Ever since I came across this set in flickr from Alan Levine, I’ve both admired and used several of these images in my presentations. Most recently I downloaded about 30 of them and simply ran them prior to a presentation. Good way to set the mood.
I’ve consciously and subconsciously tried to recreate the idea a few times but decided today to begin a set of my own. Beginning with one I created earlier this month, I was inspired to capture a quote from the recent article in the NY Times on literacy. The quote isn’t necessarily true, it is a reflection of one perspective.
While I’ll likely continue to create images based on interesting quotes, I decided to scan my blog for recent quotes I thought were worthy of an image. Beginning with George Siemens quote about short attention spans and superficial learning. I went through an interesting process in finding what I felt was an appropriate image.
Using a Creative Commons search, I thought about searching for an image of multi-tasking. I found a few but felt the message here was not so much about that as it was about the depth of connections. The easy choice is to try and go literal. However, I’m finding that as I explore and become more adept at using imagery, a little abstractness and dissonance is a good thing. I then tried to find something about connections. Still not happy. Shallow would seem to be the next choice but it wasn’t until I visualized a person walking along a beach that I entered “wading” to find the image I wanted. After adding the quote and flickr credit, this was the end result:
It’s not the only way to go but it’s one way.
The more I think about design, imagery and communication, the more I think that developing key images to attach to a few of my favourite and most meaningful quotes is a worthwhile habit to form and to share. It should go without saying but since I still get many emails, feel free to use any of these in your own presentations.
If you’d like to subscribe to my Interesting Quotes set you can do so by clicking the RSS feed at the bottom of the flickr page.
Hey Dean,
This is a very cool concept. I think there’s a lot to be learned to build a powerful message using simple bits- a cc photo, a quote, and some text commentary… I am thinking there are some great assignments one can develop for students to do this. And you can make it happen all inside flickr with cc commons search, PicNik!
This is a FANTASTIC idea, and thanks for prompting us to subscribe to the flickr feed. I tried, and bummer, Google Reader keeps saying “Oops there is a problem-try later.” I don’t know if it is a feed problem form Flickr or a feed issue with Google Reader, but if delicious this or bookmark here I’ll forget. Hopefully I can subscribe soon. But again, thanks for pointing me to the other one, and sharing yours as well. You rock!
Cathy Nelsons last blog post..All Together Now – Thing 3
Well, I just noticed the feed must have taken b/c I just got a pix (Stephen Downes quote) from the flickr feed) so I guess there is not real problem (unless you count user error.)
Cathy Nelsons last blog post..All Together Now – Thing 3
Dean, I’ll echo the previous comments that these are AWESOME. Thanks for sharing both your and other interesting snippets. Why do I feel a nearly-overwhelming urge to make some of these myself?
Scott McLeods last blog post..Productive and powerful
Dean,
I just went through the same process many times over while preparing a presentation on creativity for the Slideshare competition. I’ve been reading a lot of books on the subject and I included several quotes from them in my presentation. I spent hours searching for photos to match up with those quotes. It’s really a great feeling when you find the perfect image to match a good quote. And, like you say, it often is an image that you find after you have exhausted all of the obvious searches.
Jamie Tubbss last blog post..Vote for My Presentation on Creativity on Slideshare
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