Module 4

Say "cheese". CHE-E-ESE!

I haven't really warmed to Flickr at all, especially since I'm such a Facebook addict. I suppose I'd better start from the beginning "which is a very good place to start" (to quote the beautiful Julie Andrews).

The Flickr Feature Tour was a simple tour that provided a brief overview of the features of Flickr. It started the seed growing. I thought "I can use this", considering most workplaces block Facebook, making very hard to share pics with friends who only access the Internet from work. Next, I explore the FAQs page. We needed to find the answers to four questions:

What are content filters?
What is SafeSearch?
What are tags?
How do I share a photo/s with a group?

Content filters are filters that allow the categorisation of images based on the type of images that they are. The three main categories of filters listed in the FAQ section are:

• Photos and videos;
• Illustrations, art, animations, computer-generated images (CGI) and any other images that are not photographs; and,
• screenshots, which are images of whatever is on your computer screen.

SafeSearch is a function that allows a user to control what appears in the search results of their searches. This is especially good is the user is under 18, such as our students. It ensures that the results are clean and age-appropriate.

Tags are something everyone should get into the habit of using, especially if they want to make their images 'searchable'. They are keywords that you attach to your images to help explain what is in the images. These tags are then read by search functions so that your image can be displayed if someone has searched the relevant keyword. Facebook has a similar concept called "tagging", where you select a person in a photo and attach their name to it, so that the person and their friends can also see the image.

To share photos with a group, you need to add your photo to the group pool once you are a member of that group. You press the "Send to Group" button on the image's page.

Uploading the images to Flickr took some getting used to. I was adding them individually before I realised that I could Ctrl-a the images when the dialogue box opened! I was then able to upload 10 pics at once! Easy as ABC...

I didn't really see the point of the Make Stuff page. It was merely are showcase of what you can do with no real explanations. Below that page is another link "Do More With Your Photos". I found this more useful as it told me which third-party sites I can contact to make the relevant products. Still, the site was a bit useless, as you can go to your local Big W or Harvey Norman and do exactly the same things with your images, and have more control over it, as you are talking to actual people and can see actual samples.

Here are some of the pics I uploaded from my trip to the Hunter Valley Gardens in April. I went crazy in the storybook garden but met some fascinating creatures. To insert the images here, I went through the following steps:

1. Open the image's individual page by clicking on it in the Photostream.
2. Above the image there is a series of controls. Click "All Sizes". This will load another page.
3. Scroll down to "Grab the photo's URL.
4. Copy the URL (highlight and Ctrl-C).
5. In Blogger, when typing a new blog there is an "Add Image" icon, which is the icon third from the right. Click that icon to open the "Upload images" dialogue box.
6. Paste the URL into the "URL" box on the right.
7. Select your layout.
8. Click "Upload Image" - and you're done!

Humpty Dumpty at Hunter Valley Gardens

Getting kissed by Georgie Porgie at Hunter Valley Gardens

I've also inserted a Gadget on the left hand side of my page which displays a slideshow of my photos. Enjoy! I found this when editing my layout.

The next section of the module went into copyright. I did a class on copyright during the Easter holidays as one of the EDNA workshops. I believe teachers are one of the biggest breaches of copyright laws (admittedly, at times I am guilty as well). One thing that caught my eye was "NEALS" (National Educational Access Licence for Schools). I had seen this logo around websites and have always wondered what it is. The FAQs had links to a number of types of mediums used in schools that may be subject to copyright.

The next question for this module is:

What is creative commons?

The EDNA course I attended covered creative commons. It allows a person to give permission to others to use and modify their work. You can download from their site symbols to place on your work that clearly indicates to others what rights they have to use it. We live in the world of Postmodernism, which dictates that no ideas are new - only recreated. Creative commons embraces the postmodern theory, allowing people to share and build upon others' work.

I searched for "space" in the advanced search and selected the tick-box so that I only searched creative commons images. I was trying to find some excellent images to help stimulate the imaginations of the young writers in my class for the narrative unit on space. I found the following beautiful images. I am pasting the URLs due to the fact that no image URLs were provided:

• Living in Space by xenonb
• Pacific Ocean From Space by bluefore4116
• Inspire Space Park (and me) by Bettina Tizzy

Overall, I now know where to go for free images to place around my classroom to inspire my students. I may even start placing my images on here.

Happy snapping!

A