Guest post: aviary.com
Today's Tech Bits post is our very first guest post, written by Linda Stuckey from the E.D. Locke Public Library in McFarland:
Intro: I have worked in McFarland Library technical services for the last eight years. I am a regular reader of lifehacker.com, google tip of the day, and slashdot.org among many others that I have organized by iGoogle tabs and RSS feeds. I fervently believe that we need to stay informed on technology in order to speak the “language,” to evolve and stay relevant, to take advantage of new options and time savers that appear daily, and to solve staff and patron technology issues. Free web-based software is incredibly helpful. Aviary.com is one prime example.
Aviary.com is a web based photo-editing site that is free and does not require a login or sign up. It has several different editors including: Image editor (Phoenix), effects (Peacock), color/swatch (Toucan), vector (Raven), and my favorite, Image markup (Falcon), which allows you to capture any web page or image and add arrows, circles, and text boxes to it. There are at last count 72 tutorials under the “learn more tab.”
Under the Aviary Tools tab, dropdown menu for Image Markup (Falcon), there is a Firefox add-on called Talon. It installs an icon in the toolbar called "capture image of web page". With a click you can select any or all of the web page you are on, and then edit, save or copy it, including all the image markups (arrows, circles, etc.). It is amazingly easy and straightforward.
Some screen shots from Aviary (all made with the product!):
The home page:
The toolbars and tools (with Talon's button circled):
Talon, Aviary's Firefox extension:
This is nifty! I installed the little Firefox add-on and find myself frequently using it to capture parts of webpages (like the picture of a Google Docs resume template I just used for a TechBits post, and for Library Online screenshots for documentation).
Thanks for sharing this!
Posted by: Kerri | 08/06/2009 at 02:48 PM