Hmm I’m inclined to agree with hkibak. My more recent iPhones have become very frustratingly cranky about focusing closeup with the 3x lens . I went into an Apple store last week and asked about it. The advisor told me to use Portrait mode, which I think was him having me on. I have not used a SLR in many years, but I’m sure my old camera was never this fickle about focusing.
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Thanks for passing that tip. I’ll try it.
Misfocus with my DSLR was me and my eyesight. The iPhone wants to think for me, which causes misfocus. Then I have to fiddle to get it to “ understand “ where it should be focused. Fat, crooked old fingers don’t make that any easier.
The iPhone is easier for me to carry and is safer in its protective case. My dslr is broken (
) from hitting a tree (while strapped to my wrist) during a fall.
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If you focus not with a viewfinder, but through the screen, it uses the same constrast type of focus, it’s insanely bad, I had damaged a mirror on one of my cameras and had to go out with screen only, well, it was a perfect day and this thing couldn’t focus on a crow standing in a perfect light, just went zooming in and out forever.
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Some people know The Right Way to do things and want the others they interact with to do thing that way, and tell us so on iNaturalist. I’ve seen complaints about photo length/width ratios, as well as fingers or feet. These people are doomed to be disappointed.
I often put fingers or mittens in photos. Why? Mostly, because I had to pick the organism up to photo it. (I’m not as flexible as I used to be.) Often, to help with focus. Sometimes for scale (mostly my foot next to a mole hill, since our two moles make hills of different sizes). I plan to continue causing this kind of disappointment.
(Re conservation effects of picking things up: Right now I’m photographing lots of lichens that have fallen from trees. I don’t feel guilty about picking them up or dropping them back down. Ditto for all kinds of things that washed up on the beach. Sometimes I pick up plant parts, if needed for identification, but usually a small part of the plant or a common weed.)
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I have only recently joined the forum. So far I have learned many ways to disappoint people on iNat. I totally plan on continuing in my wicked ways! I have learned that other people’s opinion on me is 1 none of my business and 2 says more about themselves than me.
I will photograph with fingers or whatever else I need. For size, scale, to hold still and to make it easier on me.
I will continue to use CV for beginning ID. I believe it’s through use that Seek improves. Since Seek is geared for children, I believe we need to make sure it improves, or they will have a difficult time becoming good at ID.
You can teach an old dog new tricks, but it’s still going to be an old dog!
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I have Observations with fingers, even whole hands, in the photo(s)–mine and other people’s. Sometimes it is helpful to hold something in order to photograph it, whether picking up a small organism or holding a tree branch steady on a windy day.
I joke that I have more photos of a local naturalist’s hands holding “critters” than I have of him (he’s kind of camera-shy), and even recognized his hand holding a turtle in somebody else’s iNat Observation! I also noticed somebody captured my turquoise sneakers for posterity, along with something on a local beach, before I’d joined iNat.
And then there’s this one from a recent walk, in which I used my size 9 boot to illustrate the size of a dead fish on the beach: https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/104785612.
As long as the hand, foot or whatever is there only to aid in the photographing of an identifiable organism I have no problem with it. (And I’ll say what nobody else seem to have yet: the person who complained about your finger in a photo is an officious prig.)
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What’s wrong with natural looking hands/fingers? People get their hands hurt and dirty. It means they have been out and about, and it’s part of life. Advertising is another thing. Painted nails are interesting, but no better than grubby hands.
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Sometimes observations where the fingers have bleeding cuts, puncture wounds or swelling can tell an interesting story about the focal organism’s defense mechanisms
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Definitely don’t sweat the impact of fingers in your photos on computer vision. We’ve seen no evidence that hands in plant photos hurts suggestion accuracy, and anecdotally it seems to help by framing the subject and may even provide a very occasional hint to the system - I doubt we have many training photos of poison oak being held.
I guess I prefer computer vision over artificial intelligence a) because it’s more precise, and b) for the same reason we refer to model output as suggestions instead of predictions in the UI.
It also sounds a little less grandiose to me. 
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Many people who identify animal tracks know that I have a size 8 pink flipflop. I’m not worried that they will be able to steal my passwords as a result. And my sweaty fingerprints are on display in lots of photos. Good luck framing me for their murders.
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I am wondering at what stage we will start the finger puns 
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Some of the best hands and fingers I have seen are of people who do hard physical labour – photographing organisms (seeds, insects, or anything appropriate), on such hands, adds not just emotional value as @polypody says above, but I think may also be artistic.
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When I was shooting alpine flowers I included a NEW penny in one shot. Each spring I would get the new year penny so at first glance I knew when I took the pic.
Gary
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When you get your finger in the bird photo.
Now. You’re welcome.
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I’ve actually seen and ID’d observations of people holding poison ivy for the picture. >_<
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what concern me about finger in photos, and what I’ve been doing for a while now is avoiding my fingerprint, for biosecurity reasons. And yes, I use a lot my fingers to show sizes, but only from my nail view. But no problem if you use your fingers, cant see the issue.
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Canada no longer has pennies! But it’s a great idea.
I’ve only held a baby blue jay and a baby hummingbird alive. (Unfortunately I have handled several window strike victims.)
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for me putting finger in photo is necessary because my cam is auto focus one, so it cannot focus on anything small, it need a reference to focus, so I always have fingers or some external unessesary things in my photo which help me focus, so I always spoil nature photograph too
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