1Mb to just a few hundred kilobytes.

That is a very retrograde step if you ask me.

I wonder why have they've done it?

pinkypinky

I think they've always been smaller when downloaded.

Why not take a screen grab of the relevant section and then link to the page?

Hermy

Not so Pinky.

I have saved hundreds of these records since the site came online and there's no comparison between the previously saved images and those available now.

Taking one example - Dalkey baptisms first week of January 1866.

Previously saved record is 2.9Mb and 5600x3800 while the currently available record is 257Kb and 1500x990.

https://registers.nli.ie/pages/vtls000633756_026

Saving links or screen grabs just doesn't cut it with me - I always prefer to save full documents where I can.

But that's beside the point.

Why have they reduced the quality of savable images to such an extent that they are now blurred before you enlarge them?

It just makes no sense.

Hermy

For comparison here's the new image next to a portion of the old one and with both at 100%.

Five lines of the previously available image is equal to the full page of the currently available image.

spurious

Just checked this and yes, the downloaded image is quite poor.

It's hardly a storage issue is it? Can't see the reasoning behind it.

Furze99

Maybe a decision by some IT professional who doesn't really understand how people use the material??

Lime Tree Farm

Maybe if they published the FAS parish books - much more user friendly. Nice then to have a look at the original handwritten record.

pinkypinky

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122542452#Comment_122542452

They're not owned by the NLI.

pinkypinky

That is a big difference! I rename my files so I'm not 100% sure where one came from (i.e. NLI vs irishgenealogy).

Worth sending them an email, Hermy.

Hermy

Email sent.

I'll keep ye posted on any response I get.

Hermy

I got a reply to say that they are aware of the issue and working to resolve it.

So that's good news.

VirginiaB

I find the parish images on Ancestry are much clearer. When I find one on the NLI site, I then go to Ancestry to locate it and download it from there. Of course, Ancestry's index isn't as good as rootsireland.ie so there is no simple way on this.

Hermy

I received an email late yesterday afternoon from NLI to say that the matter is very close to being resolved.