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Digital Cameras
in the Classroom
Utah Education Network - http://www.uen.org
Lee Baker
Lbaker@media.utah.edu
(801) 585-7905
UEN
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Why Go Digital?
Resource from - http://www.shortcourses.com/
Saves you money
by not buying rolls and rolls of film and paying
for development.
Saves you time
you don't have to make two trips to the store to
drop off and then pick up.
Instantly see your pictures
No more disappointments a day or two later
when your film is developed.
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Why Go Digital?
Resource from - http://www.shortcourses.com/
View images before they are printed
if you don't like what you see, edit them to
perfection or delete them.
Doesn't use the toxic chemicals
that often end up flowing down the drain and into
our streams, rivers, and lakes.
No more waiting
to finish a roll before having it processed. (Or
wasting unexposed film when you can't wait.)
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Digital Cameras in School
Supplement Curriculum
Add to or supplement Fieldtrips
Go on an electronic field trip - show photos of a distant site.
Highlight fieldtrip spots not to miss ahead of time.
Review field trips with pictures to show all students the
sights, discuss learning, share with other groups.
Create assignments with pictures and processes.
For example: lab equipment, measurements, instruments,
pictures for vocabulary or reading lessons.
Use with lenses or other optics to make images
available to the entire class.
For examples microscopes, telescopes, etc.
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Digital Cameras in School
Student Projects
Enhance student project with images.
Reports, science projects, multimedia shows, etc.
Write stories or poems to go a long with pictures.
Pictures that Reinforce of real world examples.
Angle on a house, shapes etc.
Capture and identify species
Find species located close to home or school
Create a local history of sites in their city.
Create a time lapse presentation
Bean sprout or caterpillar transformation.
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Digital Cameras in School
Assessment
Digital images can enhance a student portfolio.
Both electronic and paper based
Use digital images to enhance tests and other
assessment methods.
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Digital Cameras in School
Support
Take pictures of students and create a Student
information file.
Create a photo inventory of school property for
property records.
Create posters or multimedia displays
of student activities and work for open house, awards
night, fair displays etc.
Take pictures for school newspapers yearbook.
Customize your displays and bulletin boards
Use photos from your school, lab, classroom, or
images of student performances.
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Classroom Examples:
Summer Learning High Adventure Projects
Why Cells Work - Power Point
Surweb - Egg Embryology and Production
Surweb - Box Elder, Scenic Attractions, Bear
River Migratory Bird Refuge
The Powerful Math Curse of Room 30
The Butterfly and Hummingbird Garden at
Longfellow School
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Digital Image Basics
Digital Photos/Bitmap Image
digital images are made up of tiny
squares called Pixels.
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Digital Image Basics Cont.
Quality and Size of Image
Depends on the amount of pixels used to create
the image.
Referred to resolution
300 dpi same as 1inch = 300 pixels (when printing the image)
When you reduce the size of an image you
reduce the number of pixels.
When you image is enlarged you computer adds
pixels.
This can result in your picture looking pixilated.
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Digital Image Basics Cont.
Print v.s. Computer Screen
If Printing the picture the more pixels the better.
Generally you want at between 150-300 dpi.
If using the picture on a computer screen you
want it to fit on the monitor without scrolling.
Common computer resolution is 800 pixels by 600 pixels.
If you image is bigger that that reduce the image size.
Using your image on the web.
The less pixels the quicker the download.
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3 Steps to Digital Photography:
INPUT IMAGE PROCESSING OUTPUT
Input
Digital Camera, Scanning, Digital Video
Image Processing
Edit or manipulate the image with image editing software
Output
Display, distribute or storage of images. For example
printing, email, insert in to documents, store for later.
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How the Digital Camera Works:
Image Sensor
Instead of film the digital
camera uses an image sensor,
usually a CCD or Charge-
Couple Device.
The image sensor is made up
of thousands to millions of
pixels that record you image.
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How the Digital Camera Works:
Exposure
When you press the shutter button on the
camera, light comes through the lens and each
pixel records the brightness of light that falls on
it. The more light that hits the pixel the brighter
value the pixel records.
Once the brightness value is recorded it is
converted to a digital number and saved on the
memory of the camera. The digital number
allows the image to be reconstructed on screen
or in a print.
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How the Digital Camera Works:
Photo Color
The original image is only
recorded as black and
white (using brightness).
To add color Red, Green,
and Blue filters are placed
over the image sensor to
create a color photo.
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Types of Digital Cameras:
Point and Shoot
The least expensive digital
cameras below $300.
Fully automatic and little
creative control-that's why they are called "point
and shoot."
Because of the low resolution of many of these
cameras, printed output is limited to about 4 x 6
inches or so.
The images are ideal for Web pages, e-mail
attachments, and small reproduction sizes in
newsletters and other documents.
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Types of Digital Cameras:
Multi-Megapixel Camera
Quickly becoming the most
common digital camera sold.
Over a million pixels in
their image sensors.
Cost between $300-$1000 depending on the
amount of mega pixels.
Give some creative controls.
Appeals to serious photographers who like to have
creative control of their camera's settings and
make prints up to about 8 x 10 in size.
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Types of Digital Cameras:
Professional Cameras
35mm or APS SLR cameras
that have been adapted to digital
photography
Cost from $3000 to $20,000 and more.
These cameras often use 3 image sensors,
one for each color so they capture great color
and resolution.
At least 2-million pixels in their image sensors
and usually many more.
One huge advantage is that most of the
features (and accessories designed for the film
versions also work with the digital versions.
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Camera Elements:
Image Sensor - Resolution
The number of pixel on an image sensor.
Lower resolutions such as 640 x 480 are perfect for web
publishing, e-mail attachments, small prints, or images in
documents and presentations.
Higher resolutions, over 1 million pixels, are best for
printing photo-realistic enlargements larger than
5" x 7".
Optical v.s. Interpolated Resolution
The optical resolution of a camera is the number of pixels
on an image sensor that can be counted.
Interpolated resolution, adds pixels to the image to
increase the total number of pixels.
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Camera Elements:
Aspect Ratio
Image sensors have different aspect ratios-the
ratio of image height to width.
The aspect ratio determines the shape and
proportions of the photographs you create.
To calculate the aspect ratio of any camera,
divide the largest number in its resolution by the
smallest number.
Sensitivity
An ISO is the speed, or sensitivity to light. The
higher the number the "faster" or more sensitive
the sensor is to light.
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Camera Elements:
Image Compression
Image Compression makes large image files
smaller, most cameras store images in a format
called JPEG. This file format not only compresses
images, it also allows you to specify how much
they are compressed.
Less compression gives you better images so you can
make larger prints, but you can't store as many images.
More compression lets you store more images and
makes the images better for posting on a Web page or
sending as an e-mail attachment. The only problem is
that your prints won't be as good.
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Camera Elements:
Frame Rate
There are two delays built into digital cameras that
affect your ability to respond to fast action when
taking pictures.
1 or 2 second refresh rate delay between pressing the
shutter button and actually capturing the image. This
occurs as the camera clears the image sensor, and set
the correct controls.
The recycle time, occurs when the captured image is
processed and stored. This delay can range from a few
seconds to half a minute.
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Camera Elements:
Image Storage
Fixed v.s. Removable Storage
The two most common types of removable
storage are Flash Memory Cards and Magnetic
disks.
The number of images that can be stored
depends on the following:
Capacity of the storage devise
Resolution of the images taken
The amount an type of compression
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Top 10 Techniques for Better
Photos - Kodak
Power Point Resource
Gathered From Kodak.com
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References
Short Courses -THE Digital Photography
Resource
Kodak Top 10 Techniques – A Guide to Better
Pictures
Digital Cameras in Education
Tech4learning – Teaching with Digital Cameras
Teacher to Teacher – Ideas for using digital
camera’s in the classroom
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Class Project
Class Project End Product
Power Point
Surweb Show
UEN Virtual Tour
Web Photo Album (Dreamweaver)
Story Board Project
Topic
Sequence
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Places to Go:
University Campus (Walking Tour)
Architecture, Plants, Sculptures, Geology
Utah Museum of Fine Arts
Free Admission / Only open until 5:00 p.m.
No Flash Photography
Utah Museum of Natural History
$6.00 Admission / Only open until 5:30 p.m.
No Flash Photography
Red Butte Garden
$5.00 Admission / Only open until 5:00 p.m.
Marriott Library
A Century of Skiing Exhibit
Fort Douglas/Olympic Village