Another freebie foto editor

Thanks to http://elemenous.typepad.com/, on Dec 27, 2006, I've found yet another photo editor to try out with my next Creative Explorer's Digital Photography group. And she wrote:

Link: Snipshot: Edit pictures online.

I'm researching bookmarklets for this week's edition of the Friday 5 and I stumbled upon this very cool, very basic, and free web based photo editor. If you just need something quick to edit a photo, this might do in a pinch. Installing the bookmarklet is key. This doodad that you install in your browser's toolbar allows you additional functionality in that you can import a picture directly from Flickr, edit it, and then add the edited version to your Flickr account. It's a very painless process.

Christmas Lights in Pictures

In our class we will cover taking night time photos, but I am beginning to hear questions about how to get good shots of Chrismas lights at night. So here is my research in the form of a few links:
From Lifehacker
http://www.lifehacker.com/software/photography/how-to-photograph-christmas-lights-221400.php

From "Strobist"
http://strobist.blogspot.com/2006/12/how-to-photograph-christmas-lights.html

Some general rules are as follows:
Close-ups, like a homemade ornament on the tree or your favorite elves, will need a flash.
The tree all lit up will require the use of the night time setting (yeah, the dial you almost never use) or for the "flash" to be turned off. The drawback to the night time setting is that camera's shutter is slowed down, and the result is camera shake (resulting in blurry pictures.) To make-up for that possibility use a tripod.
Take oudoor pictures of lights (i.e. the amazing Christmas extravaganza down the street!!) should be done at dusk, where you can reasonably use a little of the remaining daytime light, but still see the Christmas lights.

Apologies for the dual postings. Happy Holidays everyone!!