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Top 5 Alternative Search Engines For Discovering Great Images On Flickr

If you’ve ever surfed online for images, then you’ve undoubtedly heard of Flickr.com–the major online photo management site where you can upload, discover, and share your photos. Flickr is a great place to find some of the best images and photos on the web.

However, because there are so many uploaded images, Flickr becomes a bottomless resource that can be hard to search. Flickr does, indeed, allow you to tailor a search on the site. You can search for photos added by tags, place, sets, and galleries. You can also search by date–images recently added, added by month, or the most interesting uploads in the past 7 days. Flickr even lets you search for photos taken by a specific camera!

Although those search options are readily available, they can become a bit limited or inefficient at times when you can’t find what you’re looking for.

Ever spend hours trying to find the perfect image? Combing through the same tags over and over again? Clicking on each image for related leads? It’s like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

Fortunately, there are a few alternative search tools that can make for a more efficient search. So if Flickr’s usual search filters don’t cut it, try a few of these to get an image search that works for you.

1. Flickriver

Flickriver is a web-based viewer with one major difference from the original Flicker — it allows quick viewing of thousands of photos with a ‘river of photos’ option. This means you never have to click ‘next’ to load the upcoming, new page.

Since Flickriver is a part of Flicker, it allows viewing photos from Flickr members, taken by many different photographers, including both amateurs and professionals. You can click on any photo and get the official Flickr page where you can contact the photographer and see how you can use their images.

It’s probably the fastest photo viewing tool and because of its unusual and convenient viewing experience, Flickriver allows people to easily discover more relevant photographers and photos!

2. TinEye

TinEye is an image search and recognition company with its mission to make their images easily searchable and accessible to everyone. Their focus is on reverse image search, making it possible to find where your images appear online. Simply upload an image, search it by URL, or drag and drop your pictures to start your search. After a few seconds you will get instant results.

3. Picsearch

Picsearch helps you to search images more easily as it connects users to the wide visual resources of the internet. It uses a unique design technology to crawl the web and create a searchable index of discovered images.

How does it work? A user searches for an image after which a query is sent to Picsearch. The result is a set of thumbnail images that are as relevant as possible. If the user clicks on a thumbnail, the original website is opened where you can find where that image is placed.

With its 3 main features, Picsearch image tool stands apart from the rest of its competitors. It has a patent-pending indexing algorithm, as well as several family-friendly features that allow children to surf in safety. Any material that is not suitable for kids is separated by an advanced filtering systems. Last, but not the least, the site is user-friendly and perfect for fun and games, but also for serious business users.

4. Compfight

With Compfight you can get that visual inspiration you need to finish any project you are working on! It’s an image search engine, specifically designed to locate images for blogs.

The core of the Compfight experience lies in its various filters and amazing options. Combine that with a smart and easy-to-use tool and you will quickly discover all the images you need in the most efficient way possible.

5. Imgur

Imgur is a perfect place if you wish to share your images online and enjoy some of the most popular and awesome pictures you can find online. It’s being used by millions of people, every single day. You can get those amazing pictures and be entertained and motivated by funny, inspiring and helpful images and stories from all over the world in no time.

Imgur is currently ranked one of the top 50 worldwide websites where each month its images are viewed billions of times.

Regardless of which images you’re looking for, it’s always a good idea to have a few tricks up your sleeve when it comes to searching Flickr.com. If you can get creative with these search tools, you can quickly tailor down your search and navigate around Flickr’s databases even more efficiently in no time.

Investintech How-To Tip: Create A Handout From A PDF Document

Last week, we gave you a couple of tips on how to incorporate a few of our tools into your daily study grind. Those were tools you could seamlessly fit into your existing list of handy resources to help you get your work done.

But for the most part, as a student, you’ll be using digital documents as a major resource that can, indeed, make your school work (and learning) much easier. Yet, the only real problem is getting those digital documents to suit your needs. As they are, they may be difficult to use.

In fact, one tweeter had this exact problem:

PDF to Powerpoint Help — http://twitter.com/#!/tiff_FlOCKA/status/114816270674825217

Students are no stranger to PDF PowerPoint notes from a professor, nor are they strangers to the obstacles they pose. Luckily, Sonic is up for tackling such a task.

Sonic PDF Creator has a feature that lets you combine those multiple PDF pages onto a single page for quick overviews that are perfect when it comes to group studying, delivering presentations, or providing more compact resources.

If you’re unsure of how to get started, here’s a look at the handout creation options in Sonic that will let you format your PDF content into a handout.

1. Open your PDF file in Sonic PDF Creator

2. Go to Tools > Create Handout . . . . You’ll be given the n-Up Pages dialogue box where you can then customize and create your own handout.

Create Handout
3. Select the paper size of the handout

Paper Size

The very first thing to consider is the paper size and the orientation. Each PDF is different and no single handout formatting is a one-size-fits-all deal. Deciding which one is right for your content is easy.

From the drop down boxes you can choose from a wide range of paper sizes for your printed handout (including popular sizes: A4, Legal, 11×17, etc.). Then designate whether your pages will be in portrait, landscape, or Auto (according to custom width and height, which you can set manually).

4. Set the scale for your handout pages

Scale

When dealing with scaling options, you get to assign how those PDF pages will fit onto the page of your printed handout, whether letter size, legal, or 11×7.

The Auto feature lets Sonic calculate how to fit those PDF pages according to the paper size you selected. If you’d like to use the original size of the page, select Use Original Size. Or if you’d like to set the scale of your PDF content yourself, you can easily designate the width and height yourself.

With the Proportionally box checked, your destination area on the handout will remain proportional to the original page size.

5. Decide on the layout

Layout

Now that you have the content scaled down to the paper size and orientation you’ve selected, you get to decide the layout of that content.

When creating your layout first make sure you decide on the measurement unit (point, inch, or mm) you need Sonic to use in order to accurately space the content for your handout.

For the layout, you can designate a different number of PDF pages per column and row along with the margin spacing around them. The gutter measurements (in case you need to bind the handout) can easily be customized to any length you wish.

You can then designate how many pages you want repeated in the hand out and the order of the pages. Note that if the pages of your original PDF content are numbered, depending on your column/row layout and if you want double sided pages, you may want to carefully plan out how your pages can be effectively ordered.

When deciding on the order of the pages, you have 3 options:

Across: Runs from left to right, then top to bottom.
Down: Runs from top to bottom, then left to right.
Stack: Runs from top left of each page, then to right, then to next row.

6. Draw crop marks on your handout pages

Crop Marks

Crop marks can also be drawn onto the handout. You can choose from drawing crops in the corners, center, or both (with the Draw Crop Marks option). After you decide which crop marks you want, you can adjust and customize them manually.

7. Allow for bleed allowance

Bleed Allowance

For handouts that will need cutting, the Bleed Allowance options will let you specify your own measurements to allow for any deviations in cutting the paper to the finished page size.

You can choose from :

None: No bleed allowance.
From original PDF: Use the bleed information from the original PDF file.
Specified: User specify the bleed allowance amounts.

8. Once all your settings in place, click on OK . Sonic will generate a preview of the new handout for you.

9. If all looks okay, you can then save it using the Save or Save As options under the File menu, and then print it out.

If you created a handout with Sonic PDF Creator before, which creation options did you use to make your PDF content look like a professional handout?

How 3 Investintech Tools Can Save Your Academic Life

School’s just started and already you’re starting to sink into your own routine. Whether that means mapping out the quickest route to class or finding the best study spots along the way, you need to make sure everything works smoothly for you in the academic world.

As a tech user, it means getting your laptop and gadgets all set to keep up with you on your daily study grind. With the rise of tech gadgets and the popularity of the Internet, the academic landscape is changing. More group participation is done via forum discussion, class notes are being posted up online, and text books are being downloaded from the web.

However, organizing your arsenal of software tools can be tough when you can’t anticipate where or when you’ll need it. If you’re a user of our software and asking yourself, where and how Investintech software fits in with your academic routine, it’s time to take a closer look. Here are a couple of tip offs.

1. SlimPDF Reader

One way students are upping their productivity these days is to use a laptop in class. It’s easier to type up lecture notes and it eliminates the need for multiple notebooks. Moreover, instead of a 13 or 15 inch laptop, students are now resorting to netbooks. They’re small, efficient, and more convenient on-the-go than a laptop is.

Netbooks, however, while great for mobility, aren’t so great for the hard-core major software programs you have on your desktop. For instance, Adobe Reader is a notable resource hog, taking up a good portion of your desktop hard drive, let alone your netbook. So you’ll need the smallest applications you can find. Luckily, SlimPDF Reader is only 1.43 MB.

Slim PDF Reader Screenshot

SlimPDF Reader gives you the essentials needed for a quick clean viewing experience without the bloat.

So if a prof scans in a PDF sideways, SlimPDF can rotate it right side up with a single click from the toolbar. And as PDFs aren’t always created with a readability and navigation in mind, you can zoom in (up to 400%), quickly skip to any page, and easily search the file for keywords. Copying simple text is also made easy–just select your content and CTRL+ C it. You can paste it quickly into another application.

2. Free Online PDF to Word Converter

As mentioned, most professors will post up lecture notes or slides online. Of course, this makes it easier for everyone, as a) you don’t have to worry about getting everything down, and b) you have spot-on accurate notes from the professor himself. Definitely a resource you want to cash in on for any future assignment.

But, I bet you can guess what format these notes will more than likely be in: the hard-to-edit PDF format. This is where a PDF to Word converter saves the day. You can convert PDF to Word instantly using our free online PDF to Word conversion service.

3. Docx to Doc Converter Online

With the release of Microsoft Office Word 2007 came a new default format, .docx, a format that not everyone is using. In fact, most users are still quite attached to the .doc format. For users with Microsoft Office Word 2007, they can simply save to .doc by changing the Save As format before they save their file.

Yet for those who are receiving a .docx file, it isn’t as easy. Students on the Mac OSX platform using Pages need to import the .doc file to Mac, but have no direct way of converting it. Others may not even be using Microsoft Office 2007, but older versions with no way of opening it.

This .docx to .doc converter is perfect for any difficulties you may come across, whether it be a deadline, lack of compatibility, or being locked out of your email accounts.

DOC to DOCX Converter Interface

It lets you bypass all those hurdles. It’s free, you can use it regardless of the platform you’re using, you can access it anytime online, no registration is needed, and you get the file converted instantly without having to leave the site.

Should We Add Another Format To The PDF-Killer List?

An interesting tidbit for this week. There’s a new format on the block and it looks like it’s drumming up some buzz as the next PDF-Killer.

The last one to hit the industry, if I remember correctly, was the XML Paper Specification (XPS) format about 4 years ago when Microsoft Office 2007 was being released with XPS creation capabilities. This time around, it’s the CDF format—Computable Document Format, a newly innovated open format that puts “interactive documents” on another level.

Having been developed by the team over at Wolfram.com, the CDF format uses mathematical computation technology to render the live interactive element of its content. The company is known for its computing software program and platform, Mathematica, which, in a nutshell, is used for computing data visualizations needed in fields dealing with complex data, information analysis, and mathematical formulae.

What is the CDF format?

According to the site, the CDF is “as everyday as a document, but as interactive as an app.” Instead of simply viewing static text, images, and tables, with a CDF document you can manipulate them through inputting data, clicking on controls, and moving sliders. If you have a graph with data calculated and projected over time, you can modify those values and see the changes visualized–on the spot.

Looking at the CDF files they have on-site, you can see why it’s being called a PDF-Killer. From a user point of view, the CDF format shares a lot of the same basic similarities and uses as the PDF: it requires a file viewer (CDF Player), can contain different types of content, and is only editable in Mathematica or other CDF content creators (creating an interactive CDF actually requires a bit of coding rather than a one click creation method, though).

The PDF already has interaction capabilities with the ability to play videos, Flash games, and manipulate 3D objects. But so far, as Conrad Wolfram (strategic & international development director of Wolfram) points out, those types of interactivity are pre-generated for you.

The CDF format provides a unique way of creating, consuming, and understanding informational content. As it is with all formats, though, each has its own strengths and uses, some of which are necessary, some not. Simple resumes and articles, for example, are still perfectly fine as a PDF. Live data and textbooks, however, may be better in CDF.

Rather than a question of will the CDF replace the PDF, I think the question facing PDF users is how the CDF format will interact with PDF files over the long run. The format was just launched, so it’s still in the early stages of adoption. So far, as per the FAQ, you can import content from PDFs and the CDF Player plugin is only supported by web browsers (no embedding CDF files in PDF, for instance).

Download the CDF player and take look at a few CDF examples in action for yourself.

What PDF Tips Can 5 Popular Movies Give You?

One of the major challenges facing PDF users today is finding good tips on creating and handling that picture perfect PDF. Whether it be in regards to content, layout, or creation, it’s likely that you’ve been curious as to how you can make your PDF content more reliable and highly receptible to everyone.

For those who are looking for some ideas, all you have to do is look to the silver screen. There are a few movies that can shed some light on taking your PDF up a notch.

If you put your movie-watching time to practical use, you’ll start looking at a few popular movies—and your daily work, in a different way.

1. Inception (2010)

If you still haven’t watched this movie yet, you’ve probably already heard about the complexity of its story line. The movie’s main character, Dom Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio), has a special talent: stealing secrets from others when they’re dreaming. But having been used mainly for corporate espionage, his special set of skills has made him into an international fugitive struggling with his own personal demons.

In an attempt to redeem himself, he takes on one last mission. The goal? Inception. That is, to plant an idea deep within the subconscious of his employer’s rival that will eventually leave his employer with the corporate advantage. The deeper the idea is planted into the subconscious, the more convincing it is.

Thus, for it to succeed, Cobb and his team devise a complex—and confusing, architectural dream structure: a dream within a dream within a dream.

What advice can Inception give us about the PDF?

The content within a PDF file can be as complex in structure as the dream levels created by Cobb’s team, being either broken down into major parts, sections, or even subsections. Navigating through such PDFs can be a real pain in the neck.

Do your readers a favor: add bookmarks to your PDF. Give them a navigational structure for your PDF content, offering a way to move through the file with a single click. To add bookmarks to PDF files, look for a PDF creation tool that comes with the ability to edit PDF content. All that’s needed is a bit of organization to get your PDF user friendly.

2. Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince (2009)

Although something always gets lost in translation between film and book, this trailer is enough to get you fixated on seeing it through to the end on the silver screen. Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince is crucial to the epic franchise in that it shows you where and how it all began with Lord Voldemort.

We’ve been through the first few films knowing Harry’s past, but it isn’t enough for a story that grows dark gradually with each installment. To heighten the stakes and the tension, this movie gives us our first good look at Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes). We’re shown a memory of Professor Albus Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) meeting a young and troubled Tom Riddle (the future Lord Voldemort) for the very first time. And we see him yet again, in another crucial memory, this time as an adolescent in his first curious steps towards dark magic.

We finally see Lord Voldemort’s story (or bits of it anyway) on-screen, up close and personal—as a young student taken in by Dumbledore, and brought up within the very walls of Hogwarts Academy itself.

What PDF advice can Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince give us?

For all the good things PDF files have to offer, they can contain bad things as well without you even knowing it. All you have to do is click on a link, play a Flash video, or even just open the file and you’re caught.

There have been many ups and downs in the past year as PDF hacks started rising in numbers. The scary part is that there are reports that hidden PDF exploits are getting past popular AV programs. Even popular mobile apps and gadgets aren’t immune to security flaws which can be exploited by PDF hacks.

Lesson to learn? Don’t be too trustworthy with every PDF file you come across. While you can’t help the PDF files you get, for your own files, ensure that you have all the necessary security measures you need in place: passwords, file restrictions, watermarks, etc. PDF security is essential.

3. The Matrix (1999)

In 1999, we were all blown away by the idea of the Matrix: the everyday world perceived by humans is actually a simulated reality created by machines. Admittedly, the philosophical ideas that came with it were probably a handful to grasp the first time around.

Luckily, we learn about the Matrix alongside computer programmer and hacker, Thomas A. Anderson, aka Neo (Keanu Reeves), who gets freed from it. Once liberated, Neo’s new friends show him what the real world is like. Having escaped the Matrix, surviving underground, and rebuilding human civilization, they’ve also managed to use the Matrix to their own advantage.

Their sockets, once used to channel and convert human energy to the Machines, allows them to jump back and forth freely between both the Matrix and reality, fighting the Machines on both fronts. Those same sockets are also used for uploading information directly to the mind, allowing them to instantly learn anything that’ll help them survive against Agents within the Matrix.

Being proclaimed as “The One” to end the war against the Machines, Neo gets trained on how to fight and maneuver within the Matrix as well (“I know Kung Fu”). Only by being able to jump back and forth to do so, does Neo—and we, the viewers, begin to get a grasp of what the Matrix is.

What friendly PDF advice does The Matrix have to give?

If one thing The Matrix can give you advice on, it’s the value of hyperlinks. By being able to go directly from PDF to website, or jump from PDF to article, users can get a better experience with your PDF file.

Let’s face it. How many times have you come across a summary of an article in the PDF format, but wasn’t able to go to the actual article? Or being given a fact, aren’t given its source?

If you can link out to different sites or informative links, go for it. But use them wisely! Your PDF is only as good as the content it contains. So include necessary, but relevant, links, as well.

4. Gone With The Wind (1939)

Everyone knows this one. Gone With The Wind, the famous 1939 award-winning classic. Based on the best-selling 1936 novel of the same name by Margaret Mitchell, Gone With The Wind, follows 12 years in the life of Southern belle, Scarlett O’Hara (Vivien Leigh in her Oscar winning role) during the American Civil War and the Reconstruction era afterwards.

While the movie is praised as a classic, Gone With The Wind is also notorious for its length at 222 minutes, which translates into 3 hours and 42 minutes– excluding the intermission and both the opening and closing credits.

During those 3+ hours, we watch Scarlett struggle with unrequited love, failed relationships, and financial ruin. That’s almost the length of 2 feature films today!

What PDF tip does Gone With The Wind have for us?

PDF file size does matter. With huge PDFs, the download, upload, and conversion times could very well equal the length of Gone With The Wind itself.

Some tips? Before creating a PDF, ensure that your content is optimized in all aspects. For example, ensure that there are no excess fonts and that you’re using vector-based graphics. Set your compression options as well on both images and text. If modifying a PDF, use the Save As option, not the Save command. Try to downsample the images to a lower resolution, and avoid using a ton of multimedia and fonts for complex web-based PDFs.

Just keep in mind that if you wouldn’t want to sit around downloading a PDF file for more than a minute, chances are, your readers wouldn’t want to either.

5. Avatar (2009)

Avatar was an undeniable groundbreaker, both graphically and technically. However, it may surprise you to know that, according to James Cameron, Avatar was written more than 11 years ago, but the filming of the movie was delayed because the necessary technology to transfer his vision of Avatar onto film wasn’t available at the time.

As a result, only due to new filming methods and pushes in technology that were developed and employed right up to a year and a half before the movie was released, was filming made possible. To merge the actors into virtual characters, for instance, facial performance capture (used to transfer and create emotional details in CG) was done with mini cameras rigged to small caps worn by the actors. By employing a real-time virtual camera, Cameron was then able to direct CG scenes just like live-action scenes easily. And with the movie being almost entirely digitally generated, the creation process demanded a new way of storing and sharing all the data being generated. To that end, Microsoft created Gaia, a Digital Asset Management (DAM) system, to act as a hub for the huge amounts of data being used.

The result? One of the most visually stunning movies ever created.

What PDF tip does Avatar have to offer?

Special graphics can make any PDF pop! The PDF has come a long way from its first days and is now advanced enough to handle graphics like a pro.

Since PDF version 1.6 came out, the format came with support for embedding 3D objects. The next PDF version just took it to the next level, and has been improving ever since. Today, the format can also support geospatial capabilities, AutoCAD drawings, media, geometry, and graphics.

If you’re looking for ideas, go ahead and take a look at the Adobe Acrobat User Community gallery. They’ve got PDFs showcasing what is graphically possible with a PDF. And don’t worry about that content not being reusable. There are PDF converters powerful enough to handle advanced conversions like PDF to AutoCAD.

These are just 5 movies to get you started. What other movies can you think of?