New Flickr Toy

Retrievr, a different way to search for photos on flickr -- based on a sketch you draw.

Retrievr is a little clunky, but then my mouse is acting clunkiy: I can't quite make it do what I want it to, so I don't entirely blame retrievr, but the results are a bit on the random side. I'm sure it will be improved as more people use it and give feedback. Anyway, this is a fun way to explore random flickr images -- a little less randomly. You sketch in shapes, lines, different colors ... and Retrievr searches flickr photos for those shapes, etc. Sometimes the results don't make alot of sense, but it's kindof a creative exercise to find connections between what you drew and the photos that come up for that sketch.

Here's one result from several of my atempts:



Retrievr was written up at Research Buzz ... (click the link to read more of that article)
I would agree with the writer than you can get some pretty weird results -- and it's not all that useful if you're actually use it to search for something specific, such as Christmas trees, surfers or fences .... but if you have a little time and want some inspiration, and are willing to be random about it ... it gives some cool results.

Here is another search result using the sketch below, left: