What it is

theGOOD Uploadr is a desktop application built on Adobe Air. The application is currently in alpha with a push to release beta around the first of the year 2010.

theGOOD Uploadr aims to improve and augment the Flickr experience by adding many features to the uploading process.

Some Links

theGOOD Uploadr
follow along for updates.
theGOOD Uploadr in the Flickr App Garden.
theGOOD Uploadr is a product of theGOOD. An interactive think tank.

Yet, as a novice, I’m able to sell my services and prints to the entire world, and have. I’ve sold prints to publishers, been commissioned for projects, been invited by Getty Images to sell stock, and made various other business connections via Flickr.

And now for the ironic portion of this blog… As I try and transition past novicity and become more of a professional, however subjective that term is, I find I now hate myself and Flickr. I don’t really hate either of those two things but hyperbole makes for a more interesting read, agree? yes, you do. I’ve recently been contacted, via flickr, about the purchase of a few more of my images. One from a Holland magazine, the other a French magazine. Upon further investigation and email correspondence I’ve found that lo and behold, they have little to no budget, but would ‘love to purchase my art’ for their campaign. Since I work in advertising, this is not a new concept to me. We do the same thing at our shop. When budgets are low we scrap, and find quality on the cheap. This is what Flickr has to offer. I disagree with the Times article in some ways. I believe there is quality, in advertising terms, on Flickr. It’s one reason Getty has partnered with them. However, since this quality exists in abundance it has simultaneously made millions of professional photographers that earn next to nothing for their work. Again, this is not a new internet concept. You can see the same trend happening across various other creative mediums. Anyone can be a designer these days. Traditional professional designers will argue that these people are not true designers, and as in the movie Helvetica, you’ll hear Mr. Carson say that ‘just because they have the tools doesn’t mean they are designers’ or something like that. What he doesn’t mention is that in the industry he works in, that doesn’t matter. All that matters is what will sell and what the industry will buy. And more and more, the playing field is leveling and ‘novice’ talent is producing actual work for unreasonably cheap flow.

The same can be said for my native medium, interactive design and development. Tools are making it easier for the masses to join and compete. It’s the reason I was livid at Macromedia when it came out with its Dreamweaver product allowing non coders to build websites. It’s one more step towards not needing to know a craft to actually produce the results of said craft. Go on Craigslist and post a web development or design project. The majority of the responses will be appallingly inexpensive and equally shameful in portfolio quality. However, there will be a couple that come close enough to make the grade. The result is a lowering of the industry wage and the promotion of marginal quality. I’m forced to lower my rates to compete. Again, I wasn’t complaining about this when I was a novice web designer in 1999, but it kicks me in the boo boo now.

The book The World is Flat explains these processes in detail. I tend to agree with the synopsis of the book that the overall result of this process is actually for the global good. India is able to compete which drives US innovation, and so on. Globally this is great. I know that I need to think globally, but personally, at this moment, it is bad.

I could go on and write about this topic for hours, but It’d just be more novice writing garnering page views. Oh wait, I forgot to mention, anyone can be a published writer. Anyone want to hire me to write for their blog?

Over the last couple of years my addiction to taking pictures every day has grown in intensity. More recently this addiction has heightened my curiosity to a point of seriousity. You do realize that seriousity should have inclusion confirmation from Merriam-Webster. If truthiness can make in, seriousity should. Seriously. Ok, back to the point. I’m getting more serious about photography. I even purchased a serious camera. Along with this serious camera, and an overabundance of seriousity about it’s use, I’ve gone and constructed myself a website dedicated to my photography. It is my hope that this will inspire and urge potential clients to contact me about my services.

The concept of the site is to take as much distraction out of the interface as possible to allow all focus on the content, the photography. I decided the entire site could be controlled by a small non intrusive control. I also wanted users to be able to interact with the photography by zoom and panning. Users also have the option to zoom out to see the full photo. Finally, I wanted a super easy way to content manage the site. Since I’m an avid Flickr user, its API was a natural CMS choice. I merely have to tag my photos in Flickr and they show up categorized on my site. I’m a big fan of leveraging the many publishing outlets I already use.

If you are a photographer, and are interested in owning a site similar to this one, chirp me.

Chris Teso – Portland Photographer

After much back and forth to the drawing board I’ve come up with an idea for my new site that satisfies several needs. Furthermore, I’ve gone ahead and built it. The two main needs for the site are as follows:

1. Maintain the ability to update the site easily by leveraging the many publishing outlets I already use.
2. Aggregate all of the content I create across multiple platforms into one simple easy to use interface.

The solution for number one was to use Yahoo Pipes to aggregate RSS feeds from the various publishing platforms I already use. These platforms are as follows:

1. Wordpress – runs my blog, my portfolio and my flash lab experiments
2. Flickr – my photography
3. Vimeo – my movies
4. Google Reader – what I read

Solution #1
Pipes allowed me to marry each disparate RSS feed into one long feed. This essentially allows me to use each platform as a content management system. I had to write a few ASP scripts to enable wordpress specific posts to be translated into an RSS feed before sending it off to Pipes to be assimilated.

Solution #2
I created a simple flash application that hit the Pipes feed and displayed content in an animation that resembled a stream of data or consciousness. Within flash I had to do some custom String manipulation to identify where the various pieces of content may be originating. Once these were classified it was as simple as building out the classes that would run the content manipulation. It was also nice to get to play around with the new 3D api built into Flash 10.

All and all I’m very pleased with the site. It will allow me to continue to use the publishing platforms I like, the platforms that are best at housing content, and still display the content in one central stream.

Check out the new site here : http://www.christeso.com.

Permalink: http://www.christeso.com/index.php/portfolio/istream-a-flickr-vimeo-wordpress-google-controlled-website/

Interface and motion design idea for future interactive installation using motion detection.

Words are chosen at random from a random pool of Flickr tags. The words are then broken down into individual characters. These characters are then animated based on the location of user interaction.

Picture this large. Now take that image and double it’s size. Picture it large enough to where you’d have to jump to reach different ‘doors’. That’s how I envision it.

Try it for yourself : Interactive Motion Detection Installation [webcam es necessitous]

Permalink: http://www.christeso.com/index.php/lab/interactive-motion-detection-installation/

(Please open the article to see the flash file or player.)

Yea, it’s the same thing as over there on the right… but it needed its own post!

If you want one for your blog leave a comment below. I plan to automate that, but for now I’ll take requests.

Permalink: http://www.christeso.com/index.php/lab/flash-flickr-widget/flash-flickr-widget/

Are you a Flickr member?

Are you an aspiring photographer?

Are those two synonymous?

Do you want your own photography website that you can control via Flickr simply by using tags?

Do you have your own website but find yourself duplicating your efforts by having to update it as well as Flickr?

Are you getting sick of these questions? me too, let’s cut to it…

FLICKR CONTROLLED PHOTOGRAPHY WEBSITE

Look and Feel:

Currently two different looks:
option 1 – Photography Portfolio
option 2 – Portland Child Photography Portfolio

Both are completely run from Flickr. Simply specify the categories you want, tag your photos appropriately, and they will show up on your website in the order you specify.

More customized designs can be obtained for a fee. [see below or Contact me for more information.]

Customization Options:
There are different customization options available. For example, in option 1 you can either have a ’search tags option’ or remove it if you wish. Also, option 1 will allow you to send someone directly to certain photos by adding a simple parameter to the url like this

Base price = $500
Comes with all files, category navigation and instructions on tagging.

Additional Custom Options @ 100/hr:
- customization/design
- website hosting setup
- domain name setup

Contact me fore more info.

Permalink: http://www.christeso.com/index.php/lab/flickr-controlled-photography-website/