Introduction to photo sharing using Flickr

Here is a nice tutorial on setting up Bridge CS5 for export to social media sites including Flickr.



If you don't have the Adobe CS5 suite at home, but you want to quickly upload your images to Flickr, there are a number of tools available including a stand alone upload application and a plugin for iPhoto. Here is a link to a number of the upload tools.

When is the last time that you had prints from your photographs made?
In 1998, I managed a chain of camera stores that offered photofinishing services. At that time, only the very tech savvy, early adopters were purchasing digital cameras. Even so, it was clear that the experience of sharing photos had begin to change.
Today, as I am sure you are well aware, most people share their photos in digital form; primarily on the internet. I think it is safe assumption that most, if not all of you, have a Facebook page.

For this Assignment, you are going to really immerse yourself in Flickr; the most popular and feature rich photo community and photo sharing site. I would like you to begin by reading all the following articles so that you get a sense of what Flickr is really all about:

1. Digital-Photography-School.com article titled My Three Favorite Things about Flickr
2. PBS Media Shift article titled Flickr Changes Lives, Launches Photog Careers
3. Interview with a photographer what found success on Flickr. Rebekka Guðleifsdóttir’s Tips For Flickr Success
4. New York Times article on one of the world's largest stock image agency looking for talent on Flickr, Great Photo on Flickr? Getty Images Might Pay You for It
5. Telegraph newspaper article titledFlickr and Getty Images buy your photos
6. American Photo article on photographers getting commercial work via Flickr, Flickr Creative Showcase: Vision Quest
7. Photopreneur blog entry titled How to Get Paid for your Flickr Photos

Then, I would like you to start learning how Flickr works by going through the Flickr tour.
Then go through this Flickr Tutorial.
Then read through the Flickr page How To Get the Most out of Flickr. There you will find links on how to perform many common tasks. Here, you will find information on setting up Flickr so that you can send it images directly from your phone.

After you have completed all the reading and gone through the tutorials, I would like you to create a Flickr.com account. It is owned by Yahoo, so if you already have an a Yahoo account for any reason, you can use the same Yahoo account user name and password. Since Flickr and Blogger are both owned by Yahoo, they integrate very well with one another. For that matter, since Flickr is so popular and well supported, you can export directly from Adobe Bridge to Flickr. Since you will be editing your images in Photoshop and sharing them via Flickr, this will make things flow well.

As you set up your Flickr account, I want you to consider if you want your photos to be public or private. You can change the settings of each photo individually and you can set the default for all photos. Since a huge part of the Flickr is about sharing your photos, it seems kind of silly to keep all your photos private. However, you may take photos that you don't want the whole world to see. If you chose to set your images as private, you can still share with with fellow Flickr members that you have either indicated as Friends or Family. Here is a Flickr article about configuring the privacy settings.

Due before next class 

* For this assignment, you are to upload the 50 best images that you shot over the weekend to your Flickr account. Please don't edit them beforehand.
* Use the Organizr feature to create a set named Assignment 1.
* Privacy settings are a common concern on the web. Flickr allows you to easily control who you share your images with. I would like you to set the privacy settings for Flickr however you wish.
* Geo tag all your images.
* Join the class group. Share the Set with the Group.
*Explore other groups. Join any other relevant groups that you are interested in and submit your images to those groups. Be sure to do some searches to see the number and variety of groups out there. Please be sure to read the rules of each group. Only submit images that will meet the group’s criteria.