Re: AIS: REF: AIS as International Registration Authority

First of all, I do like the idea of having a picture with registrations. It
may even be a good idea, but it is a huge can of worms for myriad reasons.

What purpose would having a picture serve, particularly a printed picture?
The registrar or archivist would have to accept that the photo was indeed
the cultivar being registered. Most people who grow and hybridize are
meticulous and dedicated, and also honest. There would always be a few who
were not, who might substitute a nicer galmour shot of a sibling because it
looked better. For reasons outlined below, no one might ever be the wiser
even if the Court Photographer held a picture up to the registration and
deemed it the same.

First you have differences in the way plants appear caused by soil and
climate differences. For example, OKTOBERFEST  appears more pastel in Oregon
than it does in Ohio. In Ohio it has deep color saturation. Now, add film
variances, camera variances, paper variances, photo finishing variances.
Then take into consideration sun intensity, time of day the photo was taken,
and the weather conditions, not to mention age of the bloom. Are we taking
slides or print film? When we archive the photo are we scanning it? If it is
a digital photo, every digital camera takes the picture a little bit
differently  in respect to color variance and saturation. If we are simply
keeping electronic images, every monitor shows it differentl, and everyone
has their preference for brightness, contrast, and tint, all of which affect
the appearance of the picture. Some folks, especially those producing
catalogs simply can't resist Photoshop to enhance the picture. Every step
along the path from the garden to the viewed picture adds a layer of error
to what happens in the garden.

We all know the difficulties with identifying an iris from printed
descriptions. It is even more difficult with pictures. Once we have archived
these pictures, (assuming they are a tool to AID in identification) human
nature will take over for many. In life, how we perceive things often
becomes reality. Many people will take that one photo for gospel in
identifying a particular cultivar. Assuming we have overcome many of the
issues in assuring the "correctness" of the photo, this will still be a
major hurdle. But not THE hurdle.

The real hurdle will be in the use of the archived images, particularly if
they are in print form. Again assuming the real use of the images is to
confirm or rule out trueness of a cultivar rather than gathering dust on a
shelf for the sake of history, how will we administrate the use of them? At
least 1000 cultivars a year are registered. Let us assume a ten year period,
that comes to 10,000 photos. From the amount of ID requests  I see just on
this forum, we can assume at least maybe 500 to 1000 request per year to see
the photo for "XYZ" and "ABC". That is a lot of work for a volunteer,
especially since they will have to have a way to copy the picture since a
true archive photo should never leave home. I am sure the expense of doing
this would cut down the requests, perhaps even reducing the amount of
requests to a small enough number to make the photo archives gather dust
after all. Who wants to spend 5$ to verify a cultivar that cost 3$? I think
the archivist job would be a full time job.  The electronic option is
better, although not everyone has or wants to use computers. You are looking
at a large amount of storage space, and the time required to render print to
binary code, handling email requests for images, hosting expenses.....the
list goes on. If it is decentralized into sections it becomes less user
friendly as well as less economical for the sections.

The only workable way I see to deal with photos is to make it optional at
the time of registration, electronic form not to exceed a certain size (say
500k), and preface the use with hundreds of caveats in the form of a EULA
that tell why it is at best a faulty way to ID an iris.

Personally, I buy the plant, bloom it, check the written description, verify
it as best I can, and if I like it I keep it. If not, it goes into the
compost bin and I try again. And I buy from reputable sources. Just my
thoughts, I could be wrong. And welcome back, Anner, we have missed you. Do
you want to be the Court Photographer <G>?

John Bruce
Hidden Acres Iris Gardens.

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