Tag: photos

12 of Google Photos’ Most Amazing Features


“Google Photos has grown into an awesome service. From automatically backing up your phone’s pictures to letting you easily share your photos, there’s a lot to love for anyone who works with photos. Whether you want to make a mini stop-motion animation or just make a slideshow of related pictures, Photos can help. Select the Animation button under the Assistant tab, and you can choose from 2–50 photos to add. Once you’re satisfied, click Create and you’ll have a neat little GIF ready to share.” — Ben Stegner

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Why You Should Be Using Google Photos


Google Photos “takes your entire photo library — every photo you’ve ever taken on your phone, as well as screenshots and photos taken within Instagram and whatever else — and uploads it to the internet. The photos remain private, hidden behind your Google account information, but now you can access them anywhere. On your laptop? Yep. On a new phone? Yep. On your tablet? Yep, there too.” — Ben Gilbert, Business Insider

360-Degree Cameras in Education: A Quick Introduction

Guest Blogger
Kasey Kennedy

Some say 360-degree cameras may be the next big thing in education. What is a 360-degree camera? It is a camera that allows you to capture photos and videos in a spherical format. The spherical format allows the viewer to pan around the entire image or video in a 360-degree fashion.

View this 360 degree image to get an idea of what these kinds of cameras can do.

Enjoy this video, What Happens in Your Body?, and enjoy a 360-degree exploration of your circulatory and digestive systems. Follow the directions below the video to navigate this spherical video.

Click on the following image for a 360-photo of the North Pole.

Using 360-Degree Cameras in the Classroom  

Virtual Field Trips: Take a moment to view this video. You could create a video to go along with whatever you are teaching, and the students could work themselves through the video to get more information. Another example could be using a 360 video to help students explore the cells of the body.

School Events: What if you could play the camera on the stage while a student performed? This would let the students view their work, and see the performance as the audience sees it.

Parental Involvement: This would be a great way to get parents involved. Most cameras will only record parts of the room, unless it is carried around. By using a 360 degree camera, a parent could pan around to their child, and watch their child the whole time. This will help the parents see what is going on in the classroom, and it will get them more involved.

Outside of the Classroom Field Trips: When on a field trip, the camera could be used to take pictures, or a video, and the teacher could replay it for the students as they do their reflections. This could also be an opportunity for any students who missed the field trip to receive the same experience. (Source)

Tips for Using 360-Degree Cameras

Geoffrey Morrison shares six tricks for getting the best photo and video spheres. 

I also recommend 10 Things I Wish I Knew before Shooting 360 Video by Vanessa Hand Orellana.

360-Degree Virtual Tours

The Lincoln Memorial

Luray Caverns

The Secret Annex of Anne Frank’s Home

Rainforest

Boogie Boarding at Cocoa Beach, FL

Google Photos generated this highlight video showcasing some of our family’s experiences during Spring Break 2015. We wrapped-up the trip by spending two days boogie boarding at Cocoa Beach, FL. There was a huge storm headed inland on the first day, so the waves were huge.

I highly recommend using Google Photos. It makes taking, storing, editing, and sharing videos a cinch. You can use Google Photos from your smartphone, tablet, or computer.

Snorkeling in the Florida Keys

Google Photos generated this highlight video showcasing some of our family’s experiences during Spring Break 2015. We spent a week in the Florida Keys enjoying snorkeling, sailing, jet skiing, parasailing, sea kayaking, sunsets, and lots of smiles.

I highly recommend using Google Photos. It makes taking, storing, editing, and sharing videos a cinch. You can use Google Photos from your smartphone, tablet, or computer.

Photo Chat: The View from Here #edchat #edtech #idt7078 #viewfromhere

As I mentioned last week I started teaching a 7-week graduate seminar, Learning with Web 2.0 and Social Media. We are having a lot of time investigating how current and cutting-edge technologies can facilitate learning and promote thinking and creativity. To provide an immersive experience related to the course content the class is housed in a Google Site and the bulk of our social interactions is being supported by our Google+ community. We are already deep into the ideas of teaching for understanding and visible thinking, while developing a strong understanding of Web 2.0, social networks, and social media.

Throughout this 7-week learning journey I’ll be requesting your assistance in helping make this a rich experience for the teachers and instructional designers in my class. Today I’m asking you to help me showcase the “fun side” of online networks and social media. Below is a photo that I shot using my iPhone. It depicts the view from my current location. Would you please take a similar photo and share it using one or more of the following strategies?

  1. Post a link to your image in the comments of this post.
  2. Post a link to your image in the comments to this Google+ post.
  3. Share it via Google+, Twitter, or Facebook and tag it with #viewfromhere.

View from Here

Multiple Representations of Understanding with Technology

These are the slides from my first Tennessee Educational Technology Conference presentation. Unfortunately the animations and effects were lost when uploaded to SlideShare. I’ve shared my notes and resources from this presentation over on my wiki, Learning Telecollaboratively. I hope to create a Vidcast or SlideCast of this presentation once I return home and things settle down.

I demonstrated that with freely available digital technologies students can demonstrate their understanding of course content in multiple ways (images, audio, video, presentations, artwork, and more). Each student’s end product (learning artifact) allows them to personally self-express their understanding of the content/mastery of the skills. Although teachers may not be comfortable using all of today’s technology it is important to consider allowing students to use it to communicate their understanding as they are often more naturally able to more fully express themselves with digital media.

View more presentations from Clif Mims.

Conference Tag: #tetc

My Car Rolls over 200,000 Miles

My car recently rolled past the 200,000 mile mark. Anyone knows me well knows that I love my car. It’s the only brand new car that I’ve ever purchased and I’ve had it for a very, very long time. To be honest, I’m actually surprised that I didn’t reach the 200,000 mile mark a lot sooner.

Here are a few photos from the day of the big event (via my iPhone).

Here’s a brief video clip of the odometer actually rolling from 199,999 miles to 200,000. Rest assured that I took the video and images while driving through a huge empty parking lot and not while driving down the interstate.

Educational Connections
Let’s brainstorm ways that we can connect this event with the curriculum. What are some activities in which we can engage students with this event? Please share your your ideas in the comments section.

Photos from Washington, D.C.

I spent some time working in Washington, D.C. in April and was able to go sightseeing for a few hours. Here are a few of my photos from the trip. Looking at these makes me excited about returning to Washington in a few weeks for EduBloggerCon and NECC.