empty pages without animals
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by
lesleylupo
For every animal I do find, I have ten of these. I don't have a lot of time to do these so I am wondering the benefit of these empty ones? I do the penguin project too and perhaps one out of 50 is empty.
Posted
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by
remckenna
The lack of animals can sometimes be useful data, depending on the project. For example what if animals are supposed to be in an area by a season and they aren't? Alternatively, given these pictures are most likely taken by stationary cameras set on timers, if enough people indicate they don't have animals in them, they're removed from what is otherwise a painfully gargantuan dataset.
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by
davidbygott
moderator
in response to remckenna's comment.
The cameras are all stationary, attached to trees, about .5m above ground. They are triggered by motion, but any motion will do it - waving grass, even a bird or insect passing close. So we do get a lot of blanks and we value your help in weeding them out.
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by
tillydad
moderator
in response to remckenna's comment.
That is an excellent point that you make about there being no animals in an area at any given time . Researchers can gain information from "empty" images, especially by comparing images taken over a number of years, as is the case here on Snapshot Serengeti .
It is worth remembering that a negative result is still a result in terms of collecting data 😃
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lesleylupo
Wow, thanks guys, no problem then. I have a couple of other projects, penguins being one of them, and I wondered if I was wasting the little time I have for helping.
😄Posted
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by
tillydad
moderator
in response to lesleylupo's comment.
It is always a bit disappointing for we individuals to find no animals in an image, but the researchers do value all of the input that we make . It is not a waste of time, and thanks for helping, when I know that we all have pressing demands on our time 😃
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