As anyone who reads my blog has probably guessed by now I’m a bit of a flickr addict and I defy anyone who likes to take photographs or get a bit creative with images not to get hooked on it. Apart from being a fun way to show off your skills (?) with a camera it’s a great community and a brilliant way to make some new, like minded, friends and once you start to get feedback and comments from other people about your photographs you can’t help but want to both take and post more and more.Occasionally, if you’re lucky other people want to use your photographs, an opportunity for your 15 minutes of fame. For instance my housemate Alison has now been approached twice and asked for permission to use her pics, once for a Christian groups e-card and another for a video for a Church Sermon about farming. (Quite ironic really as she's hardly a regular churchgoer!)
I was really chuffed when a flickr user approached me recently from Hawaii who is working on a guide book about the surviving ships-of-the-line and battleships and want to use some pictures that I took of HMS Warrior and HMS Victory in his book. Of course I said yes and hopefully I’ll get a copy of the guide so I can show off (I can feel my head swelling now!)
With the advent of the digital age and Photoshop there’s a chance for people to get even more creative with images. I was really impressed with a couple of manipulations by flickr fans to a photograph that I took one bored afternoon of some Halloween toys we had in our shop. They were plastic eyeballs, suspended in a ball filled with liquid that lit up when you moved them. There are three different coloured LED lights in it so the colours change every time it moves, I took loads of pics and posted the one that I liked most on flickr they were then manipulated by two different flickr users Oyvind Solstad and flickrwegian/Sweet Lisa Jay so one simple photo turned into two more fantastic images.There’s also the chance to play with some toys designed for flickr by John Watson aka fd. They’re really simple to use and give those of us who aren’t so skilled at Photoshop a chance to try out any artistic flair we may have, or just to have a bit of fun with photos. So what are you waiting for – go get your camera and have some fun.
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