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If you love to create collages of all sorts from your pictures, then you know that positioning and moving individual pictures for a collage can be a time consuming process that requires many hours of experimentation. Naturally, all those extra hours mean that there is a limit to your creativity since you would not want to start all over again with a collage product.

Shape Collage, our review product frees you from these time concerns and lets you focus entirely on your creativity. Well, that's not entirely true since it also bundles oodles of creativity. Even better, the program is freeware and can create layered Photoshop files for your collage! When I saw this for the first time, it did look too good to sound true.



Read the review here...

Labels: freeware, photos, picture

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OutWit Images is a cool, free Mozilla Firefox add-on includes a powerful image search and save engine. This Firefox 3 add-on is compatible with Windows, Mac OS, and Linux.

You download and install this add-on from the Firefox Add-ons site, and end up with an OutWit Images button on your Firefox toolbar (see Figure 1).


Figure 1: OutWit Images button on the Firefox toolbar

Thereafter when you are browsing a page that has too many pictures, or some pictures you like -- just click the OutWit Images button to launch the OutWit Images application in a new window that starts with a black background filled with image previews, and little else as shown in Figure 2. In addition to using the active page as a starting point to launch OutWit Images, you can do the image searches within OutWit Images too (the top right of the interface shows a search box).


Figure 2: The OutWit Images interface

Click on any image and you'll see a larger preview of the image. Notice the horizontal pane below the search results -- that's called the Catch -- yes, that's "catch" as in fishing! You can drag any thumbnail you like, and drag it to the Catch area as shown in Figure 3.


Figure 3: Drag an image to the Catch

Once the images are in the catch, they remain there even if you shut down the OutWit Images interface unless you clear them on your own. Images in the catch can be played in a slideshow, or saved as well. You can also send image links for all the images saved in the catch.

So what is the catch in providing an amazing add-on that's more like an application for free? Ariane Chang of OutWit Technologies says "there is no catch to our free software other than that we would like to get out name out there and make searching, collecting and saving many images at a time in a search -- thus especially useful when compiling presentations".

Thanks Ariane -- and for all of you who want to use OutWit Images to search for images to use in your PowerPoint presentations, make sure you you use only images that are copyright free, and allowed to be used in presentations!

Labels: freeware, geetesh bajaj, photos, picture, powerpoint, presentations

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This is not one of the most capable paint programs out there, but it certainly is among the nicest ones -- and although it is meant for kids, there's no reason why someone who's a little young at heart can't play with this one!

Tux Paint is a free, open source program from New Breed Software that includes fun stuff like sound effects and a cartoon mascot as well.

The figure below shows you the Tux Paint interface.



Tux Paint is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux -- download it here...

Labels: freeware, painting, picture

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That's a good question. Turns out that you can do quite a bit with the free account, but the Premium account does provide more options -- after all members who pay should get something extra to justify their subscription costs!

By signing up as a free member, you are limited by some options:

• You can only upload a thousand photos.
• You can only backup to your computer, one album per day.
• You can download 5 photos per day.
• You can download a limited amount of Pro Shots photos.

For anything that's put up in italics in the list above, be assured that they will be explained in a later post.

So what do you do if you don't want to live with the limitations? Simple -- you either sign up as a Premium member, or upgrade your free account to the Premium level. Having said that, many newcomers to Webshots can continue their free accounts, and upgrade later whenever they start making more use of the site.

For the next few posts, we'll only explore the free accounts although everything explained in these posts will certainly work for Premium members as well.

Labels: free account, picture, premium account, share, webshots

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Becoming a member on Webshots is easy -- you just provide some simple details like your name, location, and email address -- then after a quick verification process achieved through email, you become a member. Once you are a member, you can use any of the free options, or opt to become a Premium member by paying a subscription charge. Throughgout this series of tutorials, we will explore both the Free and Premium accounts of Webshots -- but for now, let me show you how you can become a free member to start with:

1. Visit the Webshots site, and click on the link that tells you to sign up (on the top right corner of the site) as shown in Figure 1 below.
   
   
   Figure 1: The Webshots site
   
   
2. This brings up a login form, as you can see Figure 2 below.
   
   
   Figure 2: The member form
   
   
3. Fill all the fields, make sure you enter a valid email address, and then click the Join Now button within the Free section , as shown in Figure 3 below.
   
   
   
   Figure 3: Joining Webshots (the free account)
   
   Note: You can also click the Join Now button within the Premium section -- but that's something we will explore in a later post.
   
   
4. If the details you filled in the form are valid, you'll see a modified version of the Webshots site as shown in Figure 4 below. As you can see, Webshots allows you to upload your pictures now -- and that is something that I will explain in more detail in a later post.
   
   
   Figure 4: The Webshots home page, after you join
   
   
5. Do check your mail for a confirmation link -- follow the instructions within the email. Also remember to save your user name and password in a safe place.
   

In the next blog post, I'll explain what the free account allows you to do, and we'll also briefly look at the Premium account.

Labels: picture, share, webshots

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Webshots is a photo sharing and storing site from CNET that allows you to do more with your visual content than what would have been possible by just storing them on your computer. In many ways, it is like other photo sharing sites like Flickr, MSN Photos, Kodak Gallery -- yet it does have some features that set it apart from these other sites.

At the most basic level, Webshots is a simple area on the Internet where you can store and share pictures. Webshots also provides a desktop application that you can download from their site -- this application lets you change your desktop wallpaper at regular intervals.

In future blog posts, I will show you how you can use all the Webshots features to your advantage.


Figure 1: The Webshots site

Labels: picture, share, webshots

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