What are the irksome problems facing people who use digital media?

[Steve Harrison]

Soon I will be faciliating a workshop, looking to understand the problems faced by digital media proffessionals.

How do you find the right image?
How bothersome is it to tag images?
What would be a really cool app to have today?
etc...etc...etc

The things that stop you from being a creative genius and instead make you frustrated ( and ready to throw something)

So I thought before I ran it live, perhaps the 38 mins community would be willing to share some of your thoughts....

and those that are visually minded, could find images to represent the problem....that I can use in the workshops.

And maybe we can work on developing some solutions....and possibly we might develop an idea that either George or Ewan would be eager to invest in....

Thanks

[Steve Harrison]

Nope All Good. Seems to be spot on. I'm looking for the problems felt by anyone who is working with digital images/media, game developers very welcome. Thanks for sharing your frustrations, anyone else got anything to add? Have you thought of asking if anyone fancies the job of designing some graphics (stand up all you creatvie freelancers) and divide the spoils? I would like to explore your RPG example a bit more....what do you think could make the task easier, if we could wave our magical digital wand what would you want it to do?

[Rosie Wood]

Hi All,
Not sure if this is at all relevant so feel free to delete/edit it!
When you talk about digital media do you mean like artists, film makers and web designers?
I am a java game developer (Those who have seen Solundrian.com please don't laugh!) and have a few image problems at the moment. I've developed a simple Snap Game and Ive been using computer generated images for the cards. A good friend suggested it would be better with more cutesy images like teddy bears, birthday cakes etc. Should I take time out and design the cards or just get some uncopyrighted clip art and use these. Employing an artist isn't a viable option yet....
Another problem I have had and hopefully will have, is designing characters for an RPG game. The characters were passable when only a face image was used but it isn't easy drawing an animated rat that is standing up!
I find it really easy to get computer generated images, because I wrote a few apps in Processing that can generate these in any size and as gif, png, jpg and tif files and apply different filters. They are OK as stand in graphics and suit my requirements for the moment.
Keeping track of images is always a bit of a pain. I know I should tag them in Vista but never seem to get around to it.
Another problem I may have is allowing visitors to upload their images on a PHP form which sends them in an email to me. But I will tackle that some time soon....
Hope this isn't off topic!

[Steve Harrison]

Thanks. Both and more. What I am trying to do is understand the problems/frustrations/pain involved in not jsut finding the right image for this piece of work (the right metaphor, context, style etc) and the right image ( the killer photo we took in Patagonia ) but also working with these images. The idea being that through this dialogue we can better inform the workshops, and that the workshops will lead to technolgy /solution development/prototypes. So thanks for continuing the dialogue. What problems do you have? What images represent these problems to you?

[Kate Ho]

Hi Steve,

Some interesting questions there. But can you elaborate a little bit more. E.g. when I first read "How do you find the right image" I thought you meant it in terms of marketing/branding! Then I realised you meant images in the context of photos! (or am I wrong?)

It would be a really intriguing discussion - but can you expand a bit more?