pics

PicPlz, a photo-sharing start-up, has released a programming interface that lets applications tap into its tools for uploading and applying artistic filters to images.

"We think that allowing developers access to our upload and filter pipeline brings something different to the table than "just another photo-sharing API,'" the company said in a blog post yesterday. "We're pleased to announce that in the past 2 weeks we've had well over 100 developers apply to be part of our API (far exceeding our expectations)."

Opening an API lets programmers tap into the abilities of a … Read more

Here it is, Sony's Next Generation Portable, the NGP or the PSP2. Whatever its final name ends up being, the device boasts a healthy set of specs and features, including 3G connectivity, a touch screen, touch pad, two cameras, and a gorgeous OLED screen with four times the resolution of the original PSP.

While we'll continue to post news, impressions, and reactions, here's a your chance to see the new device from every angle.

Sooner or later, whatever your hobbies, interests, or tastes, you're going to find yourself tediously clicking through a Web page full of pictures, manually opening and saving each and every one, until it becomes more of a grim quest to be finished than a quick grab of some fun pics to sort through and maybe use later. You could just bookmark the site and return when you need a picture of Elmer Fudd to complete a masterpiece e-mail, but you can't be sure they'll still be available, which is why you were saving them to your hard … Read more

Add word bubbles, word art titles, and clip art graphics to a snap and suddenly your picture is worth a heck of a lot more words than a thousand. PicSay's free, fun app also handles photo-editing basics like color temperature, contrast, and funky effects, though it does lack other tools like cropping and sharpening, which you would expect to be shoo-ins. Sharing your creations through e-mail and social networking sites is a big draw; choosing from multiple picture resolutions makes it practical.

Image identification company PicScout is expanding its efforts to help people identify the rights holders of images they find online.

On Tuesday the company is set to add microstock site Dreamstime's more than 7 million images to its Image Exchange catalog. What this means is that users who have the company's Image Exchange Firefox add-on installed will be able to identify when one of those images (or the other 40 million or so that are in the catalog) winds up on Web sites and in places like Google's image search.

The add-on, which was introduced in October … Read more

Twitter announced on its blog late Monday that users who want to submit pictures to the social network from their mobile phones can now do so through MMS. There's just one catch: it's only available to Orange UK subscribers.

According to Twitter, Orange UK users can send picture messages to Twitter's "86444" number. They need only to snap a picture, choose "Send via MMS", and input the number. Once the message is sent, the user will receive a text message asking for their Twitter credentials. Luckily, that message is only sent once. All … Read more

PicViewer is a perfectly nice image viewer, but it offers few features beyond the native functionality of Windows.

PicViewer integrates Windows Picture and Fax Viewer into a Windows Explorer-like interface. It is easy to navigate and offers standard Explorer features such as the ability to Favorite a folder. It also provides a bit of automation, such as a menu option to move or copy images to another directory, and the ability to create a list of external applications, such as Adobe Photoshop, to open a selected image. But the few seconds you might save using PicViewer's pull-down menus instead … Read more

The full name for the Dell P2210 is the Dell Professional P2210. So what exactly does "professional" mean? Who is Dell referring to? The everyday office user? Or maybe the graphics artist professional to whom color accuracy is of the utmost importance.

Hmmm, based on the P2210's current price of $209 and Dell's decision to use Twisted Nematic (TN) technology for the panel, I'm 99 percent sure this monitor is targeted to the former professional and not the latter.

We just got this one in, so while we're busy rigorously testing the ever-lovin' crap … Read more

Anyone who has posted images to a Web site or blog knows that making the image "Internet-friendly" is crucial to fast page-loading times. Similarly, optimizing images for e-mail is important because sending enormous image files through your e-mail client can cause problems for those with slower connection speeds. There are several software tools available to reformat and optimize your images, but I found one recently that's free, easy, and effective.

RIOT (Radical Image Optimization Tool) (Free) for Windows takes the side-by-side interface approach for painless image optimization. Those who have used Adobe ImageReady will immediately recognize the … Read more