Tips for Searching images on Internet

Many a times we need images or photographs for variety of purpose.

You may need it to share a funny message on Facebook with your friends in a creative way or just want to make a personalized greeting card with a nice image. 

Many a times clipart is not enough to convey a message in a presentation so you need to search more suitable image!

What ever the purpose may be however, our goal is to find best image that suits our requirement. So let’s explore some tips on searching Images on internet.

Google Image Search is a very powerful tool that allows you to filter your search in a variety of ways using advance search!

For example while searching for a recipe, key in your word in Google image search for more visual results. Here is my result page on Google Image Search for carrot recipes.

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Google Image Search can help you in a detailed project research where you need to search for documents. For example it can readily give you an insight on ancient documents. 

You can even narrow down your search result by selecting region from advance search. 

If you want to make a greeting card for your friend who loves purple color and you need to find pictures of flowers with shades of purple color only. Here is what Google Image Search can do for you! 

Key-in flower in Google Image Search and choose Advance Search from Settings.

Now, From option Colors in the image choose radio button this color to specify your color choice.

Result page will surely offer plenty options for you to choose. Now, Choice is yours to narrow down it by choosing specific flower names like rose or lily!

For example, you need inspiration for drawing a picture of flower ! Try using option Line drawing from type of image under Advance Image Search. 

You will surely be amazed with result page about what others have shared with you!

Similarly if you want funny dog picture to share a message on facebook or need a clipart for one of your presentation! Try searching for clipart in Advance Image Search.

Though you can enjoy most images on Internet look for its copyright.

Searching Images that you want to share or use commercially becomes easy with filters for creative commons in Google Image Search.

Flickr image search is another favorite tool for finding images ! It lets you search for illustration or art on any given subject! Give it a try and you will surely enjoy it!

Here is what you can do with Flickr image search!

I don’t want to see just photographs of lion rather I want to look for illustration or art work shared by other for subject ‘lion’

Result page with variety of art work and illustrations on subject ‘lion’ is listed.

Apart from using Google and Flickr there are many more ways to find interesting images using flickriver, deviantart , imgur  and many free stock image sites.

Let me know your ways of finding interesting images too!

Searching the Internet for trustworthy information

Hi! 

From last few days I was thinking of writing something useful for few of my friends who loves Googling and searching internet.

I am actually very happy to see their reaction when they open Google in their web browser, key in a term and confidently press the search button. Choosing one website from a long list of websites from the result page is even more exciting for them! 

What next?

They just start reading the webpage religiously.

Google can flood our laptop screen with information on any topic. Now, let me ask you one thing; Have you ever thought that you might not be the first one looking for information on the topic? What you are searching on Google may have been searched many more times before.

How about finding webpages that many more people have already searched, found, read and liked? Those are the webpages actually worth reading.

So, how do you know what is most trustworthy information the Internet on any topic?

The answer is through social bookmarking cloud.

With cloud bookmarking services like delicious.com or diigo.com you can filter the best webpages on any topic of your choice.

Cloud bookmarks are nothing but a list of your favourite webpages that you can access from any ware and any time. Saving your bookmarks in a cloud means it is saved on a remote computer or server giving you freedom to access it either from your home computer or from office computer.

For example, I am a big fan of crocheting. Whenever I find any interesting crochet pattern I bookmark it using diigo.com. I also group them based on tags so later I can access them easily. I don’t even have to remember whether it was for kids or it was for home decoration; I just tag them with the term! 

Here is a screenshot of my diigo library with some of my favourite tags.

Interestingly, on these cloud bookmarking sites you can find many social groups based on your interest. You can bookmark webpages that you came across while surfing the internet and bookmark them as well as share it with specific social group. Every member in the group can share bookmarks and add it to the group’s pool.

Other members of the group can usually vote for new bookmarks just like facebook likes! Thus, filtering the best ones with more votes! 

So, searching through this pool of social bookmark can give you thorough insight of how many people have liked or voted a particular webpage! Here is an example, if you search a term ‘kids’ in delicious.com you will get a list of webpages tagged with the term ‘kids’.

Another example, In my diigo library I follow home and garden group where I share whatever I find interesting related to home and garden as well as check out what other have found they feel is worth sharing on the topic. To stay updated I subscribe through rss button on the right most corner of the group page. 

Similarly reddit.com has hundreds of subreddits on variety of topics. You can visit subreddits of your interest and look for webpages that are up voted the most.

Some of my favourite bookmarking sites are diigo, delicious, xmaks, Google bookmarks and yahoo bookmarks. All you need is an account with respective website and a browser extension to quickly bookmark your interests. If you have not yet installed that browser extension just grab one! 

Download and install Google Chrome extensions or Mozilla Firefox add-ons for bookmarking and start building your own bookmark cloud!

So, next time when you Google something do not forget to check the social bookmarking cloud of your choice!