Tourists the world over have always taken photos to commemorate their trips overseas. From Polaroids to disposables to digital cameras, we've always loved the chance to get a unique image to show people the wonderful places we've been, and now one tourism organisation in Australia is looking to use this love of photography to attract more tourists to iconic sites.
Tourism Australia is looking to achieve this feat by bringing its focus to the world of selfies. The most divisive form of photography, the selfie has risen in prominence in recent years thanks to the emergence of the selfie stick, which allows the user to snap a photo of themselves and friends from longer than arm distance.
And now the tourism board has launched what it calls the world's longest selfie stick, an innovative use of technology that will allow people visiting Australia to take truly amazing photos of themselves at a number of iconic sites nationwide.
Partnering with GIGA, the promotion first asks users to download an app that links them to the database. From there, all they have to do is locate one of the many sites across the nation set up for the long distance selfies. They then have to stand at a designated spot and face the way they're instructed to, before hitting the shutter on the app to trigger a camera up to a thousand feet away.
This new project is designed to bring the love of the selfie to an all new level, allowing people to snap images of themselves with friends and family from angles that they just could not possibly achieve on their own.
When viewing the image, tourists also get an intensely unique experience. The high-definition photo at first gives them a close up selfie style image of just themselves and their friends, before it pans out to give them an awe inspiring view of the entire iconic site with themselves in the centre of the shot.
Tourism Australia hopes that the unique chance to take photos like this will attract people from nations where the selfie has become something of a national trend, such as in Japan, where the craze has been highly popular with teens for a number of years.