Current Features

Current features of the site as of 22JUN26

• Public gallery — browse/listing pages, full photo detail pages, and per-photographer albums.
• Homepage featured row (3 cards):
  • 🏆 Photo of the Day — most-viewed in the last 24h
  • 👍 Photographer's Choice — top votes on a rolling 24h window
  • ⭐ Staff Choice — hand-picked by a screener
• Inline voting on every card (rolling 24h window).
• Smart view counting — de-duped per viewer for 1 hour, and never counts the owner.
• Country flags on cards & detail pages, plus tags / photo styles including "Scanned Photo".
• Rich upload — EXIF extraction, optional watermarking (5-position picker), and magic-byte validation.
• Aircraft lookups — registration (AeroDataBox + adsbdb), airline/airport typeahead, MSN auto-fill, and military operator abbreviation expansion.
• Daily upload limit — 5/day, resets 00:00 UTC, with an in-form counter.
• Scanned / vintage support with screener notes.
• Screening queue — full-res viewer with zoom / exposure / contrast checks, Staff Choice on approval, and mandatory rejection reasons.
• Rejected Photos page — 14-day retention + auto-purge, plus appeals (one per 24h, emailed to Head Screeners).
• Upload bans — 5 durations, emailed reason, and an upload-page guard.
• Categories grouped into News / General / Photography / Videography sections — topics, replies, and a rich editor with image embedding.
• 5-post approval queue for new users; role-restricted posting per category.
• Member profiles — ranks, signatures, and avatars.
• Moderation suite — Reports, Users, HR pages, Pending posts, Locked topics, and category/topic creators.
• Forum bans (temporary / permanent) with history tracking, HR notes, and email notifications.
• Per-topic mod controls — Sticky, Lock, Move, Mods-Only posting, and rename.
• 📋 Forum Rules page (database-editable) linked from the forum footer.
• Spotter Map — Leaflet satellite map with community spotting locations per airport; propose / edit pins.
• Spotting Conditions Calculator — sun timing (golden / blue hour), weather forecast, likely runway in use, and a per-runway lighting timeline. Works for any airport worldwide, with no paid APIs.
• ~40,000 runways plus global airport data (OurAirports).
• Full ADS-B live map (Leaflet) with 8 base maps including VFR / IFR aviation charts, METAR overlays, and a severe-weather overlay (tornado / storm / flood warnings, with a legend).
• User accounts, profiles, badges / achievements, and a photo tracking / watch page.

Thank you for being here, and happy spotting!