It’s true. The age of digital photography has resulted in photographic prints no longer being the cherished possessions they used to be. But they should be!
In fact, today there are so many options available to transform that flat image on your PC screen, and Windows Vista can help you surround your environment with wonderful memories. Here are 12 ways to bring your sharp shooting skills to life.
1. Edit and improve
Windows Vista ships with the brand new Windows Photo Gallery program, which gives you the ability to organise your photos like never before. Unlike the ancient Windows Picture and Fax Viewer, you now have the ability to make improvements to your pictures. You can adjust brightness, contrast and remove red eye with the click of a button.
2. Merchandise
With all your memories stored in Windows Vista, it’s a shame not to bring them to life in a physical form. Since the advent of digital photography, film developers have had to find other ways of making an income. Many of them will now take your snaps and print them on to mugs, mouse mats, coasters, jigsaws, T-shirts or, more conservatively, picture books.
You can then disguise these with wrapping paper and thrust them into the hands of unsuspecting relatives, in revenge for last year’s Christmas socks. Try Truprint for great ideas and products.
3. Posters
Posters make great decorations for your home, but they can be very impersonal. There are many companies offering to transform your pics to posters, but you could try Truprint if you want to go for a massive 20 x 30 inch billboard-style number.
Alternatively, some branches of Staples also provide full-colour, large size printing. If you fancy making your own motivational posters, like those used in trendy boardrooms, you can design one at Motivator.
Another interesting poster effect can be achieved using the Rasterbator, an online service that turns pictures into giant posters made up of tiny dots. To rasterbate your images go to Rasterbator.
4. Greetings cards
Flickr is an online photo app that makes it easy to share your images with the world.
You can pay a lot of money for Christmas and birthday cards, and extortionate amounts for personalised ones. So why not use your digital photos to make tailor-made greetings cards on a budget? Microsoft Office Publisher 2007 enables you to create postcards using your own holiday snaps, or greetings cards with whatever photos you fancy.
5. Share your photos
Flickr is a fantastic community-driven picture site that offers a host of options. You can upload and share your pictures with friends, and store them online. The real beauty of Flickr is the fact that its community is filled with expert photographers showing off a host of pictures, and browsing the site can give you ideas for your own masterpieces.
Windows Live Spaces also offers ways to share photos online. You can add pictures in galleries, which your friends can then browse.
6. Giant Lego picture
Lego used to offer a service called ‘Brick-o-lizer’, which took your photos and created a figurine in Lego – a great novelty for adults and children alike. Unfortunately, Lego no longer offers the service but with help from Paint.NET, a powerful photo editing tool that’s free to download, this is still possible.
Take a photograph and load it into Paint.NET. You will need a good quality close-up image. Resize the image to 440x440 pixels (this will correspond with the largest board Lego offers). Turn the picture into blackand-white, and then pixelate the image in the effects menu, using 10 point size.
This will give you a template to work from. Change the contrast so the image requires only black, white and grey bricks, then order a ton of 1x1 size bricks. Print out the image as a guide, and you can build your favourite pictures in Lego fashion.
7. Sell your pictures
If you have photos on your computer that would look better on your wall, chances are they’ll also look good on someone else’s wall. There are now web sites that allow you to sell your pictures, and even earn commission on the sale of the frames and glass – Imagekind is one such site.
However, shots of Auntie Joan falling through a deck chair probably won’t cut it. Another good web site to try is Scoopt, which cashes in on the new phenomenon of citizen journalism.
If you snap a significant moment in history, such as a freak tornado or a celebrity shaving their head in a moment of madness, Scoopt will try to sell it to the press and cut you in on the deal. Past users have cashed in on their snaps of David Cameron in Tesco and even a policeman parking his car in a disabled space. Anything goes.
Make a photo montage in Paint.NET
1. Get started
Download Paint.Net and open the program. Next load your image into it.
2. First face
Using the Lasso tool, cut out the 1st person you want to be in your collage. You may need to zoom in to get a good-quality cut. Remember, this person will be in the background so you should use a decent size image.
3. New page
A spinning, broken outline appears around the selected area of your subject, and you can cut or copy the image. Then go to File > New and load a blank page – the page for your collage – which you can size as you wish.
4. Lock down
Paste the image on to the blank canvas, and position it. After you deselect the option it will be locked down onto the page, and you won’t be able to reposition it after you choose your next image, so put it in the right place.
5. Build up
Then simply choose your next image, lasso again, and paste onto the canvas. Build up your collage, positioning your images on top of one another and, when you’re done, save it, print it out and mount it on your wall.
8. Make a montage
Just for laughs - Comeeko.com enables you to load up funny photos and turn them into a comic strip
Remember making collages at school for your scrapbook, a poster, an empty wall or simply for your own demented obsession? This used to involve cutting up your photos, often snipping off the odd ear in the process, and getting covered in glue, but, happily, not any more, thanks to Paint.NET. Check out our simple five-step tutorial to the right showing you how to make a beautiful, Pritt Stick-free montage of your favourite snaps of family and friends.
9. Comeeko comic strips
If you have a selection of amusing pictures of friends, family or workmates, you could try turning them into an entertaining comic strip. Log onto www.comeeko.com to arrange your photos and add ’toon-style speech bubbles.
10. Put them on a DVD
Been away on holiday and have a lot of pictures to show off? Accommodating friends and family round the computer can be a bit of a squeeze, and printing out hundreds of pictures is going to cost you...
So why not sit everyone down for a good old slideshow? Windows Vista lets you burn your photos to a DVD (up to around 3,000 images), and these can then be viewed on your living room DVD player. Now people can share your experiences in comfort. (Loading the images onto DVD also takes the emphasis off storing them on your hard drive, which can eat lots of space.)
11. Windows Media Center
If you use Windows Media Center in your living room, the ‘photographic presentation’ is even easier. The pictures option in Media Center offers a slideshow function and, by using a media extender, such as the Xbox 360, you can feed it directly to your TV.
Alternatively, you can use Microsoft Photo Story 3, which can be downloaded from the Microsoft web site. This allows you to create slideshows with your own choice of music, and even dictate the way the show pans across your photos. All you need to do then is stock up on the popcorn.
12. Desktop wallpaper
To give your computer desktop the personal touch, whether it is at home or at work, Windows Vista offers a handy Sidebar gadget to help. Simply click the Get more gadgets online button in the gadgets window, and download the Desktop Wallpaper one.
In the options menu you can choose to change the desktop background at given intervals and nominate a folder to select the pictures from.
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