San Francisco start-up company LookWow today debuted a new
online photo enhancement service -- optimized for photos of faces and portraits -- for digital camera and camera phone photos.
The free, advertiser-supported service wants to license its service to corporations and integrate the software with mobile devices.
To use the service, you need to log onto the Web and upload the photo. Your computer needs Java, so I don't know how well LookWow will work -- or whether it will work at all -- if you upload a photo from a camera phone and try to edit it on, for example, a Treo 600.
LookWow's services, as noted on its Web site, include:
One-Step Enhance -- Use this effect to: Visibly lift and brighten your photo Restore color and contrast to a faded photo Make a fuzzy photo more crisp Make a dull photo brighter Improve clarity and sharpen your photo Correct other common problems seen in digitized photosSuntan Effect: One click adds a sun-kissed glow.
Glamorize Effect: Skin is smoothed and main features are highlighted.
Elegant Look: Instantly give your photo a warm, classic, old-fashioned look.
Black & White: Instantly turn a drab color shot into a special black and white portrait that reduces the effects of harsh lighting.
Brighten: Is your photo too dark or underexposed? Use this feature to adjust the brightness of the entire photo or a specific area.
Darken: Is your photo too bright or overexposed? Use this feature to adjust the brightness of the entire photo or a specific area.
Brighten Smile: Brighten your smile and whiten your teeth - without toothpaste!
Brighten Eyes: Improve the appearance of your eyes.
Brighten Intensity: Brighten and intensify the appearance of your photo.
Candlelight Effect: This feature gives your photo a soft, focused light, like that of candlelight.
Enhance Lips: Brighten and plump your lips and define the mouth - without lipstick or lip liner!
Sharpen: Improve your photo's clarity and make it more crisp.
Add Caption: Add a caption or identify your photo.
Add Shadow: Add a soft shadow to your photo.
Smooth Skin: Reduce unwanted marks such as spots, scars, moles, wrinkles and lines.
Antique Photo: Give your image an antique or "Old Time" look by adding this effect to your photo.
Dusk Effect: Add this effect to your photo and make it appear to have been taken at sunset.
Water Reflection: Give your image a dreamy, rippled look by adding this effect to your photo
Enhance Colors: Different types of lighting, photo processing and image scanners can cause incorrect or unnatural coloring in photos. Use this feature to:
Balance the colors in your photo by choosing complementary colors, such as red, pink, yellow, green and blue
Make bright colors brighter and dark colors darker
Accentuate a color to your specification, by using the Choose Color to Enhance optionReduce Colors: Use this feature to reduce a specific color in your photo, or use the Choose Color to Reduce option to select a color to your specification.
Rotate: Use the Rotate feature to:
Straighten a crooked photo
Correct the orientation of a photo by rotating it clockwise or counterclockwise 90 degrees
Flip your photo
Rotate to your specificationResize: Use this feature to:
Enlarge or reduce the size of your photo by 15%
Thinify your photo by making it more narrow
Broaden your photo by making it wider
Enlarge or reduce the size of your photo to your specification.Crop: Cropping lets you permanently concentrate on an area of a photo, as if you had zoomed in more when taking the original shot. The selected area defines what part of the photo to keep.
Remove Red-eye: Fix dreaded red-eye by replacing the red with original eye color.
Photo enhancement business
Ever since I began writing and consultng about the camera phone environment I've discussed how photo enhancement software would be one major business opportunity in the camera phone ecosystem. That's not a big surprise. A little enhancement can make a big difference.
The tough part is figuring out the business model. Will consumers pay extra for enhancing camera phone photos? Are corporate sales the bigger business? How do you effectively advertise and market such services?
These are some of the issues with which I deal as part of my wireless data consulting services. There are many competitors and it isn't easy to differentiate yourself from the crowd, but there are methods -- without spending a great deal of money -- to generate excitement and provide value to customers.
Dating
LookWow is initially trying to generate buzz from consumers but obviously wants to license its offering to corporations. In the future, LookWow will offer a photo sharing capability.
The company also is interested in the use of photos for dating services and even quotes an "Internet dating coach" in its press release.
To wit: "In the growing $400 million online dating industry, the photo is a key part of the process. Several surveys show that the photo is the most important attribute in attracting a prospective mate.
"In addition, many online daters post several photos and update them frequently. 'Profile photos are the first critical step in online dating,' said Internet Dating Coach, Melanie Dodson of Gratitude Productions.
"'LookWow makes it easy for daters to improve their photos, creating a better first impression while increasing their chances of attracting someone special.'"
HI Mike,
If you want to see how it works (very well, I'd say) with camera phone photos, join MyQPU for free and test it out. We've integrated Lookwow's photo enhancement (beta version) for our users.
Let me know what you think.
Jim
Posted by: Jim Meeker | Thursday, November 18, 2004 at 02:08 PM
I am all for image enhancement options, but to me in the demo pic the "original photo" doesn't look like it was taken with a cameraphone, but rather like some stock photo cropped with a layer of semi-transparant gray above it.
Posted by: mikepop | Monday, August 30, 2004 at 12:05 PM