One of the best things about "cloud computing" is that hundreds of applications are available without installation. You can simply go to the application's web site and start using it. Many of these applications are available free of charge.
A few days ago I was using my two-and-a-half-pound "netbook" laptop computer when I had a need to resize an image that I wanted to upload to this newsletter. I had just snapped a photo with an 8-megapixel camera working at its maximum definition. I copied the photo to my tiny computer.
The image was much too large to use on a web page. The problem was that I didn't have Photoshop Elements, or any other image editing software, installed on the small computer.
Not a problem! I opened a web browser and went to SplashUp.com.
SplashUp is a surprisingly powerful editing tool and photo manager. It is easy to use, works in real-time and allows you to edit multiple images at once. I would never describe the program as "full-featured." SplashUp will never compete with Photoshop or Photoshop Elements or any of the other commercial photo editing programs that sell for $50 and up. However, it does have a surprisingly large list of features. I am not used to seeing that much functionality in free software.
SplashUp supports layers and blending, features not found in many cheaper photo editors. It also has a number of filters such as sharpen, blur, pixelate, and more. It easily resizes photos and can also edit multiple photos simultaneously.
Of course, the program will edit photos that are on your computer's hard drive. It will also directly edit pictures from FaceBook, Flickr, Picasa, SmugMug, or Photobucket. It will also save photos to those sites. SplashUp will also import pictures from most any other web site but will not be able to save to the web sites. It can always save your your local disk drive(s). It will also grab pictures from your live webcam.
SplashUp works with any modern web browser on Windows, Macintosh or Linux. The supported browsers include Firefox, Safari, Internet Explorer, Chrome, and Opera.
SplashUp will never replace the commercial photo editing products but its price is very attractive: free. It is available to you at any time you are connected to the Internet. In my case, I had a very simple task: resize a photo. SplashUp did that within seconds without installing any software on my computer.
If you need a quick and easy photo editor, SplashUp will probably do the job.
You can try editing a few photos at http://www.splashup.com.
