Image Editing

Images can be powerful additions to online course content.  Working with images requires some understanding of image editing as well as image accessibility.

This book will guide you through some techniques, tools, tips, and tricks for working with online images.

Free Photo Editing Software

Picasa
Yes! Another cool Google tool. Picasa is free download program from Google that allows you to quickly and easily crop, size, and perform basic editing on a photo (brightness, contrast, color-balance, red-eye fix).

There are also built-in filters to allow some "quick and easy" artistic modifications to your files.

Download the file from www.google.com >> MORE >> EVEN MORE

Paint.Net
A free photo editing program which allows layer editing (similar to PhotoShop) is Paint.Net.  You can download Paint.Net version 3.36 from download.cnet.com.
 
GIMP Portable - GNU Image Manipulation Program for Flash Drives
GIMP is a well-known and widely used graphics editing program.  It has been ported to run on USB Flash Drives, so that you can run it on any computer without needing to "install" it to each machine.
You can download the GIMP Portable from download.cnet.com.
 
 

Image Techniques

Cheap and Easy 3D for Images

Do you have an object that you would like to show students in 3-dimensions?
Too hard to mail the object out for viewing?
Here is a simple yet effective optical illusion that will work for you.

MP3 Player using the 3D technique

 

Make two scans of the object.
The first scan, the object will be to the left-most position on the scanner.
The second scan, the object will be to the right-most position on the scanner.

 

Open both images and copy them into a new third image. The "side-views" of the object (which were originally toward the middle of the scanner) still need to appropriately point toward the center in the final composition.

 

Leave some blank "white space" between the objects.

 

Have students stare at the whitespace between the objects and slowly cross their eyes. All of a sudden, they see the 3-dimensional object in the "negative space" left behind.

 

Light colored empty "negative" space works best. View the sample above of what is normally a very flat MP3 player (has little dimension to begin with - but with this process, you see it "lift off" the screen).

 

Have fun!

Toy and USB connector showing 3D technique

 

Easy Course Images with Scanner

Rather than buying a $900 digital SLR camera, you can create very high resolution images for your courses by using a $70 scanner hooked up to your computer.

 

Place the objects that you need photographed on the scanner glass (be realistic about size and weight of objects, please).

 

Then scan.

Simple visual elements help make content more interesting. Use of symbolism can also aid memory in a student's investigation of the topics.

 

Simple!

Pile of Canadian Coins