ANZ 23 Mobile Things Week 2 - Take a photo with a mobile device: Instagram / Flickr app / Snapchat

I rarely take photographs with my mobile devices.  I take the odd one with my mobile phone but since it has been coming up with the lack of memory issue, I try to avoid it.  And when I have taken a photo with my phone, I upload it directly to Facebook or Twitter - I don't use Instagram, Flickr or Snapchat.

So I started the week with the plan to play around with Instagram and Flickr on my tablet.  I do like the Instaweather app but have only used it twice this week.  I don't really stop during my day and think, oh I must take a photograph!  I also took a "selfie" using Instagram - and then played around with the settings to see what I could do with the photo.

I haven't tried the Flickr app - wondering why you would need two photo apps on your mobile device but then perhaps one has different features to the other?!?  But I did re-visit my Flickr account on my PC and try to upload some photos I had taken of some library visits I did last week.  I used the good old digital camera for that.  However, Flickr didn't really like me and took ages to upload and then wouldn't let me group the photos into sets.  Sigh!

Perhaps I'll just stick with taking photos with my digital camera and uploading them to Facebook to share!!  But yes, I can hear you now saying, what if you want to take a photo of the "now" and upload it during the "now" to share??  Yes, ok I can see the point of that but until I either fix my phone's memory issue or get a better phone - I can't see myself dealing with the frustration of using my mobile phone to take photos.

And as for using my tablet to take photos - number one, I rarely take the tablet with me unless I'm going to a meeting/conference/seminar (it's not something I just carry in my handbag).  And number two, it's a little on the large size so I feel a bit self-conscious when taking photos with it - sort of like holding a brick in front of your face!!

Unfortunately, I missed the #anz23mthings chat session but lucky someone archived it and I can catch up with it here.

And as for the questions we were asked to think about via the ANZ 23 Mobile Things blog, I suppose I did think about them but my library does not use Twitter, but we do try to take photographs during events and post them on to our Facebook page.  We don't have a permission form but usually when people are asked (verbally) they are quite happy for that to happen.  With children I try to take photos of the back of their heads.  And I think it will be interesting to investigate using one of these tools to house a digital photograph collection for the library.  So I still have a lot more learning to go!

Blog December Day 1

As a personal challenge I am going to try to blog every day of December.  This will be a challenge as my parents are coming up this week so perhaps I will miss a couple of days but hopefully I will have a bit of time in the day to do some reflection.

I don't reflect enough so blogging will force me to reflect.

To kick off, on Thursday I attended the Public Libraries NSW North East Zone meeting in Taree.  It is the last time the librarians and councillors who attend the meeting get to catch up for 2012 and the first time for some of the new councillors who were elected in September to actually meet.

I will discuss the meeting in more depth in a later blog post.

My two councillors were unable to attend so I travelled down with our new Information Services and Collections Librarian.  We decided that we would do a library road trip on our way back on Friday.

So while this post will be short and sweet - I will share with you some photos I took of some of the libraries we visited.

Our first library was Great Lakes Library - Forster branch.  I didn't take any photos here because I have visited this branch before and must upload the photos from this visit at some point.  So I will share later.

Next we went to Harrington Library.  It is 4 years old and located within the towns new shopping centre car park.

Then on to Wauchope Library.

Both libraries were small branches but I find visiting smaller branches very worth while as my branches are small and I can get some great ideas that I can implement in my libraries.

It is worth noting that when I visit libraries, I first go to the customer service desk and introduce myself and ask if I can take photos.  Most times I encounter a proud and enthusiastic library staff member that is happy to provide a tour and answer questions.

Sometimes I have visited a library where staff have not been very helpful.  I sometimes drop a note to the library manager (especially if I know them) and make them aware that my encounter was not a friendly one.

I'm sure other library staff do this too - well I would hope that if someone visited my branch libraries they would let me know if the customer service was not up to scratch.

What are your thoughts on this?  Would you contact a manager about customer service or would you let it slide?

Sorry this post is a bit rushed but Saturday mornings means chores and I have lot to do with the parents visiting this week.  More later!!

Road Trip Library Photos

In my previous post I mentioned that on the way to the Public Libraries NSW Conference, we stopped and visited some libraries.

I have finally uploaded most of the photos.  I haven't got to Tea Gardens Library yet but the photos will be up soon.

Here are links to the photos:

1. Port Macquarie Library
2. Laurieton Library - a branch of Port Macquarie-Hastings Libraries
3. Raymond Terrace Library - a branch of Port Stephens Libraries
4. Tomaree Library and Community Centre - a branch of Port Stephens Libraries

I hope you enjoy and I'd love to see photos of libraries that others have taken.