Learning more about the world through photography, has been the motto of these websites—
Trek Earth, Trek Nature and Trek Lens, that I ardently use to learn about my hobby—Photography! I think this has been a noble initiative that has been helping amateurs like me around the world learn the art and science of photography. I believe this site works, as I have seen people who initially had very regular photos and have now shown such improvement that I was amazed!
The reason I choose to speak about these sites is not to advertise them, but to highlight how the whole learning process here is a collaborative one, relevant to what we all speak about in informal learning. The users of this website range from professionals to mere beginners like me, from people with the most high-end DSLRs to basic Point and Shoot versions. Whatever you use, does not deter you from posting your photos here and having people critique your work.
These sites have some common features like:
On this site, you get credits for:
The way you work when you are new to the site is to upload your photo, then review other photos that you find interesting. You need to be persistent, and over time people start visiting your profile more often and leaving you critiques or comments, doing workshops, marking your notes useful, etc. You reply to them and thank them for appreciating your work or giving useful feedback, and eventually end up connecting with a few members of the community whom you follow regularly, much like how we have a blogging fraternity in our community.
Few things I would like improved about this website though is the user interface, which hasn't changed much since the sites inception, and to have some cool and latest Web 2.0 features like Flickr.
I highly recommend this site for people who are willing to learn more about photography. But when I do, I often have people look at the photos there and say "Wow, these are too good. Are my photos worth putting up here?" My only answer to them has always been, that this is not a place for professionals to flaunt their talents, but for photography lovers at all levels to share their knowledge and learn from.
I'd like to hear from all of you if there are similar sites for learning photography or even any other subject.
Trek Earth, Trek Nature and Trek Lens, that I ardently use to learn about my hobby—Photography! I think this has been a noble initiative that has been helping amateurs like me around the world learn the art and science of photography. I believe this site works, as I have seen people who initially had very regular photos and have now shown such improvement that I was amazed!
The reason I choose to speak about these sites is not to advertise them, but to highlight how the whole learning process here is a collaborative one, relevant to what we all speak about in informal learning. The users of this website range from professionals to mere beginners like me, from people with the most high-end DSLRs to basic Point and Shoot versions. Whatever you use, does not deter you from posting your photos here and having people critique your work.
These sites have some common features like:
- Regional Groupings of Photographs, that allow you to browse photos within Continents, Countries, Regions, States and Cities.
- Critique System, that allows you to give and receive constructive feedback and comments on photos.
- Workshops, that allow members to post edited versions of your image providing a useful visual example on how to improve a specific photo.
- Alerts, to receive email alerts whenever new photos are posted according to various criteria.
- Multilingual Capability, that allows you to view a page in any language (currently Chinese ~Traditional & Simplified~, Dutch, English, French, Japanese, Lithuanian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish).
- Post your photos, go and view other photos and critique them, thus increasing chances of people navigating to your photo and leaving you valuable comments.
- Critique other peoples photos and do workshops to help others learn even if you don't put up your own photos.
On this site, you get credits for:
- Giving useful critiques that help others in the community improve their work.
- Giving useful workshops that others can learn from.
- Writing useful notes that give more information on your photo, the location and history, how you took that photo, what settings you had on your camera etc.
The way you work when you are new to the site is to upload your photo, then review other photos that you find interesting. You need to be persistent, and over time people start visiting your profile more often and leaving you critiques or comments, doing workshops, marking your notes useful, etc. You reply to them and thank them for appreciating your work or giving useful feedback, and eventually end up connecting with a few members of the community whom you follow regularly, much like how we have a blogging fraternity in our community.
Few things I would like improved about this website though is the user interface, which hasn't changed much since the sites inception, and to have some cool and latest Web 2.0 features like Flickr.
I highly recommend this site for people who are willing to learn more about photography. But when I do, I often have people look at the photos there and say "Wow, these are too good. Are my photos worth putting up here?" My only answer to them has always been, that this is not a place for professionals to flaunt their talents, but for photography lovers at all levels to share their knowledge and learn from.
I'd like to hear from all of you if there are similar sites for learning photography or even any other subject.
Sreya,
ReplyDeleteI have visited Trek earth and it is an awesome site.
I like the way you have used Trek Earth as a good example of collaborative learning.
Hi Sreya, beautiful example you have here for collaborative learning. I use these sites quiet often as I am a photography enthusiast myself.
ReplyDeleteI really like the informal touch about these sites where you get to use your hobby to learn more about this world and to improve your photography skills. Flickr and myshutterspace come closer to these but they are more of feel-good-comments than constructive criticism.
Again taking ILT Vs Informal learning (sorry to cross-relate), IMHO these methods will only help in fine-tuning your skills. There is always basics which we need to learn through ILT. If you totally rely on such informal learning methods, you end up missing certain basics because you never knew such things can be done.