Digital+Photography

Digital Photography Resources

Digital Camera's are one of the most important tools in a 21st Century classroom. They can be used for any curriculum area, motivation, assessment and just good old fun. They do not require expensive film and are easy to use. 5 year olds right through to senior college students should be using digital photography to enhance their learning. This page is designed to provide some resources and links to help use digital cameras in your classroom.

Great software.

You can create collages and instantly load images to a blog or Google account. The latest version (3) has some great new editing features such as Retouch. Download it here http://picasa.google.com/thanks.html PC version http://picasa.google.com/mac/ Mac version (in beta)
 * Picasa** is a fantastic entry level piece of editing software, it keeps your photos organised and provides simple yet powerful editing of images.

It is a great programme for reluctant writers, making comics out of their own digital images, adding text and titles. It is very colourful and easy to use. Download a 30 day trial here http://plasq.com/downloads/ Select either the Mac or PC version on the page.
 * Comic Life** is not a free programme, however it is resonably cost effective when purchasing multiple licences for school computers. It can get as cheap as $8 a copy.

Download it An example of a PhotoStory movie. media type="file" key="Photostory example_mpeg4.mp4"
 * PhotoStory** is a free programme created by Microsoft. It enables you to make movies out of photographs. It is incredibly easy to use and provides great results. It can be used in conjunction with the above two programmes to great effect. You can direct the camera around the photo, taking people on a virtual tour of the image.

This programme is recommended for older students (year 5 and up). Download it here http://gimp.lisanet.de/Website/Download.html For Mac http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html For PC
 * Gimp** is a free image editing programme that has a lot of the features of Photoshop. It has [|tutorials] on its website and can be downloaded for Mac and PC.

Download Pixresizer Watch a short tutorial[| here]
 * Pixresizer** is a free programme that downsizes photos. This is perfect to resize a whole folder of photos in seconds. Great for emailing or using online on a wiki or blog.

Resources

The great "Shot treasure hunt" this is a document with different camera shot types on it that the students can try and take e.g. close up, extreme close up and over the shoulder. These can be used for digital video as well.

A postcard template that has space to insert a photo and then a space to write. Great for juniors.

Comic life resources, a rubric for creating comics and a storyboard for helping plan a comic

[|CameraShotsAnglesMovement_copy.jpg] An image of different camera shots and angles.

Web Sites

http://bighugelabs.com/flickr/ A great site to do cool and education related things with your photos (downsize your images first).

http://www.photofunia.com/ Put your, or your students faces in amazing places (downsize your images first).

http://photobucket.com/ Photo sharing site

http://www.flickr.com/ Photo sharing site

http://www.mediacollege.com/photography/ A great site for information on Camera angles and photography skills.

http://english.unitecnology.ac.nz/resources/resources/exp_lang/composition.html An English online unit based on Camera Angles.

http://www.betterphoto.com/exploring/tips.asp A great site with top ten hints for taking better photos.