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Now that both Photoshop tutorials are now out of the way, we must shift our focus on recording our dreams and to gather the appropriate images accordingly. Before doing so, let’s look at some digital imaging basics. In order to successfully complete this project, you must first be cognizant that large, high resolution images are a must. Why you ask? Well, if we are talking about quality images, the higher the pixel count, the better (1000 pixels or higher). For a better explanation on the concept of resolution, view this presentation here.
In the heart of digital imaging is Photoshop, Adobe’s premiere photo and digital imaging / editing software. The interface breakdown as discussed in class can be found here. As always, please make sure that you download both these documents for your study notes.
Where to find High Resolution Images?
The Internet is a very large place. Having said that, there are a few sites that you can visit to find images. One of the best places to do so is at Stock.Xchng (http://www.sxc.hu/) By opening a free account there, you can have exclusive access to millions of free stock images with some, limited to no copyright ownership whatsoever. Aside from the wide array of image choices, most images are at least 1000 pixels (width or height).
The other site you can visit is Flickr (http://www.flickr.com/). With Flickr however, despite its wider selection, you must dig a little bit deeper. To get to the higher resolution images, please examine the following steps:
1. Go to Flickr (http://www.flickr.com/). In the search bar, type a subject matter (in my example, I will type “Eiffel Tower”). Click on the thumbnail of the image that interests you. In the view option, please make sure that you can select various sizes (so that you can select and use the largest pixel size – usually the original size).
2. Once you click on a thumbnail, make sure you click the Actions button on the top left corner of the image.
3. Once you click View all sizes, you will enter another thumbnail section that will give you all the dimensions you need. In this case, I will select the largest image size (Original 2048 X 1365).
4. Right click the largest thumbnail and save the document to your desktop. If I were you, I’d rename the file to something I’d recognize (ie. eiffel.jpg). Often times, people that upload these images to Flickr do not name their images properly (sometimes you’ll get something like 43524524.jpg for example).
3. Morguefile – this site sounds super morbid but “morguefile” is a term that journalists use. It pertains to images taken by journalists that they take but never makes it to media (like in newspapers, magazines, TV news report or the Internet). Go here to access this site.
4. Unsplash – I placed this site as last because as high quality the images it contains, it tends to have images that have already been post-processed. You’re welcome to use the images in this site for your projects regardless. Cick here to enter the site.
5. Pixabay – This is one of the best free stock photography sites ever!