Why Make a Creative Web Memories Scrapbook?

My personal interest in the subject of archiving digital photo memories in a creative web album inspired me to share tips & insights with others. Enjoy!

Introduction
Children today know how to use the Internet to get an answer to a question quicker than parents can tell them the answer from memory. I have read that the most avid Internet users are: Retired Americans, Grandparents (or the Pearl Harbor generation) and children of the 1990's.

What does this have to do with making a creative photo memories scrapbook for the web? Everything! Grandparents who fit into the 'Pearl Harbor generation' are the ones waiting for the latest picture and news about their grandchildren. And kids are the ones who can't wait to try out the latest digital camera. Creating a web photo album is a digital solution to quickly. . .

• capture images
• preserve digital
• display creatively
• document efficiently
• communicate stories
• and archive family photos that can be shared in cyberspace!

The above list is expanding... While researching this topic I came across an article about making a digital photo album interactive in cybersapce. With technologies such as XML and Digital Item Declaration Language (DIDL) it will soon be possible to have a standard means for packaging digital content on the web. If you're like me, maybe I lost you with such 'techie' words like XML and DIDL. Don't stop... read what the authors of: 'DIDL: Packaging Digital Content' have to say,

Case In Point: The Family Album in Cyberspace
Consider the digital family scrapbook. The scrapbook may be composed of digital photos, video, and text documents. The scrapbook designer needs a straightforward way to represent the individual digital components as a single entity, to annotate the components, and to specify the relationships among the components ("this video and these pictures were taken on Bob and Emily's last trip to Florida"). Having a formal annotation scheme would allow other family members to add new annotations without disturbing the original content ("caption this picture").

Excerpt taken from XML.com
XML_com DIDL Packaging Digital Content [May_ 30, 2001].htm

Isn't this exciting stuff! This XML and DIDL technology is at the tip of our fingers... just waiting for mothers and fathers - grandparents and grandchildren to begin to creatively interact over digital family photo albums. And the best part is that these precious memories are all captured and archived for future generations.

Scrapbooking is something fun that a whole family can do. Even my 2 and 1/2 year old daughter gets a kick out of seeing our family photos on a monitor.

I know there are lots of Web Mom's out there who are also making web scrapbooks... Please contact me (budel@go.com), and lets make this a tutorial together.

To keep your creative juices flowing 'til Lesson One... visit these sites for more resources and ideas.

• Reviews of Professional Cameras: If you are a real digital camera buff, then visit pcphotoreview for a portal of resources.
• Shortcourses.com is fantastic. It tells you everything you ever wanted to know about digital photography, but were afraid to ask.
• Creativememories.com is the premier leader in making scrapbooks. Their motto says it all, "Preserving the Past, Enriching the Present and Inspiring Hope for the Future."
• To join the fun of exchanging creative scrapbooking ideas visit the what's new section of scrapbookaddict.com
• For serious web srapbook friends... go through our own Macromedia Dreamweaver Tutorial. This application will allow you to take full control of creating your original web photo album. Download a Free 30 day Dreamweaver 4 now! Go to www.macromedia.com
• And if you want to get really brave... read our Flash for Beginners article and try it out - download it now and use FLASH for free for 30 days Go to www.macromedia.com