Online Image Editing
With the untrammelled explosion of digital cameras all around and 5 megapixel cell phone cameras gaining popularity, we’re inundated with a surfeit of photographs. And quite often, we’re not very happy with the results. The picture is either too light, or too dark, or someone’s hand or foot is marring an otherwise nice image.
Flapping your hands in frustration because you need to tweak a photograph but don’t have Photoshop? Never mind. Now, point your web browser at any of the addresses below and perform almost any impromptu editing ablutions you want. Killer feature: No downloads, installations.
So fire up your browser and
tally ho!
Adobe Photoshop Express
www.photoshop.com
The short-snappy registration process here is a must. A basic free account gets you two gigs of space. You also get a personal URL, i.e. something like www.yourpreference.photoshop.com. Loading up the initial screen takes longer than the others as the programme boots its libraries etc. Uploading a 2.5MB image is fast but opening it in edit mode is slow. Newbies will find it is easy to operate. Best feature: the film strip view along the bottom that incrementally shows the range of effect within each tool.
Pixlr
www.pixlr.com
Available in two flavours: the barebones Pixlr Express and the meatier Editor. Express loads up with a no-nonsense toolbar on the right hand which takes on elementary tasks like cropping, applying basic correction filters, rotating, flipping applying colour adjustments and effects. The programme is stable, solid and works efficiently. This is intended for people who are somewhat familiar with Photoshop. No registration required for either of the programmes.
Picnik
www.picnik.com
Picnik has an intuitive interface with onscreen help via tool tips popping up all along the way to guide you through processes. You will find loads of image filters and lots of tools tucked away in the Create tab. The app’s utility as an online editor deserves full marks for allowing you to send the photos to everything from Flickr, Flickr slideshow, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Photobucket, Picasa, et al. And of course you can always e-mail the photos directly to anyone you want. Good pick for greenhorns.
Splashup
www.splashup.com
Splashup has a far more desktop-like look. Images load almost instantly. The programme also has a rather (offline) Photoshop-like feel about its interface — with its stacked tool pile on your left. The account signup is short and snappy. Splashup lets you to play with multiple images. It has a fairly decent array of editing functions for an online affair. You need Flash Player 10 installed to use Splashup, but it is slick and immensely usable.
The writer is a part-time publishing consultant and a full-time devotee of all things tech. He can be contacted at ashishone@gmail.com and
twitter.com/ashishone
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