Preserved Topic: free image editing software? (Page 1 of 1)

I've been charged with the task of getting some computer illiterate employees software that can edit images for email delivery.

The problem being that even on the lowest camera settings our digicams still spit out a large photo. We don't want these folks sending 20MB emails, we would prefer something along the lines of what XP does, when you try to email and image it pops a dialog that says "would you like to size this picture for email?" and gives you the choice of sizes based on screen resolutions.

I generally run from these types of hand holding apps so I'm finding myself at a disadvantage on this little project. Any help's appreciated.

Jason

Gimp?

[edit: See also: http://faq.ozoneasylum.com/716/ ]

___________________
Emps

FAQs: Emperor

Heh, I think you missed this part:

quote:

---

some computer illiterate employees

---

The GIMP is a real powerhouse and not quite fool-proof, not even close. We're talking eeeeasy here.

Jason

Maybe ImageN would be a good choice but it might still be a lilttle complicated. QV is another one you might want to look at.

Or you could use an Image viewer/browser type app like Slow View. It's not quite as powerfull as ACDSee but it's a simple image manuiplation tools produce better quality images ACDSee. I use this app myself because it's free, simple, and fast.

Do you have a scanner? Many scanners come with really basic image editing apps, could be worth a look.

In any event I think you'll need to 'educate' those employees a little about file sizes and digital images. You'll be doing them a favor in the long run anyhow.

Or, you could go out on a limb and write an app yourself which would check the images sizes before they get emailed out. Which shouldn't be too hard using ImageMagick to process the images.

JKMabry: I'd set up some kind of online page where people where people could upload the images and they would get resized for them and spat back. It sounds like they don't really need image editing software and you'd probably spend a while telling them all how to use it anyway.

___________________
Emps

FAQs: Emperor

Yah a Form with a dropbox for sizes, inputs for the image and email address - press enter, resize and send "From anywhere in the world". =D

Find an inexpensive Intranet system application at: http://www.hotscripts.com/
Some Intranet applications have thumbnail/thumbnail management systems onboard. With a system like this you can avoid manual resizing of images, so when an employee loads a picture on to the server the image is resized dynamically.

On the software side, buy Photoshop, Paint Shop Pro, or a separate image resizer (which can be found at www.download.com Even the most computer illiterate employees can be taught to use Photoshop. And if this company doesn't have an in-house training department... how sad...

(Edit by Weadah - fixed link)



[This message has been edited by Weadah (edited 07-26-2002).]

great ideas, 'specially like weadz with the drop down, but alas, we're in a state of flux right now on hardware/software for our servers, we've just been brought onto our parent company's NT network which is new to them as well. I'll get no support from them on server goodies until they get more pressing matters taken care of. All I have here in NT/IIS/ASP available and I try to stay away from that if I can help it. The only PHP/MySQL I have available is remotely hosted and I don't want them uploading to size then downloading/emailing after that for bandwidth reasons...

I'm pretty much painted into a corner with using something local on their machines and training them to use it myself. I've found some freebie/shareware JPEG cruncher stuff that I'm testing and I'm sure the card readers I buy will have some little ware packaged with, hopefully it'll have email integration.

meanwhile that resizing/mailing from the server sounds like a cool project to play with, if I wasn't a scripting tard that is =) sounds doable though that, thanks fellas.

Jason