Web Worker Daily

If you find yourself having to resize images often and use Windows, you might like to check out Dropresize, a handy free system tray application. It runs in the background and monitors a folder you specify on your hard drive — any images that are dropped into the folder are then automatically resized according to the specifications you set in the app’s preferences. Very handy and straightforward, particularly if you have to often have to make images one size (for blog posts, for example). But a word of warning: The original version is not kept when the image is resized, so if you want to keep the original, make a copy first (or hold Ctrl when dragging to make a copy).

Dropresize is a free download, and still in beta so there may be some bugs. No install is required (just run the program), so if you want it to run every time you launch Windows, you’ll need to add it to your Startup folder. It requires Windows XP, Vista or 7 and the .NET 2.0 Framework.

If you’ve found a handy little app like this recently, let us know about it below.

(via Freewaregenius)

Adobe Photoshop Elements 8.0 doesn’t disappoint. PSE 6 has been a fantastic software tool, and version 8 promises to be even better at a still-reasonable $99.95 (a ten dollar increase from PSE 6). I enthusiastically recommend it and wouldn’t want to be without it. There are alternatives to Photoshop Elements, however, including a gaggle of online image editing programs offered either for free or a modest fee. Read the rest of this entry »

While looking into the Operation Foxbook story, I ran across Aviary – an application interesting enough to deserve some notice on its own. Aviary bills itself as “a suite of powerful creative applications that you can use right in your web browser,” and although they’re certainly no Creative Suite replacement, for Flash-based tools they’re pretty good – as well as affordable.

Right now there are three tools in the suite:

• Phoenix, a layer-based image editor with a reasonable selection of masks and effects.
• Toucan, a tool for putting together palettes and color swatches
• Peacock, a generative “visual laboratory” that is the funnest tool in the bunch.

Read the rest of this entry »