Digital Signposts

Scare tactics, or how (not) to treat your customers

image credit Sam Judson

With tactics not dissimilar to those used  by the Music Industry, it is not surprising one could get the impression that digital content providers work against the best interests of their potential customers or users. Using the medium of the BBC Education News pages this latest example could be seen as a deliberate attempt to scare schools about their use of digital images.

Whilst the 'advice' offered by Jean-Louise Green may be legally correct, she does not provide any constructive or positive suggestions as to how schools might review the way they use and access digital images; for example, there is no mention, of using  Creative Commons image search,  (currently with over 61 million images to choose from), or pointers to any of the excellent collections and other sources of digital images schools could draw upon.

Perhaps this is hardly surprising because, Jean-Louise also runs Picture Nation, an image library and brokering service, which sells images to schools at prices, that many  would consider, exorbitant, with restrictions on use and access. Is it a coincidence that this item appears at a time when schools have to seriously consider spending their elcs before the funding runs out in August?  Perhaps it is in the interests of content providers to try a create a climate of worry and uncertainty, and on the back this offer schools an easy, (and possibly expensive) option.

I believe, what could be more helpful to schools would be focussed CPD, workshops and communities of practice to help teachers and children use digital images and other digital assets legally and confidently . This is becoming an increasingly important element of digital literacy, and schools could benefit from exploring these issues in contexts that include, searching, tagging sharing and file formats, rather than a list of  rules. What they probably don't need is threats and warnings from Linda Macpherson, the lawyer quoted in the piece. Mmm... it is also interesting to note the close relationships between all the sources of input to the article.

"RIAA notice" image credit Wesley Fryer

The Past Looks to the Future

Image Credit : US Library of Congress on Flickr

As I mentioned in a Tweet yesterday, the United States Library of Congress made 3000 images from its collections available on Flickr under a No Known Copyright Restrictions proviso. Not only are the images superb technically and aesthetically, they are well annotated, adding great value  to the collection, the Flickr community, learners, and of course The Library itself. Congratulation's!

This just goes to show what is possible given a will, let's hope that some of the gatekeepers of archives and collections on this side of the pond may begin to understand the benefits of looking to the future and allow their collections to be rather more accessible than they are at the present time.

Changing the past

Began way back, long before Photoshop. Nowadays, you can do it online, of course.

Via Boing Boing

Bitmap to Vector Conversion (Yes online!)

I've been becoming rather blase lately about online image editing. With a good number of freely available tools such as Picnik, (my personal favourite), and Adobe due to launch the free online version of Photoshop before the end of the year, there is certainly plenty to experiment with.

However, VectorMagic (beta) from Stanford, made my day, and I think this Web 2.0  service opens up a new dimension in Web 2.0 graphic editing. Up till now I have found it necessary to use Adobe Illustrator to convert bit maps into vectors for editing, but I suspect this tool will make my use of Illustrator for basic tasks much less frequent, just in the same way that Picnik changed my dependence on Photoshop.

Not only does the tool deliver an excellent  conversion, it is fast and intuitive, making it a delight to use. With some good  basic editing tools, context sensitive help, and the ability to download you images as an .eps or .SVG this is a really useful tool.  When you add the ability to store your finished graphics online and share them, then this becomes a very powerful tool indeed. The potential for creating re-usable vector 'assets or learning objects' is not to be sniffed at.

In my experience, working with schools,  teachers often shied away from vector graphics. So if it is necessary to explain " the difference between bitmaps and vectors" in  enjoyable way, then this is the bees knees.

How many did you get, then?

Many of you may have come across the significant video 'Women In Art" by Philip Scott Johnson aka. eggman913. If you are anything like me, you may have tried to guess how many of the artists you could name. I managed 52 out of the 90, (generally doing much better with the 19th/20th century stuff), before having to resort to the list kindly provided by Boni. The video itself demonstrates a significant use of digital assets that might serve as a model with which to develop other creative and innovative ways of learning. Watching the video encourages one to think more deeply.  Boni's page and links to further information about the artists and the paintings add extra value.

Combined, these two resources are an excellent example of how technology enables us to develop analytical skills, draw relationships and decode a subject. Another of eggman913's work features a selection of portraits by Picasso, that capture an essence that goes far beyond the initial content.

I gather the software used was Fantamorph

Thanks to Open Culture for the link.

Seam Carving - It really works!

Rsizr The intelligent image resizing tool,  I mentioned in my August 31st  post is now available as an online application.  It takes bit of getting used to, but it really does work. The secret is to use the selection tools to choose which areas of an image to protect, or even remove. My first attempt is shown above. I look forward to spending some time exploring the creative possibilities, and seeing the work of others. Its also quite fascinating to watch the image processing take place before your very eyes.