I've posted a few times about sites to help find Creative Commons licensed media, and I have learned that Google has made a Creative Commons image search available since at least July 2009. Knowing so many students already use Google's image search, I think this would be an easy way to introduce them to being responsible users of others' digital property.
The process is simple. Use Google's Advanced Search, either initially or after you have done your image search (that works best for me when I use Chrome). At the bottom of the page you can select from a drop-down list to filter your results by the license of your choice. (Notice that below that you can also indicate a Safe Search level)
Google Image Search Advanced Search
If you aren't familiar with Creative Commons licensing and what these different license options allow, the Creative Commons website provides a good explanation.
PRESENTATIONS ETC
On its Presentations ETC website, the Educational Technology Clearinghouse makes available "free backgrounds, templates, letters, frames, and buttons for school presentations, websites, class newsletters, digital scrapbooking, and student portfolios. Thousands of presentation elements and millions of combinations allow you to customize your school projects, electronic scrapbook, or eportfolio. A friendlylicenseallows teachers and students to use up to 50 items in a single, non-commercial project without further permission."
graphic of samples from the Presentations ETC website
The site boasts over 20,000 backgrounds, over 21,000 buttons and icons, over 7,700 letters in a variety of styles, as well as PowerPoint templates and Keynote themes.
MAPS ETC
Check out Maps ETC to find over 5,000 historic maps representing many different time periods. The same license which was mentioned above (with link) applies to the use of the map images.
CLIPART ETC
The ETC also presents over 60,000 pieces of free clipart on its Clipart ETC site. "Every item comes with a choice of image size and format as well as complete source information for proper citations in school projects. No advertisement-filled pages with pop-up windows or inappropriate links here." The same license as described above (with link) applies here.
If you have the free Cooliris plugin installed, you can view ETC clipart on a 3D wall without having to click to go from screen to screen.
COOLIRIS
Using Cooliris you can view 3D TV shows and movies as well as content on a number of websites in 3D on your computer or mobile device. You can even view the images stored on your own hard drive on a 3D wall as well. See a demo here. Cooliris supports Firefox (on Windows, Mac,Linux), Internet Explorer, Safari (Mac), and Google Chrome (Windows).
I have been using Creative Commons (CC) licensed photos for some time now, finding them by using Flickr's advanced search option. Compfight is a website that makes that search easier and much quicker. Basically, all you have to do is to click beside "Creative Commons" to change the parameter to "Only," enter your search tag, and click "Search." Click on your chosen photo to open it in Flickr, where you can check the CC details, and then view sizes to choose to download one or to use the link to the size of your choice. You can then copy and paste the URL or CC code to complete the attribution requirement.
You can also further define the search by using Seek Original, which refers to the size of the image: "Only" will limit results to images saved in their original size, "On" will display images of all sizes, with an informational blue bar giving dimensions of those which are not original size, and "Off" will display images of all sizes without the blue bar. Your search results can also be filtered by using a Safe Search to display only images which are safe for work.
If you aren't familiar with the Creative Commons license, it is a license granting a set of baseline rights to the owner and requiring the work (image, video, audio, text) to be attributed to the original author. I won't go into details here, but basically, for a licensed work, you will see the CC logo along with a description of the guidelines for use. You are then given the opportunity and responsibility to use the work according to those guidelines. A CC license can be obtained for no cost from Creative Commons. When creating a license, the owner can decide if he or she wants others to have the right to use the work commercially and if others will be allowed to modify the work.
There are times when I have wanted to convert a page of a PDF document to an image to be inserted into a Word document or PowerPoint presentation. Finally, I have found a site that will do that for me...for FREE.
Upload a PDF document to ConvertPDFtoImaGe.com, and in short order you can download your converted file(s). If you upload a multi-page PDF document, you will receive JPG of each page. I definitely like that the file is (nearly) immediately available for download. Other sites I have tried used email to deliver the completed document, and often a substantial amount of time elapsed before it arrived.
Tabs across the top of ConvertPDFtoImaGe window give access to other file conversion actions: PDF to Word, PDF to Text, PDF to html, Text to PDF, and Word to PDF. Wow! That's a lot of file conversion options from one site, and you download your converted file immediately; no there's no waiting for it to arrive in your email inbox, as with other sites I have used. I haven't actually tried each of these other conversions, so I can't comment on their performance, but I certainly will check them out next time I have a need for their functions..
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