Distinction between collars and chokers

tl;dr Neckwear tag use confusion because in theory they refer to the same concept just at different sizes but in practice they aren't.

I started thinking about this when I was replacing heart collar mistags that were meant to be heart necklace and this got me a bit curious and confused about the way we use choker and collar, though more specifically collar than anything else.

As I see it now, I've generally understood that chokers are meant to be thin bands around the neck while collar seems to be used for any other neck-related attachment at any height of the neck. Aliases like belt choker to belt collar don't do much good in breaking this weird sort of distinction between the two. Particularly that it seems like bands of any size are relegated to choker while parts of a top or anything that goes around the neck is tagged with collar.

For example, a character I upload now, Lupa (Wuthering Waves), I've been tagging with metal collar for the shiny piece around her lower neck that I suppose in a way also serves as a halterneck (is it even one? its not a string or strap from the bodysuit that's keeping it together, considering it is backless). For a more general example, playboy bunny often features what we currently tag as detached collar + wing collar (the latter less so than the former). Though no one would refute post #9390947 being a choker (or maybe someone will?).

For other examples, we currently tag Nicole Demara with heart collar (see post #8594977 for ex). It's not really a band and it's part of the top (?) which the wiki for collar says it should only be for standalone collars, though is it appropriate to consider things like this and the aforementioned metal collar as collars? They're not exactly bands and they sit at the base of the neck. The wiki also only has pictured non-examples.

WRS said:

tl;dr Neckwear tag use confusion because in theory they refer to the same concept just at different sizes but in practice they aren't.

I started thinking about this when I was replacing heart collar mistags that were meant to be heart necklace and this got me a bit curious and confused about the way we use choker and collar, though more specifically collar than anything else.

As I see it now, I've generally understood that chokers are meant to be thin bands around the neck while collar seems to be used for any other neck-related attachment at any height of the neck. Aliases like belt choker to belt collar don't do much good in breaking this weird sort of distinction between the two. Particularly that it seems like bands of any size are relegated to choker while parts of a top or anything that goes around the neck is tagged with collar.

For example, a character I upload now, Lupa (Wuthering Waves), I've been tagging with metal collar for the shiny piece around her lower neck that I suppose in a way also serves as a halterneck (is it even one? its not a string or strap from the bodysuit that's keeping it together, considering it is backless). For a more general example, playboy bunny often features what we currently tag as detached collar + wing collar (the latter less so than the former). Though no one would refute post #9390947 being a choker (or maybe someone will?).

For other examples, we currently tag Nicole Demara with heart collar (see post #8594977 for ex). It's not really a band and it's part of the top (?) which the wiki for collar says it should only be for standalone collars, though is it appropriate to consider things like this and the aforementioned metal collar as collars? They're not exactly bands and they sit at the base of the neck. The wiki also only has pictured non-examples.

ah, I just had the same problem trying to add images to the wiki.

imo the main problem is that we have 4 categories of "collar"

the true collar

the "detached" collar

the "attached" collar

the "thin" collar a.k.a. the choker

and the wiki literally says that collar is only for actual collars, not for attached collars, not even for detached collars!

so when you get to tags like fur collar, fur-trimmed collar, lace-trimmed collar and frilled collar... taggers end up using them to tag dress collars / shirt collars which have their own tags instead of using them only on "stand alone" collars

i did find an actual lace-trimmed collar btw lol post #9595922 pretty unique if u ask me! same for post #4269633 (fur-trimmed "collar") post #8297037 (fur collar made entirely of fur). just from the fact i could barely find any posts that are actual collars for these makes me think these tags were made for detached collar instead of collar.

basically every wiki page for every sub-type of collar needs to specify which category of collar the tag actually refers to because it's really impossible to guess for some of these types!

if you ask me, the difference between a "collar" and a "choker" is that a collar is THICK. it has to be made of a thick band of metal or leather to count as a collar. basically the "choker" isn't "thin" as in "narrow" it's "thin" as in it's a piece of cloth. this means "frilled collar" doesn't make any sense unless you're talking about a detached collar because standalone collars are thick and frills aren't thick. but with thousands of posts already tagged, there is no way to say for sure...

imo the whole situation is pretty confusing and in a lot of posts whether something counts as a choker or as a collar is subjective which is bad. but idk if there is a way to improve this other than separating the "feature" tags in their own tags so whether it's a collar or a choker becomes irrelevant

like, instead of having spiked choker and spiked collar maybe it should be a single tag like spiked neck band. same for studded neck band, frilled neck band, o-ring neck band, fur-trimmed neck band, fur neck band and so on. this definetely won't work for some of these tags because the "collar" tag is only used for detached collars so you can't mass update them to "neck band"

maybe this should be done part by part like... first we figure out what to do with spiked collar / spiked choker and o-ring collar / o-ring choker since they're always neck bands then we go to the other ones that are mostly detached collars

honestly it would be better if everything was in one tag... but the problem is that that tag would be choker because collar gets confused with detached collar and attached collars. so basically we would have all "thick" collars tagged as choker anyway. but then we run into another problem because the larger the collar grows, the more likely it is to evolved into a detached collar and that's a separate tag

like this post #9769098 is a collar but this post #9493800 is a detached collar? feels like this problem is just impossible to solve

Bumping this because it's a pain trying to tag them, especially when it comes to the colors and frilled tags.

The frilled collar tag is a complete mess when people are using it on collared dress and shirt when it should be frilled shirt collar, on detached collar when it's not a traditional collar, and the confusion with frilled choker as they are very similar.

LuxuryRay said:

Bumping this because it's a pain trying to tag them, especially when it comes to the colors and frilled tags.

The frilled collar tag is a complete mess when people are using it on collared dress and shirt when it should be frilled shirt collar, on detached collar despite it saying it shouldn't be considered a traditional collar, and the confusion with frilled choker as they are very similar.

my honest opinion is that we should just give up and let people use *_collar tags with clothing collars. there is currently contrast collar for clothing collars that have a different color but most people will see a white shirt collar and tag it white collar. since we have all sorts of collared_* tags it isn't realistic to create things like white_shirt_collar, white_dress_collar and so on.

i updated tag_group:neck_and_neckwear with all different types of collars and one thing you will notice is that it's very easy to find a choker but it's hard to find just... collar. normally it's an animal collar or belt collar or even a metal collar. it's very hard to find something that is literally just a choker but thick enough to say it's a collar.

imo the ideal solution would be this...

let people use *_collar tags for colored clothing collars

use *_choker tags for the colored collars on the neck

because everyone knows a choker is on the neck so it's hard to mistake it

basically just make all collars chokers and then change collar to collar_(choker) or thick_choker or whatever. it's just not possible to untangle this using a single word that means 3 different things (chokers, detached collars and attached collars)

If you expand say. White collar, to collared_shirt and collared_dress doesn't that make it redundant with white_shirt and white_dress?

zetsubousensei said:

If you expand say. White collar, to collared_shirt and collared_dress doesn't that make it redundant with white_shirt and white_dress?

do people use white sleeves with white shirt?

This is a choker right? It's thin and sticks tightly to the neck.

A collar is supposed to be looser (says so in both wiki), so you'd be able to see some space between the neck and the collar. Like this:

trapster77 said:

do people use white sleeves with white shirt?

Yes and they shouldn't be.

From the white sleeves wiki:

The sleeves have to either be detached, or differently colored from the rest of the garment the character is wearing (such as raglan sleeves).

pipebomb445 said:

This is a choker right? It's thin and sticks tightly to the neck.

A collar is supposed to be looser (says so in both wiki), so you'd be able to see some space between the neck and the collar. Like this:

The distinction is so minimal in most artistic depictions that I'd honestly rather most of these posts have one tag or the other, preferably choker due to the complications that the collar tag already has. Exceptions to this would be things like belt collars or certain types of metal collars.

NiceLittleDan said:

The distinction is so minimal in most artistic depictions that I'd honestly rather most of these posts have one tag or the other, preferably choker due to the complications that the collar tag already has. Exceptions to this would be things like belt collars or certain types of metal collars.

the problem is that the *_choker and *_collar tags imply choker/collar, so if you picked choker then you can't use it with collars

if choker AND collar have any distinction (i still think we should just make collar into collar_(choker)) then the solution would be something like high heels that can be used with either shoes or boots. basically it would need to be called neck spikes or choker spikes] or neckwear spikes