So, you know how to do some neat stuff with Photoshop (like borders), but what if you need to resize a graphic or do some other digital image manipulation and you don’t have your regular setup on the road with you, or some other such issue has left you high and dry as far as image processing is concerned? Here are a few sites that I have very recently “test driven” and actually tried out on the net, and I have included a few brief comments on each for you:

Adobe Photoshop Express

Well, being that I bow down to the “Messiah” of all photographic/design programs, Adobe Photoshop, I figured this one will be something I’ll use over and over, and I would be right except for the fact that they are so backlogged with people trying to sign up, that I’ve not even received my login and password information yet, and it’s been a week! However, that little inconvenience aside, I managed to do a basic “test drive” of the program, and what I experienced was quite engaging and enlightening to say the least!

The interface itself is very attractive, and allows you to upload many photos to the tune of a total of about 2 Gig, which is pretty generous! The program organizes your photos into a photo album of sorts, and lets you click on any photo in order to do some amazing manipulation. One simple feature in particular was incredibly impressive to me; I could take an image and change the color of the main focus, which in this particular instance was a red car, with one click. The color change feature gives one a veritable laundry list of different colors you can choose to make the car just by plonking an eyedropper onto the car, which then opens up a horizontal bar at the top of the screen which allows you to ‘mouse over’ each color until you choose one to change the original to. It was a spectacular feature that I must have spent 10 minutes on just changing colors; and it was so specific and accurate, a feature that I really appreciated.

In test drive mode, I wasn’t able to upload any of my own photos, and I also wasn’t able to really study all of the amazing features available, but it gave me enough of a ‘taste’ that I am absolutely going back once the password issue is sorted out. This is an amazing little program that is sure to please “Photoshoppers” and anyone else in need of an online photo editing tool. I would have to comment that this particular online photo editing program has a bit of a learning curve, but it is easy to figure out once you start pressing and clicking. I believe folks who already use Adobe CS products already will have no problem at all going to Adobe Photoshop Express. This program gets a standing ovation from me!

Picnik

Nice, easy site to figure out, doesn’t take a brain surgeon! A big plus about this site is that you don’t have to login and create a password if you don’t want to ‘commit’ so to speak, you can just try it out and see if you like it first. I like that; it is a bit like try before you buy! I was extremely impressed with this little tool, I must say. I easily uploaded a large, not-so-great photo of mine, and was very quickly able to crop, auto-level, sharpen, and even change the ‘color temperature’ of my awkward picture. It took seconds, and did a very nice job. This program allows you to save your photo or graphic in several formats, and even gives you options for migrating your shot over to Flickr or MySpace.

I believe this tool is quick and easy to learn, and gives you a lot of nice features to choose from. I think if you need a fast fix to a photo you are trying to prepare for use on the web, this site is a must see. Photoshop users will find this program probably a bit easier to figure out, and will also experience some good flexibility like they are used to. Picnik gets a big round of applause from me.

FlauntR

While this site has a very high-tech, attractive GUI, it is a bit complicated if you’re not a digital image processing “maven.” I was not really impressed by the menu area that doesn’t show you how to access the image you are supposedly going to work on. It’s just not spelled out very clearly anyway. This site has a lot, no, tons of features that would take a bit of a learning curve to figure out, unfortunately, and sadly, it’s a bit of a slow-loader depending on which browser you are using. FlauntR requires that you create an account and sign in, which is not a biggie, but once you get there you’d better be prepared for a long frustration session! No rousing applause for this program, and although I felt their interface was very nice, their usability factor is practically nil in my view. This program gets no applause from me at this time; maybe I will revisit sometime in the future and see if I can figure it out!

And, finally, an online design application with a bit of a twist:

Kuler

Adobe Kuler is a rather interesting web-hosted application for generating color themes for websites, interior designs, scrapbooks, fabric patterns, or graphic identities. This exceptional little program allows you to create color themes and variations, or even base your web color theme on a photograph you have. It is a very different type of program compared to the online image manipulation programs I’ve been discussing so far. Check this site out; it’s well worth a visit there for sure. Each theme or color scheme has a name, and shows you the swatches associated with that particular theme.

The interface is very friendly and seems pretty easy to use. Some of the many features: Kuler has the ability to ‘extract’ color and generate themes from images you upload using quick mood presets or markers you can use to target specific colored areas. You can also search through their thousands of color themes very quickly, and look at their highest rated themes. Another very “kule” feature also makes it possible for you to access this program through your browser (any), their own Kuler desktop, and also from within Adobe Illustrator CS3, which really shows some terrific flexibility for Adobe users. Another Adobe product that gets a standing ovation from me, or 10 out of 10.

Final Words

Do visit some or all of these wonderful sites which all have something to offer just about anyone needing to deal with images on the Internet. As you can see, they all have different features as well as some similar ones, and most importantly, they are pretty easy and self-explanatory to use if you are willing to spend a few minutes to learn the basics. When compared to Adobe Photoshop, some do quite well, others not as well. I can’t say I would use all of these programs myself, but I certainly wouldn’t rule most of them out either.

What do you think? Have you tried any online imaging tools? If so, what’s your verdict?

One of the worries I had early on with OpenID as an authentication system was its decentralization, the key feature of the system. I still to this day, don’t understand how a system like OpenID could be considered secure enough to use as a membership system for various sites.

Recently, a post on ReadWriteWeb talked about how many different providers there are and how you can set up the OpenID authentication system on your own site.

I enjoy the idea of being able to log into numerous sites with one set of credentials, but what is to stop the OpenID system from becoming a great system for spammers to use to enter sites using it as an authentication system? What stops me from having an OpenID on every provider, or every domain I own?

It amazes me how many sites are using OpenID instead of the traditional username and password system we are used to.

The OpenID system is still in its infancy, but it is being picked up faster and faster by bigger companies and websites and other than its decentralization, which stops big companies like Microsoft from controlling your data, what is so great about OpenID?

I would love to know more about people’s reasons for supporting OpenID. So if you are a fan of it, please let me know in the comments below.

I’ve been a bit busy the last week, which is why this mockup have been somewhat delayed. Among other things, I’ve moved to a new house, with lots and lots of weird things happening. Ghosts? Who knows…

Seriously, it’s time to crank up the pace a bit. I’ve tried the previous mockup design on numerous contacts, friends, and designers this past week, and there’s a consensus that it is good. So I’m moving onwards with it. That doesn’t mean that it is a final design, it’s still just a mockup, but this is the basic style we’ll be going with.

First Single Post Mockup

So with the front page somewhat specified, here’s the first front page mockup design. It is lacking comments at the moment, and I’m not happy with the box below the post either, it needs some flare and overall TLC. I haven’t touched the sidebar at all, see below.

Anyway, here’s the mockup.

Thoughts On The Sidebar

Today’s Devlounge is using the sidebar on single posts to promote the blogger with a short author bio, a picture, and for pushing for RSS signups. While I like the author bio box and all, I’m not a great fan of this, since it can confuse the users. If you’re used to find certain things in the sidebar, and it isn’t there on all pages, then the user might be disoriented. Not a big deal, perhaps, but still.

In short, I prefer to not alter too much in the sidebar. What are your thoughts on this? Looking forward to hearing them, and of course your thoughts on the mockup as well. As always, they’re much appreciated, so share!

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Are you sick and tired of the old square or rectangle that your beautiful web images are surrounded by? It’s easy to make your square edged old jpgs and gifs look exciting and new if you’ll just follow these quick instructions for creating fancy borders around your photos in no time at all! You can use this easy Photoshop technique to spiff up your graphics for your own home page or blog, or for an outstanding banner or intro photograph. There are so many uses for doing this to your images, and you will come up with many yourselves after just trying this once! It is so easy! Okay, ready?

Fancy Borders Using Photoshop

Save this new version of your image as something else, that way you still have your “untouched” original intact.

Open any one of your images in Photoshop and resize the original image to something manageable. Save this new version of your image as something else, that way you still have your “untouched” original intact. My rule of thumb on sizing graphics is as follows: If I plan to use the photo on my web sites or blogs, I usually size them down to about 450 pixels wide by 338 pixels tall. For web, make your image resolution 72 ppi. If I you are not using your image for the web, then I suggest you make your image 200 to 300 ppi in size so it can be used in print media or whatever else. Anyway, enough of this resizing – that’s a whole other blog subject!

Once you have saved this new version of your image in Photoshop, immediately move over to the right of your screen with your mouse pointer and locate the Layers palette that is usually docked in the right side of your Photoshop work space. You will see the little icon that represents your open photo, which is usually named “background.” Put your mouse on that little square representation of your photo and drag it down over the New Layer icon at the bottom of the layers palette (it is the little square next to the trash bin). This will duplicate your background layer and create a new one called “background copy.”

Next, move your mouse pointer down to the New Layer icon again and just click on it once. It will create a new blank layer. Click on the new blank layer and drag it between the other two background layers. Make sure your default color picker colors are set to black and white (type the letter “d” to reset to your default color scheme in Photoshop). With the new blank layer active (it will show as highlighted), click Alt+Backspace (on Windows), this fills that empty new layer with the color white. Your layers palette should look like the example below if you’ve done these steps correctly:

Now, while you are still in the layers palette, click on the background copy layer to target that layer and make it “active”. Click the rectangle marquee tool (the tool on your vertical toolbar that is at the very top left) and click and drag a selection area that is just inside the edge of your image, probably around 1/8″ in size thereabouts. See example:

Click on the Layer Mask button at the bottom of the layer palette menu (third button from the left – a grey square with a white circle in the center). If you have done this correctly, you should now see a little white border appear all around your photo as in the example below:

Next, click the Filter menu at the top of your document work space, then click Brush Strokes from the drop down menu that appears, and choose Sprayed Strokes from that menu. The filter gallery will open up and show you a blank, white photo image area with that particular effect you just chose applied to it as a black, jagged looking border. To adjust the effect in the filter gallery, make the stroke length about 6 and the spray radius around 15, this looks really neat. Experiment with what amount of effect you like best. Next, just click OK to approve of the effect and close the filter gallery. Voila, looks cool doesn’t it? Also, while you are being creative, go to the Layer Palette again and click on the effects icon (black circle with a script ‘f’ in the center of it) and choose Drop Shadow just for fun! That’s what I did in my example here:

To finish out your border, just click the Image menu and choose Flatten Image (or Save For Web in the File menu) so that you can save your file as a .jpg, and you are ready to go! Easy wasn’t it? Experiment on your own by using a black background fill next time, or some other color… it’s all up to you and your own creativity!

Finished image example:

I’m a dedicated WordPress user, and I know the system if not inside out so good enough to do more or less anything I want with it. That means I’m pretty psyched about the bbPress forum software, AJ’s written about it previously, the popular guide post. That was a while ago, October 2006 actually, but I’d say it still works out if you want to give bbPress a go. It might be a bit easier and polished today, but not much.

bbPress is still a bit from 1.0. Quite a bit, honestly. While I do think a forum system should be pretty slimmed down, not including everything I don’t need (but offering it as great kickass plugins), there are some things that bbPress lacks that just have to be in there.

• Subscribe to updates. There is a RSS option, but I want an e-mail digest as well, telling me when someone posted in the thread I’m interested in.
• Individual forum access. Sometimes you want locked forums, so why not let me set access on a per user basis? Or, failing that, for groups of users at least? And please let me have users in several groups, thank you very much. (Need private forums today? There’s a plugin, at least, although it is a bit lacking.)
• User bling-bling. At least some bling… You know, avatars, signatures, those kind of things. Actually, those two would get bbPress a long way. Not being able to set up a signature even, that’s pretty weak if you ask me.

bbPress is still a bit from 1.0. Quite a bit, honestly.

One could also argue that bbPress needs more themes and plugins, since although there is quite a bunch of the latter, they aren’t really as refined as you’d think they would be, it being a sister project to WordPress and all. Also, the presentation is miles behind, especially now when WordPress is in 2.5 and sports a brand new look.

bbPress is in version 0.8.3.1 at the moment. While they say it’s not quite ready yet – obviously – I’d say it is pretty stable. I’m using it for some closed groups at least, but that’s about it.

Well, there are plans now, so I need to decide if bbPress is ready. In my opinion, it works, but it doesn’t work as well as it should.

What do you think? Is bbPress ready for a live site?