Pinterest: Change Your Terms or We’re Leaving #pinterest #copyright #termsandconditions

I've recently wasted a good 20 plus minutes unpinning all the images I'd pinned on various Pinterest boards I'd created.

What promised to be a useful and fun tool, had a hidden and nefarious agenda all tucked away in the terms and condition of service.

Basically, to sum it up in simple terms, you have to have unequivocal rights to the image to even pin it, any legal action Pinterest incurs you are completely liable for the cost of and just to add insult to injury any images you do have rights to they strip you of your copyright and then can sell with no remuneration to you.

Damned if you do damned if you don't.

My own Pinterest account has only one pinned image now and one given open, and free access to pin to let Pinterest know what the users think.

Change Your Terms or We’re Leaving

A lesson to us all about what's hidden in those long and pesky terms, and conditions most of us fail to read (myself included).

Piqued my Pinterest #pinterest

So I've been roped into using yet another form of social networking: pinterest.

It's not enough that I'm already on tumblr, twitter, Facebook, flickr.... Yes the list goes on.

Just to fill my time up some more I have the corresponding apps on my phone too, just to ensure I am completely occupied with busy nothings.

Pinterest is for all intents and purposes a virtual scrap book; a collection of things you find online and want to collate into boards, like a pin board of images you've collected not unlike a moodboard to inspire your present project. So in that sense it's a really great tool.

I can't help but feel though that it's just one more thing we don't really need to occupy the time we already don't have.

Nevertheless I've joined after some arm bending and will no doubt fill it to the rafters with images I find on my online travels.

Feel free to follow my pinterest.

Getting back on the horse #artafterabsence

I've actually been drawing again, it's been a while and I even dusted off the Wacom Intuos (which I'd only used once and that was when I first bought a few years back).

I'm really not enjoying Illustrator at the moment. Tracing my scanned drawing in was one thing filling it in how I want is not intuitive. Shortcuts and buttons are not in the same place as Photoshop the latter of which I have better experience with.

I'm clearly going to need to brush up on my skills.

For now I'm importing the outlined drawing into Photoshop to finish off the drawing, but in general I still want to use illustrator as I want my art to be vector. Will be watching tutorial videos and playing around in Illustrator once I have this current piece finished.

I've also been helping out a campaign group with some basic graphics and networking. I figured this would be good experience for me as I am so long out the loop. Having a friend who works both in a creative industry and in marketing within EA games goes a long way in teaching me some basics I need to know.

It always comes back to who you know and I've always been fortunate in this area.

I also still have video to edit for our local church which took a good half a day to import. It was the first time filming with my 550D and I used 1920x1080 which meant I went through two 8gig cards for an hours filming. Again, another learning experience.

I know I have a long journey ahead of me creatively as it's been so long since I seriously took pencil to paper, but I hope it will be a fruitful one.

3six5 restart #365project #365

I managed to stall badly on this project whereby weeks went by with no photo's taken or where I simply forgot to upload them.

With all the Christmas distraction I really just wasn't able to keep up with taking a daily photo for this project.

That being said I really do want to have a crack at it so I am going to restart in the new year which seemed a fitting time and have joined a broader Flickr group for this challenge called Project 365 (the previous group was specific to 2011)

Facebook Covers #facebookcover

As people move their FB accounts over to timeline more and more are making good use of Covers.

Many have also been asking me where I get mine from. Mine are in fact my own photography and many have made requests for Covers from them.

So I have made a few to get people started (just click the images for larger view and save as), but I am sure just as with FB banners there will be sites popping up (if not already) offering Covers for your Facebook timeline. If you don't find what you need here just do a google for FB covers.

Enjoy!

*Copyright is not transferable with the use of these images, all rights reserved. For personal use only please only distribute with the original copyright. If you wish to use any of my photography for commercial purposes please obtain permission directly from myself, thank you.

Related articles

• How to Add a Cover Image to Your Facebook Profile Timeline (faebook.org)
• Timeline (rowjie.me)
• Facebook's new Timeline set to 'lock in' users (gunnyg.wordpress.com)

3six5 project

After much badgering from my mum (thanks mum) I joined the 365 group on flickr. My mums way of encouraging me to take more photo's.

Mostly on my iPhone at present, but I will try and take more on my Canon DSLR (which is what my mum was trying to encourage me to do I believe).

You can view my daily efforts on my tumblr where I give a little commentary behind the photo: 3six5

Or visit my Flickr stream (which is more up-to-date as I send my photos there direct from my phone): Flickr

10 Things That Inspire Me #10thingsthatinspire

As part of any artists process of developing their craft it is often their life experience, interests and external influences that help form their style.

I came across an article recently about a photographers method called "Seven suggestions on finding your style".

As the first step, you need to be open and honest (at least to yourself) about what inspires you. As an exercise, list 10 things – whether these are other photographers, other kinds of artists, films, music, literature etc. -Miss Aniela

So in that vein here is my list of 10 things that inspire me:

1. Cinematography - Notably Noir. I also like unusual shooting in a film or TV show (Misfits comes to mind), atmosphere and good story telling through the visual medium often without words.
2. Other artists (not forgetting Photographers) - Stand out artists for me are the likes of Dave McKean, Mark Ryden, Brian Froud, Vincent Marcone, Miles Aldridge, Vivian Maier, Shepard Fairey and many, many more.
3. Nature and seasons - The ever changing seasons and nature, wildlife and all life.
4. Mythology, legends and folklore.
5. Collage and altered art - I love the texture and abstract nature often whilst telling a story.
6. Magick, fantasy & surrealism - Like many people I like to escape the realm of reality through the surreal and hyper real.
7. Novels and books - There are many books and authors who've had a profound impact on my world view. The Celestine Prophecy by James Redfield and The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho being two such books as well as Clive Barkers Weaveworld. There are many, many more, but it would be an entire post in itself.
8. Music - Music sets the mood for everything and so too do I like to have music when I create to set the mood. I'll often create playlists with a mood in mind. I could list 'some' artists I like ('some' being an understatement) but there really are just too many to list. I really do enjoy nearly all genres of music.
9. Theatrical - I love the decadence, dramatics, feel and vibe one often associates with theatre. A dynamic so different to TV or film because of the very nature of the medium.
10. Narrative - From my other listed items this one would seem to cross over with many of them and it's something I feel is vital in my craft, to tell a story without words and to leave the viewer to piece the story together; interpret from their life experience, inspirations and influences.

Related articles

• Seven suggestions on finding your style (pixiq.com)
• When Inspiration is far from the present; Play (valorieschleicher.wordpress.com)
• We Want To Be Inspired (befreephotography.net)
• Pop Art: 5 celebrity artists (dangerousminds.net)