16 Avatar Generators for Profile Pictures and more
If you are blogging with students – it’s recommended that you don’t use real photographs of the students. A fun alternative is to create a cartoon avatar instead. This lets the students have a visual representation of themselves, but without using their real image.
You could also use these as characters in your lesson resources – add them to your interactive whiteboard presentations with speech bubbles to give lesson objectvies or to ask questions.
Here are 16 websites that you can use to create fun avatars. Some allow you to save the finished creation as a jpg for free. If not, then use the print screen button to copy the screen, paste into a paint program, crop and save as a jpg. You could also use the Smart or Promethean camera tools to capture these images to your IWB files.
1. WeeMee -Create a mini version of yourself, add accessories. There’s plenty of scope for customisation of your avatar.
2. South park studio – turn yourself into a South Park character
3. HeroMachine 2.5 – Turn yourself into a super hero character. This would also be great as a part of a digital storytelling resource or story starter.
4. Avatarizeyourself - turn yourself into a Na’vi from the movie Avatar
5. Ultimate Flash Face v0.42b a bit like a police photofit.
6. Make yourself in lego – Produce a lego character that looks like you. Or turn yourself into a Stormtrooper wizard. Is up to you 
7. Simpsons Movie – Ever wanted to be a Simpsons character? Now you can create your own yellow-skinned doppleganger in the style of the Simpsons.
8. Mr. Picassohead – become an abstract piece of work in the style of Picasso. Put your eyes and ears wherever you want!
9. BuiLD YouR WiLD SeLF – Create an avatar out of bits and pieces of humans and other animals – head, arms, legs, clothes, eyes, mouth, tail, wings, shells … just pick the parts you like and assemble them together
10.Mii Avatar Generator – create a Mii in the style of the characters found on the Wii computer console.
11. Clay Yourself - Clay Yourself lets you create a version of yourself in modelling clay. Lots of choice. (Thanks Lara for the link!)
12. ArtisanCam - A quick way of producing a sketch version of yourself. Limited choice of options.
13. Become an M and M – This lets you recreate yourself as an M and M sweet from the adverts. Probably going against the school’s healthy eating agenda…
14. Lloyds TSB Me – This lets you recreate yourself in the style of the characters from the Lloyds TSB banking adverts.
15. Grabba Beast – Grabba Beast lets you build your own monster from a large library of body parts, some scary, some cute. Plenty of weird and strange designs. This would also be great for creating characters for digital storytelling.
16. Mad Men Yourself - this is one for the teachers more than the students. Fans of the TV show Mad Men can creates a sharp dressed 60s avatar of themselves.
If you want more of these sites, the full list can be found on my Delicious list here: http://delicious.com/dannynic/avatar
Got any others you’d like to add? Let me know in the comments!
Don’t forget you can also follow the Whiteboard Blog on Facebook here : https://www.facebook.com/whiteboardblog
Also don’t forget: For SMARTboard Training and Promethean ActivInspire Training, check out my Think Bank website.
Read MoreMake Quick Screen grabs with PicPick
PicPick is a free piece of software which allows you to make screengrabs from anywhere. It also contains an image editor and screen magnifier.
Some of these features can be found in your IWB software, but for making quick screengrabs it’s a handy utility.
Check it out at http://www.picpick.org/
Thanks to Jeff Thomas for the link.
Read MoreNew Google search by image
I was told about a neat little application last week called TinEye. With it you could upload an image and TinEye would tell you all the sites that used that particular image. I thought it could be useful for teachers to check where students got particular images for coursework – it should be possible to backtrack and find the source.
It reminded me a little of the Google Goggles app for the iPhone which would search based on a photograph. I was wondering why Google hadn’t rolled a similar feature out to their desktop search tool.
Well now it turns out they have been working on a similar idea, and this week they’ve begun to roll out a new feature for Google Image Search which lets you search from an image. Similar to the Pixolu2 tool I wrote about yesterday.
Apparently the new feature will be rolled out to users this week. You’ll know you have it when you see a camera icon on the Google Image Search page. (I now have the feature in my Firefox 4 browser and in Internet Explorer 9)
Click on the camera and it opens up to let you either enter a URL of an image or upload one of your own.
The image search tool will check for identical copies of that image, and also return similar images. Handy if you want to find lots of variations on a theme for a particular presentation or piece of work.
I uploaded a photo of a sunflower I had taken with my phone, and Google returned lots of yellow/flower pictures 
It’s an interesting development, but maybe not brilliantly useful just yet. Keep an eye on it to see how it develops.
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Pixolu2 : a visual image search tool
pixolu² is a prototype image search tool which uses an interesting method to help you find images. Once you have carried out an initial keyword search you can select images that you like, and pixolu² will try and find more images that are similar. It will also try and group them visually (by colour from the look of it). By repeating the process over and over again you can narrow down the type of images you get.
It will trawl Flickr and Yahoo to find these images, but it doesn’t filter them in terms of creative commons licences, so images you get might be subject to copyright.
It’s definitely an interesting way to find similar images – go check it out at : http://www.pixolu.de
Hat tip to Misae Richwoods (@minxymoggy) for the link
Read MoreSign and Image/Text generation tool
Here’s a really quick link to a fun website that lets you generate your own signs with short snappy messages.
This would be a fun way to display keywords, learning objectives or to help introduce a story.
Take a look and see what you think : http://www.redkid.net/generator/sign.php
Other generators are available on the site including banners, avatars and road signs. Check it out.
Read MoreGoogle Image Slideshow
Google Image Slideshow is a simple tool allows you to easily generate and view an online image slideshow based on search results from Google Images. http://theslideshow.net/
If you are using this in the classroom – be aware there is you can’t preview the images you are going to get in the slideshow website. I’d suggest doing the same google image search first on the regular google image search page to check no unexpected images are going to turn up. You’d also be better off using the slideshow website in Advanced mode which will let you set SafeSearch to Strict before you start.
Google restricts all automated search results to a maximum of 64 results. So, there is no way to include more than 64 images in any slideshow.
If you want to save the slideshow to access later – once you have created the slideshow simply copy & paste the URL at the top of the page. You could add this hyperlink to an IWB / PowerP{oint page or add it as a bookmark.
Updated 31/1/13 – new link
Read More12 Useful Image Search Tools
The internet is awash with fantastic images. The problem is finding images that are not breaching someone’s copyright, which is often the case. For student projects is also good practice to have them attribute the source of their images.
Here’s a few ways of getting images that let you find ones you are actually allowed to use.
Google Image Search
Google Image Search is excellent for finding images and is often the first place people check, but in it’s default setting it has a scattergun approach to copyright, pulling images in from everywhere. It is possible to change the settings of the search to look for images that are able to be reused. Go to Google Image Search, and below the search box click on Advanced Search.
Then under “Usage Rights“, select “Labeled for Reuse“. Images that are then returned in the search should then be able to be reused in projects and on blogs safely. Always remember to credit the original source of the image though.
Flickr Commons and Wikipedia
Both Flickr and Wikipedia maintain libraries of creative commons/public domain images that are well worth a look. Flickr hosts images for many publicly-held photo libraries from museums around the world.
Wikipedia Commons : commons.wikimedia.org
Flickr Commons : www.flickr.com/commons
Flickr Search Engines
To help find creative commons images, there are several tools now which will let you search Flickr for CC images. My Favourite is FlickrCC – enter a tag to search for and it will return a load thumbnails. Click on a thumbnail to see more information and to visit the original page on Flickr.
Alternatives to FlickrCC Include:
- Compfight : http://www.compfight.com/
- FlickrStorm : http://www.zoo-m.com/flickr-storm/
- Simple Flickr CC Search : http://johnjohnston.info/flickrCC/index.php
- Flickr Creative Commons Search : http://flickr.com/creativecommons/
Pics4Learning
Pics4Learning is a copyright-friendly image library for teachers and students. The Pics4Learning collection consists of thousands of images that have been donated by students, teachers, and amateur photographers. Unlike many Internet sites, permission has been granted for teachers and students to use all of the images donated to the Pics4Learning collection.
Veezzle
Veezzle is a free stock photo search engine. The site pulls in images from many different stock photo sources, as well as Flickr. Click on the “download in HQ” button to view the image in its original site/page to be able to attribute correctly. Worth a look.
The Open Clip Art Library
The Open Clip Art Library is a good source of open-source/public domain clip art resources. Registration is required for some of the features of the site, but it’s free to join. You can browse without registering.
Also check out School Clip Art http://www.school-clip-art.com/
Searching for images on your IWB – a warning!
A quick tip if you are doing an image seach live – on your IWB – in front of a class. Although you might be searching with the best of intentions – sometimes even the most innocuous search can throw up images that you may not want the students to see. Some search engines have a “safe search” filter, and the school filter may block them, but it’s always best to cover yourself just in case.
Check your Projector remote for a Blank or a Freeze button (most should have at least one or the other) and freeze/blank the screen while you do the search on the computer. You can see the search on the regular monitor and check that nothing untoward is being displayed.
For more on Copyright and Creative Commons check here and here.
Ookaboo – free pictures of everywhere on Earth
Ookaboo is a collection of free pictures, indexed using precise words and phrases from various sources on web. All pictures on Ookaboo are in the public domain or are under Creative Commons — that means that you can use our pictures for your web site, classwork, or other creative projects!
The Map Search is a little fiddly, but you can search for keywords or places. Images include a link back to the original image, plus an explanation in plain english of how you can use the image legally. It also provides html and bbcode for reusing the image on your website or on a forum.
For example; A quick search for my home town brings up this photo of the pub we used to spend all our time in when I was a student… The html code is taken straight from the Ookaboo page.
Picture of Leigh-on-Sea
thanks to JohnArmagh from Wikimedia Commons and Ookaboo!
It’s a neat tool to add to a growing list of creative commons image search tools. Give it a test drive and see what you think! http://ookaboo.com
Read MoreWylio – a creative commons image search
Wylio is another addition to the various image search tools that you can find on Internet that trawl through Flickr and return images covered by a creative commons license. What makes Wylio different to something like FlickrCC is that it is designed with bloggers in mind, and gives you quick access to an embed code that automatically sizes the image and builds the photo credit into the code.
So for example, you type in a keyword, Wylio shows you lots of images that match that keyword. Clicking on an image will bring up a box that lets you choose the size and positioning of the image within your text with a preview of how it will look. A “Get the code” button lets you get the code which you can then post into the HTML of your blog or wiki page (or VLE object).
And you end up with something like this:
It’s quick and painless to use, and makes attributing images to their original source a lot easier. Go check out Wylio today and see what you think!
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